color combos

Dear friends,

If you have chosen a color scheme for your LJ pages that involves, oh, say darkish grey text on a lightish grey background, pale blue text on a blue background, or white text on any color background, then, nothing personal, but I'm probably not going to read your pages. Maybe it looks better on your PC than my Mac, or maybe it's just me.

Well, I'll read the parts that appear on my Friends page, in staid black on white, but not the continues or comments. I have regretted this sometimes when I wanted to see where a discussion was going, but the color contrast (or lack thereof) deterred me.

Just sayin'.

Recent books

I just finished Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman and loved it. I laughed out loud several times. There were Lafferty-esque turns of phrases. Great concept, great plot, great writing. Did I mention I liked it? Yup, sure did.

OTOH, I just returned Air by Geoff Ryman to the library, having read about 100 pages then reading the final 30 or so as I sat in the library parking lot, wondering if I would regret returning it without finishing it. And no, I didn't. Sometimes skipping to the end of a book I'm not enjoying gives me enough incentive to push through whatever's bogging me down, but in this case it just made me glad I hadn't. But I'm sad, because I've enjoyed everything else I've read by him. Oh well.

I finally read a Lemony Snickett book. I've been meaning to for a while, especially after hearing people admiringly calling them subversive (a word which here means telling kids things that adults would prefer they didn't know). And I was charmed. I gather the charm wears off after a while, but I think I'll keep picking one up whenever I'm at the library for another book, just for a little mind candy.

Oh, and I finally read books 4 and 5 of Harry Potter. Need to rent the 3rd movie to view before the 4th one comes out. I actually liked The Goblet of Fire quite a bit. There was far less of the kids doing stupid things and not bothering to tell responsible adults than in previous books, for instance. Yes, there were still huge gaping plot holes and logical inconsistencies, but I thought it was much better than the previous 3. So the 5th one, well, what a let down. Had me tearing out my hair in annoyance per usual. Guess #4 was an aberration.