Fiction Friction

I admit to being lax in not only updating this blog, but in most of my former habits.  Seeking out new music, I just don't know how without a Tower Records listening station.  Writing for my self... I guess this is part of it, but it's not what's roaming about inside my head, which currently includes a mermaid family and a teen superhero story.

Comic books are waning once again, with really only Brian K. Vaughn's SAGA series, which has all sorts of interesting bits, such as interplanetary wars, giants with big nasty testicles, assassins, spider-women, drugs, gay sex, robot royalty with TVs for heads, two people in love, blowjobs, visions of gay sex, and a cat that can detect lies.  It's pretty awesome.

Other than comics, however, I've really slacked off on reading.  I'm trying to fix that, but I'm finding it harder than it used to be.  Used to be, I could just zone out for hours on a weekend afternoon, nothing else to do, lose yourself in a good book.  Like with music, it's getting harder to find good fiction, or even nonfiction for that matter.  Take for example this book:

I made a stop at B&N recently, the first in a long while, and this is the only thing that leapt out at me, begging to be bought.  Written by a fairly accomplished author, it is literally a handbook on how to invade planet Earth.  Hysterical idea, right?  Almost worthy of Douglas Adams praise.  If only it were actually... well, funny.

It's not.  The author certainly did his research... the first few chapters talked about how since the Moon is tidally-locked to Earth and has one side that always faces away, perfect for an invasion base, and explaining Lagrange points enough that I actually understand why the Moon and Earth share five of them, and only one is good to hide from Earth's prying eyes.... but it's so fucking boring.  I'll keep giving it a shot but I'm not holding out much hope, as this guy is not even as affable a writer as Michio Kaku.  Speaking of which...

This book straight up must have been fun to write.  It's just taking research on things like life and death, the missing universe, cold fusion and The Wow! Signal, and other things science really doesn't understand, and it speaks in a tone that I first found with Kaku's Visions.  It's fun to re-read it again, and pretty shocking to realize that after five years since its publication, we really don't understand these mysteries any better.

And this, one of my two favorite bathroom books.  The other is Stewart's Wicked Bugs, which tells the encyclopedic tales of these plants wicked counterparts in the insect world.  It's entirely fascinating reading, unlike her latest volume, The Drunken Botanist, which I bought sight unseen only to find it's basically a bartender's handbook for how to get lit off of, like, daisies and stuff.  I really don't need help in that area nowadays.  

But regardless, I am going to make a concerted effort to write for myself more, and read more, like I used to do in both camps.  I need new hobbies between DLC for Dead Rising 3 and XBox One releases.