Too close for comfort

On my way back home from San Luis Obispo, I stopped for gas at the exit before my house. As I was filling up my car, I noticed a large cloud of dark smoke rising from not too far away. Hmm... that's really close to my house. I trace the roads with my eyes. That's REALLY close to my house. I call R, just to check that everything is alright. He says he can see people standing about outside, so he goes the check out the situation and I rush home. As I get closer and closer to my neighborhood, I see more and more people standing about and more and more fire trucks. It turned out that the hill behind my house was on fire. This picture was from when they had it pretty much under control (which happened fairly quickly), but at one time we could see flames on the ridge of the hill when we were standing in our driveway. Eek!

Two quick anecdotes before I disappear for the weekend

The cats have returned. Ever since we moved we have hardly seen a whisker or a tail (except at meal times). Apparently, there was much exploring to be done. They must have finished to their satisfaction yesterday, though, since last night they were suddenly their usual selves (i.e., wanting to be in the same room with us, no matter what we are doing). I'm glad to have them back, but at the same time I was enjoying not having to bribe/coax/chase them out of the bedroom at night.

Yesterday, while reviewing the notes from a video on the atmosphere, there was a bit of confusion due in part to my handwriting (and my students' inability to read it). We were listing the layers of the atmosphere and one student said we were missing one - the "lonosphere." I gave him a funny look, but then the rest of the class and I realized what he was talking about. Earlier in the week, when the students were copying down vocabulary words, I had written the words by hand and I had capitalized the first letter of each of the terms. My capital 'i' happens to look like a lower-case 'l," and while this fact had been noticed and talked about immediately after I wrote it, apparently this student hadn't heard the discussion. In any case, when I'm in my own classroom, I think I'll just type the vocabulary.

Hopping on the bandwagon

Never one to pass up an opportunity to talk about books, here is the latest meme:

Science Fiction, Fantasy, or Horror?
Yes, please.

Hardback or Trade Paperback or Mass Market Paperback?
The small and cheap ones, which I suppose are the mass market paperbacks. I just buy too many books to get larger, more expensive ones.

Amazon or Brick and Mortar?
The A&R household place big orders from Amazon every month or two, but we still go into every book store we run across.

Barnes and Noble or Borders?
Either. We're here for the books.

Hitchhiker or Discworld?
Discworld all the way. They consistently make me laugh out loud.

Bookmark or Dog-ear?
Bookmark, though I did go through a brief dog-earing period.

Asimov's Science Fiction or Fantasy & Science Fiction
I'd have to say Fantasy & Science Fiction, though I will in fact read anything.

Alphabetize by author, Alphabetize by title, or random?
Alphabetize by author (and then ordered chronologically if it matters), however comic books and manga are kept on separate book shelves and textbooks are just stored at the bottom of the bookshelves (lest they topple our cheap Flarkes).

Keep, Throw Away or Sell?
Keep. We then loan them out to friends (and recommend books to each other)

Keep dust-jacket or toss it?
Keep, though I will occasionally take them off while reading a book. Of course, owning mostly paperbacks pretty much eliminates this problem.

Read with dust jacket or remove it?
Either, depending on how much it is getting in the way.

Short story or novel?
I like both, but I wind up reading more novels. Short stories are just over too quickly.

Harry Potter or Lemony Snicket?
Having not read more than a couple of pages of Lemony Snicket, I'll have to say Harry Potter. It is on my reading list, though, so we'll just have to see.

Stop reading when tired or at chapter breaks?
Unless I'm about to pass out (about which time I become unable to remember what I just read) I try to get to the chapter break. However, after having read so many Discworld books (which don't have chapters), I've become more comfortable with stopping at any break in the text.

“It was a dark and stormy night” or “Once upon a time?”
I don't know about a book that start that way seriously, but I'd love one that starts that way in jest. If you want a good one that starts with "Long and long ago," I would recommend The Ordinary Princess.

Buy or Borrow?
If I don't buy it, how can I foist it on other people?

Buying choice: Book Reviews, Recommendation or Browse?
All, though recommendations are probably the most prevalent influence. R has excellent taste in books, so I read everything that he buys (some day I will make it through his backlog of sci-fi books, but at the rate he keeps buying new books that won't actually happen for a very long time. Luckily, I read faster than him, and for longer periods of time, so there is hope of some day catching up).

Lewis or Tolkien?
I was so depressed when I got to the last book in the Narnia series. It just seemed like such a cop out (though my mom, the religious one, found it comforting when she read the books at about the same age. Go figure). Really, though, I like them both.

Collection (short stories by the same author) or Anthology (short stories by different authors)?
Collection, though I'm always up for a good anthology (Literature from the Axis of Evil was rather interesting).

Tidy ending or Cliffhanger?
I like there to be an ending, but I'm willing to wait many, many books to get to it.

Morning reading, Afternoon reading or Nighttime reading?
All day, every day.

Standalone or Series?
I really like the sheer depth of plot and character development that a series can get into, but standalone books also have their merits.

New or used?
I generally buy new, but if someone wants to give me a used book I certainly wouldn't say no.

Favorite book of which nobody else has heard?
Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett (yes, the Discworld guy). Nothing quite as funny as the end of the world (and an evil car that turns every cassette tape in it into Queen's Greatest Hits).

Top 5 favorite genre books of all time?
I'm not completely sure what is meant by genre books, but I think my top 5 books of all time (so far) are:
1. Good Omens
2. A Game of Thrones
3. The Fairy Tale Book (I have a copy from the 50's which I think was my mother's. They've since changed the name, but the cover illustration is still the same)
4. The Diamond Age
5. The Selfish Gene

Favorite genre series?
The Discworld series (Fantasy/Comedy), though I'm also rather fond of Fruits Basket (shojou manga).

Currently Reading?
House of Leaves.

Laura and Mrs. Chili already succumbed, perhaps you will be the next to fall to the power of the meme?

My game face

This morning I had to have a talk with my class. You know, one of those "you need to shut up when I tell you to and stop being so disruptive" talks. After the class was over, my host teacher came up to me and told me that I was smiling throughout the whole thing. She thinks I've just not got a mean bone in my body, and I'm going to have to work a bit to develop the all important game face (and accompanying teacher look) so that the students won't keep trying to push my buttons. I'm very glad that I have her, a very experienced teacher, to observe me and give me tips.

However, the truth of the matter is that I'm not a super smiley person. If I'm comfortable, then I probably won't be smiling. I just get very smiley when I'm uncomfortable (which is why I tend to smile my head off in the classroom). When dealing with uncomfortable and serious subjects, I get downright bubbly. R actually finds it a little creepy when I'm smiling and giggling while talking about death.

Ye gods!

After having not touched my computer much all last week and gone most of the weekend without Internet, I opened up my RSS reader Sunday evening to find 100+ few posts. Sheesh! You people write too much. I'm only just now catching up.