We received Wicked Girls the latest CD by Seanan McGuire http://www.seananmcguire.com/ late last week. Since dad was in Mil[pitas we drove down to see him, and got a chance to listen to the disk a couple of times through.
It's absolutely fabulous! The fiddler was magical, and the drumming and other instrumentation were amazing. Seanan's qualifications as a master writer came out clearly in the lyrics, and everything was very listenable, and intriguing. I find myself wondering about the back stories of many of the songs. What I found most striking about this disk was the range of genres. There was some alternative (vaguely reminiscent of the Kimberly Trip http://www.thekimberlytrip.com/), old style country, and traditional as well as some that were just uniquely Seanan.
One of my favorite songs is "Tanglewood Tree" which I was first introduced to by Playing Rapunzel http://www.playingrapunzel.com/. The version on Wicked Girls had a distinctly harsher style which really calls out some of the lyrics.
In general the ensemble was fabulous and the music ranged from fun to touching to haunting.
The visit with dad was quite pleasant. We chatted, and reminisced about grandma, and talked about little Josh. He thinks we should officially call him Benjamin Joshua instead of Joshua Benjamin. I'm not strongly opinionated on this except that he will be called Josh regardless, and I don't want the name to cause trouble in school.
Also in new enjoyments fencerkevin has introduced Grob and me to Gail Carriger's Alecia Tarabotti Novels (http://gailcarriger.com/). Grob with his characteristic reading speed zipped through all 3 of them in less than a week. I'm about halfway done with the first one in about the same time, which is fairly speedy for me, especially since this is actually a paper book. The ones on my phone get read a little quicker, because it's always there, so I can catch a page or 2 more easily while waiting in line or wherever.
So far I'm very much enjoying it. The romance aspect is at points hilarious and at points highly intense. The story and universe are intricate, and believable and fantastical at the same time. Most though I love the characters. Miss Tarabotti who is very much the intellectual stuck in a family of ditseyness with firm ideas about food propriety and the best use for a parasol. Professor Lyall the refined werewolf trying to keep his less refined alpha in-touch with the niceties of Victorian English culture. The Alpha himself a Scot come lately (from a supernatural standpoint) to London. Evy and Mr MacDougall for fun and flavor. So far it's a rollicking adventure, and I'm looking forward to finishing it and reading the next 2. Sorry Kevin, it may take a while....
food:
omelet with extra spinach
tangerine
pistachios
snack mix
Pot roast (I'm curious to see my post roast reading I was high last night, and I'm hoping it's not connected to the pot roast, because it's really good)
