It’s been a weird, rough week in Seattle. The police violence against protesters came to a head, the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone (CHAZ) was formed, and then was renamed to the Capitol Hill Occupied Protest (CHOP) (a much better name). I can say from firsthand experience that the area feels very safe, and is much less violent than the police were previously. I hope that the space is able to achieve its goals of defunding the police, promoting anti-racism, and helping to get justice for Black victims of police crimes.
There’s been a lot more open discussion about the Black Lives Matter movement and protests at work, which I’m thankful for, but there’s still a lot of old white men acting defensive. I get the impression most folks at work haven’t yet made the leap from “Racism is bad” to “We need anti-racism”.
My workplace is taking Juneteenth as a day of learning and reflection. Hopefully I can do my small part to help educate.
In personal news, my Rain Wilds tank top is almost done!
I haven’t made a ton of progress lately because all I have left to do are the back straps and making straps, (as I have discovered) is NO FUN!
Flavors of the week:
Both “flavors” got 1 tbsp + 1 tsp of white sugar per liter.
I’ve only tried the mixed berry so far, but I really liked it! The boyfriend thinks it tastes “alcohol-y”, but I don’t personally taste it.
[finished] Biased. I really liked this book. The author, Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt, spoke very frankly about biases in general, but spent most of her time on racial bias. Dr. Eberhardt neither absolves those with bias of blame (“It’s not your fault - everyone has biases!”) nor comes off as preachy and fatalistic (“Everyone is biased and there’s nothing we can do about it!”). It brings both personal, emotional stories, and hard data to the table, but it doesn’t bring all the answers. Dr. Eberhardt didn’t explain how we can fully overcome our biases individually or as a society, but she did give me the motivation to keep trying.
[in-progress] The Subtle Knife on audiobook. I’m enjoying it about as much as the Golden Compass, but I’m just not the best at audiobooks. I’ve been listening while playing Stardew Valley on my Switch!
[in-progress] A Game of Thrones jointly with the boyfriend. I’ve gotten lots of questions on how we read together. Maybe we’re weirdos, but we physically read the book at the same time. It’s nice quality time together! I’m definitely the faster reader, but I take my time, sometimes going back to re-read or particularly interesting bits while waiting on him.
[in-progress] A Conspiracy in Belgravia. I’m almost done with this book and I’m actually enjoying it a lot more than the first book in the series. In the previous novel, I was struggling to keep track of the cast, which I usually don’t have any issue with. There haven’t been too many new characters introduced in this sequel, so I’ve really been able to get into it, and the not-so-subtle feminist themes.
[in-progress] The War for Kindness. I’ve only made a little progress on this one, probably because it’s an audiobook 😕 I’ll pick it up a bit more once I finish The Subtle Knife, which I’m rushing to beat the library due date on.
[in-progress] Ulysses. I made some discoveries that may increase my chances of finishing this one!
First, is the amazing re: Joyce podcast. While tragically, Frank Delaney passed away before being able to complete this monumental project, what exists of this podcast is an extremely comprehensive, accessible (sometimes) line-by-line annotative commentary of Ulysses. I like to sit down with my copy of the book, a pencil, headphones, and this YouTube playlist of all the 5-minute podcast episodes and take it all in. (Yes, I write all over my books.)
Next, this adorable 90’s-ish website (http://www.joyceproject.com/) with color-coded inline annotations to the book. This will be the next-best thing once I run out of re: Joyce podcast episodes.
Finally, the Wikibooks annotated version of Ulysses. I knew Wikibooks existed, but thought of it as just for textbooks, so I was delighted to discover this resource. In general, http://www.joyceproject.com/ seems to be more comprehensive, but there’s some non-overlapping info to be found here too.
This is going to be a long read!