The legendary immolation scene

I have spent the week in a strange variety of activities conducted through a haze of mild to moderate fatigue: 

• A miscellany of doctor and dentist appointments, each minor/inconsequential in its own right but cumulatively onerous (and I would say that the pharmacy at the Rite Aid on 110th and Broadway is the worst, except that I switched there a few years ago from the Duane Reade across the street because that one really and truly was the worst!); 
• a large amount of opera (about which more, perhaps, anon - final installment tomorrow); 
• and a lot of whacking of the zombie book review that would not die, though I think I have sent its final incarnation to my editor just now.  The issue closes today, so that is pretty much going to have to be it!  

Will be very glad to see the back of that one: those who review regularly know that some pieces come together beautifully in the first draft whereas others have to be monstrously hacked about and rewritten again and again.  Not for the first time, I wonder whether it really is a good idea for me to write reviews: I feel that though reviewing comes as a sort of side benefit of my main reading-and-writing skill set, it's not my true metier.  However it is likely that soon I will have forgotten the pains of this week and will accept whatever invitation next comes my way....

The activity that should loom larger on that list but that I'm very behind on: grading!  Must make some more headway today as grades for graduating seniors are due by the end of the day.

Read two very good novels around the edges, Heath Lowrance's demented and captivating The Bastard Hand and Lavie Tidhar's haunting Osama.  I can't recommend these two highly enough: really unusual and high-quality neo-noir in two quite different inflections, very good stuff.

Miscellaneous linkage:

"Glass Gem" corn.  (Via Elatia Harris.)

Charles Peterson has a long and dispiriting two-part piece at n+1 on the devastation of the research mission at the New York Public Library.

Hawkcam!  (Courtesy of Brent.)

Widely linked to already, but orangutans like iPads too...