A Day In My Life (Finally!), Nov. 17

(It's about time I finally got started, no?)

Okay, so I'm going to say that my day on Nov. 17 started at midnight, since I was awake for midnight, and so the day started with me frantically working on a memorial I had to finish writing for my Honors class. We're currently doing a China game, Ming dynasty, and I was one of the first people who had to present a memorial to the Wanli Emperor. Confusing, I know, but anyway. I was probably finishing off my black peach tea about this time too, which had gone cold a while ago. And perhaps listening to music. I had been listening to my Playlist earlier, but I think I might have switched it off around midnight, for fear that it'd lull me to sleep.

Thanks in part to the tea, I managed to stay up long enough to type out and print a respectable essay, but I only finished at four-thirty in the morning. I then snatched two hours of sleep before I had to get up and get to campus for my first class of the morning, Hawaiian Studies at 7:30. I got to the classroom early, but since I was feeling rather ill due to not getting enough sleep, I fell asleep at my desk and napped until class started about a half-hour later.

During Hawaiian class we watched a film about the Bayonet Constitution, and it was very interesting and rather sad, even though I knew the story already. I worked while I watched the film, editing the printed-out version of my speech for Honors, so by the time Hawaiian class finished, the speech was a lot better and quite scribbly and untidy looking.

Then a quick dash across campus--a fifteen-minute speed-walk--to get to Honors class. It was the first day of our China game, so we were still getting used to the new format of things, such as everyone bowing when the 'Emperor' enters the room, and such. I was second to give my speech, in which I had to criticize the Emperor for corruption, and it went pretty well, though my professor told me later that she thought I should have been more aggressive in my condemnation. And there I was thinking I was being too aggressive! I guess I'm just too nice, haha.

After Honors class I went to the Honors Lounge at the library, where I polished up the copy of my memorial that I had on my laptop, Gareth, before emailing it to my professor by the noon deadline. Then I was free for the rest of the day, huzzah, and after grabbing a quick lunch (a turkey wrap, in case you were wondering. Which you probably weren't.) I stood at the bus stop for a broiling fifteen minutes or so before the bus finally showed up.

On the bus, I fell asleep. Told you I was tired. When the bus had reached downtown I woke up a little to discover that there was this guy sitting next to me who hadn't been there when I fell asleep, but I didn't care enough to stay awake, so I napped again. I was awake to get off at my stop, however, and so got back to the apartment at about twelve-thirty.

Once there, things got a little boring, because I just slept for another four hours. Oh, no, wait, I listened to the first few chapters of 'The Lost World' on Librivox first, which was enjoyable. I love that book, and the guy reading did a decent job, even though he didn't have a British accent, heh. I tried to find that 1950's film adaptation online, but failed. Then I fell asleep.

When I woke up it was already dark, which was disorienting because at first I thought I had to get up and go to school and that it was next morning. Ugh.

Spaghetti for dinner, Video-Skyped my family who are on their way to Colorado right now for the Oireachtas, and did Russian homework. Then I hammered out a couple-hundred more words of 'Quinn', which means I'm in double-digit territory at last, but still am miserably far behind from where I need to be. Was a bit too tired for any serious creative work, though, which is why I only got a couple hundred words written. So I finally switched off the brain cells, spent a happy forty-five minutes or so watching 'Midnight' (I had forgotten how good that episode actually was, creeepy and clever), wrote in my journal, and then went back to sleep at about eleven at night.

All in all, it wasn't a bad day, although I always hate staying up all night. My only real regret is that due to my being exhausted I didn't go down to the shopping center to pick up 'Star Trek' on dvd! And after anxiously counting down the days all this time, too! Still, I'll get it soon.

"The Waters of Mars": My Review

Note: I'm trying to keep this post spoiler-free. Minor spoilers, such as brief talk of characters and interesting themes, will be discussed, but no significant plot devices or happenings will be given away.

 

I just finished watching "The Waters of Mars", the newest Doctor Who special and the last one before Tennant's final two-part story later this year. Now, I have to say that while I've been eagerly anticipating watching this episode ever since it was first announced last year, I did go into it a bit wary. I absolutely hated the Easter special, "Planet of the Dead". It was really boring, lacked any real substance, and even Tennant's marvelous-as-ever portrayal of the Doctor and a few cute one-liners couldn't save the fact that it was nothing but fluff. So, since "WoM" has been hyped for months now as a super-scary story and a lead in to the Christmas special "End of Time", I was desperately hoping it would be superior to the last special.

Was it? 

I answer with a great, resounding "YES!", thank goodness.

Not that it was perfect. I love a 'base under siege' story just as much as the next gal, but as far as that scare factor goes this one didn't really affect me as much as the classic ones did. The robot was, frankly, annoying (though the fact that the Doctor says as much at one point was enough to make me endure it for the entirety of the episode). And the monsters weren't at all as scary as I had hoped they would be, but that's probably due to the fact that I had watched my own fair share of promos and such in the days leading up to the actual release of the episode, and therefore the shock-factor was gone. I have learned my lesson, and as tortuous as it will be, I will refrain from watching any promotional footage of the Christmas and New Year's specials now.

I did not mind that the monsters themselves were not super scary, though, because I still finished watching the episode with my heart pounding like mad with fear. The monsters were fine, but the real scares here were psychological--the scariness of having to come to grips with difficult moral quandaries, and of suddenly having accepted rules of the character and show I've loved for so long turned briefly on their head in a sense--and the scariness of it still making sense in a horrid way. In the end, what really scared me was the nature of time itself, and most surprisingly, the Doctor himself. Which, in my opinion, is absolutely brilliant. Enormous kudos and applause to Tennant for his breathtaking acting throughout the episode, but especially towards the end.

Because it was the last five minutes that really elevated this story from a regular 'good' episode with slightly superior psychological play to a really fantastic episode. Those five minutes were flawlessly done. I was left on the edge of my seat (figuratively speaking; I watched the whole episode while sprawling on my bedroom floor, haha) and holding my breath and very nearly crying. And I don't cry often for filmed stuff, and certainly not for television. I am left waiting for "The End of Time" with bated breath and am making a mental note to stock up on the tissues, because if merely that last five minutes leading into the final story could sucker-punch me so hard, I'm going to be a bucket case come New Year's, alas. David Tennant, I'm going to hate to see you go.

To put my Tennant-praise aside for a moment, I must add that all the supporting actors did fine jobs as well, and as a second-year Russian student in particular it was rather enjoyable to have a Russian character. Also, that this is not an episode to show your kiddies if you are trying to get them to eat their vegetables. If you watch the episode, you'll see what I mean.

If you haven't already, I insist you go to Combom's Doctor Who blog (which you will find a link to in my sidebar) and follow the link he has there and go watch the episode! It's dark, thought-provoking, and definitely one of the better ones thus far. I am left with both extremely high hopes as to the quality of the Tenth Doctor's final story, and absolutely shattered, because now there's nothing between us poor viewers and the end of an era, and the sense of swift-incoming, crushing doom was beautifully built until it was almost palpable at the end of "WoM".

To sum up: Stellar acting by Tennant, good supporting acting, decent monsters, original and compelling psychological drama, and a killer last few minutes. This doesn't equal my top three favorite classic episodes of all time ("The War Games", "Caves of Androzani", and "Genesis of the Daleks"), but it's definitely among my favorite episodes of the new series. If it had been filmed in the style of the classics, with four separate installments, it would probably have been up there in quality. Sigh . . . a pox on the modern audience's lack of a proper attention span.

And a last note: "WoM" was not entirely a doom-and-gloom episode, it did produce this jewel of dialogue:

Adelaide: "State your name, rank, and intention."

Ten: "The Doctor . . . Doctor . . . Fun."

Go watch, and let me know what you think, mmkay?

Quinn: An Excerpt (II)

The beginning of Chapter One, where Julian Quinn himself finally takes over the narrative. 

Chapter One.

I am no author, but it comes to my mind that the best way in which to begin the story of a life would be to start at the beginning: that is, at the birth of the subject. Here I am afraid I must already fail you, for I cannot remember the day of my birth, nor the occasion, and have never in all my life found any one who could enlighten me on the subject. In an attempt to save the situation I shall now list the plain facts that I do know, poor as they are, in whatever order that seems to me most logical: 1, that I know I was born a child unwanted, given freely to the orphanage by a hale mother when I was not yet forty-eight hours into this world; 2, that I have never discovered the names of either my mother or my father, nor did they feel it necessary to inform me of mine; 3, that the tender years of my infancy I spent in as much misery as any child can bear, though in better health than many of my fellow orphans, for I have always had a hearty constitution, and 4, I was saved from my purgatory when I was six old, by a man named Gabriel, and brought by him into a new life. Since this is the first true birth of mine that I can recall, it is here that I shall begin my story.