::labyrinth of whims::

I have found one of the most awesome watches in existence and it's mine :D It's like a necklace, and looks sort of like an oldfashioned watch that people used to clip to their pants' pocket, only it's hanging around my neck instead. And I found the boots I'd wanted for a long, long time: they're made of some sort of black, stretchy faux-suede material that goes up to my thighs and best of all, they fit nicely around my calves instead of being too wide. If the heels had been slightly sturdier and slightly lower they would've been perfect.

Also bought Golden Sun DS which was a bitch to find, let me tell you. And during one of my lunch breaks I went to De Slegte and bought the Elenium trilogy by David Eddings, and am going to tl;dr about those books now.

I used to love Eddings' books when I was younger. Of course, they had their issues but I loved them nevertheless. I ran into problems with his later works because pretty much all of his books are copies of each other - you can actually take a main character out of one series and match it with another character from another series.

When I read them this time, those issues that had seemed minor when I was younger bothered me far more now.

To wit:
- interracial marriages disturb the good guys. The 'bad race' was a mixed one and according to the good guys blood wasn't supposed to be mixed like that.
- the only gay character is also a villain and a pederast to boot.
- all women are supposed to want to marry and have babies.
- sweeping generalisations about gender (all women want this, all guys want that, regardless of culture and upbringing).
- when female villains are promiscuous it's a sign of their evil. If one of the good guys fathers a child with a whore while being married it's just something that happens to men.
- all the good guys' reaction to Bevier's intent to remain celibate. In his case it's a sign of devotion to his faith rather than asexuality (he once says that he's 'attracted to the opposite sex' and it annoys him) and all his friends are all like, 'oh, we just gotta find him a wife, then he'll leave those ideas behind him'.
- the men apparently getting no choice in their relationships: it's like when a woman decides she wants to marry someone, oh, the guy'd better give up since she'll get what she wants anyway (Talen and Flute).
- Sparhawk and Ehlana's relationship, my god. He practically raised her, got exiled when she was eight and only met her again when she was eighteen. He accidentally proposed to her (he was supposed to give her her father's ring, but accidentally gave her his own instead since they look almost indentical), and apparently she's been in love with him from the moment she was five and he only raises a token protest even though in his entire quest to save her he thinks of her as the child he raised. I-It's just going too much into the direction of little girls wanting to marry their fathers, only apparently Ehlana never grew out of it.

And just, god. Ugh. UGH. There are parts I like in the book (the frantic counting of votes and general politicking around the choosing of an archprelate), people thinking of sneaky plans and happily disrupting the villains' grand designs, Martel's death scene (I also ship Sparhawk/Martel now because seriously, 'I get to die in the company of the only two people I've ever loved' really?), and the general banter, but UGH SO MANY ISSUES. SO. MANY.

I am late with this message because clearly I win at life, but:

ACCEPTED AT THE NHTV OH WOW

VICTORY


also Coraline is an amazing movie

I has a Dreamwidth! Because one of my favourite writers is not only a good writer, but also an awesome person.

Guess I'll crosspost from now on.

In not so good news, my little brother got arrested while buying weed from a dealer. Reaction at home can be best summed up with, 'Well, hopefully he'll learn something from it'. He didn't. He wasn't put in prison, just interrogated, and he had to stay there for one night, and came home complaining about how mean the police were. So, yeah. And three of his friends, one of whom is a colleague of mine, got arrested - and thrown into jail - for beating up a teenager, who happened to be an erstwhile student of my younger sister. She taught him how to play the guitar. Thankfully my little brother wasn't there when it happened, but even if he'd been there, it would've made no difference. He can say whatever he wants, but we all know he has no backbone when it comes to his friends. Just... just what.

I really don't know where exactly it went all wrong.

ETA: Man, the debate about the commission-Davids. I really don't get why people think politics are boring. Sometimes it's the best entertainment you can find. In other words, I still think Pechthold is an arrogant prick. Halsema can be incredibly harsh, but still bring it far kinder, while whatever good points Pechthold manages to bring up are automatically negated by the fact that I feel the urge to throw things whenever he starts speaking. Also, lol at Kant, who is obviously more used to yelling from a soapbox on the streets.