Posts by TracyMac
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Yup, often it's those who barely have enough for themselves who give - tangibly - more. We were on both sides of that one when I was a kid, and you don't forget.
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Some good recs here - good reason to fire up LibraryThing to add to "should-reads"!
I quite specifically didn't do English lit during the 5 minutes I attended university in the 80s (I did linguistics). I've always detested being told what novels to read, because most "worthy literature" appears to be as depressing AF. I did like Jane Eyre, though. Read that when I was 13. Never did buy the romance with Mr Rochester, but I did enjoy her choice. Also, love Jane Austen.
Another one here for loving trashyish J.D. Robbs, and I quite enjoy Nora Roberts' long form detective/suspense novels (they've all got romance elements). I steer away from the trilogies that involve a set of siblings getting married off, indulging her Ireland fetish, and the ones with mystical elements.
I have to say I bounced off Jim Butcher massively. The first book of his with the wizard guy that I picked up had some stupid byplay with a woman police officer/detective (?not sure) - he insisted on getting the door while she was leaving (going through stupid contortions to get there first) and when he knew she didn't want him to. Maybe he is supposed to be redeemed as a patronising White Knight later, but man, I wouldn't have much tolerance for that in Real Life. (I don't mind anyone getting doors for me! I mind people doing shit when they know I don't like it.) While I struggled through another 20 pages or so, I just couldn't get past it. If it was supposed to be romantic tension, it certainly elevated my blood pressure.
So yeah. Love Ben Aaronovich though. Massively.
Love a lot of the Agatha Christies, Dorothy Sayers and so on. Haven't read a Raymond Chandler yet, and really should. Also, I find all of Kerry Greenwood's oeuvre good snacky reading - the Phryne Fishers (although they get a bit samey) and Corrine Chapmans.
My favourite contemporary detective writer is Laurie King - the Sherlock Holmes pastiches are great. Some of the locations are getting a tad exotic, but she researches them so thoroughly and is so obviously enthusiastic about them, you can't begrudge. I love her standalone thrillers and ONE SF book, and the earlier Kate Martinelli series. How often do you get a heterosexually-married author starting with a lesbian detective series? And doing it so well. Her last series, set between the world wars, doesn't really appeal to me, though.
For fantasy escapism, I really enjoyed Elizabeth Moon's latest outing into the world of Paksennarion - better than the Gird/Luap books. And I've just started the Ancillary Justice trilogy for hard SF - an artificial intelligence formerly used to run space stations and colony administration is stuck in a single human body. No idea what's going to happen yet!
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DnB Adele! Much better. I wish that more breakbeat and related genres had strong female vocal like hers than those wispy girl-like voices they often seem to go for. Love those other two mixes as well.
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Hard News: Public Address Word of the…, in reply to Ian Dalziel,
fufuxache
I have to agree with Ian. While the spelling is a bit fresh to perhaps qualify as an actual "word of the year", it's a tried and true phrase I have deployed way too often this year.
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Hard News: Public Address Word of the…, in reply to Moata T,
Reboot
+1 - a concept I am heartily sick of, and it's starting to make me twitch at work (I'm in IT).
Also, rightsize is making me twitch too. Work has been talking outsourcing already, and now the Aussie govt have come right out and said that's their preferred IT "strategy".
(I work for a quasi-govt body - anyone know of Windows admin jobs going in Canberra that don't require security clearances?)
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I thought it was funny, but a little too succinct and on point to be a representative exemplar of the breed. :-)
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This does nothing to address your wider concern about finding simple manual work for those with limited skills, but delivering newspapers/circulars has always been horribly underpaid for the work involved.
That industry is simply based on exploiting those who are most vulnerable - adolescents when I delivered 200 papers for $4 total (that wasn't minimum wage in the 80s either), recent immigrants now, or people who have difficulty doing skilled work for other reasons.
The whole thing is appalling. If you need a vehicle to do the work, it should be stated up front. The work should be paid in accordance with the true number of hours expected for this work, not some fairy number based on relays of slaves.
As to the issue of finding unskilled work in general, it's tough. Let alone if you have other issues to deal with.
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So are people in NZ under the delusion that the Nats did well with the GFC? Just look over the Tasman, where the Labor govt did an awesome job, and unemployment barely budged.
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Hard News: The Police Ten 7 State, in reply to Rich of Observationz,
If NZ capped public sector salaries, I’d suspect that those who want to make money would go and work in something more entrepeneurial, and we’d have no difficulty finding able people to promote who actually want to serve the public.
Hear, hear. I don't think the PS should be paid peanuts, but let's not pretend their "business" entails the same financial risks as private enterprise.
Even the Americans have a decent attitude to executive PS salaries, despite the gobsmacking inequalities in the private sector. (They should pay non-exec staff much more - teacher pay is appalling.)
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Wonderful study of a career, and how nice to know more about this iconic artist.