Trice > Recent Status Updates

Interesting conundrum
Solid ending

Do southerners really still think that the fact the politeness is a lie, it makes it better or the lie cute?

Only a man/male author would describe a violent grape with “if he attacked her”

Hehe
Well that was tense, and you know the author was gleeful writing that last detail
Whew
Need to go to bed 🤦‍♀️

Lololol
I grew up with ppl who held Reformation Day parties on Halloween, but somehow no one ever thought of a Diet of Wurms cake lolololol

Please let this book finish with all of the women divorcing these condescending PoS’s they’re married to, immediately after the literal monster they’re humiliating their wives for is exposed and brought down

Yes

I had forgotten about that big event, but wow, I do remember it now.
In my head I’ve gone from vampire to werewolf to blood thirst pied piper and now we’ve got a children’s rhyme about a “boo daddy” with boogey man description

“Once you’ve washed a man’s underwear, you realize the sad truth about hidden depths” hahahaha

Backed up a bit to resume
Did not realize I was last listening to this in 2024 - thought it was a few months ago
When I lost the loan I was halfway between just letting that be the end of it and wanting to finish it. The MC is far too housewife-y. Will see as I continue

Problem is I’ve read the 1st chapter multiple times but don’t remember until reading so I’m rereading again (argh!) in anticipation of actually continuing this time - it always seems fascinating + a fun read + each time I’ve been distracted by life or other things

So here we are, contemplating the titular pendulum again which always reminds me of the 1 they had in the Guggenheim Museum in NYC. And onward

Restart on this New Year’s Day sitting in an HK Starbucks during a trip for a new China visa

Ha! Very much about the man - so as not to be distracted into playing w/his children, he had to leave his garage workspace to go out to a library to typewrite the1st draft of what became Fahrenheit 451 on a typewriter whose function he paid a dime/30min - laughing as I sit in an HK Starbucks to read w/30min of WiFi provided w/ea purch but only 30min. Aggravating! Sittenfeld by break time roaming the library shelves

Sigh
😔
So many parallels in the midst of differences with what happened in the Great Plains and other parts of Turtle Island

Thinking about Little Wolf, when you get a wolf by the chain and file down his fangs, you can’t let him go, but you cannot keep him. You cannot domesticate or even tame - you must learn to live with or you will lose all

“Mice are kings in a wolfless grassland”

And the children of modernity rise up to curse the generations who came before, who consumed and destroyed for greed and ease, leaving nothing of heritage, of cooperation, of interchange with Gaia’s many children behind, reaching back to further gone generations in hopes of wisdom and renewal for a new future

Some of what Bilgee teaches Chen reminds me of the kind of balance + careful taking + leaving Robin Wall Kimmerer talks about to respect the environment + the ecosystem + different parts of it so you’re a part of it too + not a parasite. And then in come ppl who have no understanding nor respect for anything but big numbers to increase their own status + they quickly destroy that balance + produce only desert

By turns frustrating + wonderful + heartbreaking + judgmental
Wolf cub dug his own little den into the ground to get down to the cooler sandy levels w/sides shading o’er to escape the summer grassland heat+sun; Chen Zhen’s worrying heart is eased at cub’s ability to problem solve sth he himself hadn’t yet figured out. Yang Ke unsuccessfully tries to save 2 unhatched cygnets fr laborers who killed father swan

I find this book crazy inspiring + in a v different way than expected. This essay for example isn’t the most interesting in some ways I’ve found other writers writing about writing to be. It almost feels like an inventory of his stories + what sparked them. But as I’m reading it’s in turn sparking off a zillion little story or exploration ideas that simply have to be recorded and they seem so bubbly/lively

I recog the convos abt culture + comparisons btwn, being incomers
Hoping for the wolf cub but apprehensive abt his end. I don’t know how they cld hold onto him once he reaches adulthd + I don’t think they cld get away w/releasing him w/o getting into major trouble w/authorities
Not surprised Dorji’s cub ended the way it did when D seemd to go into it w/even less thot - unsup’d play w/child >injury >kill pup

Very much a traditionally stylized fae story with trickery for a happy ending, but way too much retroactive course of the war telling in the beginning and way too wish-fulfillment-y at the end. The reader possibly made it too maudlin - more than the text but I’m not sure. This felt almost like she made a bet w/someone over that final theme. Fun though.

Hm

I thought I wanted it to finish but I was thinking there was just a little bit more. Maybe something of Ludo Sextus

What was the ominous note that said it wasn’t actually ok?

When a man talks from his heart, he speaks poetry (23)
They were all, when their souls grew warm, poets, (25)

Who dreams as the rain falls in sheets?

18 + 19 might be my 2 favorite chapters
Tho they’re still peppered w/the overseer’s determination not to listen to any pleas, cultural or environmental, they also hold the hearts of 2 students + connection w/wild creatures, Chen + his wolf cub, independent + wild but still connected, Yang, the swans + the overwhelming beauty of an untouched valley. Sadness; swans in their beauty always seem to come with sadness

Hearing each other