I’m currently reading American Borders by Carla King. The woman rides around the borders of the United States on a Ural (cool looking Russian sidecar motorcycle). I can’t get enough of books like this and it makes me want to quit my job and ride around the country for a few months. Of course, not being independently wealthy, I can’t do that. What I can do is save up my vacation time (accrued, annoying) and try for a 2 week trip next summer. Or maybe I could swing a 4 week trip with some unpaid time off in there. Either way, I’m really not good at accruing vacation days because I tend to use them one or two at a time on long weekend trips. With a specific big trip to work towards, it might be a little easier though. Hopefully.

The Comanche Moon miniseries is finally set to air on CBS. I’ve been waiting for this for a long time. It’s the last of the adaptations of the books, and again Larry McMurtry was a co-screenwriter so it will be very true to the story. There are a bunch of clips available on CBS’s website so I checked them all out. It looks like Steve Zahn and Karl Urban were good choices for Augustus McCrae and Woodrow Call. Those are hard characters to live up to, especially since the great portrayals of them by Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones in the Lonesome Dove miniseries. The rest of the casting looks to be good as well. It starts January 13, and continues on the 15th and 16th, from 9-11pm each night. Definitely watch this. (Also read the four books and watch the other three miniseries if you haven’t.)

I’m signed up to take the Basic Rider Course on the last weekend of March. My plan is to start getting gear ahead of time and then find a good used bike in April. I’m thinking a HD Sportster 1200. I was planning on the 883 but I’ve been told that when riding with others it’s hard to keep up. Also I just got a book called Breaking the Limit about a woman who rides from Jersey to Alaska and back on her Sporty 1200. And I’m easy to convince. Plus I can see the value of getting a bike that I’ll be happy with much longer as opposed to buying something as a starter and then having to get another one in a year or two. Of course I’m still open to other non-Harleys as well but it would have to be a great deal to win me over.

I spoke to my landlord yesterday and he is in the process of getting bids for reroofing the house and shed, and also plans to add another door to the shed so we (myself and the downstairs tenants) can use it. He said he’ll make my side big enough for a bike. I had been looking at enclosures like the Bike Barn and Cycle Shell (mainly for winter storage) but then it’s still very obvious that you have a motorcycle. Much better to have it in the shed and out of sight completely.

I’ve probably mentioned this before but a website with great information on it for women riders is VTwin Mama. Check it out.

I took my little sisters to see Enchanted last night.  Or I guess I should say, I really wanted to see it, and used them as my excuse (although at almost 13 and 17 they’re getting a little old to be my excuse for seeing children’s movies).  It was really great though.  I had read mixed reviews where people liked the movie but were put off by Disney trying to make fun of itself, while still doing the traditional happy ending.  But you know what?  It’s a Disney movie – the villain is defeated, the hero and heroine live happily ever after.  That’s why you go see it.  Amy Adams played the Disney princess perfectly, maintaining her beautiful spirit throughout the whole movie.  Even the real world couldn’t bring her down, which is really saying a lot.

Another fairy tale that’s been in the news lately is Princess Bubble.  It’s a modern day story of a princess who’s a flight attendant, travels the world, buys her own palace, and makes lot of friends everywhere she goes.  The only difference I can see between this and the traditional fairy tale is that she lives happily ever after without finding a prince.  It’s not that I don’t like the whole idea of teaching little girls to be happy with themselves and value independence (because I loved this book too), but there’s nothing wrong with a fairy tale prince either.  When it comes right down to it, it’s the heroine herself that little girls want to grow up to be – the beautiful, strong, kind, generous princess who is happy (sometimes despite unhappy circumstances).  Princess Bubble emphasizes not being a damsel in distress waiting to be rescued, but having personal strength.  If you think about it though, you’ll notice that all the Disney princesses have their own personal strength.  They’re victims of villains because the story has to have a bad guy.  All fairy tales do.  In Enchanted, Giselle actually saves her true love at the end, which a lot of reviewers saw as a Disney role reversal.  I don’t think it is necessarily.  Except for the obvious stories where the princess was unconscious and needed to be woken with a kiss, all the heroines I can think of played a part in their own rescue or helped to rescue someone else.  They weren’t passive.

There’s nothing wrong with little girls enjoying a good fairy tale.  Obviously the real world can be harsh, but children should be allowed to stay innocent of that as long as possible.  Even as they grow up and see that not everyone can be happy all the time, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with still dreaming of the happily-ever-after.  When we were leaving the theater last night, I noticed that one little girl who came to the movie was dressed up as a princess.  She was having a good time and loved the movie.  Dressing up is fun.  Just like fairy tales.  In the movie someone tried to explain to Giselle that life/love is complicated.  Her response?  “But it doesn’t have to be.”  Exactly.

I just got Fitted Knits by Stefanie Japel. I want to make pretty much every sweater in the book. You can preview a bunch of the patterns over at KnitPicks.

I just got Trinity by Leon Uris off of half.com. I’m having a hard time not reading it. Not that I have time for an 800 page novel, but I started the first couple of chapters this morning. Bad idea because now I’m hooked. I have other books that I’m in the middle of too: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Never Eat Alone, and Female Chauvinist Pigs. I’m ahead by one book in my American Literature class, but then there are two more books after that. I wish someone would pay me to read.

I want all of her books. But they’re all out of print and selling for ridiculous prices, even though they were printed in the last 5 years.

Here are some of her books to give you an idea:

And I can find absolutely no information on the author either. You have no idea how much this bothers me. Why aren’t they printing more copies?? I can’t even find a website for the publisher – Streamline Press of California.

eta:
Just found an article from 2002 in the LA Business Journal about the whole thing, where they say the books will be in print for many years to come.

(more…)

Library Thing

I’m importing my books now when I really should be on my way to work.

Comanche Moon (Chapter 1 here) is being made into a mini-series! Steve Zahn is playing Gus, which I think should fit just fine. Some Australian actor who I don’t know is playing Woodrow. He’d better be good. Val Kilmer is in it too. I love him. It looks like this will be coming out on CBS in November. I can’t wait!

If you haven’t seen the other Lonesome Dove mini-series (or read the books for that matter), I suggest you get to it:
Lonesome Dove – book – tv
Streets of Laredo – book – tv
Dead Man’s Walk – book – tv
Comanche Moon – book – tv
(that’s the order they were written in, which is not chronological for the stories, but I like it that way)