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The "I'll ask you questions" meme is going around again. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
amaebi did it as "leave me a random comment and I'll ask you questions." My comment was
"I'm in the middle of two books again--four if you count two novels I haven't picked up in months--and have another waiting at the library."
Her questions were:
1. The obvious one: what are the two books, and what are the other two?
A: The first two are John Aubrey's Brief Lives (I don't remember which of you mentioned that a month or two back) and Middlemarch. The other two are Midnight Lamp by Gwyneth Jones and Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie. No, I don't think the repeated title word has anything to do with it. With the Jones, I liked the two previous books in this sequence a lot and had trouble getting into this one (putting it aside for a while, for reasons I no longer remember, didn't help). The Rushdie I got most of the way through, then left behind while visiting someone, and had lost all momentum by the time it turned up again (in the mail). Momentum and to some extent context. I do intend to try the Jones again; less sure about the Rushdie, good though it is and much as I liked Haroun and the Sea of Stories.
2. Aside from Montreal, what would you class among the world's great walking cities?
A: New York, of course. I have a hunch that Paris and London may qualify. Toronto, maybe, it's been a while since I was there, and the city has sprawled rather further since then. Boston is walkable, but either it's not as actively appealing for that, or I haven't found the right bits. Or maybe I just have other things on my mind there, like ice cream and getting back toadrian_turtle's home.
3. Have a look atsaxikath, please. Don't you think you should know her?
A: We might get along, but her public posts don't jump out and grab me.
4. Would you mind if I joined you in celebrating the smallest uninteresting integer? (What a charming joke-- thank you. :) )
A: I would be delighted. I was startled to see that that was an unshared LJ interest.
5. If circumstances oddly brought you and your partners all to live in the same city, which city would work best, and why?
A: I suspect that that's the null set, or at least, I can't think of any city I've spent significant time in that would work for all of us, given the constraints (which include climate, geography, the availability of good mass transit, and the preferences/locations of at least two other people). That said, I like the cities my two long-distance partners live in, which makes things far more fun. Yes, I'm visiting to see them, not to see tourist attractions--but I want to be in places that feel civilized, where I can get around, and find good things to eat, and books and things to do when we want to get out of the house. Things to do can be a long walk in a park, or a play, or a ramble through used bookstores, or probably lots of other things.
[Comments are welcome as always, but I'm not promising, or even likely, to offer you five questions of your own.]
amaebi did it as "leave me a random comment and I'll ask you questions." My comment was"I'm in the middle of two books again--four if you count two novels I haven't picked up in months--and have another waiting at the library."
Her questions were:
1. The obvious one: what are the two books, and what are the other two?
A: The first two are John Aubrey's Brief Lives (I don't remember which of you mentioned that a month or two back) and Middlemarch. The other two are Midnight Lamp by Gwyneth Jones and Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie. No, I don't think the repeated title word has anything to do with it. With the Jones, I liked the two previous books in this sequence a lot and had trouble getting into this one (putting it aside for a while, for reasons I no longer remember, didn't help). The Rushdie I got most of the way through, then left behind while visiting someone, and had lost all momentum by the time it turned up again (in the mail). Momentum and to some extent context. I do intend to try the Jones again; less sure about the Rushdie, good though it is and much as I liked Haroun and the Sea of Stories.
2. Aside from Montreal, what would you class among the world's great walking cities?
A: New York, of course. I have a hunch that Paris and London may qualify. Toronto, maybe, it's been a while since I was there, and the city has sprawled rather further since then. Boston is walkable, but either it's not as actively appealing for that, or I haven't found the right bits. Or maybe I just have other things on my mind there, like ice cream and getting back to
adrian_turtle's home.3. Have a look at
saxikath, please. Don't you think you should know her? A: We might get along, but her public posts don't jump out and grab me.
4. Would you mind if I joined you in celebrating the smallest uninteresting integer? (What a charming joke-- thank you. :) )
A: I would be delighted. I was startled to see that that was an unshared LJ interest.
5. If circumstances oddly brought you and your partners all to live in the same city, which city would work best, and why?
A: I suspect that that's the null set, or at least, I can't think of any city I've spent significant time in that would work for all of us, given the constraints (which include climate, geography, the availability of good mass transit, and the preferences/locations of at least two other people). That said, I like the cities my two long-distance partners live in, which makes things far more fun. Yes, I'm visiting to see them, not to see tourist attractions--but I want to be in places that feel civilized, where I can get around, and find good things to eat, and books and things to do when we want to get out of the house. Things to do can be a long walk in a park, or a play, or a ramble through used bookstores, or probably lots of other things.
[Comments are welcome as always, but I'm not promising, or even likely, to offer you five questions of your own.]