Peace at last

I got so worn out reading War and Peace that it took me a couple of days to recover. Part of me had trouble leaving my Kindle behind when I left the house because I was sure I could pound out another 1-2% while in line at the grocery store or while waiting for my laundry to finish. But I was done! There was no more book to read! I could have the weekend to myself and move on. It was time to start another book. But I didn't. I couldn't.

I don't know that I've ever been so exhausted by a book. War and Peace was more tiring than Worm, though about half a million words shorter.

I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that I kept wanting to fling the book against the wall. I was so tired of all the court rules and who could and couldn't marry one another, and people making just the most ridiculous self-sacrifices for reasons that must be fundamentally Russian because they sure as hell didn't translate to my experience. But neither did Corsican-Frenchmen. Napoleon was intensely frustrating to read, which I think was the point. I mean really almost the entire book was beautifully crafted and family relationships were moving and just so full of minute details that it hits you in the face like a cannonball.

Also every single word about the Masons seemed like an utter waste of space. I mean I get that it was probably supposed to be a very important illustration of Pierre's wavering nature that would prove to be such a striking contrast to his character after the burning of Moscow, but for fuck's sake I can't bring myself to care about Masons NOW, when they're supposed to be actually controlling the world, how could I work up the shits to give about an organization that was ineffectually laying the groundwork to eventually fail at taking over the world? I couldn't. Fuck the masons. And fuck fraternal orgs in general - let some ladies in on the action.

Was I the only one who was supremely creeped out by the benevolent misogyny of the final chapter, by the way? Probably not, not in the least because it was so jarring. The bizarre shift in Natasha's character threw me for a loop, and Natasha and Mary's conforming to their husbands was unexpected and utterly overwhelming.

I mean I guess I shouldn't be surprised that a book about an era obsessed with class would also be obsessed with making sure people fit into their roles, but I reserve my right to look askance at a novel that tacks happily-ever-after relationships onto the lives of two women who have been interesting and defiant and different every time we've seen them.

I'm glad it's done. I wouldn't say I'm done with Tolstoy, I liked how he crafted characters and his luxuriant wallowing in the scenes he set, but I need a hell of a break.

Cheers,
     - Alli

Tolstoy, Leo. War and Peace. Gutenberg.Org. 1869. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2600

It's just not cricket

 Punch Magazine understands that women don't care 

about sports - they just want to secure a good husband.

A few weeks ago I went out to lunch with my husband when we were both bemused to find cricket on television at the restaurant. We got through our meal somehow, though we were both looking over the other's shoulder at big-screen TVs and trying to make sense of cricket; there was so much discussion of bowling and padding and wickets going on between the two of us that it's surprising we managed to put any food in our mouths.

My knowledge of cricket is limited to a vague recollection of a few pages from In a Sunburned Country where Bryson narrates the surreal discovery of Australian Cricket Radio. I struggled to remember anything other than tea-breaks and ovals to explain the odd things happening on the TV (the broadcast was in a language that I couldn't identify, let alone understand).

After this strange, awkward lunch I devised a kind of personal challenge. I want to see if I can figure out cricket without looking it up on Wikipedia or watching English broadcasts. To this end, I decided that the second book I would read on my Kindle was to be Mr. Punch's Book of Sports: The Humors of Cricket, Football, Tennis, Polo, Croquet, Hockey, Racing, &c. so that, through the humor of Punch, I might better understand cricket while also getting a laugh or two in at the society that produced the sport.

Unfortunately, now that I've read it, cricket makes less sense than it did before and I'm pissed at the Victorians.

About half of the book is directed at making fun of athletes and the sports obsessed; the remainder of the book was devoted to making fun of women who had the poor manners to pretend to be athletes in order to find a husband, who just don't understand sports, or who had the gall to actually be competent athletes.

I know that this book is supposed to be humor from another time. I know that it is compiled from a 19th century men's magazine. I know that I'm a woman in a different century looking behind the curtain into the boy's club and I shouldn't be surprised to find that it's rather a mess. But holy shit, the "battle of the sexes" jokes got old fast in this book. And what's even SADDER is that some of these jokes are still bandied about and thought of as having a basis in reality.

Let's get real for a second here - I'm something of a jock, even though I didn't realize it until my mid-twenties. I like to do push-ups, I like to hike, I like to lift very heavy things and intimidate the living hell out of my male co-workers with my badass biceps. I have a uterus, but that is IN NO WAY going to stop me from tackling you.

My little sister, who is cute and girly as hell, who wears pretty nail polish and who is obsessed with cupcakes, is the biggest football fan that I know. I've seen her jumping up and down on furniture during a grueling drive, screaming like a champ to support her team, and, oh yeah, being in the marching band for 3 years at USC (where she played a tenor sax that was about a third her size, and was a jock in her own right).

I may not like baseball, I may actively dislike basketball, and I may not understand the appeal of soccer, but I'm still a hell of a lot more into watching them than my gigantic, bearded, manly husband is, and I'm probably better at playing them too.

Yet, in spite of the fact that women play, watch, and enjoy sports on a daily basis, we STILL have to deal with condescending "don't worry your pretty little head about it, I'll explain it in small words with martinis and dancing" women's sports clinics offered as a service to us so that we have something to do other than worry about cocktail weenies on game day. And condescending bosses who didn't think you would want to be included in a lunch because it was a "sports thing". And condescending male friends who ditch you because they think of watching the game as "a guy thing" and didn't want you to be bored. And any dude who has ever been a condescending prick about sports because "girls don't like sports." We get to experience the dual joy of being excluded from an activity we appreciate as well as from all the nice socialization that surrounds that activity because we have vaginas that might be offended at the sight of cleats or something. It's idiotic.

So I guess the humor in a 114 year old book fell flat because a lot of it is based on sexist jokes that are still being told, and are still not funny or true, today. What I'm trying to say here is don't be sexist, sports people. It's just not cricket.

Ed. Hammerton, J.A. Mr. Punch's Book of Sports. The Educational Book Co. Ltd.
     London: England. 1910.

The gentleman's guide to beating the crap out of people with sticks

The reason I downloaded Broad-Sword and Single-Stick with Chapters on Quarter-Staff, Bayonet, Cudgel, Shillalah, Walking Stick, Umbrella, and Other Weapons of Self-Defense is because the subtitle suggested that it would show me how to injure people with umbrellas.

This is mostly a book about fencing, though, and the author makes a point to repeat over and over that before you attempt to beat the ever loving crap out of people with an umbrella or a stick or a dulled broadsword you should have a firm grounding in some kind of point-based swordsmanship.

If you know nothing about any kind of sword fighting this book is largely useless, though still entertaining because it is full of rather politically incorrect and dated anecdotes about the way that Irishmen fight and the way that gentlemen must defend themselves against the roughs of the lower classes.

There is some interesting history, and the diagrams provided throughout are actually a decent foundation for anyone in the modern world who wants to learn how to fence a little bit without having to go to a very specific and expensive gym. The image below in particular is a pretty decent drill routine if you're looking for a basic set of aerobic exercises to do with some open space and a long dowel (as I have been since I read the chapter - it's an amazing for your thighs).

I'm glad that I read Broad-Sword and Single-Stick, but I might be a weirdo and that it's probably not going to be as fun a read for most people out there as it was for me. If, however, you'd like to have a chuckle at old-timey notions of sports and honor and maybe learn how to give someone a smart whack with a walking stick, this book is a pretty good way to waste an afternoon.

I'd also like to take this opportunity to thank my Mother- and Father-in-Law for the Kindle they got me for Christmas - I plan on using it to read a terrifying number of books.

Allanson-Winn, R.G., C. Phillipps-Wolley. Broad-Sword and Single-Stick. William Clowes
     and Sons. London: England. 1911.