Micro was 1/3 complete when Michael Chrighton died. Someone else finished it. I didn’t see who. So… it’s terrible. The plot is OK, so it could make a decent movie. It’s basically the writing and the editing that are terrible. I don’t know how Crighton’s estate let this one out of the gates. Was it not edited at all? Like, at all at all? I’ve copied a few examples from pages 373-389:
Page 373:
They weren’t sure what had gotten into Danny. Perhaps he had become frightened, gone
into a panic, with his arm in such bad shape, and had decided to fly to Nanigen on his
own. It showed more courage than Danny seemed capable of.
Going “into a panic” shows “courage?”
Page 375:
“Little Danny was lying,” Drake muttered.
“About what?”
“About a cure for bends.” Lying to make me save him. Ha.
This bothered me perhaps more than anything. The authors dive in and out of perspectives. So this is an example of a character’s thoughts being written as part of the prose, without quotations or italicizing. Weird.
Page 376:
As Karen studied Rick’s bruises, it made her wonder what she looked like. I probably
look like I’ve been mugged, she thought.
OK here’s an example of someone’s thoughts being written with a “she thought” clause attached.
Page 380:
They began to run down the tunnel, but were hit with a blast of rushing air, hot and
soaked with fumes. Karen fell; Rick picked her up and started dragging her, but she
wrestled him away. But then she fell to her knees and collapsed. She seemed to have
fainted or something. He couldn’t see anything, and smoke had suddenly flooded the
tunnels.
I’m generally for liberal use of semi-colons, but this not… at all… a proper use of a semi-colon. Also, the two uses of “but” next to eachother reads really poorly. Also, “He couldn’t see anything”… Why? Were his eyes closed? Was it dark? Was something in his way? … “and smoke had suddenly flooded the tunnels.” Ohhh!!! Now I understand! Maybe something like “Smoke flooded the tunnels and Rick couldn’t see anything.”
Page 381:
Rourke fell back, coughing.
“Ben!” Karen screamed. She saw him fall to his knees, then stand up, and he waved them
on. “Go!”
This sure fucking looks like two people talking in one paragraph. Also, compound sentence: She saw him do this, then do that, and he did that. Two subjects.
Page 382:
He looked around: he had lost sight of Karen.
Ooh we also get improper usage of a colon. And weird usage.
Page 383:
The vehicle’s lights flashed past the far side of the crater and darkness closed in.
But the darkness wasn’t total, for the lights of Honolulu sparkled through the
branches.
I hate this use of “for.” It’s not poetry; it’s not Shakespeare. This really should be replaced with a semi-colon: “But the darkness wasn’t total; the lights of Honolulu sparkled through the branches.”
Page 384:
Rick thought Ben might have stood a chance. “I wouldn’t count that guy out.” But there
was no way of knowing if Ben had escaped or had died in the flames.
Then came the wait. The clocks in the instrument panels showed the time: 1:34 a.m. Dawn
would not come for many hours, but they couldn’t fly safely at night.
The trade wind was running strong, and the branch tossed and heaved like the deck of a
ship in a storm. She could see the bruises on her arms, dark stains in the moonlight.
Aside from “Then came the wait” and “The clocks… showed the time,” who is “she?” We appear to be following Rick’s thoughts (“Ben might have a good chance.”), and all of a sudden “She could see…” WTF?
Page 384 again.
He thought about the distance they had to cover at dawn. Fifteen miles, including a long
passage over Pearl Harbor, which was open water. He thought: It’s not possible. We’ll
never make it.
Here’s another way we’re portraying thoughts: with a colon!
Page 385.
It wound up the steep mountainside through guava forests, and came out at the lip of the
crater, and it followed the lip down through dips and gullies, washed out in several
places.
Another horrible run-on: It wound here, and came out here, and it followed this, washed out here.
Page 385-86:
There was no sign of Vin Drake’s car.
…
Eventually he reached a turnaround; still no sign of Drake’s truck.
Which is it, Bucko?
Page 386:
It was useless. He waited for a while, though, poking his finger into the soil, wondering
if there were survivors. It was too dark to see much, and they would be very small; he
worried he might crush somebody by accident.
But there weren’t any survivors, anybody could see that.
What do you mean, “anybody could see that?” I thought “it was too dark to see much.” He was “worried he might crush somebody,” even though “anybody could see” that “there weren’t any survivors?”
Page 389:
They told him. As Karen described Peter’s death, Eric’s palms hit the steering wheel,
throwing the micro-humans and the planes into the air. They came down amid choking dust
particles, and waited. They gave him time.
So… his palms “hit the steering wheel” as she described the death, which sent them flying… Did she ever finish the story?
Page 391.
Makele sucked on his lips. “The bots weren’t supposed to kill anybody.”
“So what went wrong?”
“The bots were reprogrammed. To kill.”
This could be turned into an Arrested Development-esque play-on-words:
Makele sucked on his lips. “The bots weren’t supposed to kill anybody.”
“So what went wrong?”
“The bots were reprogrammed. [dramatic pause] To kill anybody.”
Page 393.
“I will do a lot of things for seven million dollars, but there’s some things I won’t do.”
Aside from essentially saying “but there is something things I won’t do,” this is just an awful construction. “I will do at least one thing for seven million dollars, even some things. But there is also at least one thing I won’t do. Even some_ things I won’t do. There are probably even things that I haven’t even thought about, whether I would do them for seven million dollars.” It all just… sounds like Gob from Arrested Development to me.
Posted by Sam on Feb 07, 2012
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Neal Stephenson’s Cryptonomicon is taking a while to pick up speed… but there are some great quotes!
pg 120. One main character, Waterhouse, has been in Britain for a number of days, maybe weeks. He is trying to get to a meeting in a building he’s never been in:
“When he does get to the right floor, though, it is a big posher than the wrong one was. Of course, the underlying structure of everything in England is posh.
There is no in-between with these people. You have to walk a mile to find a telephone booth, but when you find it, it is built as if the senseless dynamiting
of pay phones had been a serious problem at some time in the past. And a British mailbox can presumably stop a German tank…”
pg 140. The same Waterhouse is trying to navigate British trains. He is disembarking a train:
“Waterhouse stands, plants his feet squarely, squats down in a sumo wrestler’s stance, and engages his duffel bag. Duffel appears to be winning as it seemingly pushes Waterhouse out the door of the train and onto the platform.”
Waterhouse continues to “engage” his duffel bag throughout the chapter. This is a very isolated humor. Most of the book is not humorous, and Duffel is never mentioned again. It’s very fun.
Posted by Sam on Jan 26, 2012
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This Slashdot article ends with:
“Firefox is now one of the most memory-efficient browsers in heavy usage.”
Wow. That is a profound statement. How many browsers are there in the world? Well, I suppose dozens, when you count those not in heavy use. So how many are “in heavy use?” StatCounter says that the following browsers have a greater than 6% share: Chrome 15, IE 8, Firefox 8, and IE 9. 4 browsers. But the quote isn’t about a specific version of Firefox, so we have to use this one instead, and change our list to IE, Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and, oh Hell, Opera has 1.98%, we’ll let them in.
5 Browsers. There are 5 “browsers in heavy usage” (greater than 1.97% market share). And Firefox is now one of the most memory-efficient among them. Does that put it in the… top 3? Top 2?
Is this interesting anymore? This is Jack Donaghy praising Liz Lemon with “Lemon numbers among my employees.”
fwiw.
Posted by Sam on Jan 17, 2012
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I’d like to document a scene I witnessed the other day on the Light Rail in Phoenix. I am, of course, biased one way, but I will try to describe the scene with some objectivity:
Part The-First-of-this-Scene
A man got onto the light rail car with a shopping cart. He was presumably homeless, avoided eye contact, and generally stared out the side of the car.
A few minutes later (literally… we sat there for at least two minutes), a Light Rail Conductor/Driver (?) entered our car through a different door:
Conductor: [loudly] Sir, you can't bring that onto the car.
[silence]
Conductor: [whistles] [loudly] You can't bring that onto the car. [whistles again]
[silence. The man with the cart continues to stare out the side of the car.]
One friend: [loudly] Guy with the shopping cart...
Another friend: [taps the man on the shoulder]
Man with the cart: [looks at the conductor]
Conductor: You can't have that in the car.
Man with the cart: [presses the door-open button several times, unsuccessfully.
Looks a little lost. Tries again.]
The doors open. The man leaves. The conductor leaves.
Part The-Second-of-this-Scene
My friends begin to denounce the conductor’s actions. I should give specifics, and try to be accurate.
Friend: [scoffs] That was so rude. Whistling?
Friend: I can't believe that!
Friend: He could have walked up to him, or tapped him on the shoulder...
addressed him as a human.
Friend: Can you believe that? " 'Boy...' "
Friend: " 'Boy...' " [laughes]
Friend: " 'you can't have that shopping cart here!' "
Friend: Did you see the shame in the man's eyes?
Friend: Um... I thought his face looked more like he'd been doing something else this
morning. [Alludes to drinking]
So… I think this is fascinating. I think it is a very interesting study on human characteristics. Nothing scientific or objective of course: My friends are largely a group of college-educated, left-leaning late-20-somethings. We were on our way to a bicycling/environmenty/beer festival, then some of us were hoping to participate in Occupy Phoenix, the Maker’s Fair, and an Oktoberfest. So, not really a diverse group.
Anyways, what I thought was interesting was the small piece where the conductor started out addressing the man “Sir,” and then my friend(s) (I honestly can’t remember how many or who) translated this into “boy”. I’ll be clear: The conductor said “Sir.” People denounced him for saying “boy.” This is a beautiful example of everyone (everyone) hearing what they want to hear.
Whether we are liberal, conservative, or even self-righteous-“I-don’t-blindly-vote-along-party-lines”, we hear what we want to hear.
I think this is also an example of people getting mad at hypothetical situations. People often show disgust at a simply-written, greedy banker in a fictional movie, or an overweight cop eating a donut, in a fictional movie. As if they were real people. As if the writer isn’t playing on a stereotype.
With the conductor, I think as soon as a judgement is made, we can make up our own ideas about him. “He whistled at that man. He wouldn’t even step near him. He might as well have called him "boy.” He hates homeless people. He’s probably a jerk husband. Yells at his kids. He’s a communist.“ And we can hate him more for these things we’ve just made up, and be more comfortable with ourselves.
Posted by Sam on Oct 19, 2011
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The university that I work at has a wildly popular newspaper, the Daily Wildcat. I
say “wildly popular” because many students use it to drown out their professors in
class. I’m not sure how popular it is amongst the staff or the faculty.
I never really got into the Wildcat, because the writing sucked. I decided to try
it again today while I waited on a bench for someone. I started with the cover
article,
NEW LIBRARY POLICY RAISES QUESTIONS
New curfew for non-UA students has some wondering about motives, but staff
says the change is not meant to curb resource use by the homeless
The article bounced all over the place, couldn’t focus on that title, did not back up different claims,
finished with a bizarre quote,
“We tell them they can’t sleep on University (Boulevard) and
Fourth (Avenue), we push them out of the parks, but we don’t provide them with
enough shelters or provide them with incentives to participate in jobs
programs,” said Michael Polakowski, associate professor in the School of
Government and Public Policy. “I guess our perspective is if you keep pushing
them (out) sooner or later they’ll get tired of being pushed.”
and more. I think my biggest beef with the articles in the Wildcat is the
journalist’s need to quote people, even if there is nothing good to quote. Here’s
one from this same article:
“Sometimes I’ll be trying to use the computers and there will be
people who aren’t students using the computers”, Smith said.
I’m sticking to NPR.
Posted by Sam on Sep 27, 2011
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