Idiomatic Expression

Now apparently I can read about 42% of chinese texts… Too bad that still doesn’t get me much comprehension.

This is mostly for me to review what I am supposed to know while I am on the road.

I’ve been tagged by Jenny on this one, but I ask for three volunteers as I don’t want to obligate anyone. Short form instructions, pick up the closest book, turn to page 123, count down fice sentences, write the next three sentences, list title and author, tag three more people.

８．他本人沒來．他太太來了．
９．文學學報比文學月報好的多．

This is made a bit more difficult because it is from lesson 16 and I am only on lesson 8 of The Beginning Chinese Reader by John DeFrancis translations are below.

Number 8 is pretty easy for me.
8. He is not coming himself. His wife is coming.

I was a bit confused by number 9, until I realized that I was translating 比 (bi3 compared to) as 北 (bei4 north). Actually Katherine realized this, and boy did it make a lot more sense after that.
9. The Literature Journal is much better than The Literature Monthly.

So there ya go an insight into the ultra-exciting sentences in beginning chinese instruction books. Does anyone else want to volunteer with their three sentences?

Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire, this book is a great diversion, and a lot of fun, but in my opinion, not a great book. My favorite part of the book was the way each main character grew throughout the novel and drifted apart as they left college to follow their own paths. I found the main themes of what is evil and individuals cast as unwitting pawns in the machinery of evil to be a bit heavy handed, and without any novel insights. Camus‘ Mersault never says “Wow, life sure is absurd!” yet the reader is led to this conclusion in The Stranger. That being said, I will be reading the rest of Maquire’s books because in the end Wicked is a page turner and I hope the rest of his books will be as much fun.

The Double by Jose Saramago translated from Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa , I have only read the first chapter of this novel, which is just enough to be surprised by the first sighting of “the double”. I am in love with Saramago’s writing style and since I can’t say a lot about the book yet here is my favorite sentence from the first chapter.

Sitting now on the bus that will drop him near the building where he has lived for the last six years or so, that is, ever since the divorce, Maximo Afonso, and we use the shortened version of his name here, having been in our view, authorized to do so by its sole lord and master, but mainly because the word Tertuliano, having appeared so recently, only six lines previously, could do a grave disservice to the fluency of the narrative, anyway, as we were saying…

For those that love Kurt Vonnegut’s off hand style or Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s ability to craft language into his own creations, you owe it to yourself to check out Jose Saramago.

Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream by Barbara Ehrenreich, not much to say about this one yet, as I have not opened the cover. I really enjoyed Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, even if I had some issues with how she spent the money she earned. I think I could have stretched it a bit further, but this is from someone that had to survive on a five pound bags of Kroger’s Heat n Eat Taters, ketchup stolen from James, and the rare hand out from other friends for a week at a time.

If you are still looking for a New Year’s Resolution, I suggest adding “read more good books” to your list.

I know that it was recommended by Oprah’s Book Club, and I know this is probably not the type of book that you usually read, but no excuses go buy and read this book. You can find if for only eight bucks at costco. A Million Little Pieces by James Frey is the best book I have read written this century. It is disgusting at times, exhilarating at times, and a bit uncomfortable throughout. James Frey’s second book, My Friend Leonard, is in the mail and hopefully it will be in my hands by Friday. A word of warning for those of you that like to flip to the last page before reading a book (yes I am talking to you) don’t do it for this book, and don’t read the reviews for My Friend Leonard either.

If you have already read the book, James Frey is on Oprah tomorrow, so set your tivo to stun.

With a week and a half of vacation coming up, I picked up a bit of light reading to occupy my time between the eating, hiking, and ATV riding.

• A Winter Haunting by Dan Simmons
• Neuromancer by William Gibson
• The Difference Engine by William Gibson
• The Essential Book of Sudoku by Pete Sinden

Quite a bit of brain candy reading to keep me entertained on the plane and relaxed on vacation. I am avoiding anything resembling literature to free my brain cells for a continued attempt to teach myself how to read Chinese Menus.

The recent articles posted on MetaFilter about role playing game history and Dungeons & Dragons and Advanced Dungeons & Dragons. Played a little with things like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles RPG, Runequest, and the Cyberpunk 2020. One of my favorite games of that time was the Amber RPG a great world thanks to the vision of Roger Zelazny and a great set of rules that threw away the dice and focused on the role playing and the story. The last phase of my RPG playing focused on the White Wolf games mostly Vampire: The Masquerade with a bit of Werewolf: The Apocalypse thrown in for good measure.

Most of the time playing was a lot of fun, but I finally got out of it when everyone I played with seemed more interested in advancing their character statistics and following the exact wording of the rules (including arguments about comma placement) than actually enjoying themselves. Still there is a soft spot in my heart for RPGs and from time to time I think it might be fun to play again with a basic system like the classic D&D game (not the new mis-labeled D&D version 3 which is really AD&D).

Anyone else out there ever play RPGs or still into them?

I spent the majority of Saturday reading Dangerous Doses by Katherine Eban. The book explores the illegal and quasi-legal issues surrounding prescription drug counterfeiting, and gray market activities. Eban uses a string of cases researched, investigated, and finally prosecuted by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement: As a way to explain the failings and dangers of the current prescription drug business model and regulatory environment.

If you read this book, you will probably no longer be able to pick up a prescription without spending an extra couple minutes taking a close look at the packaging, and the medicine within.

I finally got around to ordering some new books. First up isThe Friar and the Cipher : Roger Bacon and the Unsolved Mystery of the Most Unusual Manuscript in the World I am loving this book so far. Both the cipher and the unusual manuscript in the title reference The Voynich Manuscript, an encrypted tome discovered in 1912 by the English book dealer Wilfrid Michael Voynich. I am 80 pages in, and so far the book has concentrated on how knowledge was passed down from Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle through the Muslim world and back to Medieval Europe. It is truly fascinating, if I could retain half of the facts and bits of trivia that this book is throwing at me I would have material to bore and annoy my friends with for the rest of the year.

If you liked Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle, you will love this book. The subject is similar, the pacing is better, and you don’t have to worry about which characters are fictional! Even better if you haven’t read the Baroque cycle, but plan to this book is the perfect primer to understand the environment of the characters in that trilogy.

I am not cool enough to have a currently reading bit on my web page, so just in case you are wondering…

Current:
Antique Maps by Carl Moreland & David Bannister; A great book if you are interested in antique maps, otherwise it will probably put you to sleep.
December issue of the Washingtonian always a winner
December issue of Metropolis; Cool articles on the Vancouver skyline and ads in NYC, plus great pictures and ads.
Summer/Autumn 2003 issue of The Elliot School of International Affairs, International Affairs Review; Good so far…

Recent:
Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson; great book once you get past the first 100 pages.
Eating in America by Waverly root & Richard De Rochemont; Dry dry dry! With a lot of interesting facts, and a lot of 70’s era opinions regarding the American diet.
November issue of Harper’s Magazine; Two promising articles that quickly got tedious.
November issue of Washingtonian still a winner
November issue of Vegetarian Times great Thanksgiving recipes which I ignored.