Life update

[luzula]

1. I had a great weekend. There was a feminist festival in town, with seminars and concerts and workshops. I went to a workshop on bike repair, and one on how electricity works in your house (we got to put together light switches and stuff). I want to get better at practical things.

2. I'm reading a lot of Ursula le Guin atm. She's always been one of my favorite authors, and right now I've been reading her YA fantasy trilogy Gifts, Voices and Powers, and also her translation of the Tao Te Ching, and the novel Lavinia, which kind of is fan fiction for the Aeneid (she takes a minor character and retells the story from her POV). I just love her language. It's just so--simple and precise, I guess, and her writing can really make me shiver with how beautiful and thought-provoking it is.

3. I'm taking up martial arts again! I trained judo for several years when I was younger, but then wandered on to other stuff instead. My boyfriend has been nagging me to come along to his training, and I finally did. It's some Philippine style called Kali, and I liked it--lots of variety, and you get to fight with wooden sticks, too, which I've never done. Besides, it's fun to do something together as a couple (there was never any hope that I could convince him to take a dancing course with me), and this way we can practise together at home.

4. *waits to get tagged for the rapid fire snippet challenge* I have no clue what I'm going to write...let's hope the prompt takes care of that.

Comments

[vsee.livejournal.com]

Your life=whoooooo!

[luzula]

Hee, yes. I think I'm doing pretty well right now.

[exeterlinden.livejournal.com]

Oh, have you read The Dispossessed by le Guin? It is very wonderful :)

[luzula]

Yes, I have, and I loved it! But it was a long time ago, and in Swedish. I should probably reread it.

[nos4a2no9.livejournal.com]

1. That sounds like fun! And I also need to learn how to do more practical things. Where are the feminists when I need them, hmmm?

2. I've never read any Ursula le Guin. Thank you for the rec!

3. *hides from you and your mad martial-arts skills*

4. That's pretty much how I'm operating, too. I JUST WANT TO BE TAGGED, DAMMIT!

[luzula]

2. Hmm, I think I remember that you're not into sf and fantasy, right? But I think you could like her books anyway. The focus is always on social issues in her work, never on hard science or spaceship action--it's kind of like sf where the science is taken to be social science. She even wrote one book (Always Coming Home) which is like fictional anthropology for a people living in the future.

3. Hee, I've just gone to one training session so far. So no mad skills yet, I'm afraid.

[keerawa.livejournal.com]

Ursula LeGuin is EXCELLENT. The Left Hand of Darkness and The Dispossessed are my favorites, for teh unique world-building and use of language. I was disappointed by Gifts, however.

[luzula]

Yeah, both of those are really good. I read them in Swedish when I was younger, though, so I should probably reread them in English.

I liked Gifts, though I wasn't blown away by it. (I am always a little weirded out when people who grow up together as children get married later. Because if you grow up with someone, they're like your sibling.)