(Debby)
Man, I totally blogged from Accra! And it came out as a blank posting. Shucks. A Summary:

In Search of Lost Time continues - I'm up to "Madame Swann at Home", and it was the perfect complement to a somewhat bizarre time in Ghana. Just perfect.

More Bladerunner theme nights:
- eat Chinese food and drink Coca-Cola
- play that game where everyone gives 2 truths and 1 lie (the test to see if someone is an android involves asking questions and measuring the physical empathetic response)
- watch Bladerunner, A Scanner Darkly, and Minority Report (all based on Philip K. Dick novels and short stories)

(Amanda)
A paper shredder commented on my last entry. A Spanish-speaking paper shredder. How very Science Fiction.

(Amanda)
Tonight in International Horror Film we watched Dario Argento's Opera. It's rockin', freaky, badly dubbed, and extremely imaginative. AND it confirmed that my irrational fear of peepholes is entirely rational.

I just finished Twin Peaks. I have exactly two things to say:
1. Agent Dale Cooper (Kyle MacLaughlin) is the most endearing character in any show, EVER.
2. re: the final 15 seconds:
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Okay, two more things:
1. re: the final 15 minutes:
YEEEEAAAAAH! AWESOME!
2. That show was great. I think the major tool in my Sci-Fi class who said, on the first day, 'Kudos for teaching Lynch' would agree.

(Amanda)
Finally, with only a 26 year delay, I saw Blade Runner in class last night. I have some theme night suggestions ~ guess the connection. They'll be pretty obvious. You can't go too obscure with your theme nights... Answers can be found one inch below:

Blade Runner and Battlestar Galactica
Blade Runner and The Rocky Horror Picture Show
Blade Runner and Kill Bill vol. 1 or 2
Blade Runner and Nine to Five
Blade Runner and Cliffhanger


Thematic Answerage:
Edward James Olmos vs. Robots posing as people
Overly tan, overly blonde dudes in underpants and underpants only
Daryl Hannah with curious black eye issues
Shoulder pads
Hanging off things

(Debby)

Apologies to Robert Louis Stevenson – the sequel to Kidnapped(!) is Catriona, not Katriona. I was looking for Treasure Island (alas, with no success), and I noticed that 1) I had made this misspelling in my previous posting, and 2) the library has at least a half dozen copies of Catriona. Did some secondary school require Catriona, a story that primarily concerns itself with Scottish politics of the 1800s, as mandatory reading? Or did a series of libraries in the UK decide that, really, what the national public library of Kenya needed was more copies of Catriona?

Hey Hallie – I forgot about Flannery O’Connor. You are right! You are right! I LOVE her short stories. Amanda and I both took a course from Todd Davis on Flannery O’Connor and Kurt Vonnegut our first year at Goshen. The perfect pairing of authors!

Hey Amanda - I totally support the use of NetFlix. Did you finish the Gilmore Girls? Final thoughts on fast-talking gals dealing with life and love in small East Coast town?

(Debby)
I do appreciate a Thing Well Done.

Dorothy L. Sayers wrote books that are exquisitely crafted and exceptionally carried out. I had only a few minutes at the library, so I grabbed Murder Must Advertise. It’s even better the second (and third) time around. I recommend reading it after you’ve read some of the other Lord Peter Whimsey books. It’s an amazing character, in part because of the changes he goes through over the years. Oh man, character development. Character development in the context of really excellent story-telling. Is anything better than that?
Holes. The library has a couple copies of the book! Again, written with great care, a book that is absolutely impeccable.
Juno – I watched it in the movie theatre! That doesn’t happen very often. I thought it was Just Great. A good movie watched with a good friend. Safe travels, Marlies! (Marlies is going on a 'Round the World trip! Well, more of a 'Round the Pacific and Southeast Asia area trip, but one of those exciting tickets we all always wanted to buy)
Serenity –is a really, really, Really Good movie. A movie made with love.

Song of the Day: Bizarre Love Triangle, New Order.
Book of the Day: Murder Must Advertise, Dorothy L. Parker
Movie of the Day: Serenity
Document of the Day: Interim Report of the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, 22 August 2007 – great stuff on biofuel production and its implications for the right to food

(Amanda)
Um ... I think a robot commented on my March 29 post. A robot whose first language isn't English.

(Amanda)
Funny, I overheard my Sci-Fi teacher using the word 'soporific' tonight. This universe is a funny one.

(Amanda)
I Netflixed Twin Peaks, though it would certainly be purchase-worthy. I'm underemployed at the moment so I'm just trying to get the most out of my netflix dollars rather than commit a much more dramatic sum to library expansion.

I did, however, subject my bank account to a recent flurry of amazon ordering. It was just a final splurge ~ there are a few things one must own. The recent acquisition list:

Labyrinth (I can't BELIEVE I didn't already have this...)
Labyrinth soundtrack
The Neverending Story (not a great movie, but it was a monster staple of my early years)
The Wire seasons 3 and 4. I haven't watched any yet, but when every respectable source on earth declares a show to be THE. BEST. SHOW. EVER. EVER. ~ I know I'll dig it.
Battlestar Galactica ~ all of the available seasons.

I'm in the middle of the Battlestar introductory mini series. I watched season one a while back but am re-watching it before I get to the new stuff. So good. I have shed many tears in the last three hours of BSGing.

I cannot BELIEVE I have gone so many years with a decent grasp of my mother tongue and never known what prodigal meant. Shocking.

Speaking of GRE studying ~ the word that I will always associate with GRE study guides is soporific. I think I've only ever heard it used once in real life but, by golly, I knew exactly what it meant.

Dance, magic, dance magic, dance!