Clean November

And then it was November. Hope everybody had a hap-hap-happy Halloween. My plastic pumpkin was filled to the brim with the hangover of the century. It was quite a party.

Here's a new Untrue Tales page to kick off November:

Karen Comes Clean page 15

So, this week I read The Thin Man by Dashiell Hammett.
























This was a goody. It's a classic private eye yarn featuring Nick and Nora Charles the crimefighting couple that would go on to be featured in a series of films although Hammet only wrote the one book about them (it was also the last book he wrote about anything, as it happens). Lots of snappy dialogue and cool characters and a very cool central mystery. It's interesting to read old-timey noir novels like this one from the thirties just for the evolution of language. It still feels pretty contemporary, but at one point Nora Charles has to ask her husband to explain what a "junkie" is. He tells her it's another word for "hophead" which clears everything up. It's also funny that Charles and his wife spend the lion's share of the short book waking up at noon and drinking their breakfast. They basically party their way through the mystery. Nick has a drink with practically every one he meets. But it's never presented as a problem. Nick doesn't even really seem particularly "hardboiled". He and his wife are just mostly merrily wasted through the whole thing. Funny.

Also finally saw Up this weekend. I wept like a schoolgirl through the first ten minutes where they show the life of the main guy with his wife. I'm a sentimental sucker for that kind of stuff.
The rest of the movie I thought was just okay. I liked everything well enough until they got to the jungle and the whole plot with the old explorer guy kicked into gear. I found all that chasing and running around kind of boring. I liked the one dog. I vastly preffered Wall-E and Monsters vs. Aliens to this one though.

Okeydokes, that's it for now. Here's a sketch:























Have a happy November!