What's In a Name?

In my line of work, you come across a lot of names.

My first foray into the land of cubedom had me at a desk, punching numbers into the 10-key pad while scanning the screen for certain codes to appear, over and over again in mind numbing repetition.

Well, not really mind numbing, actually, because your brain doesn't really go numb when forced to do work that doesn't really require it.

In fact, the book* I'm reading right now talks about an interesting phenomenon that occurs when people are stuck doing a task that, after awhile, requires very little active brainpower to sustain. In the story they talked about security--specifically, a guard whose job it is to sit outside an exit door and make sure that no one comes in that way. Inevitably, no matter how vigilant the guard is, he or she will be unable to maintain a state of alertness and someone will get by. It just isn't entertaining enough for your brain to scan for someone going upstream constantly, when so few actual incidents occur. The theory in the book is that it's not their fault. Their brains get rewired and they can't do it.

Literally, the neuron pathways that are being used for the boring, mundane or repetitive task get suborned into working for other parts of the brain even while carrying out the task they were originally signed up for. Neal Stephenson explained it much more hip manner via his character Richard in the book:


"The brain, as far as Richard could determine from haphazard skimming of whatever came up on Google, was sort of like the electrical system of Mogadishu. A whole lot was going on in Mogadishu that required copper wire for conveyance of power and information, but there was only so much copper to go around, and so what wasn't actively being used tended to get pulled down by militias and taken crosstown to beef up some power-hungry warlord's private, improvised power network. As with copper in Mogadishu, so with neurons in the brain. The brains of people who did unbelievably boring shit for a living showed dark patches in the zones responsible for job-related processes, since all those almost-never-exercised neurons got pulled down and trucked somewhere else and used to beef up the circuits used to keep track of NCAA tournament brackets and celebrity makeovers."


So you see, I can't be held entirely to blame that during my tenure as a data entry pusher, my brain would co-opt some neurons in favor of more hip and intriguing things.

Such as looking at the names on my reports and deciding which ones would be good character names in D&D or in a nebulous, unrealized, yet to be written novel.

First, last, middle, first middle, middle middle, it didn't matter--all were potential veins of name-ore that I could mine as I keyed furiously away. I discovered that I liked certain vowel combinations ("ae" "ai" and "ei" being my favs) and over time my list developed a certain cadence all its own. Many of the features in our Dungeons & Dragons Kortoe adventure world we created were given names from my list. One of the founders even had a name generator that would give you related-sounding names if you fed it some examples first. They ended up sounding very Greek-like, with names like Taephone and Aestrom.

The Big B doesn't know it yet, but when it comes time to name our children, some of my inspiration will be coming from this list as well. I already know this will be an epic battle for us, so I am prepared to get my fun in at the same time.

Maybe someday someone will see a name from the list, scratch their head, and say, "That's weird! This first name is my last name and it's not common, either. I wonder where that name came from."

I know I would wonder if I saw my maiden name used as a first name.

*The book is fantastic--Reamde by Neal Stephenson--and I highly suggest you check it out. It gets rolling slowly at first but when it gets going! whew! it gets going. I became a fan of Stephenson after reading Snow Crash, which not only can get you thinking, but is a rollicking funny read apart from anything else you could say about it. Oh, and it's also awesomely geeky, too.

What Happens When You Have a Crush On a Fictional Urban Fantasy Character?

I'm in serious crush with a character from one of my books.

Ack! How did this happen?

Is this normal? Is there some new psychological disease they're going to name after me, that describes when someone has a crush on an entirely fictional character and pines with unrequited (and un-requit-able) love?

A friend introduced me to the urban fantasy series by Jim Butcher awhile back and I've been hooked ever since.

The main protagonist, Harry Blackstone Copperfield Dresden, just happens to live in Chicago and is the only entry under "Wizard" in the phone book. (He does not do love potions).

He's seriously tall and lanky, old-fashioned when it comes to women and children, and a wiseass of the nth degree.

He has a cat named Mister who is the closest thing to a mountain lion in those parts. He has a humongous Foo dog named Mouse who is smarter than most people. He drives a battered and beat-up Volkwagen Beetle that at one point was blue, but due to various attacks by supernatural creatures has had some cosmetic and body work done and is now more colors than a My Little Pony.

One of his best friends is a talking skull named Bob with a penchant for porn and seedy romance novels.(He's actually a spirit of intellect who lives in the skull, but let's not mince the details).

Harry battles all the supernatural baddies who come to Chicago to cause mayhem. He often gets beat up, has his apartment attacked and is constantly running his mouth when he is out of options. This is in addition to somehow finding enough money to pay the rent on his apartment and office.

Frequently this wise-cracking magic wielder gets the raw end of the deal, but he always keeps his head and somehow manages to save the day.

How can you not love a hero like him?

He's gotten to:

• Hang out with and mouth off to archangels
• Be protected by an actual fairie godmother (not as fun as it sounds)
• Battle monkey-demons who fling actual flaming poo at him
• Tell the Alien from H.R. Giger/Alien movie fame to "Get away from her you BITCH!"
• Visit his own grave
• Ride a giant zombie T-rex re-animated by polka music
• Lead a legion of tiny fair folk wielding box-cutter weapons in return for paying them in pizza

On top of being one of the baddest-ass wizards around, he hangs out with a group of collegiate werewolves who keep their campus free of crime (supernatural and otherwise) and regularily plays Dungeons and Dragons with them.

If I weren't married already (and if he wasn't fictional) I'd be driving to Chicago to throw myself at him.

If you find yourself craving some light reading and enjoy urban fantasy (or hysterically funny wiseacre heroes who regularily engage in witty banter) I strongly suggest you pick up this series. It's the best urban fantasy I've read, ever, and is one of my top ten favorite series.

Which is saying a lot, if you've seen the state of my bookshelves at home.

*The book series should not be confused with the SyFy series of the same name. Yes, technically it's based off of the books, but the word  from other loyal Dresden fans who've seen it, it's blasphemous and evil to relate itself to the books.

Geek Girls Love HBO's "A Game of Thrones"

The Doll-House was full of geeks this weekend.

Sunday was, you guess it! the premier of HBO's adaptation of George R. R. Martin's epic fantasy series A Song of Ice and Fire.

I invited my nerd herd to join us in watching the premier, since here at the Doll-House we have HBO and a fairly large flatscreen (I think it's plenty big; but according to many of my nerd herd, it could be bigger). The Big B and I got hooked on HBO when we were fortunate enough to live with the cable guy. When all that cable stuff is free it's hard to stay away from it. Of course when I heard that GRR's series was being made into an HBO show, I patted myself on the back for having the good foresight to become addicted to HBO.

We had several couples come over and while the living room got fairly crowded, we all could sit and watch with enjoyment the opening episode of what has now become my new favorite obsession.

I don't want to spoil anything if you haven't seen it...but they did a tremendous job!

While we debated whether the actress playing Cersei was pretty enough, whether the Lannisters were flaxen-haired enough, and whether the child actors chosen to play the Stark children were too old or not, overall the mood was that it was an awesome start.

The fear with translating any book to film is that inevitably, things will be left out. With a series my hope is always that there is more "time" for all the really important and fun elements to remain faithful to the written word. I have been especially leery since watching the travesty that is The Legend of the Seeker, a TV show based upon one of my favorite series of books, The Sword of Truth.

The actor playing Richard isn't big enough to be Richard, but the woman who

plays Kahlan is fairly spot-on except for her blue eyes (they should be green like mine!)



Don't get me wrong, the show is decent. I like the choreography of the fight scenes, and it's killer that Kahlan kicks equal ass in them. If you've never read The Sword of Truth books it would be just fine. From the first episode, the series demolishes what the written series was actually about. It may say it has Richard, Kahlan, Zedd, Cara and other favorite characters, but they're not the characters I grew to love while reading the books. Do yourself a favor--watch the show, THEN read the books. If you read the books first, stay the hell away or you might find yourself having to buy a new TV after you smashed the one where Legend of the Seeker was just playing.

My hopes were much, much higher for HBO. I am an avid fan of True Blood, the HBO series based on the Sookie Stackhouse novels by Charlaine Harris. While not everything on the TV show was exactly like in the books and lately they've done some things with Sookie's fairy heritage that's irked me, I have to say they've done better at remaining true to the characters and world Charlaine Harris built than any book-to-screen translation I've seen since Peter Jackson's LOTR (and I'm still a little PO'd that Tom Bombadil didn't make the cut).

So I was really hoping that HBO wouldn't disappoint me with Game of Thrones, because while I love Sookie Stackhouse, epic fantasy is my bread-and-butter and to see this epic fantasy series trashed would make me sadder than someone stealing someone else's half-eaten Subway sandwich.

It didn't disappoint (much).

Maybe I'm too much of a stickler...is it possible for fans to be more passionate than the creator? I have to think that GRRM is okay with changes and things left out from his original books. I've never been involved with translating a novel to the screen and I'm sure there's all kinds of tricky things to figure out that causes stuff to be changed or left out from the original.

I'm probably being too harsh. My anxiety that viewers who haven't read the Song of Ice and Fire series may not "get" some of the scenes is most likely overkill. Who cares if the Night's Watch deserter wasn't up in a tree when his companions were killed? So Daenerys doesn't show the Dothraki people her horsemanship skills when Drogo presents the white filly to her. Will that change the way her character is perceived throughout the show?

Probably not. It remains to be seen how the rest of the episodes will showcase Daenerys and the rest of the characters in Westeros and beyond.

Lest you think I only have negative things to say about the premier, I want to assure that the percentage of what I drooled over versus what my bookworm inner self twitched over was strongly in favor of drooling.

The way the Wall was depicted? Exactly how I imagined it, only better!
The Iron Throne (even though we really didn't see it in the premier) was perfection. I had never been able to picture this in my mind's eye (entirely my fault, not George's!) and seeing it on the screen was a treat.
The dialogue and plot points weren't twisted beyond recognition, and in some cases were exactly word for word.
The opening credits was really neat--I liked the clockwork-like way the different cities on the map of Westeros were showcased.

I think everyone in the house was tempted to say the lines along with the show when Jaime Lannister stands in front of the tower window at the very end of the premier.

"The things I do for love"

*SIGH*

Now we have to wait a WEEK for the next episode? That's my remaining anxiety. I've decided not to worry about what little things have been altered, since the majority is better than I could have hoped for.

Not everyone loved the show however, as evidenced by this review in the New York Times.

I saw this after visiting Geek With Curves and reading her reaction to the article. Amy and her 70+ commentors put it well. I won't add much to what they've already eloquently said.

There are plenty of women out there who love so-called "boy fiction" and will watch this new show, not because of any "illictiness" or gratuitous sex, but rather because we're rabid fans and are excited to see Westeros come alive on the screen where before it lived only in our imaginations.

And that, my dear Ms. Bellafonte, is perhaps where you miss out the most. It is clear that what imagination you have is limited, as you are unable to conceive that there are women out there who do love swords and socerery fiction just because you haven't met one personally.

Gee, I wonder why. With a mind as open as that, if it was a parachute, you most certainly would be ker-splatted on the ground with how well it works.

The gender ratio of those at my house, excited to view this premier, was evenly split. Three out of the four women had read the entire series, and three out of four men had too.

I'd say those are pretty even odds!