Very Bad Blogger

I suppose I should just say this blog is on indefinite hiatus. I won't delete it, because I don't want it to be taken over by spammers. Besides, who knows, I might one day pick it up again.

If you're curious what I'm up to in Doctor Who fandom, email me at
janiejane (dot) books (at) gmail (dot) com and I'll give you my Livejournal info. I don't want to post it here. Full disclosure: it's fanfiction, along with other fannish and real life things.

Or you can just email me at the above address if you want to keep in touch.

I hope all of you are well, and I hope I can keep in touch with you!

Bad Blogger

So, I'm a bad blogger, but I'm really trying to improve!

There's not much to report - I haven't been doing much reading, but I've been doing a lot of writing. Work is busy, and the courthouse is not immune to budget cuts, so we're waiting to see where the axe will fall.

But, in fun news, I just read that Claudia Christian from Babylon 5 will be at Gallifrey One in a couple of weeks. I'm going to be in sci-fi heaven for one whole weekend!

Happy Holidays!

I'm a day late for wishing you Merry Christmas, but I hope all of you had a wonderful holiday (if you celebrate) or a nice day off (if you don't)! I hope 2009 is a much better year for all of us.

One of my resolutions is to actually pay attention to this blog again. I miss writing about reading, and I have a pile of books I'm excited about reading.

And I keep forgetting to tell you guys this: I'm going to Gallifrey One in February (Yes, a Doctor Who Convention. No, I couldn't be more of a geek.) But the best part is: David Gerrold is one of the guests! So I can ask him in person where Book 5 of the Chtorr series is!

Online Friends

I was very sad to learn last week that Dewey of The Hidden Side of a Leaf passed away. I only knew her through her blog and mine, but I did consider her a friend, and the news hit me much harder than I expected.

And being me, I started thinking. I only found out because her husband posted the news on her blog. If anything were to happen to me, my family doesn't even know I have a blog. So I guess I should include some instructions about online accounts, etc., along with my will (which I haven't written yet either). I know it's not what anyone wants to think about, but there it is.

Sorry I don't have a more cheerful post, but I hope all of you are well.

Did you miss me?

Wow, I've really been neglecting this poor blog. Work has been keeping me busy, but that's not a very good excuse. I have been catching up on DVDs, and writing (fiction) and reading, but not anything particularly good. I went to the bookstore today, so my TBR pile now includes the following:

Dies the Fire - SM Stirling
Interred with the Bones - Jennifer Lee Carrell
Three Bags Full - Leonie Swann
The Demon in the Freezer - Richard Preston

Hopefully I'll have an actual review in the next few days! What have you been up to?

Book purge

I took the day off work today, and decided to finally go through my bookshelves and get rid of some so that I could finally shelve the ones sitting in piles on my floor. I'm glad to say I got rid of a lot, and managed to fit everything onto the bookshelves, but there still isn't room for much more! It feels good to get rid of some old books though, the ones that have been sitting in the giant TBR pile forever. To just say, "You know what, I'm never going to read that," and pass it on to someone who will. Of course, in the process I uncovered some books I forgot I had, that now I want to read/reread. Funny how that happens.

The Unthinkable - Amanda Ripley

The subtitle is "Who Survives when Disaster Strikes and Why." I loved this - devoured it over the weekend, in fact. My minor was sociology, and my major was psychology, so I am always fascinated to figure out why people do the things they do. This researcher interviewed hundreds of disaster survivors, trying to figure out why we react the way we do in emergencies, and why some people survive when others just freeze. The style is not at all dry and academic, and she makes the people she interviewed very vivid. I am one of those who reads the emergency information card on the plane, and I often think what I might do in a particular situation. As a bailiff, we get some training in emergency response in the courtroom, but you still don't know what you would do if something really happened. Highly recommended.

Daughters of the North - Sarah Hall

The description from Amazon.com says it is set in a "dystopian, near-future UK." So you know why I had to buy it! I enjoyed this a lot. I liked watching the main character evolve and change over the course of the book. The book is written as if it were reconstructed from tapes, so parts of it are "missing" - forcing us to fill in the blanks. I liked that. It makes you think about what you might do in a similar situation - what does it take to become a freedom fighter?