My Fab Four

Todd Mason tagged me with this, and since I got Kevin Wignall out of my hands, I decided I'd try.

Four Movies You Can See Over and Over
Steven Spielberg: Duel (USA 1971)
Orson Welles: Touch of Evil (USA 1958)
Andrei Tarkovsky: The Mirror (Soviet Union 1975)
Quentin Tarantino: Reservoir Dogs (USA 1992)
bubbling under: The Red Circle by Jean-Pierre Melville

Four Places You Have Lived (all in Finland)
Rauma
Pori
Tampere
Turku (and that's all)

Four TV Shows You Love to Watch
Twin Peaks
The Wire
Sopranos
Monty Python

Four Places You Have Been on a Vacation
Berlin, Germany
Cyprus (forgot what the town was called)
Nordkapp, Norway (for a brief moment, it's a long story)
Säkylä, Finland

Four of Your Favorite Foods
Pasta with tomato sauce and aubergine
Pasta with garlic, rosemary and chick beans in olive oil
My special brand of oatmeal with raisins, almonds and pineapple, mixed with yoghurt
Halva with vanilla (especially mixed with ice cream)

Four Websites You Visit Daily
Facebook
The Finnish National Library's database
IMDb
the Finnish Elonet movie database

Four Places You Would Rather Be
Right now? Maybe reading on a sofa or watching a movie and soon I will be. And then... nah, I'll stick with this.

Four Things You Hope to Do Before You Die
Publish a novel
Publish a novel
Publish a novel
Make my kids grow up decent, but also a bit bohemian and weirdish

Four Novels You Wish You Were Reading for the First Time (this question makes actually not much sense, because there are at least three ways to go about this: one, I could now get more out of a book if I were to read it now, with my adult understanding of themes and style; two, it's about a feeling of awe of how a writer has built the narrative and I don't as yet know I'm about to be tricked and fooled; three, I've forgotten a book so much that it's like I'm reading it now for the first time - so which should I go for? I think my choices have to do with the second option)
Richard Matheson: I Am Legend
Paul Auster: Music of Chance (or perhaps Leviathan, or perhaps City of Glass)
Kevin Wignall: Who Is Conrad Hirst?
Scott Phillips: The Ice Harvest
bubbling under: Fredric Brown: The Far Cry
bubbling under, No. 2: Alan Moore - Eddie Campbell: From Hell (from start to finish in one sitting; and I think I've done this once)
(and by the way, there are lots of books I'll be reading for the first time, since I haven't read them yet!)

Tag Four People You Believe Will Respond
No, I won't. These things move with enough speed as it is.

In the year 2525

Everybody's been doing these memes in which you mention 25 random things about yourself. I did this in Facebook and thought I'd post it here, too. (I should be doing a Forgotten Book post, but...)

1. While I'm doing this, I'm editing an article that's supposed to appear in the next issue of Ruudinsavu (Gunsmoke), the official magazine of the Finnish Western Society. The article is about Alan Ladd's little-known western movies. [Of course I'm not doing this anymore.]

2. I would've loved to be a pulp fictioneer. I believe I would've been a mediocre, but occasionally amusing adventure writer targeting at low and middle markets, maybe for the Spicy magazines or even shudders.

3. At the same time I would've tried to write some serious poetry and failed at that.

4. I also would've loved to write an Ace Double. Or even a Beacon or a Nightstand. Or hundreds of them.

5. I think I've written enough bad pulp imitation to fill an Ace Double. [I think I've actually written at least three Ace Doubles.]

6. I've also written a 20,000-word novel in a week. That's the best I could do. But I also wrote some other things at the same time. [This will probably end up self-published.]

7. I love the sound of a typewriter in the morning. Or in the night. Or during the day.

8. I once wrote with a typewriter in a train.

9. I've said once or twice that cooking is one of my hobbies. Nowadays it comes down to putting cinnamon in tomato sauce. Asked "what shall we have for dinner, dear?", I say: "Sausage and pasta."

10. Sometimes I replace tomato sauce with cream.

11. I've tried to diminish my eating of meat. I feel for the animals, but the main reason is that I try to avoid increasing the climate change.

12. My breakfast is usually oats, raisins and almonds in pineapple juice, with lots of pineapple chunks, and yoghurt. Lately I've gone for soy yoghurt.

13. I don't drive a car. I don't know how.

14. My son, who's four years old, always asks me to carry him around. He sure can walk, but I've thought that with this I can help him understand that men also can be helping and caring persons.

15. I also carried my daughter when she was four. Maybe even when she was five.

16. I've been known to carry both of them at the same time. It was one of my rare macho moments.

17. I didn't carry them very far.

18. I didn't go to the army. I think I would've gone crazy in midst of the other men.

19. People think I'm a good organizer and a good worker, but basically I'm lazy and anything but organized. My economy is a mess and I think I've done tax frauds.

20. Even though I learned from Quentin Crisp that one should stick to his or her own style, I think I've developed three or four that I change from time to time. I have different styles for Summer and Winter. Then again, who doesn't?

21. That I don't stick into one style is visible also in my writings: I've written about cinema, western writers, pulp fiction, traditional Finnish food, Mika Waltari, forgotten Finnish authors, fostering children, children's literature, Mickey Mouse handkerchiefs, the ideology of collecting, boardgames, novelizations, comics and graphic novels...

22. I always wanted to be a writer. I told my teacher in the first grade that I'm writing a book. It was about two cats having an adventure.

23. I had two cuddly cat dolls when I was a little boy. Their names were Miisu and Maasu.

24. Lately I've been collecting vintage cuddly toys with my wife, Elina. My favourite is a Pink Panther who looks like he's been in a series of foster homes and is now retired at our place.

25. I've also collected Scandinavian plastic ware, vintage swimming trunks, men's suit jackets, ties, seventies collar shirts and T-shirts, old handkerchiefs, dandy overcoats, and lately lycra biker shorts from the eighties. My favourite garment at the moment is a terrycloth overall which makes everyone else laugh but my wife. She thinks it's cute. My wife has a similar garment and I think it's hot.

The great Sulake Fuse meme of 2008

Actually couldn't resist blogging, when I saw that I'd been memed by Peter Rozovsky of Detectives Beyond Borders. The meme goes like this:

1. Pick up the nearest book.
2. Open it to page 123
3. Find the fifth sentence.
4. Post the next three sentences.
5. Tag five people, and acknowledge who tagged you.

The nearest book, erm, I even hesitate to mention what it is, but you know my fascination with... ah well, let's leave it at that, shall we? The second nearest is:

Korjausopassanasto: englanti-suomi-englanti, ed. by anonymous, Tieto-Nikkari 1981.

It's a small technical dictionary, mainly for words about cars. There are no sentences, but here goes nevertheless:

sulake fuse
sulattaa melt
sulkuhana shut-off (cock)

I like the last one, don't you, too? (As for tagging someone, I'll resort to what Duane Swierczynski did with the same thing.)