Recommendation: Lilian Jackson Braun

I apologize if my blog is rather lean. I just started a couple weeks ago, and I haven’t been able to get much feedback, maybe because I don’t know how to attract commenters. Mom told me I should be an address in my e-mail signature, but since I don’t have many people to e-mail, that’s pointless. I may put the URL in my forum signatures and see who comes.

Anyways, I wanted to update with a recommendation of an author I like. Now, I don’t read much. I have a couple of Piers Anthony and the whole Harry Potter series(I bought it again after the last book came out, but it’ll probably never see opening again unless my sisters get kids and I decided to read Sorcerer’s Stone to them while babysitting them), but the only reading materials I bother checking out are video-game related stuff like strategy guides. (I ordered a Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker guide online three weeks ago and freaked when people said it was cancelled. Luckily, it was not, just delayed.)

However, my mom bought me a gift for my 35th birthday – a book-on-CD. Now, these are a bit pricey and it’s difficult to listen to a book you can just read; these are usually listened to while cooking or doing chores or jogging in drizzling rain and risking pnumeonia(it was drizzling badly today as I went shopping); there’s no point listening to a book being read to you.

Well, this was the second book-CD I listened to entirely. (There was a third I listened to while in the car with my folks as we drove from Montana, where I went to help my little sis Ruth move in, but it was a romantic novel and those usually have implicit sex scenes, which my folks skipped. I won’t bore you with that; these two CD-books were ones I voluntarily listened to.)

Both of those CD sets I listened to weren’t Harry Potter books, but they were part of a series written by a female author.

A woman I will call L.J.B. from now on.

If you saw the title of this blog and know her, you know doubt know that Ms. Braun is not a fantasy author, unless you consider a Siamese cat who makes humans look stupid by solving murder mysteries fantastical.

Yep, the series the CDs I listened to are from the popular mystery series labelled “The Cat Who…”

I’m a cat-lover deluxe. I like petting cats, I like them in my lap, and I used to own one until I foolishly trusted it to come back home and it vanished. I hope Ashy-poo is okay.

Regardless, cats are my favorite mammal below us people, so I had a passing interest in the series. However, after reading the books a bit and listening to the CDs, I found that I enjoyed this series.

It’s no Heroes, but it will fill in the hiatus until the script writers decide to stop being a-jacks and start agreeing with the companies. It’s about ordinary people living ordinary lives in a fictitious place called Moose County, and the main character is no Pierot, but one of his Siamese cats, Koko, tends to make Encyclopedia Brown blush green with envy. He always knows that something is up with the bad guys and points out to his master, the middle-aged columnist James Qwilleran, that something is NOT RIGHT WITH THE WORLD, which usually leads to a revelation on a murder that just happened.

The CD-book I listened to recently is “The Cat Who Dropped A Bombshell”, and it was a wonderful story. I liked the auctions and the parade featured in the story, and the twist at the end. I won’t spoil the book for you, but I urge anyone who loves mystery stories with weird quirks and cat-lovers to read this book and the many others L.J.B. writes. She’s a lady something-years-young, but she is the 21st century Agatha Christie. ^_^

I’m Dazzled!

Yesterday was my 35th birthday. In the early morning of December 6th, 35 years ago, my mother went into labor and, after a long painful time, she eventually disgorged me from her body. (Okay, that was sort of disgusting, and I hope my mom doesn’t read this blog, and if she did, I’m so sorry; no woman should have to relive childbirth.) At times, I feel a little guilty for putting her through that, especially considering how I turned out, but I’m sure God wouldn’t have given me existence if he had known I was hopeless. ^_^

Anyways, for this momentous occasion, my mom gave me a nice peppermint ice cream cake that, while the cake part is dry as a rock, was delicious. We went to one of my favorite restaurants, Rudy’s BBQ, whose special sauce is sold by the local megamart…and I got a couple of nice presents. (Considering that my parents expect me to be budget-minded, and I can’t fulfill their fondest wishes on their special days, I sort of understand why they wouldn’t give me everything I wanted. Besides, Christmas is three weeks away, so any SUPER-expensive gifts I want will usually be secretly purchased by them during the Advent season. ^_^)

One of those gifts was something called the Dazzle Platinum Creator. This little device connects your computer to either a digital camcorder or VCR and allows you to rip video from those devices so you can put your favorite TV moments or your family videos on the computer in digital glory.

However, my reason for wanting one is attributed to a guy who only goes by the username Cloud8745. When I saw his awesome video game walkthroughs on YouTube(and since YouTube is a video hoster, you should know that they aren’t your usual walkthroughs) with his witty commentary and excellent intro blurbs, I had found my destiny…to create amazing video game walkthroughs. After checking it out, I found it was easy to connect – the device uses an AV cable, and I had a TV which could accompany it(I had to borrow a huge behemoth of a monster TV that was rotting in the barn we use for a garage to use my Wii, which is stubbornly restrictive and demands that hideous three-prong cable to connect it), it should be no problem, right?

Wrong!

When I installed the Studio software, my computer started hiccupping in protest to this new alien software being injected into it. It was acting like the Shanti Virus. Worse, when I tried to run it and capture some video from my TV, it whined that there was no input signal and it refused to show the TV content on the preview screen.

After checking it out, I found the problem. The connection I thought was an output connection was labelled “In.” For you techno-newbies, that means that those sockets only allow for the transfer from something to the TV, not the output of the TV to anything else.

Checking around the videos on YouTube which told you how to connect the device, I found that you need to have the Dazlle connected to a socket which says “Out Monitor” or something like that, but my Dazzle was connected to something labelled “In.” I’m pretty sure that socket was a backup socket for connecting your devices like game consoles to the TV. Either way, it wasn’t working.

So, sadly, my birthday present was a bust, at least until I can find a compatible TV to connect it to, one which would also allow me to connect my game consoles to it. However, I have an idea on a solution. If that doesn’t work, then I’ll just find another way. Either way, I am not giving up. I WILL start recording video game gameplay to my computer even if it’s the last dang thing I do! >_<

And when that happens, I certainly hope you visit my YouTube page at http://www.youtube.com/user/DragonChef4105.

And so it ends…for now

Last night, I watched the Volume 2 finale of Heroes, and it was epic.

• Nathan gets shot JFK-style as he’s about to expose a lot of secrets, and Angela was in cahoots
  with the hitman.
• HRG forces Claire to stop her jihad and has to return to work for the Company. We may see him
  doing more abductions in the future.
• Sylar gets his powers back, xo we know he’s going to begin his brain-stealing spree again. (Maybe
  we can finally find out what he does to the brains!)
• Maya comes to her senses and gets shot, but Elle saves everyone from the Sylar-man. If the
  spoiler about Bob getting killed by Elle is true, I feel that she does it to get revenge on the
  way Bob treated her.
• Nikki was engulfed in an explosion. While the odds are grim for her, I feel Kring is keeping
  what happened a secret. If she does come back, she’ll probably be targeted by Sylar and lose her
  brain, which is creepy – super-hulk Sylar tearing apart anyone who stops him is evil.
• Hiro fights Adam, and finally decides to “lock him up” like Bob, only this time six feet
  under. I don’t think Adam will live for very long, considering that Jamie from Mythbusters almost
  got crushed by being buried alive.
• Even if Adam does escape by some miracle, he will realize that his virus plan is kaput since
  Peter wiped out the virus, so he’ll likely target Peter as well as Hiro.
• Peter finally controls his radioactive hands and no longer is in danger of “going nuclear.”
  Ted’s power is put to good use in vaporizing and eradicating the deadly stain…
• But where’s Caitlin? Did she suddenly pop back? Chances are she’s gone as there is no way to
  get to her now that the future has been changed.
• And what about West? Will he try to mend the relationship with Claire, and will Claire try to
  save her dad?

We won’t know until some time in 2008, hopefully March. Until then, there won’t be any Heroes-related blogs.

Truth and Lies…er, Consequences

Well, the season finale for part two of the Heroes saga is finally upon us, and as it comes closer and closer and my Advent calendars(I got one from Hallmark thanks to my dad, and I bought another at Walgreens because I couldn’t stand to not have the usual chocolate delights every day up to Christmas Eve) start opening their doors and I decorate my borrowed electric tree and the house with mini-lights, it’s time to look back at some of the theories I gave in the last Heroes post and what was proven right and what was proven wrong.

First off, the ashes. Bob’s the giver of the urn, but whether he is keeping up the facade or someone lied to him and Bob thinks Noah is dead too is up to debate. We’ll see in the season finale whether Bob knows the truth. As for the scene in the house, let’s give it up for Sandra Bennett! (whistles and stomps feet)

Speaking of the truth, I was semi-right about Noah being locked up by the Company. In truth, 90% of my mind was voting that Suresh regenerated Noah to life, and it was proven right. I really liked how Mohinder bit Noah’s head off, even as Noah was spitting accusations of treason and profanities at him. As I said in the post of Noah’s fate, his paranoia and violent behavior got the best of him. Sorry, Noah, but Mohinder’s tougher than your av-er-age scientist and won’t flinch at being called an S.O.B. Maybe you need a time-out.

Mohinder does his research, fuses the two blood samples, and creates an uber-blood that can kill Nikki’s viral cocktail…

…and then Sylar, who had recently stabbed Maya’s twin in the heart and ended his life and then proceeded to make out with Maya, creeps in on Molly when she’s asleep and calls Suresh up for help, meaning he has to delay his return to Nikki to get the antibody to her.

Not like she’s going to live for much longer, if the trailer for the finale hints at what I think Nikki’s fate is.

We get back to Peter and Adam, and Hiro does another time-travel trip to learn about the man formerly called Kensei. The dynamic duo finally meet Victoria Pratt, an ex-bio-geneticist who created a deadly mutation of Shanti’s virus capable of creating the bleak future that Peter saw, and thanks to Adam’s presence, Vicki goes all hillbilly on them with a shotgun. Thank goodness Peter got Claire’s ability or the whole plot would be dead in the water(no pun intended); Adam shoots first and Vicki joins Kaito in the hereafter.

Monica tries to steal back the backpack, gets caught. Moni, you are a total blockhead for not studying ways to avoid getting spotted. If you get raped, you have only yourself to blame. (No offense, Monica’s one of the few Blacks I really like. Micah is the other. DL was the third, but died a senseless death, and now Nikki…uh, nevermind.)

Finally, I see something I hate – Hiro decides to go medevial on Peter and he even says “You have chosen the wrong side” without even talking about the virus! Hiro, this is the only time I think you are a douche. >_<

Very awesome episode, and hopefully the finale will be crazy and end in a bang. From what I saw, the virus is about to be released by some butterfingers, and from a spoiler I read on 10th Wonder’s forum(I know it said spoilers, but I thought they wouldn’t post the spoilers in the message! Stupid me), Nate and Matt are going to be infected with it. Not only that, but Nikki will be turned into a scorched skeleton by an exploding diner. Again, this is just speculation on my part.

NOTES: I was wrong so far about Adam and Peter and it seems HRG is going to escape and make a deal to protect his family from the Company, and he’s going to shoot Bob and Elle is going to turn on her daddy-kins and give him the same fate he gave Caitlin’s brother. Ouch.

As for the Haitian, he didn’t appear in this episode either, but Claire was about to summon him. Good thing West stopped her or else she would learn how the Haitian’s ability worked and get really humiliated and break down again when the memory came back. However, about that confrontation with Elle…need I say it…? “WAY TO GO, CLAIRE! MARRY ME!” (Gets beaten up by the other Claire fanboys. O_o)

Well, tomorrow I’m going to try to get Super Mario Sunshine so I can start putting videos on YouTube like cloud8745 and Nintendo Central.