2014 book: Treasure Planet (Man-Kzin Wars)

Treasure Planet (Man-Kzin Wars) by Hal Colebatch and Jessica Q Fox
(Book received free for review from Baen Books.)
Rating: 2/disliked (1-5/hated-loved)

I'm tired of books where all females are submissive, less than male characters, and usually stupid as well.

In the last book I read, Exiled: Memoirs of a Camel, every female camel was submissive nearly to the point of saying only "Yes, (name)" and "No, (name)". The male main character camel even stated if the females were anything but so submissive, there would be no use for males.

Treasure Planet had the bad luck of being the next book I read. A few posts back I commented that I had read some Man-Kzin books as a kid and wanted to see what I thought of them now, but I think I got my cat aliens mixed up; I think I had been thinking of the Pride of Chanur books. In Kzin, the female characters are literally animals -- they rub and purr and act like housecats to their mates. In Chanur, it's females who go spacefaring, the males are thought to be too wild and uncontrollable to be permitted on spaceships.

After the camel book, I just couldn't take another book that did that to the female characters.

To be fair to Treasure Planet, in it they had a genetic treatment to let the females be as smart as males, but that doesn't mean the initial issue was gone. Also, I don't blame the two authors of Treasure Planet for this -- they were working in a universe first created in 1966 by someone else.

The writing was fine, and the story seemed fine as well, but neither really caught my interest. I made it just over 10% through the book before giving up.

Next up: Nightshade City, which unfortunately isn't really hooking me either. Blah.

Cooking, toes (RL)

I see a nutritionist once a month. Not totally by choice, but I need to, so. One of the goals we set was me cooking twice a week. With my mother here (and cooking nightly) there was no chance or reason to, so this week is my first week of trying it. I had intended to cook last night, but I had leftover Chinese food so it got pushed off until tonight.

I poked around online for an easy recipe, perhaps one in the crock pot. I decided on:

Pork chops
Packet of ranch dressing
Can of cream of chicken soup
Stick in the crock pot on low for four hours or so.

In an effort to be healthier, I got "heart healthy" (low sodium) soup. The regular stuff has a whole day's worth of sodium in one can.

Once I was putting those things together I paused, wondering how in the world it was going to taste. Turned out it was pretty okay. It tasted neither like ranch nor like chicken/soup, it just tasted sort of okay. A tiny tiny bit tangy (which surprised me, the recipe was for 6 pork chops, I used 2, so I worried it would be too strong). I wouldn't make it again, but I ate it tonight and I'll eat the other one tomorrow night. (Edit: Must remember to remove all fat from pork chops before putting them into the crock pot.)

Must shop and find something to cook for the weekend. Also, must find things like side dishes or something (my dinner was a pork chop, period). Also, no more 'cream of...' things.

Toe/medical: I'm trying not to be too depressed or distressed, though I feel like jumping out a window. I have an infection in my toe (ingrown toenail), same side as my bad leg. I went to the doctor yesterday and got antibiotics, but she has no idea which one (if any) will work, since I had basically all of them in my system within the last month. (Isn't that a scary thought? I had every single antibiotic that exists in me, except one.)

The doctor wasn't worried, so I'm trying not to be, but all I can think about is it getting really bad and spreading up to my leg, causing that to flare up again. I swear to god, I cannot go back to the hospital. My leg has to finish getting better, not worse. It still looks like I have the plague, all the skin is in the process of replacing itself, it's really dark/grey/red blotchy. Even if I had the energy I couldn't go swimming -- rightfully people would not want me in the pool with them, I look contagious with some horrible thing.

I try to be chipper and happy, especially at work, but I just can't deal with more medical stuff. It's only been 24 hours of taking antibiotics (3 pills total). While the net has no exact figure on how long it takes antibiotics to work, every site I looked at listed something more than a day. I will not panic yet that it's not looking any better.

(I don't know why the doctor only gave me pills instead of cutting the nail like they had last time I had an infected ingrown one. I'm assuming because of the issues with my body and antibiotics, she didn't want to expose me to more potential infection than necessary.)