Things I'm Reading...

It's been a while since I've commented on books that I've read or am reading, but there's a pile of them lying around so I thought, "Why not?"

The death in 2010 of Boston author Robert B. Parker deprived the world of a master of the detective novel. Over a career that spanned five decades, Parker produced an admirable body of work in a variety of genres, his most famous characters being small-town police chief Jesse Stone and Boston P.I., Spenser.

Parker developed these two very different characters, making them believable within their universe, and while they never crossed paths in the novels, they existed in a Venn-diagram kind of milieu where supporting characters would crop up in both streams, giving the whole a unified sort of feel.

And, sad as I was at Parker's passing, I was encouraged by the fact that the stories of his two protagonists would continue, new works having been approved by his estate.

The first of these was "Killing The Blues", a Jesse Stone story by Michael Brandman, who collaborated with Parker on a number of movie projects including the Jesse Stone series starring Tom Selleck.

Brandman does an admirable job in preserving Parker's 'voice', losing none of the appeal brought by Parker in nine previous novels. Here, a crime wave of stolen cars in the town of Paradise, Mass., expands to arson and murder, and Chief Stone has his work cut out for him trying to stop it while staying alive.

The story is well-paced, the conclusion satisfying,  and I think it's safe to say I'll hang on for  the next entry in the series.

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In "Lullaby", Ace Atkins sends Spenser on a knight-errant mission to discover what really happened to the mother of then 10-year-old Mattie Sullivan, who disappeared four years ago and was found murdered. The youngster, convinced that the man convicted of the crime is innocent, hires the PI to find the truth, something at which he excels, and the game is afoot.

The story takes Spenser to South Boston, a little afield from his normal haunts, and reunites him with Hawk, as they investigate the case. With echoes of True Grit, I was also reminded (by the character of Mattie) of a young Jodie Foster in the 1974 Harry O pilot movie "Smile Jenny, You're Dead".

I'll be checking out Atkins's Quinn Colson series and other work, and watching out for his next visit to Boston.

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Robert Crais's latest novel, Taken, once again sees Los Angeles PIs Elvis Cole and Joe Pike involved in a missing persons case. Well, actually two, since Cole becomes one of them while working undercover looking for the others, kidnapped by people-traffickers in the California-Mexico borderlands.

Told from different perspectives, in staggered flashbacks, the story is fast-paced, the dialogue spare and unembellished; and, while not the best of Crais's stories (for me, anyway), it's still a solid entry in the Cole & Pike canon.

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Amos Walker walks the mean streets of Detroit's Mexicantown in his latest outing, "Burning Midnight", as creator Loren D. Estleman sends him on a mission to help John Alderdyce's daughter-in-law save her young brother Ernesto from joining one of two feuding gangs.

As he attempts to find the youngster, Walker encounters the usual gamut of  opposition,  invariably meeting it with his head and an empty .38 revolver, as he finds himself caught in the middle of arson, murder and an impending gang war. All's not what it seems, however, as the veteran PI soon finds out...

Estleman's at the top of his form here, and although Walker's starting to show signs of wear and tear (he still hasn't recovered from his last case) there's still a few good miles left in him.

Here's to the next case...

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And Now, Parody...

I was whiling away some spare time when I stumbled upon this video, courtesy of website Loyal K*N*G:

The regular reader will recognise it as a parody (and a rather clever one, at that) of the video for "Somebody That I Used To Know" by Gotye (feat. Kimbra - I believe that's important), which, for comparison purposes, can be seen here:

And on we go...

And The Angels Sing...

Justice Is Coming...

The trailer for the upcoming reboot of 2000 AD's best-known character is now online, and, if it's to be believed, will take its place as the defining portrayal of Judge Dredd.

This movie, written by Alex Garland (author of The Beach) and directed by Pete Travis (Vantage Point), follows Dredd and cadet Judge Anderson as they fight to bring down villain Madeline Madrigal, aka Ma-Ma, dealer in mind-altering drug Slo-Mo.

The character of Ma-Ma is played by Lena Headey, most recently seen in HBO's Game of Thrones as Queen Cersei Lannister, but perhaps better known as the title character from The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

The character of Mega-City One is played, in part, by the city of Johannesburg.

Karl Urban plays the eponymous lawman, the helmet stays on, the stage is set.

Court's in session September 21st, 2012.

Ulysses? It's Not All That...

For those who may not be aware, yesterday, June 16th, was Bloomsday in Dublin, traditionally the day, in 1904, on which the story of James Joyce's "Ulysses" takes place.

Friday saw the annual procession of delivery boys (and girls) on bicycles through the city, many if not all in period costume for the occasion. As in previous years, it rained.

There were also readings from Ulysses at various venues throughout the city that either featured in the book or indeed, Joyce's other works.

All of it is lost on me.

I've tried to read Ulysses - seriously, I have, but it's a punishing read, and so far I've been unsuccessful in completing it. I've attempted to read sections, but at least one is nothing more than a 50-plus page, stream-of-consciousness run-on sentence (which flies in the face of everything I was taught in school) and is not unique.

I understand that the novel is based upon the story of Odysseus, but that's about it.

And perhaps I'm showing my ignorance (although I have read Homer), but there appears to be a universal, international appeal to the book that draws people from all over the world to Dublin for June 16th, so who am I to judge?

I would, however, recommend Joyce's "The Dead", a story that I have enjoyed, as well as John Huston's film version from 1987, starring Donal McCann as Gabriel Conroy and Anjelica Huston as Gretta Conroy. I will admit to having seen the movie first, which was reason enough for seeking out the original printed work, and was not disappointed.

But for me, the appreciation of Ulysses is, sadly, something that will have to happen to other people...

Sunday, When The Lights Went Out...

So the Great Powerdown of 2012 went ahead, and was successful (thanks for asking), at least from an IT perspective. In a departure from normal practice, the project manager actually stayed onsite to supervise, something for which we were most appreciative, not to mention quite relieved.

We had a 6:00 a.m., or in military speak, oh-six-hundred (What's the "oh" stand for? "Oh My God, it's Early!!!") hours, start, in order to shut down systems gracefully rather than let them crash, which would have been extraordinarily bad, and handed over to Facilities at 7:02, at which point the word was given, and the lights went out.

After that it was home for breakfast and waiting for the call to return for the inevitable powerup and testing, which was due to commence at 6:00p.m.

I also had to decide what to do with a set of car keys I found on the street on my way to work that morning.

Quite by chance, I crossed Marlborough St. at a point closer to Parnell than I would normally have done, and came upon a bunch of keys evidently dropped by someone the previous night. There were the usual house and assorted keys, some colourful keyrings attesting to the fact that the owner enjoyed visits to (or souvenirs from) Ibiza, and a switchblade key for a Volkswagen of some description.

There being no cars in evidence, I was unable to see whether the key fit anything, so I resolved to turn them in at my earliest convenience at the nearest Garda station. Which I did.

I handed the keys over to a bored-looking cop at the desk and explained where and when I had found them. He examined the car key and told me it was one of a new type, and that if I took it to a VW dealership they'd be able to tell me the make and model of the car it belonged to, and possibly identify the owner.

There was a brief pause.

As impressed as I was with modern automotive science, I wasn't particularly interested in identifying the car, and said so; I told him I figured the car's owner would stop in at the police station on the offchance that someone had handed in the keys.

The cop thought about it, said okay, and took my name and contact number.

"Just in case," he said.

"So if no-one claims the keys in a year and a day, do I get to keep the car?" I asked, jokingly.

He had nothing to say about that...

Oh, How We Laughed...

This weekend, my colleagues and I will be assisting our facilities management team with a building-wide powerdown in order to allow them to upgrade the building's electrical generators.

The announcement went out three weeks ago, and after the inevitable wrangling and disagreements, it's on for Sunday.

A final reminder went out reminding people to make sure to power down their desktop PCs and such on Friday evening before leaving, (because power will be unavailable between 0700 and 2000 Sunday) and we got this reply back:

"Saturday's (!) fine with us for the powerdown, but we'll be updating the website on Sunday (!!)so we'll need access to email, intranet and server <xxxxxx01>, as well as a phone contact in case there are any issues. Thanks. (!!!)"

Needless to say, we were too busy rolling around the floor laughing to reply immediately, but my team leader pulled himself together and sent a carefully-worded reply to the individual concerned.

Who didn't understand.

"But we have to update the website - we need access."

"There'll be no electricity."

"But - "

"No electricity, no lights, no comms, no PCs, no servers, no network, no intranet. No access."

"But I don't think you understand - "

At which point it got ridiculous. It seems his team interpreted "No power" to mean that the network would be unavailable. Curious, because they work in Communications, and I thought we were quite clear.

Can't wait for the next instalment...

I Hate This Town...

As I may have mentioned previously, it has been our custom, where I work, to go away for a weekend around Christmas, if for no other reason than to get us out of the city and give me a chance to learn how to declare "I love this town!" in the local language, something I am now able to do with confidence in France, Spain, Italy, The Netherlands, Germany, Hungary and, if we ever go there, Klingon.

It's something, however, I am less likely to say about my hometown these days.

Dublin has degenerated into 'Land of the Junkies' - where every street corner seems to have either a dealer or a hophead, one with the jitters looking around for cops that rarely materialise, the other so spaced out of it that he wouldn't know it if they did.

They wander out into traffic and pick fights with each other or with humans, or meander their way from one end of the street to the other, wailing in barely-intelligible English for their friend/supplier/other, frequently passing each other by without noticing so that the cries and responses grow to resemble a sort of 'Junkie Sonar':

"Sharonnnn!!!"................................................................"Whaaaaa???"
"Sharonnnn!!!"............................................"Whaaaaa???"
"Sharonnnn!!!"........................."Whaaaaa???"
"Sharonnnn!!!"........"Whaaaaa???"
.............
"Sharonnnn!!!"........"Whaaaaa???"
"Sharonnnn!!!"........................."Whaaaaa???"
"Sharonnnn!!!"..........................................."Whaaaaa???"

They push baby buggies (with or without infants in them) out into traffic, almost daring it to hit them, and lurch about like the walking dead, all the while looking for their next fix.

It'd be almost funny if it wasn't so godsdamn tragic...

And then there are the pushers.

On any given day, I watch from my office window and see guided tours of the Henry St/Moore St area, where groups of people are told of the history and traditions of the quarter, and its place in our revolutionary story. And on any given day, these groups are within reach of up to three drug dealers spotting for each other while trying to stay out of the view of the so-called "anticrime" cameras.

The police do their best (and indeed have redoubled their efforts of late) but a lot depends upon their witnessing a crime before they can intervene, and their resources are stretched thinly enough that they can't be everywhere all the time. Indeed, the afore-mentioned dealers have a network in place that warns them if a Garda appears anywhere in a three-block radius. The bastards even use Bluetooth.

We've taken to giving them names - there's Scarecrow, a gangly, bespectacled individual who carries a phone in one hand and watches for police; Poison Ivy, who runs a flower stall that also sells contraband tobacco; the Ear, a guy who, like Scarecrow, acts as spotter but wears a bluetooth earpiece. You get the picture.

Merchandise is stashed in a refuse bin on the corner; occasionally we'll see a dealer running after the council workers who empty the bins if they've been by too early.

There's also a mobile 'stash', held by an elderly gentleman who looks like somebody's kindly old grandfather and goes about with a tartan pull-along shopping trolley.

Every now and again the police cruise by and disrupt business; for a short time, they even stationed a uniformed officer on the street corner. But that just succeeded in driving the business somewhere else. Three days later, they were back.

It is to our shame as a society that this situation exists and is allowed to continue.

And as much as I love my city, I sometimes really hate this town...

Rise of the Machines...

The Telegraph and other sources today reported that

"Driverless cars are to be allowed on the roads of Nevada, which has become the first state in America to allow the vehicles to apply for their own driving licences."

Developed by Google, and following exhaustive testing, the cars will be allowed to drive their passengers, freeing them to take care of such tasks as texting, drinking coffee and even reading newspapers.

Any enterprising businessperson should be off and running with this, which of course has applications in public transport.

So it shouldn't be long before we see the emergence of things like this:

Just goes to show that, in Nevada, you can bet on anything...

It Was The Best Of Times, It Was The Worst Of Times...

Manchester City 1, Manchester United 0...

That's the half-time scoreline as I write this, and I'm happy.

Added to this is the small matter of having completed a long-running project in work, the recent wedding of two very good friends (to each other, I hasten to add) and the approach of summer (and all that that implies) and I think you'll agree that life is not at all bad.

Except for the reading glasses.

I've been having problems for a while with small print and trying to read in poor light, so I decided to have my oculars tested, the result being a light prescription for reading glasses.

To be fair, it was something that was predicted in my last eye test, about 15 years ago, but it does put a tear in the ol' invulnerability index...

They aren't too uncomfortable, but I do feel like Admiral Kirk in STII - if anyone asks, I'm allergic to Retinax V.

More Stuffing, Vicar???

Note: Some (actually, only one) of the names in the following post have been changed to protect the identity of the people involved; for example, Niall will be referred to as 'Alan', etc.

Last night, following a phone conversation with my old friend, Alan (see above), I was persuaded to watch an episode of BBC comedy "The Vicar of Dibley", starring Dawn French as the eponymous cleric.

The episode in question was a Christmas special, wherein Rev. Geraldine is invited to not one, not two, but four Christmas lunches by members of her congregation, none of whom she has the heart to turn down, and one of which had about nine courses.

It gave new meaning to the word 'stuffing'.

Not that there weren't a few laughs; it is, after all, a family show with something for everybody, and the characters play well against each other.

However,the highlight for me was a small child's answer, when asked where Jesus was born.

"In Dunstable", was the innocent reply.

Thanks, Alan...