Apples!

[altivo]

We'd planned to stop in at our favorite local orchard at about noon today. Last week we didn't go by until 3 pm and they had already closed up. So we drove down there at about 12:30 and they were closed again. The sign in the drive said "Sold Out." Apple crops in Wisconsin and northern Illinois are down this year by 20 to 30% according to The Country Today, and the poor crop is attributed to weather in April and May. Early warmth brought on the blossoms early, and hard frosts in the first two weeks of May damaged many of the trees. There was also a lot of heavy rain during the pollination period, and honeybees are much scarcer (due to CCD syndrome) than they were a few years ago.

Fortunately, we remembered another place that we haven't tried before. It isn't much farther away, but is on a "road to nowhere" (a short road segment that connects two parallel county routes but serves only as a bypass in case a major route is closed by flooding or construction. Consequently, we don't pass by it regularly and I wasn't even sure the place would be open. It was. Due to the poor crop levels, they were not allowing customers to pick their own apples yet. Prices were good, though, and they had Honeycrisp, Gala, Ruby Jon, and McIntosh. We were also offered samples to try of their own preserves and a piquant peach salsa that I found quite enticing. We brought home Honeycrisp, Ruby Jon, and a jar of the salsa.

Ruby Jon is a variety I've never had before, but it will now go on my list of favorites. It was cloned from a single branch sport on a Jonathan varietal tree in Kentucky. The apples are smallish (which I like) and dark red. The flavor is rich, not too sweet, and like most Jonathans, strong enough for pies and other baked goods as well as for eating "out of hand."

With dinner tonight we had a turk's head squash cut in half and baked with apples and cinnamon in the seed cavities. It was really good.

I do hope though that our closest orchard friends will have enough of their Melrose apples later this month so I can buy some. I don't know of anywhere else to get that variety.

In other news, the literary criticism marathon continues. Looking just at the first paragraph of that 4000 word "story" I have gone back and forth with the writer four times now. Either he isn't understanding what I say, or I'm not putting it clearly enough. It seemed odd to me that he took my first private message to him and posted it to a forum thread, but I've continued with him in that vein. (I had assumed he'd prefer the discussion to be kept private.) I confess, I'm starting to wonder if I'm being trolled, though I can't imagine why.

Comments

Literary criticism marathon

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

Long ago (back in the pre-email era, so it was by snail mail), I was involved with an editing/critiquing project like that. Fortunately I could say it's a genre I didn't have a feel for, sword & sorcery, but I could tell the plot or character development wasn't there; the writer just wanted to jump right into the adventure. It seemed like actual critique was going to be hard to deliver, though. I'm not sure he really wanted that.

Some writers seem obstinate yet unaware that what comes out of their heads may need some massaging to reach an actual market.

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[altivo]

Alas, in this case it's a failure to grasp the basics of English syntax and grammar. A literal "failure to communicate." And he says English is his native language, too. The writing is on the level of a twelve year old trying to tell someone what he saw on television last night. I can't even get him to grasp the idea that sentences need verbs and subjects. Forget about punctuation.

Malaprops, sentence fragments, misspellings... Even after I provide examples and specific corrections he just shakes the same words up in a dice cup and throws them out in a different order, misspellings and all.

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

Oh dear. I wonder if he reads books much. One would probably pick up a lot of how it should go from that. Although if he got this far without a consistent grasp of syntax, grammar, or spelling... that's like being a mechanic but not knowing how to use socket wrenches.

Maybe he's using some sort of bot for his responses?

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[altivo]

My guess is that his reading is limited to online sources like Facebook, with the addition perhaps of Japanese manga or other graphical novels. He's trying to create visual images like a sequence of frames, now that I think of it. It's like a graphic novel, but without the actual pictures and his language abilities and vocabulary are so limited that it all comes out as "It was a cold day. Joe was waiting for someone. He was in Tokyo. In front of the train station." Imagine a series of passive sentences and fragments like that, about ten lines to each 'paragraph.' Oh, and he persists in spelling "front" as "fount" even after I've corrected him twice.

It might pass for screen writing, in a very crude sense. But prose fiction?

I've asked several times what he reads or has read, but he doesn't answer. I've suggested authors he should try, but no answer to that either.

Heck, he himself transferred the thread I started as private messages to a place where the public can read it. If you really want to see it, put on your editorial armor and go to http://forum.furrag.com/index.php?topic=735 (or not, I won't blame you for avoiding it.)

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

I kind of skimmed that thread, partly because my brain might be slightly mushified (it wasn't even that long a workday so far...). But there was a lot there that needed improvement, even in the first three words of his intro. I wonder if he shouldn't be trying to work with an artist and turn this into a graphic novel. An artist would still need the ideas well described, though, which requires, um, good writing skills.

Good luck.

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[altivo]

My suspicions are finally confirmed. His reading background is almost entirely manga. Since those are just dialog and pictures, he has no internal model at all for prose sentences or syntax. He finds reading "hard" and therefore avoids it. Why he would aspire to write when he doesn't read? Who knows?

Obviously, US public schools have failed again.

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[songdogmi.livejournal.com]

Maybe if you read it back-to-front it'll make more sense. :)

Re: Literary criticism marathon

[altivo]

Since manga make little sense to me either forward or backward, I somehow doubt it. As far as I can tell, they all rely on a worldview that is uniformly dark and oppressive, with violence and drama multiplied by several orders of magnitude.

Come to think of it, rather like daytime soap operas. That's an insight I'd missed.

[kakoukorakos.livejournal.com]

One of the main reasons for trolling is the lulz. There wouldn't seem to be many lulz to be had on proofreading or editing, though.

I'd think one needs to learn to crawl before one is able to walk, and to learn to walk before one is able to dance. Perhaps this individual needs to go take some remedial English courses. Trying to skip a step in that process can only end in tears and frustration for anyone involved.

I'll have to keep an eye out for Ruby Jons. That sounds like quite an interesting variety.

[altivo]

Yep, if you can find the Ruby Jon, I think you'll like them. Unless, that is, you are actually a fan of the mealy Red Delicious and mush McIntosh. ;p

My "student" needs to read. A remedial English course would be too hard for him. He has never read literature other than manga, by his own admission.