Technical Difficulties

UBC

Albert, Alexa. Brothel: Mustang Ranch and its Women. New York: Ballantine Books, 2001.

This is a much better book than Daughters of Joy, Sisters of Misery. The fact that it's "popular" nonfiction rather than "academic" nonfiction means that the prose is readable--WHY IS THIS? WHY CAN WE NOT HAVE BOOKS THAT ARE BOTH INTELLECTUALLY RIGOROUS AND READABLE? WHY WHY WHY?

*ahem*

I digress.

And in any event, although not theorized, Albert's book is intellectually rigorous--more so than Butler's, as Albert goes ahead and questions all those assumptions about morality that Butler simply applies with a trowel. Nothing in the world of Brothel is simple, and Albert pays attention to every complexity. She neither has nor pretends to have answers, but she has a lot of careful observations, both of prostitutes and their customers--and of the forces outside the brothel, both pro and con--that make hash of all the "answers" various persons put forward.

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BPAL
( for the kitties! )

1. Larry at OF Blog of the Fallen reviews The Bone Key, which mrissa and stillsostrange have also recently confessed to liking. (Given mrissa and given stillsostrange, I consider this a very neat trick indeed.)

ETA: buymeaclue also likes it.

2. I have not abandoned the Due South episode analyses, but in the meantime I have a question for persons more knowledgeable about Canadian literature than myself. Is there a sub-genre of Mountie-lit, and does it replace or overlap with or otherwise have a relationship with the Western? Does Canada have an indigenous tradition of the Western (i.e., stories about cowboys and wild frontiers and lawmen and rustlers and robbers rather than stories about, say, Vancouver) or is that genre American?* I have a rather muddled idea about Due South and the Western, and it could use some grounding.

3. BPAL's Titus Andronicus (Dark musk and black amber with frankincense, red sandalwood, neroli and bergamot.) may be edging out Sin (Thoroughly corrupted: amber, sandalwood, black patchouli and cinnamon.) in my affections. Considering my unholy love for the play, this seems no more than appropriate.

4. Speaking of unholy love and Renaissance drama, if you're interested in revenge tragedy at all, I highly recommend Revengers Tragedy (2002). It's like the psychotic bastard child of Almereyda's Hamlet (2000, Ethan Hawke) and Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet (1996, Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes), and like any self-respecting bastard in Jacobean tragedy, it takes down both its progenitors and does the Monster Mash on their faintly twitching corpses.

(N.b., our excellent local indie video store shelves Revengers Tragedy under Comedy. Be prepared.)

5. The Formerly Feral Ninjas are very odd little girls. I don't know if this is to do with being feral rescues, or to do with being warped in their childhood by me and mirrorthaw and heresluck, or if they would have turned out this way regardless. But definitely odd. They have Designated Petting Places. Outside a DPP, one does not touch the cat; inside a DPP, one MUST PET the CAT, biPED. The First Ninja will actually come fetch me and lead me with imperious mews to her DPP. Her sister, the Second Ninja, is more flexible about these things, and will designate temporary PPs as needed (You may pet me when I stand here as opposed to the true DPP: I am standing here! You must pet me!), although some places are simply Not Suitable and you will NOT touch the cat you icky biped. Neither of them approves of bipeds bending over them. The Second Ninja's DPP (the radiator cover in our bedroom) puts her at waist height, whereas to pet the First Ninja, even in her DPP (the front stairs), it is necessary to sprawl full length on the stairs and follow her as she weaves up them. Or down them, for that matter, although she's only persuaded me to do that once. What's interesting is that they have quite distinct and nontransferable DPPs. I've never seen the First Ninja in the Second Ninja's DPP at all, and while the Second Ninja perforce transverses--and often hangs out in--the First Ninja's DPP, she does not want to be petted there and attempting it will get you fled from as perfidious and untrustworthy and probably planning to eat cats.

Catzilla and the Elder Saucepan think the Ninjas are very weird.

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*Yes, it is embarrassing how little I, as an American, know about Canada. Also embarrassing that I am, in this, typical of my countrymen and -women. :P

O the work I am not accomplishing today! It is legion.

( last but one of the BPAL imps )

1. Talking for fifty minutes? Not a problem. (Talking coherently for fifty minutes? We'll get back to you on that.)

2. Chalk dust does not enhance the smell of Sin.

3. Dark brown corduroy is a cat fur MAGNET.

4. My posture improves dramatically when I'm wearing shoes with heels.

5. Although you might not think it, it's easier to learn 70+ names divided up into chunks of 16-19 than it is to learn 30 names in a lump.