Book wish list

I'm currently making my sluggish way through the fifth (of seven planned) Game of Thrones "Dances with Dragons" and I've also started "Dickens" by Peter Ackroyd which is perhaps the biggest book in the world (1200 pages and weighs nearly 4lbs. Once I have read it I will probably use it as furniture). So although I went to Chapters yesterday and found a bunch more books I want to read, for now they are just on my wish list.

I loved Oliver Sacks's "Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" in which he talks about some of the patients he had as a neurologist. I can't say I've ever done that, but I've certainly done things almost as daft and I'm not even officially mentally ill. Anyway, I loved his writing style, and in this book Sacks heads off to Mexico to write about Ferns. Not that I am at all interested in Ferns but from the book jacket it sounds full of interesting anecdotes.

Not on the shelf for another week. "A Lady Cyclists Guide to Kashgar" is the first book from Suzanne Joinson (disclaimer she is a cousin) and it's published by Bloomsbury. I love the cover and the idea and can't wait to check it out.

A staff pick at Chapters... Mr G tells the story of creation as told by God. “As I remember, I had just woken up from a nap when I decided to create the universe.”. Sounds awesome.

I read most of Neal Stephenson's books but he lost me a bit with his Baroque Cycle. While it has some good characters and lots of historical information, it got too long for me to follow. Maybe when I retire I will revisit these on a chair overlooking a lake, occasionally calling a nurse to come and turn the page for me.

This is a neat book... I need to learn some CSS3 right now, and this is a nice thick book filled with screen shots of what the code does. Also seems to be quite detailed unlike a lot of the 'quick' guides to things.

That's all folks.

The Secret World of Arrietty

This is the 9th review I'll have written about a Studio Ghibli movie, but the first that I have seen in the theatre. We went along for to see the North American release of the 2009 movie, which has been dubbed in French and (British) English already. As a kid I really enjoyed the Borrowers books by Mary Norton, but I can't say any of the movies and tv shows based on the works impressed me much. So it was pleased to hear that Studio Ghibli were making the movie, and in fact the founders of the studio have been thinking about doing so for 40 years!

Borrowers, if you do not know, are 10cm tall people that live hidden in our houses, and get along by 'borrowing' things that we won't miss. Borrowers must never be seen, as once curious humans are dangerous, so once spotted they must uproot and move to a new home immediately. This movie takes the Borrowers story and relocates it in Japan, telling it the style of the many Ghibli movies before it.

The story begins when a young boy, Shō, is driven to the house in Tokyo his mother grew up in, to stay with his Great Aunt. While his Aunt goes into the house alone, he investigates the garden where a large (fat) cat is investigating a bush. The cat takes off and Shō catches a glimpse of our hero Arrietty as she slides down the stem of a flower and out of sight. Later that night we join Arrietty in the Borrowers home, as she prepares with her Father for her first dangerous journey up into the house to acquire sugar and tissue paper.

As with all Ghibli movies, the heroes are the children. The adults may be busy, sick, turned into pigs or just not give a damn, whilst the kids are independent, fearless and trying to grow up. In this movie the father is a strong yet silent type who obviously runs a tight ship with his family but is not afraid to let Arrietty grow up and take on dangerous work. The mother is more of a worrier, very comfortable in her little Borrower home and not wanting anything to change that. Of course Arrietty soon gets into adventure, or misadventure, with her parents nowhere to be seen.

Having seen a lot of animated movies aimed at kids recently, it was refreshing to watch one where the pace of the story was slow and thoughtful. Rather than being 90 minutes of action and drama, there is time for tension to build as the characters face increasing danger. There is time to watch amazingly animated beetles, centipedes and ants interact playfully with Arrietty, and for the sour faced fat house cat to play with Shō as he lies on the grass.That said there is plenty of action too, and the movie is never dull. It should appeal to most age groups.

The audio is notable, in that the sounds of everyday objects have been amplified and deepened in pitch so they become alien and scary when heard as if through the ears of the tiny people. I thought the soundtrack sounded like it was influenced by Irish or Spanish folk music, and really suits movie, but in fact was created by French musician Cécile Corbel. From Wikipedia:

"Corbel also performed the film's theme song, "Arrietty's Song", in Japanese, English, French, German and Italian. Corbel became known to Ghibli filmmakers when she sent them a fan letter showing her appreciation of their films, together with a copy of her own album."

There's no need for me to say that the animation and backgrounds are gorgeous, but it's certainly amongst the top three Ghibli movies. In particular the animation of the creatures in the movies is both lifelike and at the same time they have a lot of personality. The Borrowers house is as richly detailed as the real house upstairs.

Much as I love all the Ghibli movies, this is now among my favourites. Arrietty is a strong, attractive and likable character, whilst Shō is a tender and pleasant one. The movie explores some serious themes without getting too morose or serious, and gets nostalgic without being sentimental.

Ocean Waves

A while ago I set myself a goal to watch and review all of the Studio Ghibli movies, since I enjoy them a lot, and I wanted a way to remember what each one was about. (I am losing my marbles you see.) Here's my eighth one.

Ocean Waves was made for Japanese television, directed by Anime producer Tomomi Mochizuki, his only Ghibli title. Despite being made for TV it ran over budget and over time (when does anything good not?).

Set in a rural city of Kōchi on the Japanese island Shikoku, it's a high school "love story" of sorts. The main characters are friends Taku Morisaki and Yutaka Matsuno. Strong willed they make a stand alone against the school authorities when a school trip is cancelled due to poor academic performance. (The kids instead get to go to Hawaii, my heart bleeds!) Japanese school children being much more deferential to authority and elders, their behaviour is quite something to the other kids. Taku in particular seems an independent and strong willed fellow.

Meanwhile, following a marital break up Rikako Muto must attend the high school in Kochi having previously lived in Tokyo. She quickly moves up the schools academic league table, and feeling more sophisticated than the other students in Kochi she doesn't make friends. Instead she is defiant and doesn't take part in school activities.

Needless to say the boys are attracted to Rikako. Yutaka expresses this openly to his friend Taku. As the story unfolds Taku connects with Rikako. Initially they mock each other, but Taku helps Rikako and she quickly decides that she can both trust him and exploit him to enact her plan to visit her father in Tokyo.

Taku has to do all the work in this story, both to maintain his friendship with Yutaka and Rikako, but he never seems to be bummed by it, and his personality is refreshingly strong and positive.

This movie won't appeal to kids as the story line is too mature to be interesting (not that there is anything inappropriate though). I really enjoyed it however, it's typical Ghibli. Beautifully drawn and animated in the usual style. The characters and the world itself feel fully real.

Occupy Vancouver

Took some shots at the Occupy Vancouver protest taking place at the Art Gallery on Monday. Nothing particularly exciting going on. There are more people smoking dope there on a normal day. In fact it was remarkable how clean and tidy the camp was. Very Canada.

Austin Trip

Austin trip

I've never been to Texas before so I was excited to head down to Austin for this years GDC Online conference. Arriving in the evening we headed straight for 6th street which was very lively, with rock and blues bars blaring out music.

On the first night I watched blues at a live jam session. The music was awesome. At one point a local middle-aged Dell employee in a boring blue business shirt and grey pants and very little hair took the stage. Turned out he was an awesome drummer.

Next night we went to movie theatre, also on 6th, called the Alamo Draft House where you can order beer and food from your seat which is then brought to you while you watch the movie. (We watched Drive, which is kick ass by the way).

Finally on the last night I went to a coyote ugly style bar. It seemed quite normal at first, but after a few minutes the waitress climbed on the bar and danced along it, pouring shots into the mouths of anyone she decided seemed to need one.

Last day before I flew back to Vancouver I took a quick walk around Austin. I went up to see the Capital building, and then down to the river, where over 1 million bats live under a bridge there. Even though it was day light you can still hear them all fidgeting and gossiping to each other in my video.

A day at Harrison Hot Springs

Harrison Hot Springs

Saturday was a bit of a wash out, so I wanted to do something on Sunday that would be fun even if it was still raining. Harrison Hot Springs has a public indoor pool, sourced from two hot springs at the end of Harrison Lake.

Amazingly the sun came out and it was beautiful drive along route 7. We had burritos at Muddy Waters Cafe before heading to the pool. Lunch was pretty good, but priced for tourists. The hot springs were fun. The public pool is in an old building, but is clean enough and the water temperature was somewhere between a pool and a hot tub. There were about 10 people in the pool at any one time and there are loungers around the side so you can cool off and look out the window at the lake, which was stunning.

The drive out from Port Moody was about 2 hours including stopping for snacks and gas. A great day.

Vietnamese chicken stir fry

For some random reason I decided to have a go at some Vietnamese style cooking. Starting off nice and easy I made this chicken stir fry. Actually this is the second time I made it, having made it last week too, and this week incorporated some of the suggestions of my food critic family.

Ingredients

Lemon grass. (Sliced lengthways then finely chopped, about 2 tbsp)

Garlic (2-3 bulbs chopped and crushed)

Fish sauce (2 tbsp)

Chilli sauce (1 or 2 tsps)

Bean shoots (2 handfulls)

Chicken breasts (2 large ones, no skins)

Cilantro (small handful, chopped)

Snow peas

Carrots

What you do

Although I didn't do it due to lack of time, you're supposed to combine the lemon grass, chilli and fish sauce with the chicken and marinate it in the fridge for an hour.

Also due to lack of time I cooked the carrots by slicing them and sticking them in the microwave for 3 minutes, so I could throw them in with the snow peas and not have to wait for them to cook through.

Then fry the chicken for a few minutes until all white then put it on a plate, fry the onions, garlic and lemongrass. Once they're soft add the chicken. Once that lot is cooked through and you're a few minutes from done, throw the snow peas and carrots in. Finally throw in the bean shoots and cook for a couple of minutes.

I served it on steamed rice as you can see.

Family reaction

With just a tsp of chilli this is not too spicy for kids or adults afraid of spice. It's quite a dry dish so I added a little chicken stock. It's filled with tastes. The lemongrass in particular makes the dish very fragrant. Last week I made this with yellow and red peppers instead of carrots, and they had a flavour that did not compliment the dish.

In general the family liked this meal a lot. I'm looking forward to trying something more advanced.