Sully Sullivan’s Neighborhood

I can't help but post these types of things every time I get them from my aunt or cousin, complete with their little comments at the top:

 

 








 

 

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Book 3)

J.K. Rowling

Read because: I'm listening to all the HP books on CD

Borrowed from: the Sacramento Library

Rating: 8 out of 10

Synopsis: Harry is back and in fine form in the third installment of his adventures at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. His summer with the hideous Dursley family is cut short when, during a fit of quite understandable rage, he turns his Aunt Marge into an enormous balloon and then runs away. Soon, it becomes quite apparent that someone is trying to kill him; even after Harry is ensconed in the safety of fall term at Hogwarts, the attacks continue. Myriad subplots involving a new teacher with a secret, Hermione's strangely heavy class schedule, and enmity between Ron's old rat, Scabbers, and Hermione's new cat, Crookshanks, all mesh to create a stunning climax. The pace is nonstop, with thrilling games of Quidditch, terrifying Omens of Death, some skillful time travel, and lots of slimy Slytherins sneaking about causing trouble.

My review: I really like book 3 of the series. Things get really dark, with omens of death for Harry, a mass murderer on the loose, and some really close calls for the three wizards. I also love the introduction of Sirius Black (played by Gary Oldman in my head), who is one of my favorite characters in the entire series. He's extra crazy in this book, and it's really fun to watch Rowling develop his character, not to mention the characters of other adults in the book -- Snape, James Potter, Pettigrew, and Lupin. I also really like Lupin in this book, and how he gives support to Harry when most others write him off. And once again, Jim Dale is the best audio book reader out there. (Finished 11/23/09) 

Sex God: Exploring the Endless Connections between Sexuality and Spirituality

Rob Bell

Recommended by: a bunch of people. Plus I'd read other books by Bell.

Purchased from: A Borders going-out-of-business sale, at 80% off. Woot.

Rating: 9 out of 10

Synopsis: "Is sex a picture of heaven?" Bell wonders. It's all about God and sex and heaven, he says: "...they're connected. And they can't be separated. Where the one is you will always find the other." It's the story of God becoming human, of humans mirroring God and love made manifest in the chaos of our humanity. Sex God is about relationships revealed in a way that elevates the human condition and offers hope to those whose relationships are wounded. In Bell's spare, somewhat oblique style, he addresses lust, respect, denial, risk, acceptance and more. He does a fine job using the Bible and real life to show that our physical relationships are really about spiritual relationships. This book joyfully ties, and then tightens, the knot between God and humankind.

My Review: I feel like I should have read this a long time ago. I've had it for a while and I read it in less than twenty-four hours. It was a wonderful picture of what God has set out marriage and sex to be. Bell really delves into how the spiritual and the physical come together and how our relationships here are a picture of God's relationship with us. It's fascinating, really. Bell's style takes a little getting used to -- it's sparse and really uses the white space on a page. This book, though, was probably the least-difficult to handle visually (compared to his other books). I wish I had it with me so I could quote from it a bit. Anyway, I highly recommend this book, especially to high schoolers and people who work with them. I could have used some of this information back in my youth-leading days.  

What are you hoping to find under the tree this year?

Money.  Lots and lots of money. 

But I'll settle for some argyle socks.  I love argyle socks.

Days blocked on Vox bis

Key to the calendar. Yellow: days when Vox worked normally. Pink: days when the compose screen took minutes or hours to load. Red: days when Vox would not allow me to compose at all.

I’m sure most of you will agree that putting up with a compose screen that will not load for hours or days since October 28 is being pretty patient.
   In that time, Daisy and Six Apart have been great at trying to help me troubleshoot why this is happening. They have confirmed that there is something wrong and that, even at Six Apart HQ in California, they cannot get the compose screen to come up when logged on as me.
   A number of solutions have been proposed, but despite carrying them out, the loading delay remains intolerably long.
   It’s as though the Six Apart servers (after becoming self-aware!) know it’s me and fail to serve the compose page. No code is downloaded.
   I remain convinced that whatever is happening to me is connected to what happened to Patricia (who has only made 50-odd posts on Vox, but has exactly the same symptoms) and Ninja (who can no longer compose with this site without switching to Internet Explorer—Vox is the only site which he has to make a browser switch for). I also believe the bug is connected to the one that locked out all the Australians I knew on this service in August 2009.
   We also have the mysterious period between November 16 and 18 when the site operated normally, and the compose screen came up on demand. What happened on those three days? I had more tags in my account than when the site first blocked me from composing, and possibly more neighbours. Yet for those days, everything was normal here.
   I have never suggested seriously that the block was malicious (though it was fun to entertain some outlandish theories), but it does seem to be rather coincidental that I come across bugs on Vox, Blogger, Facebook and other services continually. Many have been documented on this blog. I just never thought that among the last regular blog posts, the bugs I write about would be Vox’s.
   One day I am sure they will find the error, or there will be a new version of Vox which remedies it. The underlying code is updated a lot more frequently with incremental improvements than Team Vox will have us know. Until then, I will check in here periodically—to read your posts, delete spammers, and administer the many groups that I run—but we will have to say farewell to my regular updates. I will also click on ‘Create’ from time to time to see if the bug has been fixed, and, if the site ever lets me, post the odd private neighbourhood or friends-only entry.
   Finally, you could say, my disappointment outweighed my patience. As some of you read in a private post yesterday, this is a good time to move on.
   Vox is, after all, still in beta, if its terms and conditions (revised a few months ago) are to be believed, so there’s no point my getting mad about this. It is what I signed up for in 2006 when I began as a Vox beta tester. Three years on, it appears I was still in the same boat, but with a less reliable site.
   Thank you for all your friendships over the last three years. I have enjoyed it and everything this blog has offered. You can still find me on Facebook (a site with far worse issues than Vox ever had), Tumblr and at my main blog, where I am already ramping up the posting I do. I have a campaign site for the 2010 mayoral election here in Wellington, and will offer occasional commentary at Lucire’s web edition. If the Vox cravings get too much, I might enter the odd thing at lucire.vox.com, but even that account began to fail a few days ago.
   This is not a total farewell. In the words of Gen Douglas MacArthur, ‘I shall return.’

A sunny day in Wellington, even if it took over half a day to get a compose screen on Vox. I’m already blogging more on Blogger, so I suspect these posts will become fewer (and not out of choice). This was around 5 p.m. today:

Victoria Street outside the CPO, summer 2009

My Nook was delivered yesterday! I'm so excited about it - its
everything I was expecting and I'm excited to buy books for it. On
Tuesday night we drove to a Barnes & Nobles about thirty miles away in
order to get a cover for it (our B&N didn't have cases, just a
display) and I'm really happy with the one I choose. It was between
the brown one and a red one. The red one was nice, but I was looking
for low-key.

I was also happy to go online and see that B&N has adjusted their
eBook prices to MATCH Amazon! I bought "Her Fearful Symmetry" -
originally $26.99 in hardcover, now $7.29 in hardcover - for $5.79!
Brilliant, isn't it?! I've got so many books I want to buy - let's
just hope that I can hold back!

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Hey Terri! Look in the upper corner - it's your letter!!!

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Not sure how many hours it has been since Vox was capable of loading a compose window for me. I lost count. I no longer believe that deleting tags has helped, especially as it is now 2.20 a.m. and I had no access to Vox all evening. Please write me with your next theory, Vox.
   As a result of the return to terrible load times, Kimmie’s theory about a dodgy neighbour might still be true. I haven’t deleted everyone from my neighbourhood and started from scratch, which is arguably the next step, if I have sufficient time to waste.
   I have downloaded Firebug (thanks to my friend Andrew Carr-Smith) to see what data Vox loads on to my browser in the times I get a blank compose screen. Answer: none. Nothing even begins to load.
   I still think the Vox server knows when it’s me, Patricia or Ninja, or any of the others who might have left here without telling us why, and fails to serve any compose screen to us. I still reckon that there is something peculiar about our accounts that the programming does not like.