Monthly Archives: July 2010

Dailies #64

Boom & bust.

The Holy Grail.

The Best One-Liners from the Women of Mad Men.

Arab man convicted of rape after posing as jew to seduce woman.

Bill Murray’s biggest regret? Garfield, but that’s because he thought it was a Coen Brothers movie: “At least they had whats-her-name. The mind reader, pretty girl, really curvy girl, body’s one in a million?”.

Justin Cronin – The Passage – delicios. Fictiune apocaliptica facuta cum trebuie – un sfarsit credibil, personaje bune, twisturi interesante, plotting excelent, pesimism cat cuprinde. Din pacate, cartea incepe abia dupa prima treime – undeva pe la pagina 250, atunci are loc schisma, iar pana atunci e doar expozitiune banala care m-a scos din sarite pentru ca nu parea sa aiba, si mai tarziu am realizat ca ea chiar nu avea, legatura sau influenta cu restul romanului. Credeam ca mor cu cartea in brate, o caramida hardcover >1kg, care ma plictiseste la lacrimi. De vreo patru ori am tot renuntat la ea si mai citeam recenzii pozitive intre timp, incercand sa inteleg ce le place lor. Ei bine, lor le place aventura post-apocaliptica care incepe dupa primele 300pg. Cartea e, de fapt, grozava, desi un amalgam din cele mai bune elemente ale genului (gandeste-te The Stand cu Reapers din Blade), daca incepi lectura de la pagina 260, de la inceput citind doar capitolul 2 (cel cu mailurile, +-6pg). Acum mai ramane doar sa se publice si restul trilogiei, desi cine stie cat o sa dureze si asta. Voi astepta insa in liniste. *** */2

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BD #3

Se pare ca pe masura ce cumperi mai multe carti de la ei ti le expediaza mai repede, cartile de ieri sunt deja in tranzit. Profitand de faptul ca mai am datorii bani, am mai comandat cateva restante: Mistborn Trilogy, Night Angel Trilogy si trilogia The Court of the Air, The Kingdom Beyond the Waves, The Rise of the Iron Moon. Trei serii, primele doua mass-market, ultima trade paperback, toate pentru doar 200ron.

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BD #2

Tocmai ce-a venit Under The Dome (20ron), Dhalgren (25ron) in schimb lasandu-se in continuare asteptat. Astazi am mai comandat Varney the Vampyre, Last Argument of Kings, The Blade Itself si Before They are Hanged, toate astea fiind bunatati trade paperback (13/20) pentru doar 77ron. BD, te iubesc.

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Dailies #63

Mystery trader buys all Europe’s cocoa.

White House demonstrates American commitment to free speech by shutting down 73,000 blogs in one day.

Last month was the hottest June ever recorded on Earth, the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Thursday.

Wedding from hell: Ringbearer has a seizure, the groom’s mother collapses, a guest learns his father has died and two children suffer head injuries. Suddenly your best man getting drunk before the toast doesn’t seem so bad.

The state’s youth detention agency was ripped as incompetent in a blistering report yesterday for allowing three murderers and a robber to attend a sex-soaked “social dance” at a facility in Orange County with less security than one would find “at a high-school prom”.

China Mieville The City & The City – l-am asteptat atata vreme, am citit atatea recenzii sclipitoare, si totusi e doar o dezamagire crunta, un rateu pe care l-am oprit putin dupa jumatate. Suna mai bine cand o spun in engleza: there was no fantasy, the case a boring procedural of typical historical fiction, the characters flat and paper thin, the dialogue stilted and terrible, the plotting tedious. What a waste.

– Amintindu-mi cine navigheaza nava – acum ca Steven Moffat, geniul din spatele Coupling, Jekyll si al episoadelor timpurii perfecte din Dr Who, e la carma, i-am mai dat o sansa noului sezon din Doctor Who. Pustiul care-l joaca pe noul doctor ma enerveaza la fel de tare ca prima oara cand am incercat sa-l vad, dar am reusit sa ignor asta restul sezonului – pe care l-am vazut intr-un maraton tipic intr-o duminica plictisitoare. Scenariile sunt absolut fantastice, in special episoadele 3, 4, 5 si 10 (scris de Richard Curtis), iar sfarsitul sezonului – duetul 12 si 13 – e o dovada incredibila de story-telling combinand tot ce-am iubit vreodata si in special sezonul asta la Dr Who, ba chiar aruncand si chiuveta in ecuatie, pentru a realiza un arc de poveste nemaipomenit, comparabil cu sezonul 4 din Angel si sezonul 5 din Supernatural, realizand o apocalipsa cvasi-perfecta. Noua asistenta, Karen Gillan, asa cum am mai zis, e excelenta – se pare ca nu am fost singurul naucit de Carey Mulligan in Blink. Hello, nurse. Atot-perfecta Lizzie Corday Alex Kingston ne onoreaza cu prezenta in cateva episoade. In rest… ce pot sa zic? Cel mai bun sezon al serialului a fost saturat cu povesti bune, toti inamicii posibili si foarte mult umor.

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Dailies #62

the forgotten – un raposat procedural despre un grup de civili care dezgroapa cazuri rece si, ca-n orice serial american, le rezolva cu fler. Hard Harry Christian Slater straluceste, iar adorabilele personaje secundare includ hot-chick Michelle Borth, emotionally-damaged doppelgänger pentru Allison SmithHeather Stephens, artistul-rebel Anthony Carrigan si old-reliable Bob Stephenson. Ieftin, dar mi-a placut, mai ales acum in lipsa lui Without a Trace.

– A trecut o luna de la ultima comanda, desi intre timp am vandut o duzina de carti, asa ca e timpul pentru noutati: Dhalgren si Under the Dome, ambele pentru doar €10.54.

Democrats roll out their strategy for the Kentucky Senate election: “Rand Paul is completely nuts”.

In China, prisoners die picking their acne, falling into toilets, and playing blind man’s bluff.

What’s Jon Stewart really like? Well, for a sexist prick, he can be quite charming.

The first official trailer for “Machete” is out. Eat your heart out, Chris Nolan.

– Nanny, 30, died from sexual arousal while watching pornography.

The computer mouse. How quaint.

80s style intro for Firefly!

Simon Tam M.D.!

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GRRM – ASOIAF (A Song Of Ice And Fire/Cantec de Gheata si Foc)

George R. R. Martin a mers ceva mai greu decat ma asteptam – le vedeam ca mici adorabilitati pentru un total de doar 4000pg, dar uitasem ca sunt paperbackuri indesate a caror formatare duce 43 de randuri pe pagina, nu-i de mirare ca varianta Nemira are 6000pg. Lectura a inceput cu stangul deoarece dinainte sa ridic coletul de la posta deja eram presat de timp – in cele doua zile dintre expedierea coletului si sosirea lui cineva a cumparat cartile, asa ca aveam termen limita o saptamana – miercuri la 14 le-am ridicat, miercuri la 13 trebuie sa le expediez, ca sa le poata da vineri. Ca sa fie potul indulcit, atunci a venit si Bigbro, deci miercuri si joi au fost pierdute intre pizzerii/baruri/sali de biliard. De vineri insa, cand a plecat Bigbro, am intrat intens in ele – vineri prima carte, sambata a doua, duminica si azi a treia.

Prima carte, A Game of Thrones, (more…)

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The Cruelest Study

Say you’re a college student who was recently dumped by the person you thought was the One. You’re moping around campus in your I’ve-given-up sweatpants and eating crappy comfort food when you come across a flyer seeking people who are still pining for their exes. You think, at last, someone to talk to!

Well, not exactly. When about 15 sad sacks responded to the flyers, which had been distributed around the State University of New York at Stony Brook and Rutgers University, they discovered they were actually being invited to take part in a psychological study: researchers wanted to gauge the kind of pain felt by people on the business end of a breakup.

Each student was hooked up to a functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner and asked to…

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