2002-05-17 - 11:49 a.m.
"Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope!"

*blinking at fingers* Bah. I forgot my rings today, I guess. I don't even remember picking them up. I *do* remember grabbing my breakfast bar just before I left home, but I can't find it anywhere now, so it must still be back on the counter. Two marks up in the Oops column already!

One big mark up in the Yes! column, however ... I got tickets on Fandango last night to see Star Wars II: Attack of the Clones. That was cool. I checked last night's early-evening shows first when I got home from work, up through the 8:45pm show, and they were all "Sorry, all tickets have been sold for this show." Big surprise. But not today's! So at 5:30pm, Azash and I will be getting in line for the 7:00pm showing. I still have to pick up the tickets at the window, but our seats are guaranteed.

Just for the waiting experience, I purchased the new Elizabeth Lowell novel, Moving Target. It's about an ancient Druidic manuscript covered in valuable materials (gold, gems) that antiquities dealers will kill for, and the woman who inherits it after her grandmother's violent death. Looks like it will be good.

Some of her historical romances are a little overblown, IMHO, but that's because I'm picky about the way historical women are characterized and because I get sick of stories that are all about whether the brawny smart male and the gifted vulnerable female will ever overcome their differences and just Do It. However, her modern romantic mysteries, like this one, are pretty darned good. I've particularly enjoyed her Donovan family series, which are centered around the jewel trade. She's done amber, jade, pearl, and ruby so far, covering 4 out of 6 Donovan children. I hope she does eventually get to the other two.

*laughing* I read too much, I know. If I weren't wasting hours of my time gobbling up TWoP chatter and EQ gaming and fanfic, I could finish seven or eight novels a week, easy. As it is, I still wedge in a book every few days. I know I use it as an escape sometimes, but, *sigh* There's just so much out there ...

Every book read, every film watched, every point debated with intelligent friends is another little piece cemented into a person's worldview. If you subtracted from my childhood C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkein, and fairy tales I would be an entirely different person.

Along those lines, my brother tends to agree with my parents that Harry Potter is too much of an evil influence for children to read or see. I just don't get that. I guess it depends on if the children in question have already learned to differentiate between fictional worlds and real ones, and to see past the fireworks and baubles to the story/theme/symbolism beneath it.

I guess I'm prejudiced, though, since I can't remember ever not being able to read and analyze what I read. Maybe when I was five, and got scared by "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" ... but by the time I was seven and read it again, I had gone leaps and bounds beyond in terms of being able to see beyond the surface of a story. My reading skills and comprehension were senior-level high school by the time I was in the fourth grade.

All that is to say, I have no way of knowing what the average person's comprehension level is, and when stories like "Harry Potter" switch into the "okay" column. It reminds me of the "Buffy" debates I had with my mother, even though in most cases the "demons" and apocalyptic problems represent the same metaphoric issues (in a different format) as the "aliens" in the Star Trek universe. *rolling eyes*

Okay, too much philosophizing for one day. Must go organize my supervisor's office now. Blessings, and have a good weekend!