Book-A-Day #19 (8/5): Flaming Carrot Comics, Vol. 6: Special Women Trouble Issue by Bob Burden

The above is what the cover and spine seem to think the title is; the title page has this as Bob Burden's Flaming Carrot Comics: Unacceptable Behavior and the copyright page is just Flaming Carrot Comics, Vol. 6. So I gather we can choose our own subtitle for this one.

The Carrot is one of the quintessentially indescribable comics characters: he's this guy who wears flippers and a giant carrot mask (with a flame on top, natch). And he fights crime. And zombies. And chases pretty girls (with quite a lot of luck for a guy with a giant carrot on his head.) His adventures at least border on the surreal, sometimes from the other side.

There's a short Carrot story online, which can give you the idea. If you don't feel like clicking, here's his first speech balloon:

Am I a killer?...Yes.
Am I a monster?...Perhaps.
Am I wrong?...Hardly Ever!
I am Flaming Carrot!
Even best friends fear me a little!

Anyway, this collection, whatever it's called, is not the place to start -- find the first Dark Horse trade paperback, Man of Mystery (or maybe issue #12 of the comic, "The Dead Dog Jumped Up and Flew Around the Room," which is where I started, twenty years ago). The world has long needed a dada superhero, and the Carrot is it.

Movie Log: O Brother, Where Art Thou?

The Wife and I watched this a few nights ago. There was a point when I'd seen all of the Coen Brothers' movies and considered myself a big fan of theirs, but somehow I missed a bunch after Fargo and have been catching up ever since. By the evidence of this week, I'm still five or six years behind.

I'm afraid the details of the movie are swiftly escaping me; it was a good picaresque story, but I'm already losing track of what happened before what. It was a gorgeous-looking movie, full of interesting actors given good lines to say, and I enjoyed it from start to finish. But I don't have much more than that to say about it; I guess I'm better at talking about things I don't like.

World Fantasy Award Nominees

I'm posting a notice here as well as the SFBC Blog out of pure ego-boo: I am one of the WFA judges this year. Well, maybe it's not pure ego-boo; I also think all of these works are worth celebrating and I want to see them get the widest possible recognition. The list is from the official WFA site.

Novel:

• Hal Duncan, Vellum (Macmillan; Del Rey)
• Bret Easton Ellis, Lunar Park (Knopf; Macmillan)
• Graham Joyce, The Limits of Enchantment (Gollancz; Atria)
• Patricia A. McKillip, Od Magic (Ace)
• Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore (Harvill; Knopf)
• Paul Park, A Princess of Roumania (Tor)

Novella:

• Laird Barron, "The Imago Sequence" (Fantasy & Science Fiction, May 2005)
• Michael Cunningham, "In the Machine" (Specimen Days, Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
• Joe Hill, Voluntary Committal (Subterranean Press)
• Tanith Lee, "UOUS" (The Fair Folk, Science Fiction Book Club)
• Kelly Link, "Magic for Beginners" (Magic for Beginners, Small Beer Press; Fantasy & Science Fiction, September 2005)
• Simon Morden, Another War (Telos Publishing)

Short Fiction:

• Peter S. Beagle, "Two Hearts" (Fantasy & Science Fiction, Oct/Nov 2005)
• Joe Hill, "Best New Horror" (Postscripts 3, Spring 2005)
• Holly Phillips, "The Other Grace" (In the Palace of Repose, Prime Books)
• Caitli­n R. Kiernan, "La Peau Verte" (To Charles Fort, With Love, Subterranean Press)
• George Saunders, "CommComm" (The New Yorker, 08/01, 2005)
  

Anthology:

• Weird Shadows Over Innsmouth ed. Stephen Jones (Fedogan & Bremer)
• The Fair Folk ed. Marvin Kaye (Science Fiction Book Club)
• Polyphony 5 ed. Deborah Layne and Jay Lake (Wheatland Press)
• Adventure Vol. 1 ed. Chris Roberson (MonkeyBrain Books)
• Nova Scotia: New Scottish Speculative Fiction ed. Neil Williamson and Andrew J. Wilson (Crescent Books)

Collection:

• Joe Hill, 20th Century Ghosts (PS Publishing)
• Caitli­n R. Kiernan, To Charles Fort, With Love (Subterranean Press)
• Kelly Link, Magic for Beginners (Small Beer Press)
• Holly Phillips, In the Palace of Repose (Prime Books)
• Bruce Holland Rogers, The Keyhole Opera (Wheatland Press)

Artist:

• Kinuko Y. Craft
• James Jean
• Dave McKean
• Edward Miller (Les Edwards)
• John Jude Palencar

Special Award: Professional:

• Susan Allison and Ginjer Buchanan (for Ace Books)
• Lou Anders (for editing at Pyr)
• S. T. Joshi & Stefan Dziemanowicz, Editors (for Supernatural Literature of the World: An Encyclopedia, Greenwood Press)
• Peter Lavery (for Pan MacMillan UK/Tor UK)
• Chris Roberson and Allison Baker (for MonkeyBrain Books)
• Sean Wallace (for Prime Books)

Special Award: Non-Professional:

• The Friends of Arthur Machen (for Faunus, Machenalia, and The Life of Arthur Machen)
• Leo Grin (for The Cimmerian)
• David Howe and Stephen Walker (for Telos Books)
• Jess Nevins (for The Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana, from MonkeyBrain Books)
• Rodger Turner, Neil Walsh, and Wayne MacLaurin (for SF Site)
  

(Let me note in passing that I learned that these had been released by reading Darkecho Blog; I'm going to go check my work e-mail now and see if I should have known ahead of time. Five minutes later: yes, they did e-mail me early yesterday to say the list was being released, and it's my own fault for not keeping up with e-mail.)

In Which Thing 2 Unknowingly Re-Enacts a Calvin & Hobbes Cartoon

I know there's at least one person out there who wants more Thing 1 and Thing 2 stories, so this is for you...

Last night I was reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone to Thing 2 (Thing 1 now reads to himself; he'd just stalk the room when I was reading, which did not make for peace in the household). Thing 2 is not as attentive as I might like -- he's five and finds it hard to sit still for two nanoseconds at a time -- but I think he's mostly listening. Well, at least some of the time. And I do try to keep him quiet, so that he's potentially listening.

Anyway, he's also playing with various toys around his room, though I can usually see that he's got his head cocked towards me, so I'm getting at least a fraction of his attention. (Have you guessed yet that I'm paranoid about the are-you-listening-to-me thing?) But then he picks up a red sports car, and starts talking about jumping the Grand Canyon. The car jumps once safely (all the way across the room), but falls on the return trip. Thing 2 says something about the driver trying to jump out, but it's too late -- and I'm getting a gigantic feeling of deja vu.

So, when I get him into bed, I head down here to the basement and start poking through The Complete Calvin & Hobbes, Vol. 1 (which I've been reading at the computer, off and on, over the past week or two). I finally found the above cartoon: February 15, 1987 (a good thirteen-and-a-half years before Thing 2 was born, mind you). The details aren't completely identical, but it's very close. (I couldn't find this strip online, but I made this very bad scan myself so you can get the idea.)

There is only one possible explanation. My younger son -- the normal one -- is actually Calvin. (Which means his invisible friend May, about whom I haven't heard much lately, is Hobbes.)

Reading Into the Past: Week of 7/30

I rolled two dice this week and got a 5, so these are the books that I was reading this week in 2001:

• Sue Grafton, "P" Is For Peril (7/23)
  I always enjoy these books while I'm reading them -- Grafton is one of the better mystery writers working today -- but I can't remember which one was which five years later. The titles certainly don't help.
  
• Dave Sim & Gerhard, Church & State, Vol. 1 (7/4)
  Over the past decade, I've tried to catch up on the comic Cerebus several times; each time, I start at the beginning, gain speed through the really good years (High Society, this volume, most of the second half of Church & State, and particularly Jaka's Story), and then hit the brick wall that is Reads. I have five of the collections after Reads (though not the last two), and I'm afraid that I'll never get to them. Perhaps I'll try again one day, and that time actually blast through the Sucky Barrier of Self-Indulgent Wankery. Anyway, this is really good, but it's one half of a giant comics novel, and doesn't stand on its own. High Society and Jaka's Story do, though -- try leafing through them in a store and see what grabs you.
  
• John Edward Dell, editor, Visions of Adventure: N.C. Wyeth and the Brandywine Artists (7/25)
  I think I got this as a remainder, because I keep thinking those old adventure-story illustrators are probably right up my alley. I didn't absolutely love it, butt it does have a lot of good art in it.
  
• Joe Gores, Cons, Scams & Grifts (7/26)
  One of the DKA novels, a series notable mostly because it's about a realistic private detective agency (lots of people, lots of paperwork, no crusading, no solving of murders, no hard-boiled redheaded dames) doing mostly realistic PI work (a lot of car repo'ing). By this book, the realism had slipped a bit, since there's a band of almost preternaturally-skilled-at-car-thievery Gypsies running around, but Gores is still mostly trying to ground this in the real world. The earlier books were better, but this was still OK.
  
• Lemony Snicket, A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Ersatz Elevator (7/27)
  I don't know if it's fair to call this the point where the series got really dark -- since, of course, the whole thing started with a pretty depressing set-up and continued on as the Platonic ideal of Goth pre-teen misery -- but I still remember the climb up the elevator shaft, and that was an awfully powerful scene, especially for a kids' book. This series is sneaky and nasty and subversive in all the right ways; I can't wait until the final book this fall, and I hope the ending is as horrible as I suspect it will be.
  
• Terry Pratchett, The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents (7/28)
  The first of the Discworld books to be officially a "YA" novel, which meant that it had chapters and didn't use the word "Discworld" anywhere. I think the discipline of chapters does good things for Pratchett, since the YA Discworld books are probably his best recent work.
  
• Bob Mankoff, editor, The New Yorker 75th Anniversary Cartoon Collection (7/29)
  A gigantic book of witty cartoons, created for the urban literatti of the past three generations. I enjoyed it; I really like the New Yorker cartoon style.
  
• Gilles Neret, editor, Taschen Icons: Erotica, 19th Century (7/30)
  A small-format book, part of a large series of art books (not all porn, I think, but containing, as usual for Taschen, a whole lot of porn). Other people's porn can be a very weird thing, especially if those other people have been dead a hundred years and can't hide their stash or explain themselves. This stuff also vibrates (sometimes uncomfortably) between "fine art" and "porn," which makes it doubly interesting, Plus, y'know, boobies.
  
• Daniel Handler, Watch Your Mouth (7/31)
  You know that Handler is the real name of the guy who writes as Lemony Snicket, right? This is his second novel, which does have a fantasy element which I will not spoil here. It's also a novel in large part about sex, providing us a double-theme for this week's reading. Watch Your Mouth isn't quite as successful as Handler's sublime first novel The Basic Eight, a modern masterpiece of unreliable narration, but it's very good.
  
• Vernor Vinge, The Collected Stories of Vernor Vinge (7/31)
  Vinge's stuff tends to leave me cold for some reason, and I'm not sure why. I particularly disliked "Fast Times at Fairmont High," the new novella here, which seemed to be dedicated to the dystopian idea that only the very smartest, fastest, sneakiest, luckiest, and best-connected few people will have any work at all to do in the near future (and that this is a wonderful thing, because we're following those stuck-up dweebs). I don't know what it is, but I just don't seem to connect with Vinge's stories; I probably need to try his novels and see if they work better for me.
  

Well, I managed to get this done before the week was over, which is an improvement.

Incoming Books: 4 August

Three things came home with me from work today:

• Phaic Tan, a joke travel guide from the people who did Molvania.
• Your Call Is Important To Us: The Truth About Bullshit by Laura Penny -- in hopes that it's more interesting than On Bullshit
• The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi

And this when I already have approximately eight shelves worth of books overflowing from my to-be-read bookcase...

Book-A-Day #18 (8/4): The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman

This is a very funny, very witty book, but reading it straight through probably wasn't a good idea (especially in my current, lackadaisical post-WFA state). The Areas of My Expertise is made up of dozens of sections of various lengths, all detailing unlikely information about all manner of topics, and all completely made up by Mr. Hodgman.

(Hodgman, if anyone is trying to place him, is the actor who plays "Windows" on the current series of Mac TV commercials. He was also the "Deranged Millionaire" on They Might Be Giants' last record, Venue Songs -- the supposed set-up was that the D.M. had challenged them to make up a new song for every place they played on that tour, or lose their magical song-writing talisman. That story is similar in tone and style to the pieces in this book; Hodgman is magificently deadpan, with a fine sense of what's just weird enough.)

This book is full of wonderful stuff, and is alternately laugh-out-loud funny and just plain odd. Hodgman throws off asides that sound like unwritten Paul Di Filippo or Howard Waldrop stories, about the hobo wars of the '30s or the secret history of lobsters in Central Park. The Areas of My Expertise also features the exceptionally valuable Lycanthropic Transformation Tables, correlating type of lycanthrope with the phase of the moon. It is strange and wonderful, and its particular kind of strangeness would be particularly interesting to SF readers.

Book-A-Day #17 (8/3): The Complete Peanuts: 1959 to 1960 by Charles Schulz

The big news in this volume is the birth of Charlie Brown's little sister Sally, but all of this is great stuff.

If your newspaper runs the '50 Peanuts reruns, you're reading 1959 right now, but don't let that stop you from getting this. Charles Schulz was a brilliant, and amazingly incisive, cartoonist, and these stories are some of the best -- and the most important -- stories to come out of the American 1950s.

Book-A-Day #16 (8/2): B.P.R.D.: The Black Flame by Mike Mignola, John Arcudi and Guy Davis

Trying to explain this so that it makes sense to a new reader is probably impossible, but here goes:

This is the fifth volume collecting the B.P.R.D. comic books, which have been a series of mini-series. B.P.R.D. is itself a spin-off from Mignola's more famous creation, Hellboy. Hellboy is a mildly monstrous (large, strong, bright red, has a huge stone-like right arm and horn-stumps on his head) creature who was summoned by Nazis led by Rasputin, late in WW II, in an attempt to bring about a Lovecraftian Ragnarok.

Hellboy didn't materialize where expected, though: he was found by a U.S. team and raised as a good guy. He became the core of the "field work" team of the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense once he grew up, and thwarted many horrors (a fair percentage of which were attempts to use him to summon various Elder Gods from other dimensions to destroy the Earth, of course). The rest of the B.P.R.D. is made up of some regular soldiers (for cannon fodder, mostly) and various other odd characters: a firestarter, the spirit of a dead medium in a containment suit, a homunculus, and an amphibious man. Some time ago -- probably just a couple of years in comics continuity -- Hellboy quit the B.P.R.D. for personal reasons.

Since then, there have continued to be Hellboy comics, which Mignola writes and draws himself. And there have now been five series of B.P.R.D. comics, co-written by John Arcudi and illustrated by Guy Davis, following the characters he left behind there. The amazing thing is that the B.P.R.D. books don't feel like sharecropping or brand extensions; they're real stories in their own right, set in the same world, in which important things happen and people change.

This is another good 'un: the B.P.R.D. is in the process of clearing out nests of toad-men across North America (scattered there by events in the previous books), and then things get worse.

This is obviously not the place to start: if the idea intrigues you (and I hope it does; Hellboy and its spin-offs are some of the best fantasy/horror/adventure comics of the past decade), start with either Hellboy: Seed of Destruction (the first story) or one of the collections of shorter tales (The Chained Coffin and Others or The Right Hand of Doom). The shorter stories often incorporate folkloric creatures (and do it very well, I think), so readers more used to written fantasy might find those the best entry-point.

In Which I Am Generally Too Thick To Comprehend a Comic Strip

Today I read a Day by Day cartoon that I not only understood, but actually agreed with (more or less).

This is a landmark, because -- though I've seen this strip off and on, usually as linked by Compass Points, the blog of my colleague Brad Miner of the American Compass book club -- none of the previous strips I've read have quite made sense to me. I can tell that they're supposed to make some kind of a political point, but they always seem to be referring to unspecified things, people and actions that I don't recognize at all. So -- though it's obvious I'm supposed to say "Yes, Mister X is completely wrong with his policy of blah blah blah," I instead think "who the hell is Mister X?"

(Parenthetically, let me note that the artist, Chris Muir, draws one smokin-hot woman, though I keep worrying that her pants/skirt/whatever-it-is is about to fall off her. Hm. Maybe that's the point? But the green-skinned guy in panel two today is just weird.)

I'm sure this is because I don't have my head completely encased in a partisan media environment, but it's baffling that such a deliberately opaque cartoon can continue to exist.

It reminds me of a woman who was in one of my classes at Vassar, back about eighteen years ago. I don't recall the exact name of the course, but it was something like Introduction to Political Theory (it was a 100-level Poli Sci class), and it was taught by the great Steve Rock. My friend Vin Bonanno (who e-mailed me a few weeks ago, and hasn't replied to my answer, the bum) and I sat together, and we had a great time. One of the reasons we did was this woman, who was clearly on a completely different wavelength from everyone else in the class. She'd sit quietly in the corner, visibly stewing as other people spoke. Then, when she had had all she could take, she would blurt out something incomprehensible, and then return to fuming silently and staring down anyone who looked at her. I suspect she was a Marxist of some stripe (the Spartacist League was active in those days), but no one else in the class ever agreed with her, or had any idea what she was talking about. (Even the professor.)

I can't remember anything she said specifically -- none of it made any sense, so it was hard to remember -- but the way we described it to friends at the time was as if she said "The balance of payments was low!" at the top of her voice.

I'm afraid Day by Day is the urbane, conservative version of that woman.

Quote of the Week

"A monarchy is a merchantman which sails well, but will sometimes strike upon a rock, and go to the bottom; a republic is a raft which will never sink, but then your feet are always in the water."
- Fisher Ames

My Worldcon Schedule

I don't got one.

Either the folks running the program have snubbed me (which is not likely) or I forgot to notify whoever it is I was supposed to notify that I was willing to do programming (which is exceptionally likely).

Either way, I'm not scheduled for anything, so I will be wandering aimlessly in Anaheim. (Which will make it easier to sneak away for a day-trip to The Mouse.) If there's anyone out there who wants to meet with me at any particular time or place, drop me a line at andrew dot wheeler at doubledayent dot com. (There's always the usual Worldcon practice of just running into people, which I expect will happen a lot, but most people's schedules will be busier than mine.)

I'll be the only representative of the SFBC at Worldcon (Ellen Asher will be busy riding across Scotland, which is how she usually spends August), so I'm the one you'll want to find -- or avoid, as the case may be...

Book-A-Day #15 (8/1): Dave Barry's Money Secrets by Dave Barry

And so I continue on my path of reading books with very little serious value to them in an attempt to decompress from World Fantasy.

This is the latest book by a guy who was a bit funnier when he was writing regular newspaper columns. (Not vastly funnier, but Dave Barry's Money Secrets is not Barry in top form.) It's very silly, and contains nothing useful whatsoever.

Barry's full-length books can be hit or miss; when he's actually interacting with the outside world (as in books like Dave Barry Does Japan), he's at his best. The books that are generated by his sitting in his office and thinking of booger jokes (like this one) are generally less successful. I also think the discipline of a weekly column was good for him; he developed running jokes and recurring column topics (Ask Mr. Language Person, exploding toilets, setting Barbie's hair on fire, etc.), and interacted with his readership. Writing a whole book of this kind of light, silly humor straight out tends to leave it detached from anything solid, and consequently less funny.

But this was a very amusing way to kill a couple of hours, and the photo-captions alone are almost worth the price of the book. Just don't expect anything deep or meaningful from it, and you'll be happy.

Now I've Got Meme All Over My Good Clothes!

John at SF Signal tagged me, so now I actually feel an obligation to do one of these silly meme-things. (Edit before even posting: I've been sitting on this for a day, and now I've been tagged again, by Deanna Hoak. I'd better get on this -- and, at this rate, there won't be anyone for me to tag.)

1. One book that changed your life?
I really can't think of anything; I read books wholesale, but they don't directly change who I am. (Over the longer term, sure, but I can't think of any individual book.) Books often change me in small ways -- I was unpleasant for several days after reading Bret Easton Ellis's Lunar Park, and I had the best posture of my life for two days while reading The Remains of the Day -- but there's no One Big Book in my life.

2. One book you have read more than once?
How about The Book of the New Sun? I read that originally back in the mid-80s (right after The Urth of the New Sun was published, I read the whole series), and then again a few years back. I don't re-read much, since I've got so much that I haven't read even once yet.

3. One book you would want on a desert island?
There's a book I sell in the Outdoorsman's Edge book club (my other professional hat) called The Forgotten Arts & Crafts that I think would be incredibly useful on a desert island. This question doesn't say "the one book," so I'm assuming I could have more than one.

4. One book that made you laugh?
About half an hour ago: The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman.

5. One book that made you cry?
Movies and songs have been known to make me leak very slightly (in an exceptionally manly manner) from the eyes, but not books, usually. I may have misted up a bit at the end of Doomsday Book by Connie Willis, but I can't swear to that.

6. One book you wish had been written?
Whatever novel Roger Zelazny would have published this year.

7. One book you wish had never had been written?
Ishmael by Daniel Quinn. I loathe that book and its puerile anti-civilization message with the fiery heat of a million suns.

8. One book you are currently reading?
Well, I already mentioned The Areas of My Expertise. I'm also reading Book One: Work 1986-2006 by Chip Kidd in bed; a book of UK and US language called Divided By a Common Language in the smallest room, the first volume of The Complete Calvin and Hobbes downstairs by the computer, and Horror: Another 100 Best Books on my reading couch in the dining room.

9. One book you have been meaning to read?
Arthur and George by Julian Barnes

10. Now tag five people.
Let's see -- who will probably read this and hasn't done this meme yet? How about:
John Joseph Adams
Rob B.
John Klima
James Nicoll
Paul Stevens
And anyone else who wants to, actually -- it's all fine with me.

Another iTunes Meme

I love randomness (at least in small, controlled doses, for purely research or scientific purposes), so I had to do another version of the "set your playlist to random and answer these questions" meme. I saw this one over at the home of the mighty Sea Wasp.

• Will I get far in life?
"Cheatin'" by the Gin Blossoms -- Does that mean this is the only way I might get far in life?

• How do my friends see me?
  "I Believe" by R.E.M. -- Aw, how sweet. They believe in me. Exactly what they believe is another question.
• When will I get married?
  "The Only Flame in Town" by Elvis Costello -- Since I'm already married, I'm guessing this means I won't get married again, which is what I expect.
• What's my theme song?
  "Them, Big Oak Trees" by The Wonder Stuff -- That is utterly random, and, thus, I love it.
• What is the story of my life?
  "No Kruggerands for David" by Camper Van Beethoven -- I was really hoping this would come out as "Story of My Life" by Social Distortion (because it's a good song, and because of the amazing self-referentiality). But this is fine, too.
• What am I like in bed?
  "Been Around the World" by Cracker -- No comment.
• How can I get ahead in life?
  "She's the One" by Bruce Springsteen -- but who is she?
• What is my best feature?
  "Solsbury Hill" by Peter Gabriel -- My best feature is that I quit Genesis because God told me to?
• How is today going to be?
  "Listen To My Heart" by Ramones -- So I'll do just what I want to do, then.
• What is in store for this weekend?
  "Uncle Son" by The Kinks -- either hillbillies or a lot of family time, I guess.
• What is my life like at the moment?
  "I'm Sick (Of This American Life)" by They Might Be Giants -- not particularly, as far as I can tell.
• What song describes my secrets?
  "Baba O'Reilly" by Dread Zeppelin -- Yes, now I can come clean: out here in the field, I do fight for my meals, and get my back into my living. God, how good it feels to finally be honest!
• What is my current lover like?
  "Cadillac Life" by LP -- I've never sure if you're supposed to just take the name of the song as your answer, or if the song itself has something to do with it. This is a quiet depressing song about wanting something better than you have, but the name makes it sound like a positive answer to the question.
• What song will they play at my funeral?
  "Point of View" by Ivy -- Yes, a random song from the other band of that guy in Fountains of Wayne. Suits me; I'll be dead anyway.
• How does the world see me?
  "Radio, Radio" by Elvis Costello -- As a guy who complains about everything? Or as an actual radio?
• Will I have a happy life?
  "Is There Life After Breakfast?" by Ray Davies -- I think this one counts as a bunt.
• What do my friends really think of me?
  "I Don't Want to Know" by Matthew Sweet -- and I'll leave it at that.
• Do people secretly lust after me?
  "Money for Nothing" by Dire Straits -- You mean I could get paid for it? Oh magic 8-ball, I think your warantee has expired.
• Will I accomplish my goals in life?
  "Par for the Course" by Aimee Mann -- I think that means yes.
• Will I find true love?
  "Happy Hunting Ground" by The Church -- I guess this means yes as well.
• How do I treat others?
  "The Tyger" by Birdsongs of the Mesozoic -- no idea what this means.

Remember: on LiveJournal, everyone is fourteen years old unless proven otherwise. And all quizzes are based on that fact. Spending actual useful time on a quiz like this is rather silly for someone of my advanced age, though.