“A long time ago, one of our ancestors made a terrible mistake.
They disobeyed the authority. And that is what brought Dust into
the world. And ever since then, we’ve been sick. Sick with evil -
sick with Dust.”
~by Mrs. Coulter, The Golden Compass
===============================================
鄉民們，學著點，看看上面那句話，這才是「戰意十足」啊啊～～～
星期日, 10月 07, 2007
台灣角川，你又來了！
日前在誠品看到伊坂幸太郎的新書「天才搶匪盜轉地球」（陽気なギャングが地球を回す），翻了一下，覺得滿有趣的，回家之後就在誠品網路書店訂了一本。前天拿到書，昨天趁颱風天沒事拿起來看，突然，看到一句話：「......然而，人的恐懼也是由大腦裡的扁桃體負責記憶......」（p75）。扁桃體？大腦？記憶？唔，雖然當初唸解剖或是生理的時候都不太用功，再加上時隔多年，大腦的詳細解剖構造和分區功能早就（從一開始就）不復記憶。不過，我怎麼不記得大腦裡有個「扁桃體」？況且，我印象中的「扁桃體」是位在咽喉區域的淋巴組織，難不成在我不當學生的這幾年，生物醫學竟然發生了如此巨大的變化？
不信邪，把「扁桃體」用google搜尋，發現跟我的印象符合，至少第一頁的十個結果都是在講咽喉部的tonsil這個東西。那我手上的書上白紙黑字寫的，難道是伊坂幸太郎信口胡謅出來的嗎？不，雖然這本的基調有點戲謔，可是這麼冷的笑話－咽喉的扁桃腺跑到大腦裡－他應該是說不出來的。
一本翻譯小說出現文意不通的情形，如果不是作者的錯，那麼，就剩下翻譯的問題了...
把書翻過來，出版社－「台灣角川」...台灣角川...角川...唔，等等，我記得之前「青之炎」的出版社也是「台灣角川」，當時裡面也是出現了同樣把日文漢字名詞原封不動地搬做中文譯名（「心室細動」->「心室震顫」(ventricular fibrillation)）。難道，歷史又再度重演？
再仔細的查日文wiki裡面有關扁桃体的相關條目才發現，原來日文的扁桃体是「amygdala」，中文正式譯名是「杏仁體」，負責情感學習以及恐懼時的生理反應。
至此，真相大白。
他ｘ的角川，你又來了！！
不信邪，把「扁桃體」用google搜尋，發現跟我的印象符合，至少第一頁的十個結果都是在講咽喉部的tonsil這個東西。那我手上的書上白紙黑字寫的，難道是伊坂幸太郎信口胡謅出來的嗎？不，雖然這本的基調有點戲謔，可是這麼冷的笑話－咽喉的扁桃腺跑到大腦裡－他應該是說不出來的。
一本翻譯小說出現文意不通的情形，如果不是作者的錯，那麼，就剩下翻譯的問題了...
把書翻過來，出版社－「台灣角川」...台灣角川...角川...唔，等等，我記得之前「青之炎」的出版社也是「台灣角川」，當時裡面也是出現了同樣把日文漢字名詞原封不動地搬做中文譯名（「心室細動」->「心室震顫」(ventricular fibrillation)）。難道，歷史又再度重演？
再仔細的查日文wiki裡面有關扁桃体的相關條目才發現，原來日文的扁桃体是「amygdala」，中文正式譯名是「杏仁體」，負責情感學習以及恐懼時的生理反應。
至此，真相大白。
他ｘ的角川，你又來了！！
星期日, 9月 30, 2007
Truly, Madly, Guiltily
Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
Date of Publication: March 27, 2005 Sunday
Section 9; Column 1; Style Desk; MODERN LOVE; Pg. 11
By Ayelet Waldman
I HAVE been in many mothers' groups -- Mommy and Me, Gymboree, Second-Time Moms -- and each time, within three minutes, the conversation invariably comes around to the topic of how often mommy feels compelled to put out. Everyone wants to be reassured that no one else is having sex either. These are women who, for the most part, are comfortable with their bodies, consider themselves sexual beings. These are women who love their husbands or partners. Still, almost none of them are having any sex.
There are agreed upon reasons for this bed death. They are exhausted. It still hurts. They are so physically available to their babies -- nursing, carrying, stroking -- how could they bear to be physically available to anyone else?
But the real reason for this lack of sex, or at least the most profound, is that the wife's passion has been refocused. Instead of concentrating her ardor on her husband, she concentrates it on her babies. Where once her husband was the center of her passionate universe, there is now a new sun in whose orbit she revolves. Libido, as she once knew it, is gone, and in its place is all-consuming maternal desire. There is absolute unanimity on this topic, and instant reassurance.
Except, that is, from me.
I am the only woman in Mommy and Me who seems to be, well, getting any. This could fill me with smug well-being. I could sit in the room and gloat over my wonderful marriage. I could think about how our sex life -- always vital, even torrid -- is more exciting and imaginative now than it was when we first met. I could check my watch to see if I have time to stop at Good Vibrations to see if they have any exciting new toys. I could even gaze pityingly at the other mothers in the group, wishing that they too could experience a love as deep as my own.
But I don't. I am far too busy worrying about what's wrong with me. Why, of all the women in the room, am I the only one who has not made the erotic transition a good mother is supposed to make? Why am I the only one incapable of placing her children at the center of her passionate universe?
WHEN my first daughter was born, my husband held her in his hands and said, ''My God, she's so beautiful.''
I unwrapped the baby from her blankets. She was average size, with long thin fingers and a random assortment of toes. Her eyes were close set, and she had her father's hooked nose. It looked better on him.
She looked like a newborn baby, red and scrawny, blotchy faced and mewling. I don't remember what I said to my husband. Actually I remember very little of my Percocet- and Vicodin-fogged first few days of motherhood except for someone calling and squealing, ''Aren't you just completely in love?'' And of course I was. Just not with my baby.
I do love her. But I'm not in love with her. Nor with her two brothers or sister. Yes, I have four children. Four children with whom I spend a good part of every day: bathing them, combing their hair, sitting with them while they do their homework, holding them while they weep their tragic tears. But I'm not in love with any of them. I am in love with my husband.
It is his face that inspires in me paroxysms of infatuated devotion. If a good mother is one who loves her child more than anyone else in the world, I am not a good mother. I am in fact a bad mother. I love my husband more than I love my children.
An example: I often engage in the parental pastime known as God Forbid. What if, God forbid, someone were to snatch one of my children? God forbid. I imagine what it would feel like to lose one or even all of them. I imagine myself consumed, destroyed by the pain. And yet, in these imaginings, there is always a future beyond the child's death. Because if I were to lose one of my children, God forbid, even if I lost all my children, God forbid, I would still have him, my husband.
But my imagination simply fails me when I try to picture a future beyond my husband's death. Of course I would have to live. I have four children, a mortgage, work to do. But I can imagine no joy without my husband.
I don't think the other mothers at Mommy and Me feel this way. I know they would be absolutely devastated if they found themselves widowed. But any one of them would sacrifice anything, including their husbands, for their children.
Can my bad motherhood be my husband's fault? Perhaps he just inspires more complete adoration than other husbands. He cooks, cleans, cares for the children at least 50 percent of the time.
If the most erotic form of foreplay to a mother of a small child is, as I've heard some women claim, loading the dishwasher or sweeping the floor, then he's a master of titillation.
He's handsome, brilliant and successful. But he can also be scatterbrained, antisocial and arrogant. He is a bad dancer, and he knows far too much about Klingon politics and the lyrics to Yes songs. All in all, he's not that much better than other men. The fault must be my own.
I am trying to remember those first days and weeks after giving birth. I know that my sexual longing for my husband took a while to return. I recall not wanting to make love. I did not even want to cuddle. At times I felt that if my husband's hand were to accidentally brush against my breast while reaching for the saltshaker, I would saw it off with the butter knife.
Even now I am not always in the mood. By the time the children go to bed, I am as drained as any mother who has spent her day working, car pooling, building Lego castles and shopping for the precisely correct soccer cleat. I am also a compulsive reader. Put together fatigue and bookwormishness, and you could have a situation in which nobody ever gets any. Except that when I catch a glimpse of my husband from the corner of my eye -- his smooth, round shoulders, his bright-blue eyes through the magnification of his reading glasses -- I fold over the page of my novel.
Sometimes I think I am alone in this obsession with my spouse. Sometimes I think my husband does not feel as I do. He loves the children the way a mother is supposed to. He has put them at the center of his world. But he is a man and thus possesses a strong libido. Having found something to usurp me as the sun of his universe does not mean he wants to make love to me any less.
And yet, he says I am wrong. He says he loves me as I love him. Every so often we escape from the children for a few days. We talk about our love, about how much we love each other's bodies and brains, about the things that make us happy in our marriage.
During the course of these meandering and exhilarating conversations, we touch each other, we start to make love, we stop.
And afterward my husband will say that we, he and I, are the core of what he cherishes, that the children are satellites, beloved but tangential.
He seems entirely unperturbed by loving me like this. Loving me more than his children does not bother him. It does not make him feel like a bad father. He does not feel that loving me more than he loves them is a kind of infidelity.
And neither, I suppose, should I. I should not use that wretched phrase ''bad mother.'' At the very least, I should allow that, if nothing else, I am good enough. I do know this: When I look around the room at the other mothers in the group, I know that I would not change places with any of them.
I wish some learned sociologist would publish a definitive study of marriages where the parents are desperately, ardently in love, where the parents love each other even more than they love the children. It would be wonderful if it could be established, once and for all, that the children of these marriages are more successful, happier, live longer and have healthier lives than children whose mothers focus their desires and passions on them.
BUT even in the likely event that this study is not forthcoming, even in the event that I face a day of reckoning in which my children, God forbid, become heroin addicts or, God forbid, are unable to form decent attachments and wander from one miserable and unsatisfying relationship to another, or, God forbid, other things too awful even to imagine befall them, I cannot regret that when I look at my husband I still feel the same quickening of desire that I felt 12 years ago when I saw him for the first time, standing in the lobby of my apartment building, a bouquet of purple irises in his hands.
And if my children resent having been moons rather than the sun? If they berate me for not having loved them enough? If they call me a bad mother?
I will tell them that I wish for them a love like I have for their father. I will tell them that they are my children, and they deserve both to love and be loved like that. I will tell them to settle for nothing less than what they saw when they looked at me, looking at him.
Adapted from ''Because I Said So: 33 Mothers Write About Children, Sex, Men, Aging, Faith, Race and Themselves'' published by HarperCollins.
Date of Publication: March 27, 2005 Sunday
Section 9; Column 1; Style Desk; MODERN LOVE; Pg. 11
By Ayelet Waldman
I HAVE been in many mothers' groups -- Mommy and Me, Gymboree, Second-Time Moms -- and each time, within three minutes, the conversation invariably comes around to the topic of how often mommy feels compelled to put out. Everyone wants to be reassured that no one else is having sex either. These are women who, for the most part, are comfortable with their bodies, consider themselves sexual beings. These are women who love their husbands or partners. Still, almost none of them are having any sex.
There are agreed upon reasons for this bed death. They are exhausted. It still hurts. They are so physically available to their babies -- nursing, carrying, stroking -- how could they bear to be physically available to anyone else?
But the real reason for this lack of sex, or at least the most profound, is that the wife's passion has been refocused. Instead of concentrating her ardor on her husband, she concentrates it on her babies. Where once her husband was the center of her passionate universe, there is now a new sun in whose orbit she revolves. Libido, as she once knew it, is gone, and in its place is all-consuming maternal desire. There is absolute unanimity on this topic, and instant reassurance.
Except, that is, from me.
I am the only woman in Mommy and Me who seems to be, well, getting any. This could fill me with smug well-being. I could sit in the room and gloat over my wonderful marriage. I could think about how our sex life -- always vital, even torrid -- is more exciting and imaginative now than it was when we first met. I could check my watch to see if I have time to stop at Good Vibrations to see if they have any exciting new toys. I could even gaze pityingly at the other mothers in the group, wishing that they too could experience a love as deep as my own.
But I don't. I am far too busy worrying about what's wrong with me. Why, of all the women in the room, am I the only one who has not made the erotic transition a good mother is supposed to make? Why am I the only one incapable of placing her children at the center of her passionate universe?
WHEN my first daughter was born, my husband held her in his hands and said, ''My God, she's so beautiful.''
I unwrapped the baby from her blankets. She was average size, with long thin fingers and a random assortment of toes. Her eyes were close set, and she had her father's hooked nose. It looked better on him.
She looked like a newborn baby, red and scrawny, blotchy faced and mewling. I don't remember what I said to my husband. Actually I remember very little of my Percocet- and Vicodin-fogged first few days of motherhood except for someone calling and squealing, ''Aren't you just completely in love?'' And of course I was. Just not with my baby.
I do love her. But I'm not in love with her. Nor with her two brothers or sister. Yes, I have four children. Four children with whom I spend a good part of every day: bathing them, combing their hair, sitting with them while they do their homework, holding them while they weep their tragic tears. But I'm not in love with any of them. I am in love with my husband.
It is his face that inspires in me paroxysms of infatuated devotion. If a good mother is one who loves her child more than anyone else in the world, I am not a good mother. I am in fact a bad mother. I love my husband more than I love my children.
An example: I often engage in the parental pastime known as God Forbid. What if, God forbid, someone were to snatch one of my children? God forbid. I imagine what it would feel like to lose one or even all of them. I imagine myself consumed, destroyed by the pain. And yet, in these imaginings, there is always a future beyond the child's death. Because if I were to lose one of my children, God forbid, even if I lost all my children, God forbid, I would still have him, my husband.
But my imagination simply fails me when I try to picture a future beyond my husband's death. Of course I would have to live. I have four children, a mortgage, work to do. But I can imagine no joy without my husband.
I don't think the other mothers at Mommy and Me feel this way. I know they would be absolutely devastated if they found themselves widowed. But any one of them would sacrifice anything, including their husbands, for their children.
Can my bad motherhood be my husband's fault? Perhaps he just inspires more complete adoration than other husbands. He cooks, cleans, cares for the children at least 50 percent of the time.
If the most erotic form of foreplay to a mother of a small child is, as I've heard some women claim, loading the dishwasher or sweeping the floor, then he's a master of titillation.
He's handsome, brilliant and successful. But he can also be scatterbrained, antisocial and arrogant. He is a bad dancer, and he knows far too much about Klingon politics and the lyrics to Yes songs. All in all, he's not that much better than other men. The fault must be my own.
I am trying to remember those first days and weeks after giving birth. I know that my sexual longing for my husband took a while to return. I recall not wanting to make love. I did not even want to cuddle. At times I felt that if my husband's hand were to accidentally brush against my breast while reaching for the saltshaker, I would saw it off with the butter knife.
Even now I am not always in the mood. By the time the children go to bed, I am as drained as any mother who has spent her day working, car pooling, building Lego castles and shopping for the precisely correct soccer cleat. I am also a compulsive reader. Put together fatigue and bookwormishness, and you could have a situation in which nobody ever gets any. Except that when I catch a glimpse of my husband from the corner of my eye -- his smooth, round shoulders, his bright-blue eyes through the magnification of his reading glasses -- I fold over the page of my novel.
Sometimes I think I am alone in this obsession with my spouse. Sometimes I think my husband does not feel as I do. He loves the children the way a mother is supposed to. He has put them at the center of his world. But he is a man and thus possesses a strong libido. Having found something to usurp me as the sun of his universe does not mean he wants to make love to me any less.
And yet, he says I am wrong. He says he loves me as I love him. Every so often we escape from the children for a few days. We talk about our love, about how much we love each other's bodies and brains, about the things that make us happy in our marriage.
During the course of these meandering and exhilarating conversations, we touch each other, we start to make love, we stop.
And afterward my husband will say that we, he and I, are the core of what he cherishes, that the children are satellites, beloved but tangential.
He seems entirely unperturbed by loving me like this. Loving me more than his children does not bother him. It does not make him feel like a bad father. He does not feel that loving me more than he loves them is a kind of infidelity.
And neither, I suppose, should I. I should not use that wretched phrase ''bad mother.'' At the very least, I should allow that, if nothing else, I am good enough. I do know this: When I look around the room at the other mothers in the group, I know that I would not change places with any of them.
I wish some learned sociologist would publish a definitive study of marriages where the parents are desperately, ardently in love, where the parents love each other even more than they love the children. It would be wonderful if it could be established, once and for all, that the children of these marriages are more successful, happier, live longer and have healthier lives than children whose mothers focus their desires and passions on them.
BUT even in the likely event that this study is not forthcoming, even in the event that I face a day of reckoning in which my children, God forbid, become heroin addicts or, God forbid, are unable to form decent attachments and wander from one miserable and unsatisfying relationship to another, or, God forbid, other things too awful even to imagine befall them, I cannot regret that when I look at my husband I still feel the same quickening of desire that I felt 12 years ago when I saw him for the first time, standing in the lobby of my apartment building, a bouquet of purple irises in his hands.
And if my children resent having been moons rather than the sun? If they berate me for not having loved them enough? If they call me a bad mother?
I will tell them that I wish for them a love like I have for their father. I will tell them that they are my children, and they deserve both to love and be loved like that. I will tell them to settle for nothing less than what they saw when they looked at me, looking at him.
Adapted from ''Because I Said So: 33 Mothers Write About Children, Sex, Men, Aging, Faith, Race and Themselves'' published by HarperCollins.
星期三, 9月 19, 2007
The Oath of Night's Watch
"Night gathers, and now my watch begins.
It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children.
I shall wear no crowns and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post.
I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls.
I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men.
I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come."
It shall not end until my death. I shall take no wife, hold no lands, father no children.
I shall wear no crowns and win no glory. I shall live and die at my post.
I am the sword in the darkness. I am the watcher on the walls.
I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn that wakes the sleepers, the shield that guards the realms of men.
I pledge my life and honor to the Night's Watch, for this night and all the nights to come."
~"The Song of Ice and Fire", by George R. R. Martin
星期三, 9月 12, 2007
JOJO on CELL!!
這.這這這...這太酷啦！！
JOJO冒險野郎的作者竟然替CELL期刊畫封面！！
Cover Caption
On the cover: Presynaptic plasticity is a fundamental, yet poorly understood, neural phenomenon that is thought to be the basis of learning and memory. In this issue, Yao et al. (pp. 943–957) identify a novel ubiquitin ligase named SCRAPPER, which is responsible for tuning of synaptic vesicle release probability. SCRAPPER ubiquitinates presynaptic active zone protein RIM1, triggering its proteasomal degradation. Neurons from the Scrapper-knockout mice have hyper electrophysiological activity and contained increased amount of RIM1, and these phenotypes could be rescued by re-expression of SCRAPPER or knockdown of RIM1. The results highlight the importance of protein degradation in the regulation of synaptic activity in vivo. On the cover, the purple SCRAPPER humanoid is putting blue heart-shaped ubiquitins on the red RIM creatures. Japanese manga artist Hirohiko Araki created the cover image with scientific direction from Drs. Setou and Ageta.
JOJO冒險野郎的作者竟然替CELL期刊畫封面！！
Cover Caption
On the cover: Presynaptic plasticity is a fundamental, yet poorly understood, neural phenomenon that is thought to be the basis of learning and memory. In this issue, Yao et al. (pp. 943–957) identify a novel ubiquitin ligase named SCRAPPER, which is responsible for tuning of synaptic vesicle release probability. SCRAPPER ubiquitinates presynaptic active zone protein RIM1, triggering its proteasomal degradation. Neurons from the Scrapper-knockout mice have hyper electrophysiological activity and contained increased amount of RIM1, and these phenotypes could be rescued by re-expression of SCRAPPER or knockdown of RIM1. The results highlight the importance of protein degradation in the regulation of synaptic activity in vivo. On the cover, the purple SCRAPPER humanoid is putting blue heart-shaped ubiquitins on the red RIM creatures. Japanese manga artist Hirohiko Araki created the cover image with scientific direction from Drs. Setou and Ageta.
星期五, 7月 20, 2007
To All that was lost and all that was found
"Reading a book is not selfish. Private, but not selfish at all. You have to surrender something to enter the world of the book and merge the world of the book and the world where you stand into each other."
~John Connolly, speech in Book Reading and Signing of《The Book of Lost Things》at Eslite Bookstore.
本日戰利品 XDD
以下是簽書會實況...
除了簽書還提供合照服務...
邊簽書還邊跟讀者哈拉...
John Connolly真是很可愛，可愛到一個不行～～
而且聲音超好聽，很有磁性，不知道是不是每個愛爾蘭人講話都這麼好聽？
感謝麥田的活動攝影
Guess who is in the following pictures?
~John Connolly, speech in Book Reading and Signing of《The Book of Lost Things》at Eslite Bookstore.
本日戰利品 XDD
以下是簽書會實況...
除了簽書還提供合照服務...
邊簽書還邊跟讀者哈拉...
John Connolly真是很可愛，可愛到一個不行～～
而且聲音超好聽，很有磁性，不知道是不是每個愛爾蘭人講話都這麼好聽？
感謝麥田的活動攝影
Guess who is in the following pictures?
星期六, 7月 14, 2007
伊嵐翠旅遊導覽手冊
歡迎，歡迎各位不遠千里來到歐沛倫中最美麗，也最偉大的城市－伊嵐翠。在下不才，是各位本次導覽的領隊，迦拉旦，負責向各位介紹伊嵐翠中各種風土民情。
此次我亞瑞倫王國為表示對各位的歡迎，本來計畫由國王陛下偕同皇后親自接見各位，可是不巧國王夫婦必須回到泰歐德省親，所以就由我－迦拉旦－負責擔任導覽人，可了？
首先，各位見到的閃閃發亮的建築物是伊嵐翠的城牆，建造年代不明，上面所雕刻的花紋據稱是當初建造時用依照古老的符文魔法刻上的。有興趣的話，各位之後可以由外圍的階梯登上城牆，一覽伊嵐翠的風采。
各位現在所在的地點是伊嵐翠的市場區，曾經是我亞瑞倫，不，全歐沛倫上最大的貨物集散地，不過之前因為「災罰」的關係而傾頹並沈寂了一陣子，目前我亞瑞倫正在積極重建此處，希望在不久的將來能夠回復往日的榮景。
對了，在這裡要提醒各位，由於「災罰」的關係，目前伊嵐翠各處仍存在許多的古代符文，雖然國王陛下已召集專家學者解讀出部分符文文義，大部分的符文功效仍然不明，請各位看到符文印記不要太好奇……穌雷，小心！呃，來不及了……各位，剛剛那位朋友不小心碰到的是傳送符文提亞（Tia），按照這個符文的尺寸大小，現在那位朋友應該在泰歐德國境內，不過不用擔心，泰歐德與我國有互惠協定，持本國簽證一樣可在當地通行，而泰歐德與我國交通方便，那位朋友如果想的話，坐個十天半個月的船應該就可以回來了。
各位現在在路邊看到的金色漂浮物，名為侍靈（Seon），是當初「災罰」後先人所遺留下來忘記帶走的，目前負責遠距離通信，打到哪都碼ㄟ通喔，各位有興趣的話可以試試看。不過它們不是什麼伊嵐翠吉祥物，請各位不要拍打餵食，謝謝合作。至於它們的製造方式以及通信原理，這有關神學方面的問題，有興趣的朋友請科拉熙或德瑞熙樞機主祭，我相信各位一定可以從那兩位大人身上得到截然不同的解答。
最後提醒各位一點，在各位遊覽的時候，請勿隨便相信無照營業的治療師或是路邊商家誇大不實的廣告宣傳，例如：「你給我30秒，我給你全世界」，或是「6分鐘解決你「下半身」的苦惱」，等等。無照治療師因為沒有通過國家考試，效力沒有保證，請各位看到我左手指的那位朋友，他就是最好的例證。他當初就是誤信無照治療師，結果讓他變成長短腳，不幸的是，該名無照治療師目前仍然在逃，無法針對當初畫下的符文做出正確的消解符文，所以那位朋友目前只能先穿著單腳矮子樂來平衡長短腳所造成的差異。我亞瑞倫政府已加強取締，希望能藉此打擊無照營業的治療師或黑心商家，使各位能夠在伊嵐翠放心消費。
本次的導覽到這裡告一段落，謝謝各位的參加，各位在離開時可以至城門處領取紀念品一份，內有著一條麵包、一點乾枯的蔬菜、半把玉米粒和一小瓶的葡萄酒。
謝謝各位，期待各位再度光臨。
此次我亞瑞倫王國為表示對各位的歡迎，本來計畫由國王陛下偕同皇后親自接見各位，可是不巧國王夫婦必須回到泰歐德省親，所以就由我－迦拉旦－負責擔任導覽人，可了？
首先，各位見到的閃閃發亮的建築物是伊嵐翠的城牆，建造年代不明，上面所雕刻的花紋據稱是當初建造時用依照古老的符文魔法刻上的。有興趣的話，各位之後可以由外圍的階梯登上城牆，一覽伊嵐翠的風采。
各位現在所在的地點是伊嵐翠的市場區，曾經是我亞瑞倫，不，全歐沛倫上最大的貨物集散地，不過之前因為「災罰」的關係而傾頹並沈寂了一陣子，目前我亞瑞倫正在積極重建此處，希望在不久的將來能夠回復往日的榮景。
對了，在這裡要提醒各位，由於「災罰」的關係，目前伊嵐翠各處仍存在許多的古代符文，雖然國王陛下已召集專家學者解讀出部分符文文義，大部分的符文功效仍然不明，請各位看到符文印記不要太好奇……穌雷，小心！呃，來不及了……各位，剛剛那位朋友不小心碰到的是傳送符文提亞（Tia），按照這個符文的尺寸大小，現在那位朋友應該在泰歐德國境內，不過不用擔心，泰歐德與我國有互惠協定，持本國簽證一樣可在當地通行，而泰歐德與我國交通方便，那位朋友如果想的話，坐個十天半個月的船應該就可以回來了。
各位現在在路邊看到的金色漂浮物，名為侍靈（Seon），是當初「災罰」後先人所遺留下來忘記帶走的，目前負責遠距離通信，打到哪都碼ㄟ通喔，各位有興趣的話可以試試看。不過它們不是什麼伊嵐翠吉祥物，請各位不要拍打餵食，謝謝合作。至於它們的製造方式以及通信原理，這有關神學方面的問題，有興趣的朋友請科拉熙或德瑞熙樞機主祭，我相信各位一定可以從那兩位大人身上得到截然不同的解答。
最後提醒各位一點，在各位遊覽的時候，請勿隨便相信無照營業的治療師或是路邊商家誇大不實的廣告宣傳，例如：「你給我30秒，我給你全世界」，或是「6分鐘解決你「下半身」的苦惱」，等等。無照治療師因為沒有通過國家考試，效力沒有保證，請各位看到我左手指的那位朋友，他就是最好的例證。他當初就是誤信無照治療師，結果讓他變成長短腳，不幸的是，該名無照治療師目前仍然在逃，無法針對當初畫下的符文做出正確的消解符文，所以那位朋友目前只能先穿著單腳矮子樂來平衡長短腳所造成的差異。我亞瑞倫政府已加強取締，希望能藉此打擊無照營業的治療師或黑心商家，使各位能夠在伊嵐翠放心消費。
本次的導覽到這裡告一段落，謝謝各位的參加，各位在離開時可以至城門處領取紀念品一份，內有著一條麵包、一點乾枯的蔬菜、半把玉米粒和一小瓶的葡萄酒。
謝謝各位，期待各位再度光臨。
星期一, 7月 09, 2007
The Pilgrimage to the Dark Tower
這絕對不是一條容易的路。
中古世紀的歐洲，天主教徒要從羅馬到耶路撒冷是非常辛苦而且難以達成的，他必須要跋山涉水，歷經重重險阻，才能到達目的地。但是在當時的教徒心裡，他們還是認為值這種旅程是神聖的、不可取代的，也唯有經歷過這些苦難，那種他們所渴求的宗教神性才能發散出來，所以他們把這種必須歷經苦難、折磨，才能彰顯神性的歷程稱為pilgrimage：「天路歷程」。歷時195年的八次十字軍東征，是當時歐洲天主教徒的「天路歷程」；唐朝玄奘法師從長安隻身前往天竺取回657部佛經，也是「天路歷程」。
史蒂芬‧金的《黑塔》系列，描寫世界裡（故事的世界）最後一位槍客羅蘭，找尋世界上（或許是所有的世界，當然也包含我們的這個世界）的一種存在，一種關鍵，所有存在的連接之處：「黑塔」。第一集「槍客」描寫的就是羅蘭在荒漠中追尋自己的使命，歷經被背叛與背叛，目標是一個黑衣人，而從黑衣人身上才能找到前往「黑塔」的關鍵。而羅蘭的世界「時間」不是等速前進的，讓羅蘭（也讓身為讀者的我們）無法確定一覺醒來，是過了一小時、一天，還是一個禮拜？第一集的敘事方式也因此是片段的、不連續的。無可否認的，第一集對我來說是一本閱讀門檻比較高的小說，在閱讀的時候，我必須時時確認羅蘭在哪裡做了什麼事，而往往一個分心閃神，我就跟羅蘭一樣，迷失在尋找黑塔的路程中，惶惶不可終日。第二集「三張牌」就好了很多，至少我的閱讀速度比起第一集快得多（很多！）。第二集裡羅蘭必須要找到黑衣人用塔羅牌預言的「囚犯」、「陰影夫人」，還有「死神」（雖然死神不是來找羅蘭的）。而看完第二集以後，我想我就跟艾迪口中的羅蘭一樣，得到了「黑塔癮」。
史蒂芬‧金從1970開始撰寫《黑塔》系列，到最後一集《黑塔》出版大約歷時30年。他承認在一開始（或許現在還是）黑塔的名氣遠不如他自己其他的作品，例如：《末日逼近》（The Stand）。在他的創作過程中，一直保持（雖然間隔有點長）《黑塔》系列持續有作品出現，他也一直相信上帝會讓他有時間來完成《黑塔》系列。直到二十世紀末的一場車禍，讓史蒂芬‧金下定決心要完成羅蘭的故事。史蒂芬‧金對於車禍這件事是這麼說的：「……如果那天那輛撞我的車再大一點，或是撞的再正面一點，我想事情就會變成有人在喪禮上獻花致哀，而家屬答禮，然後羅蘭的故事就留在那裡，沒有完結，至少不會是我來完結。」
雖然我知道這麼說很不應該，可是我還是想說：「Thank God！」
我想，《黑塔》的故事不只是描寫羅蘭追尋黑塔的「天路歷程」，同樣也代表了史蒂芬‧金在他寫作生涯的「天路歷程」。史蒂芬‧金和羅蘭一樣都在創作／尋找「黑塔」的路上，找到了他們心中的那一塊神聖而不可取代的地方。
同步刊載於PTT book板、Fantasy板，以及我的部落格
http://akirajacky.blogspot.com
中古世紀的歐洲，天主教徒要從羅馬到耶路撒冷是非常辛苦而且難以達成的，他必須要跋山涉水，歷經重重險阻，才能到達目的地。但是在當時的教徒心裡，他們還是認為值這種旅程是神聖的、不可取代的，也唯有經歷過這些苦難，那種他們所渴求的宗教神性才能發散出來，所以他們把這種必須歷經苦難、折磨，才能彰顯神性的歷程稱為pilgrimage：「天路歷程」。歷時195年的八次十字軍東征，是當時歐洲天主教徒的「天路歷程」；唐朝玄奘法師從長安隻身前往天竺取回657部佛經，也是「天路歷程」。
史蒂芬‧金的《黑塔》系列，描寫世界裡（故事的世界）最後一位槍客羅蘭，找尋世界上（或許是所有的世界，當然也包含我們的這個世界）的一種存在，一種關鍵，所有存在的連接之處：「黑塔」。第一集「槍客」描寫的就是羅蘭在荒漠中追尋自己的使命，歷經被背叛與背叛，目標是一個黑衣人，而從黑衣人身上才能找到前往「黑塔」的關鍵。而羅蘭的世界「時間」不是等速前進的，讓羅蘭（也讓身為讀者的我們）無法確定一覺醒來，是過了一小時、一天，還是一個禮拜？第一集的敘事方式也因此是片段的、不連續的。無可否認的，第一集對我來說是一本閱讀門檻比較高的小說，在閱讀的時候，我必須時時確認羅蘭在哪裡做了什麼事，而往往一個分心閃神，我就跟羅蘭一樣，迷失在尋找黑塔的路程中，惶惶不可終日。第二集「三張牌」就好了很多，至少我的閱讀速度比起第一集快得多（很多！）。第二集裡羅蘭必須要找到黑衣人用塔羅牌預言的「囚犯」、「陰影夫人」，還有「死神」（雖然死神不是來找羅蘭的）。而看完第二集以後，我想我就跟艾迪口中的羅蘭一樣，得到了「黑塔癮」。
史蒂芬‧金從1970開始撰寫《黑塔》系列，到最後一集《黑塔》出版大約歷時30年。他承認在一開始（或許現在還是）黑塔的名氣遠不如他自己其他的作品，例如：《末日逼近》（The Stand）。在他的創作過程中，一直保持（雖然間隔有點長）《黑塔》系列持續有作品出現，他也一直相信上帝會讓他有時間來完成《黑塔》系列。直到二十世紀末的一場車禍，讓史蒂芬‧金下定決心要完成羅蘭的故事。史蒂芬‧金對於車禍這件事是這麼說的：「……如果那天那輛撞我的車再大一點，或是撞的再正面一點，我想事情就會變成有人在喪禮上獻花致哀，而家屬答禮，然後羅蘭的故事就留在那裡，沒有完結，至少不會是我來完結。」
雖然我知道這麼說很不應該，可是我還是想說：「Thank God！」
我想，《黑塔》的故事不只是描寫羅蘭追尋黑塔的「天路歷程」，同樣也代表了史蒂芬‧金在他寫作生涯的「天路歷程」。史蒂芬‧金和羅蘭一樣都在創作／尋找「黑塔」的路上，找到了他們心中的那一塊神聖而不可取代的地方。
同步刊載於PTT book板、Fantasy板，以及我的部落格
http://akirajacky.blogspot.com
星期六, 7月 07, 2007
星期日, 5月 27, 2007
His Dark Materials - The Golden Compass
The Aletheometer is coming. Beware, the enemy of the heir...
The official site
http://www.goldencompassmovie.com/
Casting:
Lyra Belacqua: Dakota Blue Richards
Mrs. Coulter: Nicole Kidman (dreams come ture!!)
Lord Asriel: Daniel Craig (James Bond [Casino Royale])
Serafina Pekkala: Eva Green (Bond girl [Casino Royale])
(Bond and Bond girl meet at the Arctic again...cool)
Lee Scoresby: Sam Elliott
Iorek Byrnison: CG...(XD)
The official site
http://www.goldencompassmovie.com/
Casting:
Lyra Belacqua: Dakota Blue Richards
Mrs. Coulter: Nicole Kidman (dreams come ture!!)
Lord Asriel: Daniel Craig (James Bond [Casino Royale])
Serafina Pekkala: Eva Green (Bond girl [Casino Royale])
(Bond and Bond girl meet at the Arctic again...cool)
Lee Scoresby: Sam Elliott
Iorek Byrnison: CG...(XD)
星期六, 5月 12, 2007
政策未落實 未來3年 半數生技畢業生沒頭路
中國時報 2007.04.09
李宗祐/台北報導
生物科技相關領域系所學生還沒畢業，就有超過半數的人可能找不到工作！行政院科技顧問組統計調查，國內生物科技產業今年起到2009年，每年人力需求逐年下降，還不到各大學院相關系所畢業人數的一半，供過於求嚴重。(全文連結)
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歸去來兮～田園將蕪 胡不歸～～
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