Ubalblog

[  Mood: Happy ]
[  Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
A.K.A. Indemnity Only – A Quick Review

Ah V.I. Warshawski! One of the first of the "new breed" of tough female detectives. Forget the bad movie with Kathleen Turner, the novels show us a woman who is prepared to walk on the dark side to find the truth.

This first novel finds V.I. (or Vic as her friends call her) hired to track down a missing girl. Only when she starts investigating does she realize that she’s been had and that there is a lot more going on here than meets the eye.

This Sarah Paretsky novel is slightly dated at this point, especially with its use of dame and broad. Mind you, it is set in 1979. It is still nice to revisit and see where the series, and a lot of today’s female detective fiction started. And some of the modern urban fantasy comes from too. It would be easy to make an argument that people like Kim Harrison and her character Rachel Morgan owe a lot to V.I. and the other hardboiled female detectives who came out in the early 1980s.

Over all, good read.

[  Mood: Sleepy ]
[  Currently: Listening to CBC Radio ]
So P&G got back to me and this is what they said.

My response? I find it fascinating that it is somehow my or my child’s fault that we had repeated leaks.

We had no leaks with the Huggies newborn product that were given to us as baby shower gifts by other parents. Clearly these people already knew what we have discovered; which product is superior.

I am also baffled by the reference to the gel in their response. I mentioned nothing about a gel in my letter. This leads me to think that they have had many complaints about this product and have simply developed a generic response to deal with them.

That tells me all I need to know.

[  Mood: Sleepy ]
[  Currently: Listening to CBC Radio ]
These diapers are, quite frankly, crap. (If you want to look upon that as pun, go ahead.)

Yesterday I put my newborn son in Pampers Swaddlers for the first time. Since the he has managed to pee the bed four times. We have had to change the sheets twice. We are now out of sheets. We are also out of sleepers as he has managed to soil those.

Pampers did nothing to stop or slow down the process.

I get to do even more laundry, despite the fact that I did laundry yesterday and should have had a day’s grace. I also have the joy of working on less sleep, because my son kept waking up soaked! And don’t think that I can catch up today. Remember that laundry? Yeah, that will cut into my rest time. Not to mention dealing with a cranky two week-old, who didn’t get enough sleep either.

This is the last time I will buy a Pampers product. The advertised quality is just not there. And believe me, I plan to share this info with my fellow new mothers. Back to Huggies for this family.

[  Mood: Happy ]
[  Currently: Listening to CBC Radio ]
A.K.A. Three Martini Play Date – A Quick Review

This book is a refreshing look at the art of raising children. Author Mellor’s tongue in cheek look at parenting is refreshing. She advocates not spoiling children, rather giving them chores to do. She also thinks that children should have some unstructured time, that mommy’s job is not to chauffeur the little mites to every lesson/club/meeting/event known to man.

Her sarcastic sense of humour makes this book move along quickly. My fave? The reference to the turtle as a piece of sculpture. She calls it the "Japanese performance artist of the pet world".

Very funny. Pick this up!

[  Mood: Sleepy ]
[  Currently: Listening to CBC Radio ]
(A.K.A. Moon Called – A Quick Review)

Okay, so when I got this book, I looked at the cover and said, WTF? Is this Poison Album or an Urban Fantasy novel with a strong female protagonist?

Luckily for me (and you) it is the later.

Patricia Briggs has created in Mercedes Thompson, an interesting taking on the Werewolf ethos. Mercy, her nickname, is a skinwalker, a native shapeshifter who takes the form of a coyote. She was abandoned by her mother when very young and fostered by a werewolf pack.

A VW mechanic by profession, this first novel of the series, finds her being pulled into a fight when the local werewolf alpha is attacked and his daughter is kidnapped. She is forced to reach out to old friends and allies and negotiate with the local vampire group (kind of like the supernatural mafia) in order to save the day.

Good book, moves well and doesn’t get bogged down in sex like some other contemporary offerings. This is one case where you shouldn’t judge the book by its cover.

[  Mood: In Love ]
Some of you may wonder why I have been so quiet. Or since you are all smart peoples, you may have figured it out. And then there are those of you that all ready know.

I had the baby on Friday, April 18 at 9:23 am. Geeklet turned out to be a boy. We have yet to buy him a black shirt, but we are working on it.

They called me in on Tuesday to be induced a mere one and a half hours prior to the shower the teachers at my school had organized. Given how long the whole process took , I probably could have gone to the party – but then you know what they say about hindsight.

I will spare you all the details at this time, suffice to say that the beds in labour and delivery are not meant to be slept on and that epidural = my new best friend. I will tell you that the delivery room I had was about the size of my classroom and had a two-person jaccuzzi with a shower. The staff were insistent that this was the Princess Margerite (Dutch Princess born in Ottawa during WWII – long story, fascinating, another time) suite. Given my heritage and family’s involvement in WWII, I would have loved for it to have been, but that part of the building is just not old enough for it to be that suite.

The boy was 6lbs 14oz and 48 cm long. He has very long arms and legs and has already lost his umbilical cord. He has very striking blue eyes. HusbandUnit and his mother see HusbandUnit’s father in his face. And, no surprise to anyone of you, when he is not happy with a situation anyone within a hundred meters can hear about it. Wonder where he gets that from? I think he is adorable, but then I am biased.

No pictures yet, but HusbandUnit is working on a secure site, when he is not helping me clean the house so the public health nurse doesn’t faint when she sees the living room and kitchen. Being in the hospital for a week and having me on restricted duties the week before due to increasing blood pressure meant the house took a beating. A huge thank you to the friends and family who have come in for a few hours to clean.

So while I will not be very active for the next little bit, I am thinking of you and wanted to let you know that the blessed event has occured.

[  Mood: Hypnotized ]
[  Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
Virginia is an overweight sixteen year-old in a skinny, perfect family. Her best friend has moved to Walla Walla and she is having trouble fitting in. She has written the Fat Girls’ Code of Conduct and it reads like a bad low self-esteem playbook. Stuff I see all the time in my job.

Carolyn Mackler has created a very believable young adult novel, where Virginia struggles with her weight, fitting in and coping with a family that thinks she should just lose a few pounds.

I can see why the ALA made it a Michael L. Printz Honour book. Good stuff.

[  Mood: Distorted ]
[ Currently: Drinking Organic Black Ginger Tea ]
Once again, I find myself reading a relationship book, not because there are any problems in my marriage, but because the authors are funny people.

This book is written by a former writer for Sex In The City (Liz Tuccilio) and a consultant for the same series (Greg Behrendt). Greg’s the guy who also co-wrote It’s Called a Break-Up Because It’s Broken.

The basic message of this book is, Ladies, if he ignores your phone calls, doesn’t want to have sex, can’t make a commitment or for any other reason doesn’t want to be around you, he’s not into you. No amount of you caving, whining, hanging around, looking pathetic or crying is going to change that. He is not going to change. Basically, if a man is into a woman, he will move Heaven and Earth to be with her.

Greg is very blunt about this through out the book. He even has a survey of 25 men at the end of each chapter where he asked them the question that section was examining. Harsh words from the men to back up the tough medicine.

Women need to hear this message, cause we have been trained to believe that we can change men, that we should sit by the phone and wait for him to call, that we should make a billion excuses for men. Basically, that we should settle, cause we aren’t getting any younger, rather that wait for Mr. Right to come along.

Good book – message delivered with humour, which means it tends to stick in your brain better. I may be buying this as a gift for many people this year.

[  Mood: Happy ]
[  Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
Pretties is the sequel to a previously reviewed Uglies. It finds Tally after she has had her operation to become a Pretty. She now lives a dilettante life of parties and drinking of which Lyndsay Lohan only dreams.

Into this life intrudes her past, the escape to the Smoke, the fight against the tyranny of the city and Tally’s own actions. Pretty soon, Tally is questioning her new life and trying to make some changes.

Once again, Scott Westerfield has produced a marvelous piece of dystopian writing for teens, with a twist at the end that you don’t see coming but sets up for the next book.

Good stuff.

[  Mood: Happy ]
[  Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
In my family, politics was a blood sport. My father and stepmother are very politically active. The news was watched and debated. They were card carrying members of the Conservative Party of Canada at one point, and attended political conventions. I learned a lot about the inner workings of government sitting at the dining room table listening to the two of them.

So I enjoy watching a political horse race. And let me tell you, what is happening in the US, actually is way more exciting than most races up here.

We Canadians like to see ourselves as progressive and liberal. We also like to compare ourselves to the US and say "we are so much more progressive than you!". But in terms of this election, the US has us beat by a mile.

You have a black man and a woman battling it out to see who will lead one party. Oh, sure we’ve had a female Prime Minister, but she was appointed and is a bit of a national joke. And one of them, Barak, actually talks to the voters like grown ups! His response to the "race issue" was so calm and rational, it was refreshing.

And your other party is lead by a guy who spent years in a bamboo cage in Vietnam and has views that can be considered quite left. Although McCain may be courting the religious right from time to time, he seems to represent the Republicans that have grown tired of their nation and party being hijacked by zealots.

Oh sure, their are pockets in the US who are clinging to the old ways, and the candidates are not perfect, but I think Canadian politicians have a lot to learn from this election. Diversity, not division, is a good thing. Ideas, not ideologies, are important.

Bravo my American cousins! Bravo!