Two books for the holiday season. I just now finished my first ever reading of A Christmas Carol. Well, that's not quite true. When I was twelve or so, my friends and brothers and I decided it would be fun to put on a neighborhood performance of a Christmas Carol ("Hey, kids, let's put on a show!"), and I read a version of it written as a play. Plus, having seen most of the film versions of the tale multiple times, I already knew the story by heart. The George C. Scott version appears to be the most faithful of the films. The book is short enough that you can probably do all the dialogue verbatim and still get in under two hours.
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I haven't read any Dickens since high school, and I guess I was expecting it to be fairly stodgy, or something, but it wasn't. It's a lot of fun, actually, as Dickens takes sarcastic potshots at Ebenezer Scrooge. I may have make this a tradition.
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I finished a reread of The Hobbit late last week, right about the time Peter Jackson and New Line announced that he'd signed to make the film version. There was also mention of a "sequel," but I thought he'd already done that. One of the things I like about The Hobbit is that the wood elves come off as arrogant jerks. After I finished the book, I rewatched the animated version of the book, and having Otto Preminger providing the voice for the king of a bunch of elves drawn to look like Peter Jackson's orcs really reinforces that view.
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Scariest moment of Christmas Eve dinner—Discovering that in answer to my mother showing him an article on wormholes, my father replied, "They should check with Colonel O'Neil and Major Carter. They know all about them." My dad rarely watches TV. Who knew he'd become a huge Stargate fan by watching over my mom's shoulder?
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I haven't read any Dickens since high school, and I guess I was expecting it to be fairly stodgy, or something, but it wasn't. It's a lot of fun, actually, as Dickens takes sarcastic potshots at Ebenezer Scrooge. I may have make this a tradition.
---
I finished a reread of The Hobbit late last week, right about the time Peter Jackson and New Line announced that he'd signed to make the film version. There was also mention of a "sequel," but I thought he'd already done that. One of the things I like about The Hobbit is that the wood elves come off as arrogant jerks. After I finished the book, I rewatched the animated version of the book, and having Otto Preminger providing the voice for the king of a bunch of elves drawn to look like Peter Jackson's orcs really reinforces that view.
---
Scariest moment of Christmas Eve dinner—Discovering that in answer to my mother showing him an article on wormholes, my father replied, "They should check with Colonel O'Neil and Major Carter. They know all about them." My dad rarely watches TV. Who knew he'd become a huge Stargate fan by watching over my mom's shoulder?
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