pavonis

Finished Count Zero yesterday evening. Finally!

Started The Undercover Economist by Tim Harford last night.

Finished The Armchair Economist yesterday. I hope to finish Count Zero this week.

Finished Coal on Saturday, and started The Armchair Economist by Steven Landsburg.

No, it was published in 2003, long before The Hunger Games became popular. Perhaps The Hunger Games author read the book before writing the novels, though. Coal mining is dangerous work, and children were often employed in it, to justify smaller, more economical mine shafts, so that part of The Hunger Games is realistic.

The book is well-written, and more engaging than Salt was, in my opinion.

Finished Salt today. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else. I thought the topic was interesting enough to finish it, but I doubt I'll read it again soon. Too dull and repetitive. Even so, I still found it preferable to Count Zero - I'm still trying to get through that one.

Started Coal: A Human History by Barbara Freese today.

Finished An Edible History of Humanity and started Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky over this weekend.

Well, I've always had an interest in human evolution and history. I have a variety of books by Donald Johanson and Richard Leakey on hominids, and many history books. When Borders was having a sale, I loaded up with dozens of new titles for my library. I spotted Catching Fire and Edible History at Borders goin out of business sale, and honestly, I was just really hungry at the time, too. I don't know if I would have bought them if I weren't hungry! But they were good buys even so.

Now I'm reading An Edible History of Humanity by Tom Standage. Like Catching Fire, but more about modern history and the influence quests for food have had on events. Currently I'm in the chapter on how the quest for spices in Europe helped drive the boom in exploration in the 15-16th centuries. Very interesting. We remember that Columbus was looking for a faster route to the Indies, but forget why he wanted to find a faster route - for spices.

Well, I just finished Catching Fire: How Cooking Made Us Human by Richard Wrangham this past weekend. I'm in the middle of Count Zero by William Gibson yet. I just can't get into Count Zero the way I did Neuromancer, but it's not too bad.

^A new companion or two will definitely liven up the Eleventh Doctor. I like Smith's take on the character, and would like to see him stick around for a few more years.

I enjoyed the Xmas special. I never thought that every episode must involve peril to the universe, or Earth for that matter. Sometimes the well-being of an individual or a family is sufficient to make a story dramatic. If the Doctor is going to keep a lower profile for now, then these kinds of stories should be more common in the next season.

Still processing the inputs from the episode....

Now I know to what UKLK is referring. A very good episode. I rarely experience an episode of any show without knowing spoilers about the episode. This one was a lot of fun for me.

Impressive! I enjoyed it a lot!

Books I'm reading now:

Psychohistorical Crisis by Donald Kingsbury

Understanding China by John Starr

The Drunkard's Walk by Leonard Mlodinow

I like the finale of Falling Skies. It has some potential to get my full attention next year. Personally, I think this story would work better as a book or book series, though. But there are very few things I don't think wouldn't work better as a book.

I dunno if we'd follow Doctor Ganger, just that his survival could be ambiguous. Then later maybe he pops up again.

 

Also since Rory isn't Rory, he's 2000 year old artificial Rory, I totally believe we were being shown Rory's... Shall we say ancestors? "It's early technology." Says the Doctor. Then he looks at Rory. Then Rory is all emotionally invested in the Gangers' plight. Then the Gangers decide, later in the episode, not to go after Rory even though he was alone and an easy target. The Doctor even explains to Amy, "They're not after Rory, they want us." paraphrased.

No, Rory is human now; he was "rebooted" with the rest of the Universe. He just remembers being plastic. Anyway, Autons are animated by the Nestene Consciousness, an extraterrestrial entity. They're not human-made (though I suppose the Autons could be in for a Cybermen-type reboot of their origin).

I figured the 'Gangers weren't after Rory simply because they're out to destroy their originals, not just humans (or Time Lords) in general. They don't need to kill Rory because he doesn't threaten their existence.

The only thing that sticks out to me-- and remind me if I am wrong, but I swear that when River first saw Matt Smith she recognized him, but it still wasn't "her" Doctor that she had the relationship with. Now it seems as if it is, because she wouldn't buy that the Astronaut killed him if she had been with a later regeneration... right?

I'm not certain that River knows the order of the Doctor's various incarnations. We only know she has a "spotter's guide" of his various faces. We don't even know how many incarnations are listed in her guide.

Reading Jennifer Government, by Max Barry and yes, Thermodynamics by Enrico Fermi. Yes, really.

As to the different responses of the Doctor to his charges in "Voyage of the Damned" and "Midnight", I just figured it was a matter of the different time frames he was in, or the "alien" nature of the passengers on the Titanic. It's one thing to announce you're a Time Lord when people might recognize the name and accept it as legitimate, and quite another to announce that you're an alien to a bunch of spooked humans looking to eject any aliens from their midst.