Privacy concerns

I've become concerned about the amount of information Facebook has on me. But thinking about it, this blog has quite a lot now too, given the Shuttercal and Twitter links it now has. And it's all public content. Not quite sure how to feel about this.

Other than that: procrastination is alive and well, and listening to Elijah is awesome!

Springtime at the University

The Main Quadrangle, Sydney University

Flowers in what I believe is the Vice-Chancellor's garden

Azaleas in the same garden -- apparently very easy to grow, but I thought they were pretty

Bujold: Horizon

I want the new Bujold to come out in paperback so I can buy it and find out what happens!!!! But HarperCollins hasn't even put up a release date for the mass-market paperback edition, which does not bode well!

After my exams are over, I'm going to make the trek out to the not-quite-local suburban library that has a copy and sit there and read all day. But I still want to own a copy - it's only practical. After all, at last count I'd read Beguilement four times, Legacy four times and Passage twice. And I lent out my copy of The Curse of Chalion as part of my Bujold-proselytising campaign, so naturally I want to read it again right now. And I can't. And it's very irritating. Plus there's all the attendant guilt of 'you shouldn't be reading books you've read at least four times already when you have exams in three weeks time and you know nothing about Property Law'.

EDIT: I just noticed that Passage wasn't out in paperback until about December 2008. Does that mean I'm going to have to wait over six months for my book fix?!?! Tell me it isn't so!

Blackberries galore

On the weekend, we went blackberrying at my grandmother's house, and came home with 2kg of blackberries. I've made the following three things, and we still have 3 small Chinese food containers of blackberries in the freezer...


Spiced blackberry cake (external)

Spiced blackberry cake (internal)

Blackberry and apple pie

Blackberry pie.

Ratings system

Book and film ratings system

Cribbed from: http://www-users.cs.york.ac.uk/susan/sf/books/rating.htm

1 - unmissable
A "classic", that should be read or seen by everyone. Some classics are just excellent books; others have contributed to the development of the genre and need to be experienced to get a better appreciation of the genre as a whole.

2 - great stuff
Well put together, with some definite depth to the plot, characters, or ideas. Definitely re-readable / re-watchable.

3 - worth reading / watching
A good enjoyable story, worth the time spent reading / watching. Some may be re-readable / re-watchable.

4 - passes the time
It passed the time well enough, but I probably won't be reading / watching it again.

5 - waste of time
I read/watched it, but wouldn't have if I'd known... (As a book, it might have been saved from unfinishable only because I read it in a single sitting: if I'd been interrupted, I might not have picked it up again. As a film, it was probably saved only because I had paid to see it, in the cinema: if I'd been watching on TV, I might have given up.)

6 - unfinishable
I couldn't finish it because it was so bad, or boring, or whatever. Or maybe the style just didn't appeal to me. I probably said the Eight Deadly Words: "I Don't Care What Happens to These People" ... or Beings, or Artifacts, or whatever the plot is 'about'.

Review: All Things Wise and Wonderful

All Things Wise and Wonderful

James Herriot

The omnibus edition of Vets Might Fly and Vet in a Spin finds James Herriot far from his Yorkshire Dales veterinary practice and in the middle of wartime boot camp. Herriot has been called up by the RAF, but most of the book consists of the flashbacks to the Dales he has while at basic training. Most of the tales originate from his veterinary work, but the focus is more often on the owners than their animals. As in the first two omnibuses of Herriot's stories (All Creatures Great and Small and All Things Bright and Beautiful), each chapter is a new story, none more than ten pages long, which makes the book as a whole very easy to read.

Though Herriot’s subject matter would initially strike many as boring - sick cows and sheep have never appealed to me all that much either – my great delight in his work is that, despite this, I am always entertained. There are no tumultuous romances or high-speed car chases (except for a brief jaunt in a Tiger Moth) yet the book is never dull. Herriot clearly loves his work and his life, and makes it very easy for the reader to engage with the people and animals portrayed.

While the actions of the Yorkshire locals provide most of the humour, Herriot's love for the country and its inhabitants is obvious and infectious. His tone is never mocking or disparaging and, indeed, he is just as prepared to make himself the butt of the joke. Regular appearances are also made by Herriot's wife, Helen, as well as the other members of the Skeldale House practice: the eccentric Siegfried and his younger brother Tristan.

This – as well as his other books – makes perfect reading for depressing rainy days.

Rating: 2 - great stuff

Wordle.net

Yes, it's a pictorial representation of my essay about the right to vote in Australia! (I shouldn't be so excited by the concept, but that's just one of the sad things about my life...)

It's all part of the Internetty genius of Wordle.net - it works best when you use a large amount of text. My family spent a happy half hour converting various texts about proportional representation and Australian electoral law. Because that's just the way we bond as a family...

Exams

One of those nothing posts where I complain about exams.

Re: Exams: "Complain, complain, complain." [Repeat as necessary.]

I was all excited about studying international law, but then I ended up with a lousy lecturer and realised how much of a fiction the whole thing really is. Not that law itself is not a fiction, but at least municipal law has enforcement mechanisms. International law really doesn't have that many effective enforcement mechanisms. As they say in the first chapter of our (badly written, badly indexed and generally bad) textbook: "Yes, well, international law seems to work, and States adhere to it - but we don't really know why..."

Then there's Kelsen and his search for the grundnorm, i.e. the God Norm in whose image all other norms are formed. Which, personally, I think is complete bullshit. You cannot say that every single "norm" descended from one original standard of behaviour.

Then there's the ridiculous article in our readings about how the concept of the State is inherently masculine. It's apparently all to do with impermeable boundaries and the penetration thereof. Apparently our definitions of statehood also reinforce the view of women as inferior. It's people like these writers who give feminism a bad name.

The hippogriff, sorry, the elephant in the room in international law classes appears to be the fact that, unless the powerful States participate, international law is meaningless. I don't think it's been mentioned once in the entire course how ineffective the UN is without US support. Then there's China, whose human rights violations are the stuff of legend - and yet nothing is done about it. (Then there's the Sudan, where nothing is done either, but I don't think that's got anything to do with their economic clout.)

Sigh.

And I was so looking forward to international law!!

Yay! Bujold in paperback!

Get this widget!

(You can't tell I'm supposed to be studying for exams right now, can you...?)

For all you library larcenists out there...

This is section 525 of the Crimes Act 1900 (NSW):

525 Stealing or damaging books and other things in public library and other places

Whosoever steals, or removes, secretes, or damages with intent to steal, any book, print, manuscript, or other article, or any part thereof, kept for the purposes of reference, or exhibition, or of art, science, or literature, in any public library, or in any building belonging to the Queen, or to any university or college, or a council (within the meaning of the Local Government Act 1993), shall, on conviction by a Local Court, be liable to imprisonment for one year, and to pay a fine of 10 penalty units in addition to a fine equal to four times the value of the article stolen, or intended to have been stolen.

So, tell me, which of you has never nicked a library book?