Day: 05/01/2014

Family history

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I thought this story in the New Yorker about the family of 2000 Pulitzer Prize winner Henry Allen (1941-) during the first half of the 20th century was interesting. In two words, his family was “Old Money.”

In contrast, I think most of my ancestors could be described by the word “Farmers.” This isn’t bad, of course, but I think it’s interesting to read or hear about people’s families (Albert Einstein, for example) and think that, instead of being from an urban middle class family, most if not all of my recent ancestors have been farmers.

Both of my grandfathers served in the army, but that’s sort of an accident of being born male in the mid- and late 1920s – one grandfather served in the South Pacific during World War II, and the other served in Korea during the Korean War.  

I think one of my great-grandmothers had a college degree, which probably wasn’t terribly common in the 1920s, and divorces probably weren’t that common either, but I’m not exactly certain just how common either of those things were at the time.

Anyway, I always think this sort of thing is interesting to think about. On a lighter note, I started watching “Community” earlier today, and now I can understand its popularity among my friends. I remember seeing an episode about 4 years ago, but now I’ve seen the first three in order and it all makes a bit more sense. 

Well, this is interesting

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Input:

“Recently, I’ve been on a reading kick. I’ve always enjoyed reading, but the Internet and various other unfortunate facts of life (i.e., work) ensured that, for a time, I read less than I used to. This year, I’ve read in fits and spurts – reading voraciously for a time, and then not reading for a while due to being occupied by books, school work, moving, and various other petty and quotidian concerns.

In the past week or so, since my university’s winter break started nearly two weeks ago, I’ve been devouring science fiction via my Kindle – more specifically, Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash and Iain Banks’ novelsInversions and Look to Windward. Early this morning, after finishing Look to Windward, I began reading Poul Anderson’s The High Crusade. This is the story of an alien scouting ship landing near a medieval English village, which is promptly taken over by the local Baron after a brief skirmish. After loading his entire village aboard the alien craft and trickery by the sole surviving alien who had been taken captive, the ship’s autopilot takes the ship back to its home base. The Baron sets his sights above merely going to France and the Holy Land, and instead sets about taking on the alien empire- beams, cannon, and starships versus steel, longbowmen, and horse. This story is told by the monk who was initially tasked with learning the alien’s strange tongue, and, after some initial confusion when said alien lacks knowledge of Latin and fails to burst into flames when hearing the Paternoster (I paraphrase), eventually serves as his lord’s interpreter to the aliens. Hearing concepts familar to nearly any science fiction fan (faster-than-light travel, 20th century weaponry, and astronomy, among others) translated through a 14th century monk can be quite entertaining. Suffice it to say that metal detectors are ineffective against wooden trebuchets. ”

Output:

I write like
H. P. Lovecraft

I Write Like. Analyze your writing!

Okay.jpg

I can’t remember for certain if I’ve read any Lovecraft, but if I have it’s been at least 5 years. Reading more Lovecraft is definitely on my to-do list, however.