More weather, and Film Festival, and gender-neutral to boot!

[vilakins]

More storms; this is shaping up to be a bad winter. (And have I mentioned recently how I feel about winter?) The gales yesterday were too strong for brollies (I tried the trusty gustbuster but it almost carried me away) and I got worried when the power browned out while I was cooking dinner. This time it was the North Shore who lost power; we were OK for once. However this morning we found that a neighbour's tree had come down in the night and we had to cut the thing up and haul it off the driveway before we could get our cars out. Luckily it missed the fence and house.

[Edit] The wind was up to 200kph last night. I just heard it peeled the roof off an apartment building here and took out power over a lot of the North Island; 20,000 houses are still without power. The streets are full of broken branches and our driveway had rubbish down it including a recycle bin from at least the far side of the road. [worries as lives on a hill]

This is also the month when they hold the International Film Festival. Why, I ask every year, do they do that in the depths of winter when the last thing I want to do is go out in the wet and cold to share a cinema with lots of people who have colds but are damned well going to use their tickets anyway? Sigh. I've booked for five films anyway, including Paprika on the strength of the wonderful Tokyo Godfathers, and the Ghibli Studio's Tales from Earthsea, based on one of Le Guin's books (the third, I think). I shall console myself for being forced out in this weather with coffee from Stark's Bar. :-P

It's the 11th here and look: no gendered pronouns! :-D We should be glad that's all English has though: other languages have gendered adjectives and nouns, and in Hebrew even the verbs are.

Comments

[snowgrouse.livejournal.com]

Finnish has no genders whatsoever, so I might as well just do a post in Finnish:). That can be annoying at times, though, because sometimes you will have to indicate the speaker with "the woman" or "the man", especially if translating from a language with gender pronouns, and if that doesn't draw attention to the gender, I don't know what does.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Yes, I know about Finnish. Every language should be like that, but I'm glad English is as neutral as it is. You can still conceal a character's gender in a story, and in job applications. :-)

[azdak.livejournal.com]

I love genders! I tired to learn Czech once, and that not only has three genders, it also subdivides the masculine gender into "animate" and "inanimate" (but this is a grammatical category so it doesn't exactly correspond to living/not living), and then subdivides the animate masculine according to whether the root consonant is "soft" or "hard". Then there are seven cases, all of which are marked by inflections carried directly on the noun, and of course the inflections vary by gender. You have to have mastered half the grammar book before you can say "Hello, Nic[INFL], what a nice[INFL] day{INFL]!"

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Eep. I'll stick with German. I love German.

[redstarrobot.livejournal.com]

I shall console myself for being forced out in this weather with coffee from Stark's Bar.

And I shall go with you.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Yay! It's good coffee too, even without Baniks serving it.

[hafren.livejournal.com]

Is it the Use No Gendered Pronouns day or something? I must use some in protest...

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

It is on the 11th. I didn't do it at work or anything, just here.

[glitterboy1.livejournal.com]

It was an idea from cangetmad, whose research has looked at gender and assumptions in language, and their effect on comprehension (which is a rotten explanation of it!). Hence the interest in the area. Anyway, the idea was to see, just for interest, how easy it would be spend a day without using gendered pronouns.

[mafiro.livejournal.com]

I wandered over because I wondered how you might be faring in Auckland's wild weather.

I see that while Le Guin isn't enthusiastic about Tales from Earthsea, at least she didn't give it the slating she gave the scifi channel mini-series.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

I'm cold and a bit battered. Our driveway was full of rubbish when I got home including someone's recycle bin that has crossed at least one street. :-(

They'll have doubtless changed the plot quite a bit as they did with Howl's Moving Castle but I still love the animation and invention. I do suspect Ged's white once again though. :-(

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

I'm not surprised you are sick of winter, it sound dreadful :0(

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

The wind was up to 200kph last night. I just heard it peeled the roof off an apartment building here and took out power over a lot of the North Island; 20,000 houses are still without power. The streets are full of broken branches and our driveway had rubbish down it including a recycle bin from at least the far side of the road.

And we live on a hill and therefore stick up a bit. :-P

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

that's might fast wind :0(

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Yeah, we've really been battered over the last week or so. I don't think the wind was that fast here though; it was further east.

And today's the proverbial calm after the storm: clear, sunny, still, and crispy cold. I could like winter if it was like this.

[imhilien.livejournal.com]

The storm was dreadful yesterday, wasn't it. :( I really feel sorry for the people up north who were flooded...

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Northland gets a lot of floods and damage. It was rather like the bad storm that hit up there at the end of my holiday. I'd still like to live up there though; it's warmer and they have a more relaxed lifestyle--well, when their houses aren't being swept away or filled with mud.

[glitterboy1.livejournal.com]

Eeep - I'm glad that there was no major damage from the neighbour's tree! It sounds like a bad time for some people.... *keeps fingers crossed for you*

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

So far we've been fine apart from the tree in the drive and a leak which we have a bucket hung under. I must buy a white bucket though; bright green does not suit the decor. ;-)

Today is lovely: sunny, clear, cold, and only a bit windy.

[jhall1.livejournal.com]

The wind was up to 200kph last night.

Eek! We had something like 160kph in October, 1987, and I find it hard to imagine what 40kph more thsn that must have been like.

I'd be interested to hear what you think of the Earthsea film (once you've seen it).

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

It was only 200kph in places east of here. But still: people have lost roofs, there are branches on the roads (a tree blocked the main road Greg's work's on) and one of my workplace's signs was found several blocks away.

We see the Earthsea film on Saturday. I think Ged might be white in it going by the poster, but it has to be better than the US series. BTW they can't see this film there till 2009 because of that series holding the rights to Earthsea on screen or something. I'm sure I'll like it though, even if they change the story; Ghibli make excellent animes.