Pick Me Up

The Stephen King Illustrated Companion now seems to be in stock in most Barnes & Noble stores. If you want to check before you head out to the store, visit this link and enter your ZIP code to see if one near you has the book. There’s a chance it might still be in the store room, so you might have to ask for it if you can’t find it on a shelf or display table.

I finished Ilium last night and started The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson, book three of the Millennium trilogy. It was a toss-up between that book and the new Ian Rankin, but since I’d recently finished the second book I thought it wise to carry on. The final installment picks up immediately where The Girl Who Played With Fire left off, making it more of a direct sequel than book two. The second book resolved the main plot line of that novel, but there were many loose ends left to be tied up, not the least of which is that outcome of Erica Berger’s decision. I’m 50 pages in–it starts out at a much faster pace than the second book did. It’s a shame that when I finish, that’s the last of Larsson I’ll have to read.

I liked Ilium a lot, too, and I’m glad I finally took the plunge. I won’t wait too long before getting into Olympos, which I also have on my Kindle. It’s a longer book than the first part so I decided to take a small breather between the two.

In the next of the signs that portend the end of days, I signed up for a Twitter account this morning (as BevVincent, for anyone who wants to play along). I don’t intend to subject anyone to the mundane matters of my day–that’s what this blog is for! I joined primarily so I could contribute a piece to the UK Under the Dome contest, but I’ve already picked up a couple of followers just from a single tweet, so I can see how this thing works quickly. For the record, my snippet of Under the Dome is buried in the dead zone. Is that cryptic enough?

I’m hoping that John Lithgow gets to step into the spotlight a little more as season 4 of Dexter plays out. Up to this point, all we’ve seen is crazy, homicidal Trinity, and it will be interesting to see who he is when he’s not reenacting some trauma from his childhood. How does he fit into society? How has he gotten away with it for so long? I noticed that he poured something, presumably cremains, next to his second victim and also that the crime scene investigators didn’t seem to notice this fact. And Dexter has some splainin’ to do after his little bout of neighborhood vandalism.

A good episode of NCIS last night, although Tony seemed a little bit off for the first half hour. Like he was taking speed or something. Amped up to the max. The scenes between Gibbs and Ziva were especially good. I started to watch the LA episode, but lost interest fast. I wish there was a way to balance out the TV schedule. One show on Tuesday I like, one on Wednesday and about 14 on Thursday!

It’s supposed to be over 90° this afternoon. That’s just not right. Thankfully, a cold front is scheduled to arrive tomorrow or the day after to put us back where we belong.