Thoughts on Romances

Posted on 03/13/2024 by chick

Another post from 2022 that I never published–

I read a bunch of romance novels earlier this year. I haven’t gotten around to writing one yet myself, but I had some thoughts about how I’d approach the work, based on what I did and didn’t like about the romances I’ve read so far. I wrote my thoughts down, and now I’m going to share them.

  1. A romance needs some sizzle, clash, and struggle. There are few things more boring and frustrating than a romance in which the characters like each other from the get-go and are kept apart only by their own stubbornness. I want to root for the romance, not waste time waiting for the leads to see the light.
  2. Swearing is risky and ought to be kept to a minimum. Not only can it be offensive, but if a swear is intended to denote emphasis, then swearing repeatedly erodes its power.
  3. Leave out the sex scenes. I can’t remember ever being really impressed with a sex scene, but I can remember being turned off by some of them.
  4. Short novels need to be focused. Real life is big, random and full of trivialities. People, places, things, and events aren’t always interconnected and most of them don’t mean anything. A book is different. It’s a tiny, enclosed world. Everything in it needs to work together. Keep random elements to a minimum and limit the cast of characters. Use the available space to develop the big picture, providing details that help the readers “see” the story. Everything you write into the story is a resource that you can draw on later. Leave nothing underutilized.
  5. Cell phones are romance spoilers. Texting, dating apps, and social media are a big part of modern life, and that’s important to acknowledge. Romance can be fostered over a phone or social media, but that’s not where it lives. People do a lot of socializing on their phones, but deep down they know (or ought to know) that in-person is better. Keep texting to a minimum unless it’s an integral part of the story.
  6. It’s convenient when the point of view switches back and forth between two people within a scene, because you get to know right away what both characters think about what’s happening, but it can be jarring and/or distracting. It’s best, even in a romance novel, to stick to one point of view per scene and/or chapter.
  7. Diversity among characters is good, even when it’s obviously deliberate. Better to be heavy-handed than noninclusive. The world is not the way it ought to be, and we need to “fake it until we make it.”
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SITY: Mysterious Behavior of Ants

Posted on 03/12/2024 by chick

A post from July of 2022 that I never published–

There are two things that I see ants do almost every year. One is farming. I’ve shown pictures of this in the past, but not yet this summer. Actually, I was just musing today on the fact that I hadn’t seen a single ant farm since the weather turned warm. The Gods of the Great Outdoors must have heard me and granted my wish, because I found a tiny ant farm on a clover flower that I picked for a bouquet for Livia.

Aphids on Clover
Farmer Ant

I hadn’t meant to ruin their farm, but having already picked the flower, the damage was done. I put the flower back in the grass. I hope the bugs all find a new home.

The other thing I see ants doing every year is moving their colonies. At least I think they’re moving. I see them scurrying around like mad, carrying what appear to be eggs, and I can’t imagine what else they could be doing but moving.

Three Ants
The lowest of the three is carrying something (egg? larva?).

I wonder every time, “Did something attack their nest?” According to my research, that’s a possibility, but apparently ants sometimes just up and move themselves for no obvious (to entomologists, anyway) reason.

P.S. One of the most disturbing things I have discovered while researching the native flora and fauna is how many of the search engine hits relate to destroying the very things that I’m researching. I want to know more about the ants, not kill them. Geez. Sometimes it seems as if humans have decided that they hate Nature and would rather replace everything in it with lifeless replicas.

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3/11/2024

Posted on 03/11/2024 by chick

I took an online quiz that measures sensitivity. I figured I’d score pretty high on it, given how anxious I get from loud noises and too much activity going on around me, and I did. I got 6.3 on a scale of 7, which makes me an “orchid” (ha-ha–I’m always telling my husband that I’m a delicate flower, and here’s proof). Being an orchid may sound nice, and there may be some benefits to being one, but honestly I’d rather be a “dandelion,” able to thrive in any conditions.

This morning I decided to play hooky from work. I wasn’t feeling up to a day of hard mental labor. That’s a rarity for me. Usually I like work, because it keeps my mind occupied. Not today. I’m tired, and I don’t feel like doing anything complicated. Maybe the time change got the better of me. It usually does.

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Reading Report: Things You Learn in Your 50s

Posted on 03/11/2024 by chick

Piano Lessons: Music, Love & True Adventures by Noah Adams, A–

Switching gears from that long fantasy novel, I moved on to this relatively short (248-page) memoir by Noah Adams, former host of NPR’s All Things Considered. In this book Adams chronicles a year of trying to learn to play piano as a 51-year-old adult. I stumbled across it while I was in the music section of the library, and since I was also 51 years old and attempting to learn something new, I thought it might make an interesting read.

As someone who already plays piano, I felt that Adams made several questionable calls, such as buying a brand-new Steinway upright that he couldn’t be sure he’d ever really use, as well as trying to learn to play the piano from a computer program rather than a teacher, not to mention insisting on learning Schumann’s Traumerai right away. (I had reason to revisit Traumerai myself recently, and though I wouldn’t say it’s a hard piece, I also wouldn’t classify it as beginner material. A teacher in the book calls it a third-year piece, which sounds about right.)

His mule-headedness is sometimes a bit hard to take. But, he’s a smart guy and a good narrator, and he sprinkles the book with interesting piano trivia. As a whole, I think the memoir works, and that’s why I gave it a good grade.

One thing that particularly struck a chord with me (ha-ha) was this part:

Many years ago an accomplished pianist and veteran teacher decided you could tell which youngsters were going to be able to play by just looking at them. Helen Hopekirk wrote: “You will find that all musicians have noses that are broad at the base. Always look at a new pupil’s nose, and never expect anything of a pupil who has a thin, pinched nose. If a pupil has a nose that is broad at the base, you can feel quite happy.” In recounting this story in The Great Pianists, Harold Schonberg adds; “Hopekirk had a nose that was very broad at the base.”

And I’ve been told to look for an extra-long little finger. That pianists will often have a little finger that extends well past the knuckle of the finger next to it. This is interesting but probably not important: Josef Hoffmann, one of the great pianists, had rather small hands. Steinway even made special instruments for Hoffmann, with the keys scaled down just a bit.

The bit about noses is, of course, total nonsense, but funny as an anecdote. The bit about pinkies has a lot of truth to it. The right-hand pinky takes point on the melody, and the left-hand pinky takes point on the bass line, so the pinkies are crucial. Having long ones is certainly an advantage.

The video below is of a lovely piece by Schubert in which the melody is almost exclusively played by the right pinkie while other fingers of the right hand play all the harmonic filler. At times the camera focuses in on Horowitz’s hands, and there are several good shots of his left pinkie. Assuming his right pinkie matched (and why wouldn’t it?), he was blessed with long pinkies, making this piece a total cakewalk for him. (But of course, that’s only half the story. His musicality is simply stunning and has nothing to do with his physicality. In this video he’s hardly moving, seemingly half-asleep, and yet somehow all this music is coming from the piano. Amazing!)

I myself have ridiculous little pinkies. They’re not even average length, let alone extra-long. As a consequence, I struggle in ways that Horowitz could never have understood. But, I can play that Schubert piece, too. I just have to use the pedal to hold some of the melody notes, in order to keep my hands in comfortable positions, whereas Horowitz wouldn’t have needed to do that.

So I wouldn’t say that you need long pinkies to play well, but they are unfortunately needed for playing certain pieces comfortably. I wish I’d given more thought to such things when I was younger. I might have spared myself some difficulties. But, it’s those difficulties that are pushing me now to learn how to compose pieces that suit my particular skills. Sometimes we don’t realize until we’re in our 50s what it is we really ought to be working on.

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3/10/2024

Posted on 03/10/2024 by chick
  • I have now successfully cleared out my blog drafts folder. There are only two drafts left. One is a list of potential subjects for posts, and it’s pretty much a permanent fixture. The other is a post about a local plant. I haven’t finished it because I want to add some photos. Rather than dig through thousands of old photos looking from the ones I need, maybe I’ll just take some new ones later this year. Clearing out this folder was not officially on my to-do for the weekend, but I’m glad it’s done. It always feels good to battle clutter and win.
  • Also not on my to-do list was clearing out the fruit drawer of the fridge. But, as I was looking in the drawer for an apple, I noticed a bunch of wizened oranges staring back at me. Ick. So I took everything out and tossed anything that was sus. A few pieces of fruit had started to rot, but none had reached the liquid stage, so I’m calling that a win. It doesn’t look like I did anything, though, because we had stashes of apples all over the fridge, and by the time they were all put in the drawer, the drawer was full again. Oh, well.
  • I finished reading My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George, bringing my Top 100 Children’s Books total up to 98. Only two to go!

P.S. I really hate the time change. The day felt like it was over before I’d really gotten started, and I didn’t get nearly as much done as I’d hoped.

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Reading Report: 3/9/2024

Posted on 03/10/2024 by chick

Earlier this year, I wrote, “It would be great if I could manage to write at least a few lines about each book that I finish in 2024.” It was an easy thing to write but it’s not so easy to do. The only way to tackle it is one book at a time, so let me get started with this post about the first book I finished this year.

Scythe by Neal Shusterman, A

The premise: In the distant future, a seemingly benevolent AI has taken over the world. Human disease, pain, aging, and death have been largely eliminated through technological developments, and the AI entity (known as the Thunderhead) keeps everything, including food production, running smoothly. But though people rarely die naturally (at least not permanently, unless their bodies are destroyed beyond redemption, as in a fire), it was decided that a certain number of people still needed to die each year, so the Scythes were created. Scythes are experts in weapons, combat, and the methodology of death, and their role in society is to end lives. It is supposed to be a moral, principled job, never driven by bias or love of killing. By law, the Thunderhead cannot interfere with the scythes, so it’s an entirely human system, and over time it has become corrupted. When apprentice scythes Citra and Rowan find their existence threatened by this corruption, they have no choice but to try to fix it, each in their own way.

My reaction: I originally bought this book as a Christmas present for Livia, but then worried it might be too dark/mature. I decided to read it first, then give it to her if I thought it was OK. Time has passed, and I worry less now about what Livia reads, so perhaps I needn’t have bothered to read it myself at this point. However, I’m glad I did. Though the subject matter is dark, the book is a real page-turner with some great plot twists. I haven’t specifically given it to Livia to read, but I told her that she could if she wanted to. I’m currently reading the sequel.

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Musical Miscellany

Posted on 03/08/2024 by chick
  • Did you know that the famous Minuet in G wasn’t actually written by Bach? It was written by a guy named Christian Petzold. The mistaken attribution was discovered decades ago, so we all ought to have learned the truth by now, but old misinformation dies hard. And now that I know the truth, it’s creating a dissonance in my brain, because I so strongly associate that tune with Bach.
  • Speaking of brain problems, a couple of weeks ago I completely forgot what time my music lesson was at. I left the house with the intention of getting there for 3:00, which hasn’t been the correct lesson time for months. It’s alarming when an important piece of information randomly falls out of your brain, and it could have caused me some trouble. Luckily, my husband commented on the fact that I seemed to be leaving earlier than usual, which made me wonder if something was amiss, and ultimately I figured it out before I showed up at my teacher’s house a half hour early. All’s well that ends well, I guess, but I am left wondering if more similar occurrences (what some would call “senior moments”) might be in the offing. Ugh, I hope not. I’ve got enough problems as it is!
  • Some days I just can’t seem to face the music. The keyboard reproaches me with its silence.
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3/2/2024

Posted on 03/02/2024 by chick
  • In addition to my weekly music lessons and composition assignments, I’ve been reading music theory books and websites, listening to recordings, and watching various music-related YouTube videos. I mentioned some things I’d seen online to my teacher, and he said, “You consume a lot of media, don’t you?” I don’t normally group music and literature in the “media” category, and I don’t (usually) spend much time on social media or the news anymore, so I had considered my overall media consumption to be down. But he’s right. I do still consume a lot of media, and I probably should cut back, at least on the ones that I use my eyes for.
  • Speaking of books, I have an idea for a novel. Since I never finished any of my previous attempts, and because I’m out of practice writing, I’m not feeling much inclined to start on a new one. But the idea is tempting….
  • I only just took down the Christmas tree last week. The tree was up for over two months. That might have been the longest stretch ever, though I’m not sure, because there was at least one other year that the tree stayed up well into February. All I know is that it’s symptomatic of a persistent bad mood. I’m hoping that the spring season will perk me up some.
  • Speaking of spring, the daffodils are starting to come up, and it’s lovely to see green returning to the world.
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2/28/2024

Posted on 02/28/2024 by chick
  • I started learning how to write music in canon, and it’s sort of amazing. It’s a perpetual music machine. You can cap it off, but the potential is always there to go on and on and on, forever, into musical infinity.
  • Regarding that $3,000 medical bill, I told the hospital, “Bill me a reasonable amount and I’ll pay it.” They replied, “The price is the price.” So I told them to go pound sand. There have been many exorbitant medical bills that have taken me by surprise over the years, including my recent MRI. In America, healthcare always costs more than it should, and health insurance never covers as much as it ought. I’ve paid every bill up to this point, though, as ridiculously inflated as some of them were, because I could rationalize paying a lot of money for procedures that I knew to be expensive. But I cannot justify paying ten times the normal rate for a routine doctor visit. That’s a bait and switch, and I refuse to be taken advantage of that way.
  • Doing the Letter Boxed puzzle at The New York Times, the app told me that “bitchy” is not a word. Ha-ha. We know otherwise!
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Finally, Air Frying!

Posted on 02/26/2024 by chick

I had been eying a toaster oven/air fryer since before Christmas. I put it on my Christmas list, hoping my parents might spring for it. Alas, they did not.

So I started thinking about buying it for myself. I was struggling to justify it, though. We didn’t need more appliances, and we certainly didn’t need to spend more money. But then my husband and I were at Macy’s, where the oven was in stock, and I was able to get a discount by selling my soul to the Macy’s credit card gods. I simply could not resist.

We waited to use the oven until we got the credit card bill and saw that the discount had been applied (the discount wasn’t listed on the receipt, because Macy’s does things strangely). Tonight we tried the oven’s air fryer function for the first time. We made chicken fajitas, and they came out really good. My husband has already picked out several other recipes to try. If nothing else, at least the new oven got us cooking some new dishes, and I’m looking forward to them.

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