FIFA 2010 - venting

WARNING to my regular readers: This post is only about soccer. If you haven't caught the bug yet, read Nick Hornby's Fever Pitch.

Now, to FIFA 2010, and in no particular order:

• Despite all the glam expectations and promises of foreign money pouring into the country, fewer that 8,000 tourists entered South Africa on a FIFA visa. If the number seems reasonable enough to you, here's some perspective: the purpose-built Soccer City Stadium in Johannesburg can hold over 88,000 spectators.
• I'm not blaming those who chose to stay away. I did, too. To find out why, read this article.
• Bafana Bafana played an awesome game against France, and the only reason they didn't get to go through was the disgraceful ref call (penalty) in the game with Uruguay. It's unfair that the diving Uruguay team is going into the elimination stages and I hereby promise to support any team playing against them. Except for Italy, that is....
• All Whites played an awesome game against Italy, and the only reason they might not get to go through is the disgraceful ref call (penalty) in the game with Italy. It's unfair that the diving Italy team is going into the elimination stages and I hereby promise to support any team playing against them. Except for Uruguay, that is.
• If you want to know why I love soccer, look at the photos of the Portuguese team (on this post).

Chapter and Woman's Day

My thanks go to Chapter Book Store and Woman's Day magazine for sponsoring our RWNZ short story competition. I'm thrilled for one of my stories to have placed 3rd.

Interview with Carlton Scott

Q: What technique did the author use for his illustrations: Pencils? Oil Pastels? Textured Paper? Layered Images?

A: In the early 1990’s, when I did my first book, Grin’s Message I used crayons and colored pencils. I tried to make the characters very cartoon like and full of expression. After losing my sight in my left eye from glaucoma in 1996, I was very frustrated with my lack of depth perception and could not draw the Rocky Mountains like I had hoped for my second book Little Big Wolf.

Since I had many beautiful photos from my hikes while living in Denver, Colorado I messed around with the idea of combining my drawings and scanned images. After realizing this unique effect would work, I chose to publish the book and see how people would react. I’ve received a lot of positive feedback from kids and adults and I think the blending of my photography and pencil drawings works well. I then decided that when I attempted my third book, I would do the same…

With my Glamour Girl book, I used colored pencils and photos I had taken during my travels as a nurse. The sky and clouds are enlarged to 17” x 11” as the backdrop for my colored images and are all scanned together in photo-shop on the computer and my art placed into the photo. When I do any drawings I always sketch them out in pencil first to make sure I like it and then color them in after with Prismacolor pencils. Sometimes part of a drawing will look really nice and then I’ll mess up another section. Instead of trashing the whole image like I would do in the past, I cut out part of the picture that works and layer it with another drawing from another piece of paper, like a collage. When I teach kids in elementary school how to write, illustrate, and publish their work, I always tell them to draw out their entire story first in pencil so they can erase any errors before they bring their characters to life with color...

Scott has dedicated his life to working with children, both as a nurse and mental health worker. He has written and illustrated three picture books for children. As part of his commitment to supporting children’s health, he donates 50 percent of all profits from his books to children’s hospitals across the country. He created his newest book, Glamour Girl from the Stars, to foster self acceptance in young girls.

For more information about this virtual book tour, please visit http://bookpromotionservices.com/2010/05/13/blog-tour-carlton-scotts-glamour-girl-from-the-stars/ You can learn more about this author and purchase his books at http://www.carltonsbooks.com/index.html.

Live up to your potential

Book Review

"Glamour Girl from the Stars" by Carlton Scott

Children's Fiction

The first thing I noticed about "Glamour Girl from the Stars" was the very pink cover with a hand-drawing of an alien stepping out of her space ship. It's clearly meant to look like a child's drawing, not like a super-realistic computer generated graphic, and yet the green bald alien is clearly female, with a body language full of attitude.

The beautiful visuals continue throughout the book as they illustrate the alien girl's journey. From the stars straight into Dinosaur Era (you have to see the dinosaurs!), fast forward to 2010 right into Area 51 (a nice touch for the adults), then on to Waikiki, China, Rome.

When she finally arrives at the Miss Universe Pageant, she can't believe the number of hungry earth girls she sees there. The book's moral about self-confidence and living up to your potential is a lovely touch.

The author has kindly answered my questions about his drawing technique. Please see the next post.

Scott has dedicated his life to working with children, both as a nurse and mental health worker. He has written and illustrated three picture books for children. As part of his commitment to supporting children’s health, he donates 50 percent of all profits from his books to children’s hospitals across the country. He created his newest book, Glamour Girl from the Stars, to foster self acceptance in young girls.

For more information about this virtual book tour, please visit http://bookpromotionservices.com/2010/05/13/blog-tour-carlton-scotts-glamour-girl-from-the-stars/ You can learn more about this author and purchase his books at http://www.carltonsbooks.com/index.html.

No, it's not what you think!

This book is NOT about economics. I repeat: not related to, not remotely, and nothing to do with the price of eggs. Or the price of margarine when the price of butter goes up. Or any of the boring topics like value-adding, the 3-6-3 rule, stock, derivatives, zzzz zzzzzzz zzzz zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz... that ensured I never became a rich actuary.

"Freakonomics" and "Super Freakonomics" are humorous and chatty books about people:

• what makes us give to charity
• why an IT specialist chooses to "turn tricks"
• parenting
• school teachers
• drug dealers who live with their moms
• ... all that plus three easy way on how to avert the global warming crisis.

Read one or both of them. That's coming from me, someone who dislikes non-fiction almost as much as she loves fiction.

I felt cheated

LOST FINALE REVIEW: SPOILERS!!!!

LOST, the final episode. I loved the character development. I didn't care about the unresolved mysteries. But as soon as I realised the "sideways" or "LA X" reality was a sham, I felt cheated.

I felt cheated. As she was dying, Juliet said "it worked". This was reinforced a few episodes before the finale, when Miles did his speaking to the dead routine. It worked, he said. That's what the whole final season was about, that it worked. It didn't. A video review points out that when Juliet said "it worked", she meant the candy machine (the "enlightenment" scene with Sawyer in the last episode). I would have said "what a long con", only it would be besmirching to Sawyer, so I'll say instead "what a cop-out".

I felt cheated. I got a glimpse of the way life could have been for these people if only Jacob hadn't messed with it, and, having done his dirty work on the island, having completed their save-the-world mission, they deserved a chance to have that original way of life back, with all their island memories switched on so they remember every day how lucky they are to live their happy HERE-after. Instead, their grand prize was a waiting room.

I felt cheated. Just as it was imperative for the actions taken in the Island Reality to influence the final resolution, so should the actions taken in the Sideways Reality have mattered. Switching on their memories should have helped good overcome evil in the Island Reality.

Speaking of good overcoming evil, I felt cheated. Other reviewers have put it eloquently enough (see the 2 paragraphs beginning with "I was especially disappointed when Kate killed MIB...", then the comment Steven Says "What I took away from this, is if I ever get into a fight with a creature made of spirit possessing no body..." and WarnaBrutha's comment "An alternate version of the fight scene...").

Look, I still loved every 120 or so (somebody else on the forums did the maths) of the hours I spent watching LOST. The characters were iconic. The mysteries mind-blowing. It was fun to keep track of the timelines. But did I mention how, at the end of it all, I felt cheated?

PS: I love this alternative interpretation (although emotionally crippling, it's actually much more satisfying from a writer's perspective):

Damon Says:
May 25th, 2010 2:01 AM

You guys just don't get it. Did you even watch the show? Some of you seriously need to go back and watch it again if you did. It was clear that they didn't die when the plane crashed. The island was real, and the losties created there own after-life get-together so they could be with the ones that were most important to them. At least that's what they thought. The twist was that in the church Christian Sheppard was actually the smoke monster. He took old-man Sheppard's body as he had done many times before throughout the series. It was his way of getting even with the losties for all the trouble they put him through -- his long con. After Jack kicked Smlock off the cliff, they thought he was dead. Well, wasn't it odd that a creature that lived hundreds of years and could withstand bullets and everything else and turn into smoke was so easily beaten by Jack and Kate. He didn't really die. When the losties weren't looking, Smokey left Lock's body. When the losties all eventually died and went to their after-life gathering, little did they know that Smokey was there as well -- he had found another loop-hole. That's why Christian's body wasn't in the coffin, just like in the early episode when Jack found the coffin in the woods without the body and then saw Christian, who was actually the smoke monster. At the gathering, Smokey was misleading them into believing that they were "moving on." Nothing he said was true. Instead, Smokey was ushering them into a fate "worse than death." Didn't you see the light from the door he opened? It was the light from the cave. They never really left the island. The sideways world was not in L.A. It was something they created after they died on the island. No one ever left. It was a perfect ending. It was true to Lost being about the duality of man. Good versus Bad. Light and Dark. But with no clear winners and losers. The thing is, we never saw the losties walk into the golden light, so we don't know if they did. Perhaps they didn't fall for Smokey's trap. But then again, maybe they did. Now I know some people think the smoke monster snuck on the plane when Miles and Richard were fixing the wiring and that the plane took off before Jack corked the hole in the cave so Smokey possibly got off the island like he said he would. If he did, then maybe the world (and the island) were destroyed, which explains the island being at the bottom of the sea. I guess that's possible. It's all up to how you see it. Best show ever. (http://www.tvfanatic.com/2010/05/lost-review-the-end/comments-2.html)

PPS: I felt cheated: "Over the duration of the series, much speculation was made that the Island was Purgatory or Limbo where the characters all existed after dying in the crash of flight 815. The purgatory island theory was officially denied by the producers. In the series finale, it is revealed that the Flash-Sideways "Timeline", where the uninhabitable Island existed, was the purgatorial limbo existence. (Irony)"

(http://lostpedia.wikia.com/wiki/The_End)

Literary Fiction versus Pop

Why are all the literary fiction books out there so dreary? Yvonne Walus investigates and fails to find the answer here.