Wednesday, February 29, 2012

2012 February Reading List

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome – This book was such a giggle! Sure, it has some slow parts and you get to learn quite a bit about traveling by boat, but it was a wonderful experience as a whole. 4/5 stars

The Confession by John Grisham - Is it just me or Grisham’s books used to be much more fun in the 90’s? I did not like this one. 2/5 stars

The Demolished Man by Alfred Bester – After the disappointed with “The Stars are My Destination”, I was a bit reluctant to start on another Bester book. Luckily, it’s a better read once you get into the story. 3/5 stars

A Dance of Dragons by George R. R. Martin – I’ve had this one since before Christmas, but then I only read the prologue and let Dad have a go at it first. The problem was that I didn’t like “A Feast of Crowe” and the reviews for “A Dance of Dragons” weren’t that encouraging either. My fears turned out to be true. The book introduces tons of characters I couldn’t care less about, and barely mentions the ones that matter to me. In +1000, pages almost nothing important happens. The plot advances with the speed of a snail, any slower than that and it would go backward. The read is long and boring like a cooking book. Wait, it is a cooking book! Only because even when the plot sucks Martin still manages to write good prose I’ll give it 4/5 stars. (It’s more like 3 stars if you ask me.) Rant over.

The problem with the above mentioned book is that it’s hard to find something to read after Martin and enjoy it too. The solution is to make a complete change and go in a different direction, and this is what I did. Now I kick myself for having not read Truckers, Diggers, and Wings by Terry Pratchett 4 or 5 years ago when I first got the books. The Bromeliad trilogy is so much fun! 4/5 stars

Sunday, February 26, 2012

Steampunk - Galileo Awards 2012 Winner

"Steampunk: A doua revolutie" has won the Galileo Award 2012 for Best Romanian Anthology published in 2010-2011.

Miss Vu is beaming with pride and wants to go for another ride! :)

Read full announcement here.

Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Cyril Niccolai - I Belong to you (The Fairchilds)



Lovely song... I especially like the way this verse sounds:

"You know my love for you is blind"

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

It's Been 10 Years

Forget Valentine's Day! Today we're celebrating the tenth anniversary of Alexei Yagudin's perfect Olympic win in Salt Lake City. Remember this? Can you watch and not feel in love? :)

2002 Olympic Games SP - Winter




2002 Olympic Games FP - The Man in the Iron Mask





2002 Olympic Games Medal Ceremony




2002 Olympic Games EX - Overcome



More videos at http://ayunofficial.allalla.com

Sunday, February 12, 2012

2012 Four Continents

Colorado Spring, CO, USA
7-12.02.2012

Full Results

Men

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Patrick CHAN

CAN
273.9411
2Daisuke TAKAHASHI

JPN
244.3332
3Ross MINER

USA
223.2364
4Adam RIPPON

USA
221.5573
5Takahito MURA

JPN
217.1626
6Denis TEN

KAZ
210.0357
7Tatsuki MACHIDA

JPN
208.04410
8Kevin REYNOLDS

CAN
203.2695
9Misha GE

UZB
196.53118
10Jinlin GUAN

CHN
196.53109


Ladies

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Ashley WAGNER

USA
192.4121
2Mao ASADA

JPN
188.6212
3Caroline ZHANG

USA
176.1843
4Kanako MURAKAMI

JPN
169.3235
5Kexin ZHANG

CHN
162.5954
6Agnes ZAWADZKI

USA
157.2366
7Amelie LACOSTE

CAN
147.6578
8Cynthia PHANEUF

CAN
147.4787
9Haruka IMAI

JPN
134.49119
10Min-Jeong KWAK

KOR
130.52910


Pairs

FPl.NameNationPointsSPFS
1Wenjing SUI / Cong HAN

CHN
201.8311
2Caydee DENNEY / John COUGHLIN

USA
185.4222
3Mary Beth MARLEY / Rockne BRUBAKER

USA
178.8933
4Meagan DUHAMEL / Eric RADFORD

CAN
171.7684
5Narumi TAKAHASHI / Mervin TRAN

JPN
171.1145
6Amanda EVORA / Mark LADWIG

USA
167.9956
7Paige LAWRENCE / Rudi SWIEGERS

CAN
158.6667
8Jessica DUBE / Sebastien WOLFE

CAN
154.7978
9Yue ZHANG / Lei WANG

CHN
140.24109
10Huibo DONG / Yiming WU

CHN
137.91910


Ice Dance

FPl.NameNationPointsSDFD
1Tessa VIRTUE / Scott MOIR

CAN
182.8421
2Meryl DAVIS / Charlie WHITE

USA
179.4012
3Kaitlyn WEAVER / Andrew POJE

CAN
163.2633
4Maia SHIBUTANI / Alex SHIBUTANI

USA
158.2944
5Madison HUBBELL / Zachary DONOHUE

USA
129.2055
6Alexandra PAUL / Mitchell ISLAM

CAN
117.9767
7Xiaoyang YU / Chen WANG

CHN
115.0576
8Anna NAGORNYUK / Viktor KOVALENKO

UZB
107.6198
9Danielle OBRIEN / Gregory MERRIMAN

AUS
105.9189
10Corenne BRUHNS / Ryan VAN NATTEN

MEX
91.571010

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Rule 34 - Vampire Diaries Styles



It's way below freezing outside, so here's your Saturday morning porn to warm up... Just because Damon Salvatore exists, of course there'll be porn about him. After all, he must have shagged the entire female population of Mystic Falls by now. :P

Thursday, February 9, 2012

No Scifientland 2010/2011 Anthology

Mircea Coman announced on his blog that the Scifientland 2010/2011 Anthology project has been dropped. All I can say is too bad. Maybe next time. Until then, the table of contents is available here and all the stories can be read on-line.

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Venus Available on Elefant.ro

"Venus - Povestiri erotice science fiction" is available exclusively on Elefant.ro. The anthology is nominated for 2012 Galileo Awards and it includes my story "Adevarul din privire" so don't miss it!

Monday, February 6, 2012

Rule 34 - Supernatural Style



So Dean and 'Aunt Jenna' are getting it on to "You Shook Me All Night Long" by AC/DC soundtrack. Kudos to whoever removed the gore parts... because of course there has to be porn about it!

Wednesday, February 1, 2012

Story: An Hour of Love

Some of you might still remember this one, it's a story fitting this month's theme:

An Hour of Love