Mahsdad's (Jeff) 2021 Thread - Q3

శుక్రవారం కొత్త క్వార్టర్ మరియు అద్భుతమైన ఫోటోకు స్వాగతం

Welcome, if you're new, my name is Jeff. I live in Southern California. I'm an avid reader. My wife might say I'm bordering on the obsessive. But then, I think that could apply to a lot of us in this group. I also enjoy photography, movies, hiking and playing games and hanging out with my family. Book-wise, I have a pretty eclectic taste in what I read and I hope to give you not so much reviews but my impressions about what I read.

What you will find here is mostly my rambling, way too many (according to some :) ) Wishlist and TBR pile temptations and a smattering of my photography. I don't really make a plan for what I'm going to read thru out the year. Its mostly what strikes my fancy from the TBR piles.

2013 Reading Thread
2014 Reading Thread
2015 Reading Thread
2016 Reading Thread
2017 Reading Thread
2018 Reading Thread
2019 Reading Thread
2020 Reading Thread

Come on in and sit a spell...

2021 Statistics - Q3

A - Audio
ER - Early Review
GN - Graphic Novel
K - Kindle
LL - Life's Library

September
70. Bird Art Life - Kyo Maclear (LL) :
69. The River - Peter Heller :
68. Hawkeye Vol 1 - Matt Fraction (GN) :
67. Later - Stephen King :
66. Notes from the Internet Apocalypse - Wayne Gladstone :
65. The Rabbit Factory - Larry Brown :
64. The Glass Hotel - Emily St. John Mandel (A) :
Favorite : The Rabbit Factory


August
63. Without You, There Is No Us - Suki Kim (LL) :
62. Ender in Exile - Orson Scott Card (A) :
61. The Calculating Stars - Mary Robinette Kowal :
60. Joe - Larry Brown :
59. Day - Elie Wiesel (A) :
58. From Hell - Alan Moore (GN) :
57. Dawn - Elie Wiesel (A) :
56. Thunder Below - Eugene Fluckey (A) :
55. Dead Astronauts - Jeff VanderMeer :
Favorite : Joe


July
54. Night - Eile Wiesel (A) :
53. A Gentleman in Moscow - Amor Towles (A) :
52. Whose Names Are Unknown - Sanora Babb (LL):
51. The Anthropocene Reviewed - John Green :
50. Out on Blue Six - Ian McDonald :
49. Johnny Tremain - Esther Forbes :
48. Brooklyn - Colm Toibin (A) :
Favorite : Whose Names Are Unknown

2021 Statistics - Q2

A - Audio
ER - Early Review
GN - Graphic Novel
K - Kindle
LL - Life's Library

June
47. The Driftless Area - Tom Drury :
46. The Serpent of Venice - Christopher Moore (A) :
45. Haunting of Tram 015 - P. Djeli Clark (K) :
44. We Are Still Here - Emily Koon :
43. Circe - Madeline Miller :
42. Fool - Christopher Moore (A) :
Favorite : Circe


May
41. Shakespeare for Squirrels - Christopher Moore :
40. A God in Ruins - Kate Atkinson (A) :
39. Sweet Tooth Vol 6: Wild Game - Jeff Lemire (GN) :
38. More Baths Less Talking - Nick Hornby :
37. Sweet Tooth Vol 5: Unnatural Habits - Jeff Lemire (GN) :
36. Sweet Tooth Vol 4: Endangered Species - Jeff Lemire (GN) :
35. John Henry Days - Colson Whited (A) :
34. The Song of Achilles - Madeline Miller (LL) :
33. Sweet Tooth Vol 3: Animal Armies - Jeff Lemire (GN) :
32. Sweet Tooth Vol 2: In Captivity - Jeff Lemire (GN) :
31. Inherent Vice - Thomas Pynchon :
Favorite : The Song of Achilles


April
30. Sweet Tooth Vol 1: Out of the Deep Woods - Jeff Lemire (GN) :
29. One Last Thing Before I Go - Jonathan Tropper :
28. Home: Habitat, Range, Niche, Territory - Martha Wells :
27. The Wild Blue - Stephen Ambrose :
26. Lanny - Max Porter (A) :
25. Olive, Again - Elizabeth Strout (A) :
24. How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia - Mohsin Hamid (LL):
Favorite : How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia

2021 Statistics - Q1

A - Audio
ER - Early Review
GN - Graphic Novel
K - Kindle
LL - Life's Library

March
23. Olive Kitteridge - Elizabeth Strout (A) :
22. Shopgirl - Steve Martin :
21. Recursion - Blake Crouch :
20. Little Weirds - Jenny Slate (A) :
19. How to Write an Autobiographical Novel - Alexander Chee (LL) :
18. Network Effect - Martha Wells (K) :
17. Leonardo da Vinci - Walter Isaacson (A) :
16. Scott Pilgrim Vol 2 - Bryan Lee O'Malley (GN) :
15. Dark Matter : A Century of Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora edited by Sheree Thomas :
Favorite : How to Write an Autobiographical Novel


February
14. The Porpoise - Mark Haddon (A) :
13. Scott Pilgrim Vol 1 - Bryan Lee O'Malley (GN) :
12. Forever Free - Joe Haldeman (A) :
11. Forever Peace - Joe Haldeman (A) :
Favorite : The Porpoise


January
10. The Accidental Time Machine - Joe Haldeman (A) :
9. Forever War - Joe Haldeman (K) :
8. House of M - Brian Michael Bendis (GN) :
7. There, There - Tommy Orange (A) :
6. Ready Player Two - Ernest Cline :
5. Rant - Chuck Palahniuk (A) :
4. Pirate Hunters - Robert Kurson :
3. If It Bleeds - Stephen King (A) :
2. Themes and Variations - David Sedaris (K) :
1. The Day I Died - Lori Rader-Day (ER) :
Favorite : Ready Player Two

Audiobook Narrators

Will Patton,
Stephen Weber,
Danny Burstein - If It Bleeds

Too Many to List - Rant

Darrell Dennis,
Shaun Tylor-Corbett,
Alma Ceurvo,
Kyla Garcia - There, There

Kevin Free - The Accidental Time Machine

George Wilson - Forever Peace

Peter Berkrot - Forever Free

Tim McInnerny - The Porpoise

Alfred Molina - Leonardo da Vinci

Jenny Slate - Little Weirds

Kimberly Farr - Olive Kitteridge, Olive, Again

Annie Aldington, Clare Corbett, David Timson, Jot Davies - Lanny

John Shea - One Last Thing Before I Go

Peter Jay Fernandez - John Henry Days

Alex Jennings - A God in Ruins

Euan Morton - Fool, The Serpent of Venice

Kirsten Potter - Brooklyn

George Guidall - Night, Dawn, Day

Cory Snow - Thunder Below

Stefan Rudnicki (and a cast of others) - Ender in Exile

Dylan Moore - The Glass Hotel

Seth Numrich - Later

Life's Library Book Club

Life’s Library was created by John Green and Rosianna Halse Rojas to celebrate two of their favourite things: good books and good communities. Every 6 weeks or so, they send out a new book. Hopefully, from authors that I've never heard of.

Season 1
1. If You Come Softly- Jacqueline Woodson -
2. A Field Guide to Getting Lost - Rebecca Solnit -
3. We Crossed a Bridge and It Trembled - Wendy Pearlman -
4. The House of the Spirits - Isabel Allende -
5. The Yiddish Policemen's Union - Michael Chabon -
6. Stories of Your Life and Others - Ted Chiang -
7. Mountains Beyond Mountains (The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World) - Tracy Kidder -
8. The Summer Book - Tove Jannson -
9. Howl's Moving Castle - Diana Wynne Jones -

Season 2
1. The Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler :
2. All Systems Red by Martha Wells :
2a. Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne :
3. Blonde Roots by Bernardine Evaristo :
4. Space Struck by Paige Lewis :
5. Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli :
6. On Immunity by Eula Biss :
7. Teaching a Stone to Talk by Annie Dillard :
8. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston - Read several years ago. Skipping it this time.
9. How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee :

Season 3
1. How to get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid :
2. The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller :
3. Whose Names are Unknown by Sanora Babb :
4. Without You There Is No Us by Suki Kim :
5. Birds, Art, Life by Kyo Maclear :
6. Why Fish Don't Exist by Lulu Miller

Pulitzer's Read

Ongoing bucket list to read all the Pulitzer winning novels. Santa was very good to me this year on this front, so I got plenty to work with

Bold : On the Shelf
Strikeout : Completed

Total Read - 33
2020 - The Nickel Boys
2019 - The Overstory
2018 - Less
2017 - Underground Railroad
2016 - The Sympathizer
2015 - All the Light We Cannot See
2014 - The Goldfinch
2013 - The Orphan Master's Son
2012 - NO AWARD
- Swamplandia - Nominee
2011 - A Visit from the Goon Squad
2010 - Tinkers
2009 - Olive Kitterridge
2008 - The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
2007 - The Road
2006 - March
2005 - Gilead
2004 - The Known World
2003 - Middlesex
2002 - Empire Falls
2001 - The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
2000 - The Interpreter of Maladies
1999 - The Hours
1998 - American Pastoral
1997 - Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer
1996 - Independence Day
1995 - The Stone Diaries
1994 - The Shipping News
1993 - A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain
1992 - A Thousand Acres
- My Father Bleeds History (Maus) (Special Awards & Citations - Letters)
1991 - Rabbit at Rest
1990 - The Mambo Kings
1989 - Breathing Lessons
1988 - Beloved DNF
1987 - A Summons to Memphis
1986 - Lonesome Dove
1985 - Foreign Affairs
1984 - Ironweed
1983 - The Color Purple
1982 - Rabbit is Rich
1981 - A Confederacy of Dunces
1980 - The Executioner's Song
1979 - The Stories of John Cheever
1978 - Elbow Room
1977 - NO AWARD
1976 - Humboldt's Gift
1975 - The Killer Angels
1974 - NO AWARD
1973 - The Optimist's Daughter
1972 - Angle of Repose
1971 - NO AWARD
1970 - The collected Stories of Jean Stafford
1969 - House Made of Dawn : DNF
1968 - The Confessions of Nat Turner
1967 - The Fixer
1966 - The Collected Stories of katherine Anne Porter
1965 - The Keepers of the House
1964 - NO AWARD
1963 - The Reivers
1962 - The Edge of Sadness
1961 - To Kill a Mockingbird
1960 - Advise and Consent
1959 - The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters
1958 - A Death in the Family
1957 - NO AWARD
1956 - Andersonville
1955 - A Fable
1954 - NO AWARD
1953 - The Old Man and the Sea
1952 - The Caine Mutiny
1951 - The Town
1950 - The Way West
1949 - Guard of Honor
1948 - Tales of the South Pacific
1947 - All the King's Men
1946 - NO AWARD
1945 - A Bell
1944 - Journey in the Dark
1943 - Dragon's Teeth
1942 - In This Our Life
1941 - NO AWARD
1940 - The Grapes of Wrath
1928 - The Bridge of San Luis Rey

Hugos Read

Ongoing bucket list to read all the Hugo winning novels.

Bold : On the Shelf
Strikeout : Completed

Total Read - 36

2020 - A Memory Called Empire - Arkady Martine
2019 - The Calculating Stars
2018 - The Stone Sky
2018 - All Systems Red - Novella
2017 - The Obelisk Gate
2016 - The Fifth Season
2015 - The Three-Body Problem
2014 - Ancillary Justice (DNF)
2013 - Redshirts
2012 - Among Others
2011 - Blackout/All Clear
2010 - The Windup Girl
The City & the City
2009 - The Graveyard Book
2008 - The Yiddish Policemen's Union
2007 - Rainbows End
2006 - Spin
2005 - Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell
2004 - Paladin of Souls
2003 - Hominids
2003 - Coraline (novella)
2002 - American Gods
2001 - Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
2000 - A Deepness in the Sky
1999 - To Say Nothing of the Dog
1998 - Forever Peace
1997 - Blue Mars
1996 - The Diamond Age
1995 - Mirror Dance
1994 - Green Mars
1993 - A Fire Upon the Deep
Doomsday Book
1992 - Barrayar
1991 - The Vor Game
1990 - Hyperion
1989 - Cyteen
1988 - The Uplift War
1988 - Watchmen - category : Other forms
1987 - Speaker for the Dead
1986 - Ender's Game
1985 - Neuromancer
1985 - The Crystal Spheres - David Brin - Short Story
1984 - Startide Rising
1983 - Foundation's Edge
1982 - Downbelow Station
1981 - The Snow Queen
1980 - The Fountains of Paradise
1979 - Dreamsnake
1978 - Gateway
1977 - Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
1976 - The Forever War
1975 - The Dispossessed
1974 - Rendezvous with Rama
1973 - The Gods Themselves
1972 - To Your Scattered Bodies Go
1971 - Ringworld
1970 - Left Hand of Darkness
1969 - Stand on Zanzibar
1968 - Lord of Light
1967 - The Moon is a Harsh Mistress
1966 - Dune
This Immortal
1965 - The Wanderer
1964 - Way Station
1963 - The Man in the High Castle
1962 - Stranger in a Strange Land
1961 - A Canticle for Leibowitz
1960 - Starship Troopers
1959 - A Case of Conscience
1958 - The Big Time
1956 - Double Star
1955 - The Forever Machine
1953 - The Demolished Man

Retro Hugos - this are given for years when no award was given (more than 50 years ago). Of those...

1939 - The Sword in the Stone
1951 - Farmer in the Sky
1954 - Fahrenheit 451

National Book Award Winners

2015 - Fortune Smiles
2014 - Redeployment
2001 - The Corrections
1988 - Paris Trout
1985 - White Noise - Don Delillo
1983 - The Color Purple - hardback award
1981 - The Stories of John Cheever - paperback award
1980 - The World According to Garp - paperback award
1953 - Invisible Man

Man Booker Books
2002 - Life of Pi
2009 - Wolf Hall - sadly I never finished this, never hooked me.
2015 - A Brief History of Seven Killings
2016 - The Sellout
2017 - Lincoln in the Bardo

The 75'r Chunkster List

1. The Overstory by Richard Powers
2. The Fifth Season by N.K. Jemisin
3. The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco READ
4. Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
5. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell READ
6. The Witch Elm by Tana French
7. The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood
8. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr READ
9. Little, Big by John Crowley
10. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides READ
11. The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt
12. Possession by A.S. Byatt
13. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel DNF
14. The Queen of the Night by Alexander Chee
15. The Secret History by Donna Tartt
16. The Parisian : A Novel
17. Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
18. Fingersmith by Sarah Waters
19. The Wind-up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami READ
20. Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson
21. Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie OWNED
22. American Gods by Neil Gaiman READ
23. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Klay by Michael Chabon READ
24. The Grace of Kings by Ken Liu
25. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen READ
26. Skippy Dies by Paul Murray
27. A Naked Singularity by Sergio de la Pava
28. An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears
29. A Brief History of Seven Killings by Marlon James READ
30. Life After Life by Kate Atkinson READ
31. The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe
32. A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
33. Winter's Tale by Mark Helprin READ
34. JR by William Gaddis
35. Almanac of the Dead by Leslie Marmon Silko
36. Mason & Dixon by Thomas Pynchon
37. Dhalgren by Samuel R. Delany
38. The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett READ
39. The Stand by Stephen King READ
40. Underworld by Don DeLillo
41. The Luminaries by Eleanor Catton
42. Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke
43. Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry READ
44. 2666 by Roberto Bolano
45. Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra
46. Ducks, Newburyport by Lucy Ellmann
47. Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
48. Parallel Stories by Peter Nadas
49. Women and Men by Joseph McElroy
50. A Suitable Boy by Vikram Seth

Paul's Alternative 20

A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry
The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
The Far Pavilions by MM Kaye
Earthly Powers by Anthony Burgess
White Teeth by Zadie Smith
The Sunne in Splendour by Sharon Kay Penman
Saville by David Storey
To Serve Them All My Days by RF Delderfield
Captain Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernieres
Sacred Hunger by Barry Unsworth
Birdsong by Sebastian Faulks
Sophie's Choice by William Styron
Sea of Poppies by Amitav Ghosh
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving READ
The Singapore Grip by JG Farrell
Magician by Raymond E Feist
The Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy
A Chain of Voices by Andre Brink

Bill's Alternative Weird Dozen

To Say Nothing of the Dog by Connie Willis READ
Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi
Rabbit at Rest by John Updike
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger READ
Cider House Rules by John Irving
The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
Nobody's Fool by Richard Russo
The Book and the Brotherhood by Iris Murdoch
The Book Thief by Markus Zusak READ
August 1914 by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey
Lethal White by Robert Galbraith
The Golden Notebook by Doris Lessing
The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams READ
11/22/63: A Novel by Stephen King READ
His Dark Materials Omnibus (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass) by Philip Pullman
The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer
Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling READ

2021 So Far

Books Read : 47
Number of Authors : 33
Authors of Color : 5
Lady Authors : 7

That's all I need, come on in. I'm going back to the top to fill things in.

From one rambler to another:

Happy new thread!

Is >1 mahsdad: a santolina? It's such a pretty yellow!

Happy new thread, and a good weekend-ahead's reads.

>12 mahsdad: Thanks Paul!

>13 PaulCranswick: Santolina? No idea. My thumb ain't green. ;) Like you said, it was just a pretty yellow.

Since today's Friday, I won't give you another image, but its that time of year to share my favorite Simpson's clip for today's Book Update. Its most appropriate, since its Independence Day weekend, or as the Brits would like to say; Treason Day. :)

Celebrate the Independence of your Nation, by blowing up a small part of it. https://youtu.be/Zc2d652_2hE

Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Out on Blue Six - Ian McDonald. A really weird, trippy sci-fi book that I've had on the shelf for quite a while. I got it at the recommendation of Cory Doctorow.

From his introduction to a new printing : I won't try and summarize the plot. There's no point. Picture a 16-car pileup in Dr Seuss country, where the colliding zithermobiles are piloted by William Gibson's console cowboys and Mad Magazine caricatures, have P.K. Dick and Orwell do alternating rewrites on the text, and you'll be getting close to the kind of novel that this is.

Reading - The Anthropocene Reviewed - John Green
Listening - Brooklyn - Colm Toibin

Favorite Read from June - Circe by Madeline Miller

Happy new thread, Jeff!

>16 mahsdad: *chuckle* I didn't think Out on Blue Six was *that* weird, but it definitely played around with one's expectations...in what I came to agree was a good way. Enjoy it.

The King of Nebraska and his retinue of sentient raccoons. Come on, that’s weird. LOL. I’m enjoying it tho

Happy new thread, Jeff

Thanks Shelley

Happy new thread!

Happy new one!

Happy Friday, Jeff. Happy New Thread. Have a nice holiday weekend. Loving Joe. He is such a great writer.

Thanks Susan, Jim, Mark.

Hope you all are having a great weekend.

Happy Independence Day to all who care about that sort of thing. :)

I decided to pad my page counts by reading Johnny Tremain this weekend. I see it everyday on a shelf as I walk into my office, but I've never read it. We bought it years ago for the kid, but nobody every read it. Its pretty good and an incredibly quick read (given that its aimed at Tweeners).

>25 mahsdad: Johnny Tremain is one of very few books I read in English. A member of this group sended it to me in 2009, together with Celia Garth, so I could read some about US history. As I knew next to nothing back then.

Hi Anita, how interesting. I'm sure she took some poetic license with the characters, but it is a good first step into the Revolutionary highlights. Its a good read. Didn't quite finish it yesterday. Will tonight.

Johnny Tremain is still a children's classic. It won the Newbery medal back in 1944! You can find excerpts of it in many of the reading textbooks for 5 and 6th graders even today. I think it is one of those winners that has stood the test of time. Good book for the Fourth of July.

>28 benitastrnad: I agree. It might be a new tradition, maybe not to read JT every year, but to try to read an historical book of some sort around the holiday. I was very close to finishing it in 3 days, just couldn't do it. Only have about 30 pages left.

Talagsaon nga Litrato Biyernes (but on Saturday)

Sorry, sorry, sorry. I hate it when work gets in the way of what's important. Hope everyone is doing well on this lovely Saturday morning. It appears summer has finally found us, tho luckily we're dodging most of the heat out here on the coast. Nothing planned for today, which means as much reading as possible, if I can stay off the social medias. But tomorrow we're probably going to meet up with some friends at a park for a free concert.

Since the camera on my phone is no longer working, no new images to share so today I'll dip into the archive and share some rusty old chairs. I took this at an old gold mine outside of Julian CA. In case you didn't know this about me, I like taking pictures of rust and rusty things :) Enjoy...



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Out on Blue Six by Ian McDonald. Still weird, still enjoying.
Reading - The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green Sort treating this like a devotional, reading 1 or 2 essays a night. Fun stuff
Listening - Unseen Academicals by Terry Pratchett. Football at the Unseen University. TBH, I'm not connecting with this, so I'm going to put it down. Going to try...
Listening - A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
Graphic Novel - From Hell by Alan Moore

>30 mahsdad: Tagalog is a good choice. The empty chairs are, too...great textures on rusty things!

I think, the older I get, ie, the rustier I get, the more I appreciate them. :)

And you were very close with Tagalog, its actually Cebuano, which came next in my weekly traverse thru Google Translate's options. It is a different language spoken in the Philippines. I would imagine its pretty close to Tagalog. Funny (or just plain wrong), Tagalog is not on Google Translate's list of languages. That's strange, because other than the big obvious ones, Tagalog is always one that I see as language options on stuff out here (especially ATM machines).

Have a great weekend!

>32 mahsdad: Cebuano and Tagalog must be mutually intelligible, at the very least, since those are all Tagalog-adjacent (heh) at the least words!

Google Translate doesn't have Tagalog! That shocks me. How incredible to not have a language with ~25MM speakers but to include Esperanto!

>33 richardderus: It works if you invoke Filipino.

Hidey-Ho my lovelies.

A couple bookish thoughts that came to me after a long day tied to my desk.

First a hilarious meme post from Samantha Bee, poking fun at one of the RWWhacko's in congress



The other being, I've been seeing a lot about the triumvirate of billionaires going to space (Branson, Bezos and Musk), it reminds me of Buzz Aldrin's SciFi book Encounter with Tiber. Its been years since I read it, but the biggest memory for me is his take on how to get us out of the gravity well. Its all about monetizing LEO. He has some pretty interesting ideas. First, let goverments, do the exploring, let industry handle LEO. He talked about starting small, and having lotteries to raise funds to help develop the next bigger system. I immediately think of Branson and Virgin Galactic, a purely touristy endevour.

Written during the time of the space shuttles, the other very interesting idea was to always take the big fuel tank up to space with your. Open to a the vacuum, slap on an airlock, tie a bunch together and you have a space hotel. It's a pretty interesting read, at least it was 20+ years ago, when I last read it.

>32 mahsdad:, >33 richardderus:, >34 quondame: Yeah, that sent me down a bit of a rabbit hole. Filipino is listed in Google Translate, and that is apparently a standardized version of Tagalog. I feel like Translate used to say Tagalog at one point, but I'm not sure.

>35 mahsdad: So the media likes to make fun of billionaires in space, and really, it's in some ways a bit ridiculous. But there are some good results from this. The biggest plus is that each company has its own launch vehicle now, so the US went from a monopolized launch consortium for the Air Force to competition for launching payloads, bringing the price of launch vehicles way down and availability way up. Performance of these new vehicles is also way better - we can lift more on each vehicle.

Also, each of the competing companies is making space available on flights for hosted payloads, which means we science types get more access to space, especially for little experiments that wouldn't be worth NASA's money to fly individually. And these companies, along with commercial access to the Moon, are driving the next steps in human space - setting up permanent scientific and commercial facilities there. Note, I'm not talking about mining the Moon, or anything like that, but there are some really interesting manufacturing things that can be done in low gravity that might be commercially viable if access to the Moon is cheap enough.

And honestly, if I had the money to take a ride to space, I'd go in a heartbeat. 😀

>37 drneutron: If the price of a telescope on the far side of the moon is Branson's ugly mug on my computer screen, it's cheap at twice the price.

Hiya Jeff!

I could have sworn I replied to everyone yesterday, but the data gremlins attacked, and its gone.

>36 ursula: Somehow I'm not surprised Google "standardized" things. Not that I like it, tho

>37 drneutron: I didn't even think about the way this market opens up new opportunties for the smaller science projects getting lifted up. And as far as the moon is concerned, we've all read enough scifi to know how that can be done well and, ummm, not so well. :)

>38 richardderus: Absolutely!

Фантастик фото җомга

Hey folks not much new to report, glad its the end of another busy week work-wise. I did finish Out on Blue Six (#50) and will probably finish The Anthropocene Reviewed this weekend, so it will be a good results weekend. Photos have been pretty slim recently, just haven't had the opportunities, and with my phone being out of commission, the quick grabs ain't happening. Got to make sure I have the big boy.

Well, I got a couple neat ones today, to document Laura's success at fostering a great wildlife environment in our yard. This has been a banner year for Monarchs around here. It even got to the point where she had to go out to the garden store to buy some more milkweed plants. The caterpillars were eating us out of house and home. :)



I shook on this one, but I kinda like the double-exposure aspect...


This one isn't spectacular either, but I liked seeing two of them fighting for resources...


Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Whose Names Are Unknown by Sanora Babb. Current Life's Library Book. The Grapes of Wrath before the Grapes of Wrath. Lived in OK and CA during the Dustbowl and inteviewed those who lived it. Supposedly Steibeck used her notes as research for Wrath. Once it was published she couldn't get her book published. She wrote it in the 30's, but it wasn't published until 2004
Listening - A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles. Enjoying this a lot. Just about a 1/3 thru. Still now sure how this uppercrust guy is going to survive in Soviet Russia, but we'll see. Just got to a part where the powers that be didn't think it was right to have so much choice in the wine selection at the restaurant, so they were only going to serve red or white, and took all the labels off the vintage wine collection. Interesting.
Graphic Novel - From Hell by Alan Moore. Was looking around Hoopla for a GN and saw this. Thought, yeah, I should read this. Not realizing until I started that it was 580 pages long, what a doorstop of a comic book. Geesh. Interesting so far.

I haven't started listing to it yet, but there is a new podcast that is working with Tor, to broadcast all of Three-Body Problem in serial form. Its only available thru sometime in September, so as long as you download the episodes, you can listen to it all.

Its called Stories from Among the Stars

Happy Friday, Jeff. Hooray for A Gentleman in Moscow. I am also a big fan of the Count! I have not read From Hell yet. maybe you will supply the nudge.

>40 mahsdad: I think the middle one's really cool! Don't say it's an accident...let people assume it's your Artistry.

Read well this weekend. #51 needs to keep the streak alive.

>42 msf59: Thanks Mark. Yeah Moscow is a really nice listen. From Hell is very interesting. All black and white, the art style is very dark and sparse. It could have very easily been done as a novel. A little bit misogynistic , but I'm not really sure if that's Moore, or just the subject matter and the mores of the Victorian era.

>43 richardderus: Thank you kind sir. I do try for the odd, different angles and crops, but I'm not afraid of admitting to my happy accidents.

>40 mahsdad: A Gentleman in Moscow is being read right now on Chapter a Day on public radio! I've been enjoying it. Of course, that's not the audiobook version.

>45 justchris: Another happy coincidence of people around here start reading the same thing but not for the same reasons. Like Circe that everybody seems to be reading recently.

Lightning Round!

47. Driftless Area by Tom Drury (8/10): Pierre is a bartender in a town in the midwest, after he is saved by a woman with a mysterious past, his debt to her leads him down some twisty roads. A very interesting story I enjoyed quite a bit

48. Brooklyn by Colm Toibin (7/10): Eilis is a young girl in post-War Ireland. Unable to find work, a Priest back from the US, offers to sponsor her with a job and a place to live in Brooklyn. She goes off on her own and finds life challenging and rewarding, and as she finds love, family issues bring her back to Ireland, for good? Listened on audio.

49. Johnny Tremain by Esther Forbes (8/10): The classic kids story about the beginnings of the American Revolution. It won the Newbery Award in 1944. Don't know why I never read this when I was in school. A fun, quick read.

50. Out on Blue Six by Ian McDonald (8/10): Life in a future city is stable and happy all thanks to the Compassionate Society. Every thing you do is dictated by your genetics. Stray for the path and the Ministry of Pain is there to keep you in check. Courtney Hall is a satirical cartoonist who finds her self outside the norm and escapes the city to the underground, where she finds a group of people who may have the key to the survival of humanity. Shades of Vonnegut, Gibson and the Matrix. Weird but fun read.

*review*

51. The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green (8/10): Subtitled, Essays on a Human-Centered Planet. This book started out with a podcast that he did of the same name, where he would rate certain aspects of society and our world on a 5-star scale. It seemed tailor made for his next book and he expanded it to be part memoir, part pondering of our world. Its really an eclectic collection of small essays that are almost like little devotionals. I read 1 or 2 a night before bed. From "Our Capacity for Wonder", to "Diet Dr. Pepper" to "Harvey" to "Kentucky Bluegrass" to "Wintery Mix". Some where better than others, but lots of interesting thoughts to ponder.

(Humanity's Temporal Range) referring to a religious cult who predicted the end of the world... "We humbly acknowledge we were wrong about the timing," although for the record no individual ever humbly acknowledged anything while referring to themselves as "we." I am reminded of something my religion professor Donald Rogan told me once: "Never predict the end of the world. You're almost certain to be wrong, and if you're right, no one will be around to congratulate you"

(Teddy Bears) ...the teddy bear is a reminder of the astonishing power of contemporary humanity. It's hard to understand how dominant our species has become, but sometimes I find it helpful to consider it purely in terms of mass: The total combined weight of all living humans currently on Earth is around 385 million tons. That's the so-called biomass of our species. The biomass of our livestock - sheep, chickens, cows and so on, is around 800 million tons. And the combined biomass of every other mammal and bird on Earth is less than 100 million tons. All the whales and tigers and monkeys and deer and bears and yes even Canada geese together weigh less than a third of what we weigh.

(The Yips) Once you've known the yips personally, you can't unknow them. Every time you toss a tennis ball for the rest of your life, you'll know what could happen. How can you regain confidence when you know that confidence is just a varnish painted atop human frailty?

(iPhone Notes App) a listing of one note from every year Green has had an iPhone. 2014: "Strawberry Hill is not the luxury alcohol experience I remember it being." I wrote this after I'd had a bottle of Strawberry Hill, a four dollar, bright pink, wine-like beverage made by Boone's Farm. I often drank Strawberry Hill in high school, and loved it then, but in the intervening years, either it has changed or I have.

>48 mahsdad: But what about the biomass of beetles? The true masters of the animal kingdom. But nothing on fungi!
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/humans-make-110000th-earths-biomass-18...

>47 mahsdad: Johnny Tremain was required reading for me back in elementary school. The molten silver incident made a lasting impression on me. I've actually got it on my bookshelves now as part of a boxed set of Newbery winners.

>49 justchris: Yeah, he only listed the mammals and birds in the text. He doesn't talk about insects, but in a footnote, boy howdy, how about bacteria.

We are all dwarfed by bacteria, though. According to one recent estimate, the biomass of bacteria is about 35 times larger than the combined biomass of all animals.

Tremain - it just might have been required reading for me and I just didn't remember. The silver, however, was a strong memory, not sure if its the book or the Disney film that I'm sure I saw some Sunday night growing up on the Wonderful World of Disney. :)

Book Acquisitions - Recently I came into some new books that I thought I'd share...

Without You, There Is No Us by Suki Kim. Author goes undercover as an English teacher in a North Korean University. Its the next book in the Life's Library Bookclub.
Joe by Larry Brown. Thanks Mark! Love me some Brown
The Missing American by Kwei Quartey. Again Thanks Mark!
The Secret History by Donna Tartt. Not really new, it was in Laura's pile. She just finished it and I added it to mine.
Wild LA from the Natural History Museum. A book about exploring all the fun nature stuff in and around LA

>51 mahsdad: I remember reading The Secret History many moons ago and absolutely loving most of it.

>48 mahsdad: The yips certainly affects many in sports either where nerves need to be kept intact or where hand/eye coordination has to be on point under pressure. I have a few friends, Jeff, for whom putting on a golf green can be a very taxing experience.

>51 mahsdad: Lovely thing to happen! What was it, just opened the front door one day and there they all were in their little sailor suits carrying their bags?

>52 PaulCranswick: My folks both golf. I was decent at it, but living in California it was more of a hassle than a joy so I gave it up. But I can certainly sympathize that golf in general can be a very taxing experience. :)

>53 richardderus: Pretty much. One day, there was 2 packages, the NHM book and Mark's package, then the next day, the Life's Library book came. Its so nice when new friends come to visit. :)

>53 richardderus: As predicted, it's back in stock.

>55 quondame: Oh Susan, I think RD gets daily deliveries, so the shelves are never empty for long. LOL

Inspired by Ursula to expand my data visualization. Here's the last 3 years of reading.

Chithunzi Chosangalatsa Lachisanu

Hey everybody, we made it, then end of another week on this treadmill we call life. (Too maudlin? Ha, its been a week :) ) Well maybe I can be a little more depressing, or maybe its just a challenge I'm putting out there with today's image. Instead of a personal image, I'm sharing a meme I saw on FB yesterday. I think there's a lot of people around here that will blow this number out of the water. LOL!



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Whose Names Are Unknown by Sanora Babb
Listening - A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
Graphic Novel - From Hell by Alan Moore

>58 mahsdad: That's hilarious! And yes, I've already blown past that number...but 129MM books in the world is all? Where'd they get that number, I wonder. (We know they mean "works" so that's not the issue.)

>59 richardderus: Yeah, I tend to doubt the veracity of the actual numbers, but the sentiment is hilarious

>58 mahsdad: LOL, Jeff. A quick search revealed that the total was the estimate of 2010...
And I was happy to be about halfway in only 12½ years keeping track of my readings.

Dune Trailer anyone?

https://youtu.be/UfWVVu1tVgQ

Loved Dune (read it multiple times, the last time about 10 years ago), could never get into the subsequent books. Last time I tried was when I was a teen. Maybe I was too immature (still am, but my literary capacity is broader)

>61 FAMeulstee: I'm at about 20% with about 16 years of tracking, but only 11 of those are 50+ years. I didn't ramp up my reading until I found this crazy bunch of degenerates. LOL!

>63 mahsdad: I think I've logged at least 3500 books read since 2007 when I started keeping track, but that wouldn't include any re-reads as I'm going by 2500 library books and about 1000 books from my own collections. I'd guess 50 books a year would not have been out of the question through my 20s and 30s, though I'm sure my 40s took a hit with my kid and a ~80hr work weeks for a couple of years.

>57 mahsdad: nice! There’s something satisfying in seeing the range, I think. I noticed I had one year when I read a much larger proportion of older books … and this year is ending up with lots of new ones.

>62 mahsdad: Yes! I'm really excited about the new movie. I loved the older film and LOVED the first book of the series, but several friends whose opinions on such things I take seriously have told me that the first book (and to a lesser extent the second and third) are good, but the rest of the series is rot. So I've never bothered to read any more of them.

>65 ursula: Yeah, my decade chart that I was using was showing that trend for me as well, but the scatterplot is just much more satisfying

>66 scaifea: Hi Amber. I hadn't heard that (about the rest of the Dune series), but TBH, I'm not surprised. I'm not going to rush out and try to read them. SO MANY other books to read first. In fact, I should step away from the computer and put down the ipad and go read a bit. :)

Yeah, I loved the trailer! Like you’ve read Dune several times, but I’ve never made it through any of the others.

No harm no foul on not reading things. :) Hell, I tried several times (as a youth) to read Foundation and I've never been successful. And I don't think I'll ever manage to finish Gravity's Rainbow :)

>51 mahsdad: You are more than welcome, Jeff. I am sure you will enjoy both books.

I am glad you liked The Driftless Area. It fell a bit short for me. Instead I was completely smitten with Driftless.

>70 msf59: Hey Mark, thanks for stopping by.

Well I just might have to continue the Driftless trend and try that one as well. :)

அருமையான புகைப்படம் வெள்ளிக்கிழமை

Hey everybody. Nothing much new to report, hope all is well in your neck of the woods. Once again, nothing much on the agenda, but hey, it will be August on Sunday and that means I'm going to have to start getting off my ass and start running again, if I want to somehow manage to run my annual Labor Day Bridge run at the end of the month. Something tells me I'll be walking a lot this year, its not been a good year for me and jogging. Oh well, it will still be fun. :)

Today's image is an actual new one, that I took with my big camera from some orchids in our kitchen window. Enjoy...


Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Dead Astronauts by Jeff VanderMeer. Boy howdy is this a weird book. I guess I'm on a weird kick (after Out on Blue Six), but it is a very interesting read
Listening - Night by Elie Wiesel. Done with the book proper, just have some afterwords. Such a powerful, poignant read. I'm sure I'll jump right into the other 2 of the trilogy. Narrated by George Guidall, who until this one, I didn't know his name, but is a favorite audiobook voice for me. You'll know its him as soon as you hear him.
Graphic Novel - From Hell by Alan Moore. A little over half way thru on this trippy doorstop of a comic book.

>72 mahsdad: Good luck on the bridge!

I think the colors, the textures, and the forms make it very clearly a You photo. The shadows...you really captured a special moment.

Thanks RD, it was the shadows that caught my eye, the sun was just hitting them in the right way, and I was like.... quick, where's my camera...

Happy Friday, Jeff. Have a good weekend. I hope to revisit Night. I never did finish the others in the trilogy.

>72 mahsdad: LIKE!

Happy Friday to you!

Thanks!

Happy August!

July Recap

7 Books Read

DTE - 4
Audio - 3

Best of the Month - Whose Names are Unknown by Sanora Babb. The story of life in the Oklahoma Dust Bowl and migrant farm workers in California during the Depression. Sound familar? It should. Her notes and interviews that she would use in writing this book were given to Steinbeck and may or may not have been used in Grapes of Wrath. This was going to be published in 1939, but Grapes came out just ahead of it and it was put on the shelf until 2004.

Year to Date
Books Read - 54
Total pages - 8,700 (41.04 pages per day, 255.88 pages per book)
Total Audio hours - 8 days, 21 hours, and 24 minutes (22 minutes per day)

Projected # of Books for the year - 92

周五的精彩照片

Here we are again, its Friday and I'm watching the clock. Oh well, at least the weather around my neck of the woods (KNOCK WOOD) has been really nice. Staying well under 80 during the day and nice breezy 60's at night. I know we still have late August and September to come, when it tends to heat up around here. Today's image is a box full of joy I received the other day. One of the nice off shoots of lockdowns of last year, some California Breweries have setup the ability to ship to residential addresses within the state. That lets me get some of my favorite beers. These are Pliny the Elder, a lovely IPA, that is 8% ABV and 100 IBU (IBU is a measure of bitterness and 100 is high, and that's a good thing :) )



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

eBook - The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal. I needed an electronic book when I found myself without one, so I started this. 1950's alternate universe America. What happens when a meteorite hits Earth and we find ourselves having to get off the planet.
Listening - Thunder Below by Eugene Fluckey. A memoir of Fluckey's time as the Captain of the USS Barb, a submarine, during WWII. Sometimes a little bit of just a list of stats, but an excellent narrative read.
GN - From Hell by Alan Moore

>78 mahsdad: Quite the haul! Wise of the breweries to get that set up.

I suspect you know that Mary Robinette, Empress of Lady Astronautry, is enshrined with UKL and Martha Wells as Goddesses of SFFH.

Not sure if I did, this is the first of hers I've read. Always knew the name. SFFH? Science Fiction/Fantasy - what's the H (he asks expectantly, as the answer is going to make him give himself a dope slap :))

In looking at her bio, she's quite the polymath. An audio narrator, puppeteer, author. I'm sure I'll read more of her stuff. I'm enjoying this first one a bunch

"Horror"

::side-eye::

:::Dope Slap:::

Nice pic! And a nice treat too. 😀

Thanks Jim. And they are.

Latest book in the Life's Library Bookclub announced.

Its Birds, Art, Life by Kyo Maclear. It looks pretty interesting, and I see that Mark gave it pretty high marks

I am also sitting on Without You, There is No Us by Suki Kim. About life at a university in North Korea. Probably start this after I finish Joe (which I'm enjoying quite a bit)

Yeah, yeah, I hear ya. I wish I had more time to do what I love during the day. :)

Here ya go...

Акси афсонавӣ рӯзи ҷумъа

Been a busy week and I'm glad that its coming to an end. No really "artistic" images to show today, but one of domestic improvement. What do you think it is?



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Joe by Larry Brown
eBook - Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal
Listening - Day by Elie Wiesel

A piece from your grill? I must say it cleans up right nice.

Happy Friday, Jeff. You got some great books going. I enjoyed The Calculating Stars and loved both Birds, Art, Life & of course, Joe.

>89 richardderus: Right on. The "cleaned up" one is actually a new one. The one of the right is after 3 or 4 years of use.

The other day, I wanted to clean out the crud in the bottom and a blog post on Charbroil said to put some foil on the grates and turn all the burns on high for 15 minute to cook everything off. Well it started smoking really good after about 5 minutes and then alarmingly so after 7. Lifted the lid a bit and it was a full blown conflagration in there. Yikes. So I turned it off, turned all the fans in the house to blow out the smell. and waited for it to cool down. After I cleaned up the grates and these reflectors, I said the heck with it, I'm going to buy new. $25 a pop, but it will probably prevent future flair ups and prevent me and my house becoming a statistic. :)

>90 msf59: Hey Mark, thanks! Looking forward to the Bird book. Still have H is for Hawk on the shelf, probably should get to that too.

>72 mahsdad: Love your images, as usual. Also Jeff VanderMeer. I just started Hummingbird Salamander and I really enjoyed his Borne. High hopes!

>91 mahsdad: Glad you didn't burn the house down!! New sounds like a wise choice. LOL. Have fun with H is for Hawk--it's a good one.

Happy weekend.

Hey Kim, thanks for stopping by. I liked Borne as well, and of course the Annihilation trilogy. He is just the right kind of weird.

Exactly. : )

Update Time!

52. Whose Names Are Unknown by Sanora Babb (8/10) : Babb's story of life in the Dustbowl of Okalhoma during the Depression, and after escaping, life on the migrant farm picker circuit in California. A very gritty intense story that, to be honest scares me a bit for the future. It was only published in 2004, but was written in 1939 and wasn't published because of Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, who actually used Babb's notes in the development of his story. The title comes from the eviction/foreclosure notices that used to come out where the banks didn't know who owned the property, so they just listed them as "John Does", whose real names are unknown.

The old man years ago had done with his faith in religion. He had not made a sharp conclusion. He had grown away from it because it had nothing to do with life and more and more was no guide to living but only a guide to death, a humiliating guide at that. He knew that many of his neighbors felt the same, although there were no declarations. There were at first doubts, then the fear of having doubted, then the long and patient recognition that religion had failed them in their greatest need, not once but altogether. It betrayed them into a humility and a patience unnoticed by God but noticed and used by man.

53. A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles (8/10) : (audio) A the beginning of Soviet Russia, an aristocratic Count is sentenced to house arrest in the majestic Metropol hotel. An excellent tale of the life of such a stoic character, from retaining his sophistication thru the Bolshevik Revolution, surviving WWII, living and surviving in the Soviet Union and his ultimate escape. Well worth your time.

54. Night (8/10)
57. Dawn (7/10)
59. Day by Elie Wiesel (6/10) : (audio). Night is Wiesel's excellent memoir of his experiences and survival of the death camps of Auschwitz and Buchenwald. Dawn and Day are novels that are loosely connected to Night. Dawn, tells the story of a young operative in Palestine (pre-state of Israel) tasked to execute a British officer at dawn, he spends the night reliving his experiences and questions his faith and ability to carry out his task. Day tells the story of a different man, who is hit by a taxi and critically injured. He then, in recovery questions his life, his believe in God, and how could the Holocaust happen. I "enjoyed" Night a lot. I'm glad I read the other two, but they are not quite as profound (at least to me) as the first one.

55. Dead Astronauts by Jeff VanderMeer (8/10) : I really enjoyed reading this book, its weird and a little hard to get into at first, and very hard to describe. It follows a blue fox who is following 3 astronauts who come back to a post apololyptic earth and they keep repeating their lives and experiences, in either alternate worlds, or time loops. VanderMeer plays with characters and perspectives and tenses and techniques (prose vs poetry). If you like odd stories, this might work for you.

56. Thunder Below by Eugene Fluckey (9/10) : (audio). The WWII history of Fluckey's time on the USS Barb as its Captain. He was an innovator in submarine warfare in the Pacific. The Barb was very successful in using new techniques to harrass the Japanese in the late parts of the war. It lead to many awards for Fluckey and his crew, including the Medal of Honor. An excellent read.

58. From Hell by Alan Moore (8/10) : (graphic novel) Moore's graphic (in more ways than one) collection of the story of Jack the Ripper. A massive 500+ page tome about Victorian England and the crimes of Whitechapel and who Moore thinks did the deed. I didn't read the 50 pages of notes at the end, I was mentally exhausted after 500 pages and glad for it to be done, but nevertheless its a worthwhile read. (I think that might be one of my biggest pet peeves of electronic reading. I didn't know there were notes and there's no easy way to flip back and forth to read them at the end of each chapter, oh well).

*review*

>95 mahsdad: Quite the weekend update, SNL!

Ha!

Well it is a month's worth. Later half of July and August so far.

>95 mahsdad: Huh. A Vandermeer that’s weird. So situation normal… 😀

>98 drneutron: Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

>98 drneutron: LOL

>99 mahsdad: True true.

Ah its ant season in So Cal. And I'm getting to an age where my crappy eyes don't see them. The worst part is, after you clean them up and find the source of the trail, you feel like they're still crawling over you every once in a while. :)

>101 mahsdad:
It is year round ant season in Alabama. Consider yourself lucky it is only part of the year.

Its when it starts getting really dry that they start venturing out for food and water. Its amazing how efficient they are at finding the source. :)

Happy Birthday, Jeff!

Thanks Guys! I appreciate it. The older I get, birthdays are just another day, but its so nice to know you lovely folks are thinking of me just a bit. :)

I like the new Charts feature, as a whole. Some of the charts themselves are superfulous for what I track, but its fun to look at. For this group, I especially like the total talk messages and the posts over time.

Just experimented and found that you can see other's charts as well. Its part of the profile info, if you go to someone's page. More stuff to be creepy stalkers about. (and by creepy stalkers, I mean just good curious friends) :)

^Have a great day, my friend! And Cheers!

Happy (remaining) Birthday (minutes) !

>108 msf59: Thanks!

>109 quondame: Thanks Susan. There's still an hour, and for once in a blue moon, there are several activities planned for the weekend. I have tomorrow off, and my sweetie and I are going to the beach. And on Saturday we're going on a walking tour of downtown, focused on the Art Deco period. Put on by the LA Conservancy. It will hopefully prove photographically fruitful.

Slightly belated birthday wishes, Jeff!

Aw, I missed the birthday, but I'm here to hope that it was a great one for you!

>111 PaulCranswick: Thanks Paul! Your lovely wife was slightly early (at least in my time zone), and you're slightly late so it nets out to perfect timing!

>112 scaifea: No worries Amber, thanks for the warm wishes no matter when they come.

Foto Fantastica Venneri

Hey everybody, we made it to Friday again. I'm not working today, so that's a good thing. I'm celebrating the anniversary of me surviving my first year of life. LOL. Going to be headed out to the beach in a little bit. Just an excuse to sit and stare at the vastness of the ocean and read my book.

Today's image comes to you by way of the flowers that my SIL sent to my wife. Enjoy...



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 books

Reading - Without You, There Is No Us by Suki Kim. Subtitled; My Time with the Sons of North Korea's Elite. The author's time teaching at an exclusive university in North Korea. Very interesting so far
Listening - Ender in Exile by Orson Scott Card. The 6th book in the story of Ender. I was going to start over and listen to them all, but none but this new one, was available. Its the story of what happened to Ender right after the war in Ender's Game. Yeah, I know Card is problematic as a person, but I still like his stuff.
eBook - The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal

>114 mahsdad: Gorgeous!!! I think that is one of my favorites from your posts. Wow.

And happy happy birthday week! (Since I missed the day.) Have fun at the beach. And with the books. : )

>114 mahsdad: Stargazers! Such gorgeous lilies. Happy celebration-by-reading, Jeff. Many, many more.

>115 Berly: >116 richardderus: Thanks Kim! Thanks RD!

We went on an Art Deco architecture tour of downtown LA over the weekend, and one of the buildings we talked about was the Central Library building. While not strictly Art Deco it is a very iconic building. I really like the motto/quote that is emblazoned across the top...

Books alone are liberal and free. They give to all who ask. They emancipate all who serve them faithfully.

>118 mahsdad: Love the motto! DISlike the brutal whack-your-knuckles building, like the UGLIEST most squatty cathedral in Christendom at Montpellier:

*thud*

Yeah it was built by government bureaucracy in 1926. Money started getting tight and they had to cut corners (or add them depending on your perspective.) It was supposed to be more art deco'y and there was supposed to be a dome instead of the pyramid, but the church that was across the way complained that it would be taller and detract from them. They were louder and they won.

Also due to the way thing go, there was (is, can't remember) a zoning restriction on how many floors a building can be, so to fund the reconstruction after the fire in 86, they sold the air (50 stories) above the building to a couple developers 25 went to the Library tower building (now US Bank) and the other to what is now the Deloitte building a few blocks away. So since they couldn't go up to expand the building, they went down. A new edition goes down 5 stories underground.

If you haven't (for anyone), read The Library Book by Susan Orlean

I went a little bit mad this week and put all of my reading history (at least since I started tracking it) into a scatterplot. I think its quite beautiful.

Fantastisk fotofredag

Hey there friendly friends. You made it to another Friday. Hope this weekend will be a good one. On tap for the weekend is something that is barely worthwhile IMHO... a garage sale. Over the years, I've prided myself on being able to get both cars into the garage, not a common occurance on my street (as we have no basements and your garage becomes yours). Until 2 years ago when my SIL passed and we got all her stuff. We can now get 1 car in, and we're having the final sale (we've had a couple over the years) to try to sell the rest. After this, its donation time. I'm also going to be installing some new mesh routers in the house that will hopefully solve our spotty wifi coverage around here. Weee fun. Oh, and I hope to get a lot of reading in :)

Today's image comes from our Art Deco walk last weekend. I saw variations on this plaque embedded on the ground all around some of the older buildings. Very interesting disclaimer that the building owner can block the sidewalks at any time (or used to be able to). Fun...



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Without You, There is No Us by Suki Kim. Boy is DPRK a Stepford Wives sort of place. Its no wonder that Cheetolini was so enamored with the dear leader, the blind fanaticism is right up his alley.
Listening - Ender in Exile by Orson Scott Card

>122 mahsdad: That monument is o.l.d.! I do enjoy those odd-little-corner photos you're so adept at seeing...I've probably walked over something like that 1.4 gajillion times and never even glanced at it.

Happy weekend-ahead's reads!

>123 richardderus: Absolutely, I'm sure I've passed them by as well. Thank you so much for noticing my odd eye. If I can humble brag a bit, if I do have a superpower, its my ability to see things from odd angles. Or maybe its my introverted tendencies and I'm always looking down. :)

My wife, when we're out for a walk or hike, is used to me just all of a sudden dropping off to take a picture of some obscure thing.

Yeah, that is pretty cool. I don't think I've seen those anywhere.

Unfortunately, that's the only one I took a picture of. But I'm sure there were at least 2 or 3 others I saw. I guess the key is look around buildings that are 70-90 years old that haven't had the sidewalks changed too much.

>122 mahsdad: I have a friend living in Rolling Hills Estates who has found the most delicious antique fabric items at local garage sales - but possibly that isn't a thing for you.

>127 quondame: Oooo Rolling Hills, that's the upper crust. LOL. And we're looking to get RID of stuff, not bring more in. :)

>128 mahsdad: Well it's up there, that's for sure. But the time it takes to get anywhere from there pokes a few holes in the crust, or so my brother says - he lives in Rancho Palos Verdes.

Absolutely, before I moved down to the common folk in Pedro, we lived in RPV (renting) as well. It was when I was commuting down to Huntington Beach for work. It took forever to get off the hill and to the freeway.

>121 mahsdad: Love it!

>121 mahsdad: Baffling. What do the individual colors represent? If the display is for 2007 to 2021, what are the dots prior to 2007? There are an awful lot outside the range. And the x-axis?

There's a lot of chattering on the thread "New Features: Charts and graphs is released!" Your scatterplot would trigger some apoplexy among the critics of charts and graphs. "Skip the colorful graphics, damn it! Just give us the numbers. I can't deal with scrolling."

>132 weird_O: Understandable Bill. each colored dot represents a book I read and when it was published for the years of reading between, 2007 and 2021. The legend on the right shows which year is which color. 2007 at the top, 2021 at the bottom. I haven't figured out how to add text to the legend yet.

The actual dates going down the left are the publish dates of each book I read. So each dot is a book that I read and when it was published. Its just giving a relative position going across to the right as to when in the year I read the book. It just plots the dots sequentially. Book one is on the left and the last book I read in a year on the right. I just think its visually interesting, to see how my reading habits of new vs old books are clumped together.

I have plenty of numbers as well on my Yearly tracking spreadsheet, and plenty of my own graphs. I got the idea for this one from Ursula. The one for just the books I've read in a 2021 isn't nearly has busy. The lifetime chart, probably doesn't provide any useful analysis, just a fun art piece. :)

>133 mahsdad:, >132 weird_O: ...which is the reason I stay away from those groups. Not to mention threads.

"I don't like the way you want to do this thing. I want you to do it My Way." It gets deeply annoying because they're Right and therefore you're Wrong and must be Vanquished. Fine! I quit. I wish to hell they'd change the revolting colors of this site...or give me a way to change it for myself...but wading into that area of the site makes me far too annoyed far too fast.

Amen, RD. :-)

Oh, and Jeff. I'm glad you are having fun with the scatterplotz. I guess you have to settle into a dotty frame of mind. Heh.

>134 richardderus: Yeah, I tend to agree with you. I like staying in our comfortable, welcoming abode. I'll lurk in the update threads occassionally, and its usually. "Hey I love the new feature, its just what I was looking for", then immediately after "What the hell are you guys doing, this is the worst thing you've ever done". Geesh.

>135 weird_O: You have your physical stacks of books you've read (which I love BTW), and I have my whacky charts. Its all good. :)

ETA - geesh, posted this 2 days ago and just noticed that my last comment was meant for Bill, not Richard. I was talking about your (Bill) pictures of your book stack that you generate as you finish a physical book through the year.

Books of the Month

January : Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline
February : The Porpoise by Mark Haddon
March : How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee
April : How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia by Mohsin Hamid
May : The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
June : Circe by Madeline Miller
July : Whose Names are Unknown by Sanora Babb
August : Joe by Larry Brown







Thanks Paul for the formatting idea.

>137 mahsdad: Joe is one fine read, for sure! August was a good reading month for most of us, it seems.

:) For me its been a pretty good reading year in general. But then reading-wise most years are pretty good, cause I'm reading.

Normally I am a person who Knows My Own Mind. Startling, I realize, for you to hear this...as I've always been such a soft-spoken crowd-goer-alonger.

Stop laughing.

Anyway. I need help. The wisdom of the crowd is sought to help be decide between two equally strong contenders for Read of the Month. I am simply incapable to unparalyzing myself from the FOMO I get thinking about this problem.

Please vote on the poll or you will be directly responsible for my re-admission to the Goofy Garage this birthmonth.

Fantastična fotografija u petak

Hey all, I find myself at another Friday, and today I'm off work. Took the day, because tonight we are going to brave the huddled masses to go see Green Day at Dodgers stadium. It was a concert that was delayed from last year and then pushed out a couple times. We're vaxxed and we'll be masked and it will be fun to rock out.

On a different subject, I had a serious CRS (can't remember shit) moment last night. The book I'm reading came from a bargin bin and it had stickers all over the front. Looked down at it last night and there were no stickers, and I thought, who the heck took off the stickers? Had no memory of doing it, but there they were sitting on my nightstand. Either had a stroke or too many G&Ts :)

For today's image, I was just looking thru some old stuff, to see what I could share. I saw this and realized that I haven't flown for over 2 years. For me, that's a long time. Not sure if its a good or bad thing. Enjoy



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - The Rabbit Factory by Larry Brown. Yes that Larry Brown, Mark. Its his typically gritty drama, this time with more crime and with a much larger cast of characters. TBH, a little slow it getting started, but accelerating quite nicely.
Listening - The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel

My wife had a meeting last night over in Torrance (which means nothing to you, but basically on the other side of town), and I went with her, to enjoy a quick dinner, help her with some setup and on the promise of some alone time at the Church of the Mighty Tsundoku (i.e., Barnes and Noble).

I was able to contain myself to just 5 books. Having your WL visable thru the LT app is such a good thing for browsing. "Ooo, do they have that? No, How bout that?" "Hey, I've never heard of that book before, let me add to my list", etc

MacBeth by Jo Nesbo. From the Hogarth Shakespeare series, where authors pick a play and reinterpret it. I have read several, on the whole really pretty good. This one is set in the 70s in a small industrial town with a drug problem. MacBeth is a police inspector.
My Sister, The Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite. Had this on the list for about 3 years
Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu
Double Feature by Owen King. Stephen's other kid is an author too. It was in the discount bin, couldn't resist for $3
Candide by Voltaire. Again, in the discount bin for $3, couldn't pass it up

>136 mahsdad:. >137 mahsdad: Those stacks of books read, and your comment, remind me that I gotta get cracking on another bookcase.

Your list of "Books of the Month" also remind me of the excellence of Madeline Miller's two books. I've got them switched on my favs list 'cause I read Circe, then Song of Achilles. I also note that I got a copy of Mohsin Hamid's book at your recommendation; found it on the bargain book cart. So maybe I should actually read it.

>142 mahsdad: Noice! I like the Braithwaite the best, of course, having warbled my lungs out about it a couple years ago.

>141 mahsdad: I hope Larry Brown keeps his winning streak going for you.

Pretty sky...the wing shapes of modern planes are so cool to me...all the way around it gets *chef's kiss*

>143 weird_O: Ha, isn't that always the way with us. Where to safely (don't want the stack to get too high) and aestically pleasingly store our stash. Hope you enjoy the Hamid, when you get to it. Glad that I can contribute to the delinquency of book nerds anywhere. :)

>144 richardderus: I think it was your warbling that made me put it on the list.

Thanks for the photo love. Clouds are such interesting things, photographically.

>142 mahsdad: Ah, Torrance. I worked there 78&79. And a spot in 2013 doing a mutual favor for my brother. On Hawthorne, in the set of stores just north of the Mongolian BBQ is my favorite Indian hole in the wall. Is El Pollo Inka still around?

That looks like a good bunch of choices if you're going to restrict titles.

>146 quondame: Hey Susan, I thought I might see you on this post. Lol.

El Pollo Inka is indeed still there. We haven’t been there in years, should remedy that. Otherwise, there’s been lots of changes over the years along Hawthorne, especially at the mall.

I’m not familiar with an Indian hole in the wall, those are sometimes the best. I’ll have to look around see if it’s still there.

Thanks for visiting.

Nice haul! I haven’t read any of Owen’s stuff yet. I need to remedy that.

Hey Jim. Neither have I. I think he gets some short shrift of "fame" from Joe and his Dad. I'll let you know how it is, whenever I get to it. :)

Interior Chinatown was an unexpected delight. I hope you enjoy it too, Jeff.

Hey Mark, I knew it got some praise around here. I'm sure I will enjoy it. Eventually. ;)

I certainly hope that Interior Chinatown is good, but most anything would be an improvement on How to Live Safely in a Science Fiction Universe. It was one of the worst books I read last year.

Ah, I don’t think it was that bad. Tho I have no empirical evidence. Lol. I read it in 2012, which was a year before I started “reviewing” reads.

Different strokes....

Thanks for stopping by

WL updates from my recent trip to the bookstore that I forgot about.

Billy Summers yet another new book by Stephen King. I thought he was going to slow down after his accident in 1999 (20+ years ago, and he's published 30+ works since then)

Run by John Lewis. I guess this is being published posthumously. Its the sequel to the March GNs

>121 mahsdad: Very cool in a nerdy, artistic way. What are the axes, and what do the colors represent?

>154 mahsdad: Ooh! Another Stephen King? I love him! I read Later by him in April and gave it a 4.5. : )

Hey Kim...

Each color represents the year I read the book. From 2007 to 2021 (at least 2021 so far), Google Sheets just randomly selected the colors as I added data series to the chart. There's really only 1 axis in a scatterplot. The dates down the left hand side are the published date of the book. Then it just puts a dot from left to right of each book I read on the row when it was published. So on the left is book 1 and it goes out to the right for as many books as I read that particular year. With so many years it gets jumbled to actually see anything but a pretty abstract image and the general trend of whether I read old or new books.

I'm liking Later a lot too so far. I nice dip back into some vintage creepy King territory.

>153 mahsdad: I'm with >152 benitastrnad:...I gave it 1/8 star.

Just...dreadful. So I won't be picking up others he's written...why run the risk of hurting myself that badly again?

I value both of your opinions, but in this case I'm still going to risk it. While I can't exactly remember what I thought of Sci Fi Universe, but I read Sorry Please Thank You last year and I loved it.

So where would the fun be if we all liked and read exactly the same books. No where, I know there's plenty of books that you all have read that I wouldn't touch with a 10 foot pole, but plenty that hit me with a BB right between the eyes.

And as you say, life's too short to be burned more than once. Maybe this one will burn me, but I'm like a moth to the flame. :)

>158 mahsdad: ...it's your funeral...

:-P

Given the towering stack of TBR that I have, it will probably be at least a year before I get to it. :)

Well, I loved Interior Chinatown, though I haven't read anything else he's written. So as you said, different strokes and all. (I almost typo'd that as "different storks", which I rather enjoy as an expression.)

Picha ya kupendeza Ijumaa

One thing I like about long weekends, and that's a short week right after. :) Not too much to report today, so I'll just share this image from our LA walking tour. I, of course played around with the settings to give it this weird psychadelic look.



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Notes from the Internet Apocalypse by Wayne Gladstone. Author takes a tongue-in-cheek, witty look at what would happen if the Internet went away. A little dated from when it was written way back in 2014, but pretty good so far.
Listening - Later by Stephen King. Interesting almost horror story about a boy would can talk to dead people. (And yeah he explicitly talks about Sixth Sense :) )

>162 mahsdad: Oh, that is so. cool!

>163 richardderus: Thanks buddy!

As stated above, I'm reading the Gladstone. I'm pretty sure I got it from you many years ago, if not I can't remember where I got it. But I just got to a page that has a little brass bookmark that you slide over a single page. Never noticed it before. Its pretty cool. I'll keep it in my stash.

If it was yours, I guess turn about its fair play, I sent you one of my book marks and you sent me one back. :)

>164 mahsdad: Yes, I sent that to you ages ago...the little brass bookmark is a Book Dart, which I've used for decades and decades to mark memorable (for good and bad reasons) bits I want to quote for review and/or put in my commonplace book.

Where was it? I never bothered to quote anything in my 3-star review or add anything to my quote book.

Crap, I thought it was just a book mark. I already moved it, I can't remember what it was pointing to. Oh well. Its a fun read. Definitely dated now, even 6 years on. The internet has changed so much since then. :)

I'll have to try using it. I don't really keep a permanent quote book, but I do mark down quotes in my phone for when (or if), I actually review a read.

>166 mahsdad: No worries. I'm hardly likely to care at this late date, apart from the mildest of curiosity!

Absolutely.

For those interested in such stuff, the first trailer for the new Matrix movie (called Matrix Resurrections) is out. Interesting for those of us around here. David Mitchell is listed as one of the writers.

And I just stumbled upon a new podcast, celebrating the 20 year anniversary of Band of Brothers, it looks like they're doing a deep dive on each episode. The first one is with Tom Hanks, and the second one (the actual first episode of the show - Currahee) is with Ron Livingston. Along with From the Earth to the Moon, probably two of my favorite mini-series. Got to watch them again.

Lightning Round!

60. Joe by Larry Brown 9/10. A favorite author of mine since Mark introduced me to his short story collection Tiny Love. Joe Ransom is hard drinking ex-con who you shouldn't like but you do. Gary is a young homeless kid, who is getting abused by his father and finds Joe and looks up to him as a surrogate father figure. Looking forward to reading more of his stuff (despite the fact that there's only a finite list)

61. Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal 8/10. A very interesting alternate history of the world, where an asteroid strikes the east coast of the US in the early 50s. The aftermath makes it very apparent that we have to get off the planet. The main protagonist is a computer for NASA and becomes one of the first Lady Astronauts. Excellent read.

62. Ender in Exile by Orson Scott Card 8/10 The last of the Ender saga, but one that takes place directly after Ender's Game and tells what happens to Ender and Valentine on their first trip to another planet, where he becomes Speaker for the Dead. If you're a fan of the Ender books, you should read this.

63. Without You, There Is No Us by Suki Kim 8/10 . Kim goes undercover as an English teacher at a private University in North Korea created by a group of Evangelicals. Its 2011, right before the death Kim Jong Il and gives a fascinating look at the paranoia and cult of personality that is life in DPRK.

Virtually every building is adorned with a slogan, every TV screen with the same image, the way advertising billboards fill the horizon in Western societies, but in North Korea there is only one product: the Great Leader. Yet beneath such noise is terrifying silence. Everything has been so hushed for decades that if you press your ear to the stillness, you can almost hear the muted cries.

I stared across at him and felt a familiar sick feeling. Perhaps this was only the beginning. The questions they would have. The questions they should be asking. The questions they would realize they had not been asking because they did not imagine they could, or because asking meant that they could no longer exist in their system.

64. The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel 8/10 Listened on audio. This one was a slow burn for me and could probably rate it a little lower. Its the story of the lives of a brother and sister told in flashback. Vincent (the sister) is a bartender who "marries" a wealthy financier, and their lives ultimately go off the rails. Not a particularly uplifting book but an interesting read once it got going.

65. The Rabbit Factory by Larry Brown 9/10 . Another excellent read from Mr. Brown. One I've had on my shelf for years before Mark introduced me to him with the short stories. Another gritty point in time story with a much larger cast of characters than I'm used to. An older rich man struggling with his marriage to a younger woman who is out looking for younger men, including a homeless hunk working at a pet store. There's also a prostitute/dancer with a heart of gold and the navy seaman who becomes a little bit obsessed with her, with plenty of other ancillary characters living their lives in and around the Peabody Hotel in Memphis.

The nice was coming off her like heat off his granddaddy's stovepipe.

*review

Mitchell, huh. Well, maybe it won’t be the total train wreck I assumed it would be. 😀

Yeah, cautiously optimistic.

So amongst all the other places I keep track of my reading, I'm adding my books to the "Books Read in 2021" list here on LT.

There are currently 3338 books in the list. I find it interesting that out of the 66 books I've read, only 4 are in the top 100.

Another question I have is how the heck are these books ranked. Well, I know, its by score, but I have no clue how the score is calculated. :)

>169 mahsdad: #60, #61 Yay! Both were faves of mine as well.

#64 Rated it lower than you (6/10).

#63, #65 On my lists...seriously need to meet the vampire of my dreams so I can have all those nights for reading!

>173 richardderus: Glass Hotel, I really should rate it a 7, it was a borderline 8 The ponzi stuff was unexpected but a plus for me.

Rabbit Factory - its yours if you want it.

>174 mahsdad: Oh heck yeah! I'd love to have it!

I'll drop it in the post this week!

I usually don't find any BB in the occassinal book recommendations they have in the Parade magazine (A Sunday newspaper section), I'm just not the target demographic. but today there were a few

Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr : Characters in 1400s Constantiniople, present day Idaho and a future spaceship named Argos are all united by a log lost book from ancient Greece. Yes please

Harlem Shuffle by Colson Whitehead : a family-saga-meets-classic-heist set in 1960's NYC.

The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles : a young man fresh out of a juvenile work farm in 1950's Nebraska gets caught up in the exploits of two work farm escapees headed to NY. I'm a new fan of Towles so that looks interesting.

E.R. Nurses by James Patterson : looks like a non-fiction exploration into the lives of America's frontline medical workers.

Also as an aside, how can there be more than 10 books named Cloud Cuckoo Land? Have we maxed out on book titles? LOL

>178 mahsdad: 2,414 years of imitation and emulation results in quite a footprint. Would Aristophanes appreciate the durability of his creation or would he be an Athenian Disney and send cease-and-desists like a madman?

>177 mahsdad: It is a sweet read indeed. NetGalley deserves a nice little thank-you note for getting it for me.

>176 mahsdad: Yay!

Happy Sunday, Jeff. I am so glad to see another Larry Brown fan. He deserves a major following. Try to track down the film version of Joe, with Nicholas Cage. A pretty good adaptation.

>172 mahsdad: On the "Books Read in 2021" list: The score of the lists is calculated by place on the list, so my #1 gets more points than my later read books. You can make it an unnumbered list, then all books get the same score. I use a numbered list, to make it easy to check if all my reads are on the list. At the end of the year I usually turn it in an unnumbered list.

>180 msf59: Thanks for the reminder about the Joe movie. You can rent it on Youtube, I'll have to see if its streaming anywhere else.

>181 FAMeulstee: Thanks Anita, that make sense. Though in terms of a list of books read in a given year it doesn't quite make sense. The first books of the year get the most weight and it goes down from there. But for a favorite/best book list, it makes much more sense. Everyone's #1 read gets more weight than their #5 read, then total up all the scores and get a best for the year.

I decided I wanted to start listening to Dune again (new movie coming out soon).

It wasn’t available in LAPL, so I put it on hold last week (Libby). Just noticed that it’s a 14 week wait. I’m number 689 in line and they have 98 copies. Geesh

I just put a hold on it at my other library. They only have 2 copies, and it that’s still a 5 week wait.

Popular book. 😁

Okay, I might have bitten off more than I can chew audiobook-wise. I just finished Later by Stephen King, a tight 6+ hour book. I needed a new one, while waiting on Dune, searching around, found James Michener's Alaska.

It weighs in at a hefty 57+ hours. Should be done around the 14 weeks my hold on Dune is open. :)

57 hours? That's quite an undertaking!

>185 ursula: Its actually not that bad. I'm listening at 1.4x. That's about as fast as I can go. Depending on the narrator, I might have to slow down a bit.

Its a very interesting listen so far. He started out with the geological formation of Alaska, then to a herd of mammoths coming across the land bridge (nicely anthropomorphized, I might say. He gave them an inner monolog), then to the early humans who followed them across.

If I keep up my current pace, I'll be done in about 35 days, only have to renew once. (21 day borrow period)

Michener certainly followed his universal outline. I don't remember him introducing the hands of God in the first chapter, but he did like having the earth's materials kneaded and squeezed, volcanoes erupting, dinos passing through, cataclysms, dogs and cats living together. Sure sold a lot of books.

>187 weird_O: I've never actually read Michener, so I'm not familar with his modus operandi, but like you said, it certainly worked. :)

Fantastická fotka v pátek

Nothing new to report, other than to share this image that just doesn't do what we saw the other day justice. It was a good sky evening. The sun was setting off to the right and it was catching the clouds just right. They were glorious



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - The River by Peter Heller. Very thrilling. The sense of danger is palpable.
Listening - Alaska by James Michener. Long but very engaging. Still following native peoples making their way East from Siberia to Alaska. Current track to finish by the end of October.
GN - Hawkeye by Matt Fraction. Just saw the trailer for the upcoming Marvel series and started reading the GN that its supposed to be based on.

Fabulous photo! Light and clouds always fascinate me, too!

Thanks Shelley!

>189 mahsdad: How stunningly gorgeous! Those kinds of sunsets are gifts, aren't they?

Michener! *flees*

>192 richardderus: Thanks buddy. You are absolutely correct. One of the benefits of being out here on the coast. You get sunrises over there, but that means getting up early, and that's just a non-starter with me. LOL. To be fair and honest, the way my house faces, I actually get sunrises too. I face directly east looking at Long Beach.

Sounds like you think of Jimmy the same way you think of Chuckles. :) This one really isn't too bad.

>193 mahsdad: Honestly no, I carry no abiding animus against Michener...just that I'm not often in the mood for his formula. It's effective, and in the proper mood very satisfying. Apart from the treacly stodge of A Christmas Carol, which works because it's short, there is no time at which Chuckles' ghastly misshapen warthogs-in-story-form are called for.

"there is no time at which Chuckles' ghastly misshapen warthogs-in-story-form are called for." I love the imagery this imparts. :)

>195 mahsdad: ...one does one's poor best...

Hi Jeff, The Rabbit Factory is here! Thank you so much for it.

>198 mahsdad: My pleasure kind sir! Its so rare that I read something that you "expert"-level readers haven't yet so I'm happy when I get to send one out, rather than just accumulating them for the library sale table. :)

Hebat Poto Jumaah

Over on Paul's thread there's been some discussion going round about the CA Governor Recall, and how it was such a strange process. I was curious about it too, and went down a rabbit hole on Ballotpedia (yes there is such a place), so whether you like it or not, here's how it works.

Currently there are 20 states that allow its citizens to recall their Governor, it in some form or another.

In CA, it takes a petition with 12% of the number of votes cast in the last Governor election to trigger a recall. Then we do a simultaneous recall election, where we vote Yea or Nay to kick the guy out of the chair AND vote for who we want to replace him with at the same time. If Yea wins, then whomever gets the most votes (no majority, simple or otherwise), just the most votes wins. There were 46 candidates on the ballot; 9 Democrats, 24 Republicans, and the rest of various flavors of third-party candidates. To get on the ballot, you just had to be a US citizen, registered to vote in CA, submit 65 signatures and pay $4,194 (but that fee is waived if you get 7,000 signatures).

There's been 55 attempts to do this in CA since 1911, it only worked once, when Gray Davis was ousted for Arnold Schwarzenegger. In that election, there were 135 candidates.

And let's not even talk about ballot measures, geesh. I like living here, but boy we're a whacky bunch. ;)

As far as the image for today, I'm getting a new phone today so there should be some fresh stuff coming soon, but for now, I'm weird and like to take pictures of chairs, and here is one.... :)



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Q3 Books
>3 mahsdad: Q2 Books
>4 mahsdad: Q1 Books

Reading - Birds Art Life by Kyo Maclear
Listening - Alaska by James Michener. About 20% through. An enjoyable listen. Up to the early 1800's dealing with the brutality of the Russians over the native peoples. Never knew that two of Captain Cook's lieutenants were Bligh (yes that Bligh) and Vancouver (guess he liked the Pacific Northwest, either that or Canada liked him)

>199 mahsdad: I live in one of the most corrupt states in the Union...but it's waaayyy better than y'all's idiotic libertarian socialism. Like, at least it can be comprehended.

I like the geometry, the textures, and the symbolism of a shadow of a supporting structure.

*Still* with the Michener! Why not just go to an S&M club if you like pain so much?

>200 richardderus: I'm not going to disagree with you. Especially with ballot measures, I'm pretty much a blanket no on all of them. Except for Prop-13. NEVER repeal that! Only thing that is keeping my property taxes low. LOL.

thanks for the photo love. I'm with you on geometry and textures, but I go right off the rails with symbolism. I'm pretty shallow when it comes to that. With Art or books, I either like it or I don't, I generally don't have a clue on what it actually "means"

And yes, still with the Michener. I'm committed now (or I'm sure you'll say I SHOULD be committed). I probably won't read another soon, but its good to read at least one (and this is my first)

>201 mahsdad: Prop 13 does keep our property taxes low, but has caused taxes on many other things to rise and has benefited corp-rats hugely. And it's racist to the core. Its supporters were the anti-busing, let us not pay for their education crowd. Watching the rhetoric of that election is what showed me how racist all the nice white people I hung out with were. They all moved to the suburbs while I have kept myself in the city with my claws holding hard.

You're absolutely correct. And the whole rhetoric about it was why the partial repeal to close the commercial building loophole failed. I think back in the day (like 5 years ago), it wasn't so readily apparent, but now with Zillow and Redfin and the like, I can go look at my neighbors who bought in the last 10 years and see that they're paying more than double me, who bought 25 years ago. And I'm paying double what one of my most long time neighbors is paying because they bought in 1962.

In Southern California the suburbs left are to move far inland, and that dog ain't gonna hunt for me. :)

I came across a copy of Michener's Tales of the South Pacific yesterday. It won him the Pulitzer back in 1948. Then Rodgers and Hammerstein transmogrified it into a musical, South Pacific. Gotta read those Pulitzer-nabbers, so I bought it. Otherwise, I'm separated from Michener.

Yeah, that’s usually why I search Libby for Michener, I want to read South Pacific. I saw Alaska on a trip there several years ago and was intrigued.

I seriously doubt I’ll read his whole bibliography. 2 will be enough

>203 mahsdad:
Why don't you just ditch SoCal and move to ... say, Denver. Denver has a tech crowd, lots of hipsters, and good weather. Not to mention skiing that can replace surfing, and all that stuff that SoCal has including a former governor who lists his occupation as brewer.

>206 benitastrnad: SoCal isn't going to be our forever home. We are actively planning on where our Dystopian bunker/estate will be, just not sure where yet. :) Denver might be a good choice. Well probably not Denver itself, but maybe the vicinities.

>207 mahsdad:
And it has breweries. Lots of them. Including the granddaddy - Coors in Golden, CO. But I'm not a beer fan and wouldn't know one local popular brew from another. I just like Denver. It even has a light rail system to get to downtown and bike lanes. Even though the airport is half way to Burlington, there is a rail system to get there from downtown that is really handy. Maybe one of the suburbs you could consider would be one of the northern ones - Cheyenne, WY. It is only about 100 miles from Denver and far better than the southern suburbs like Colorado Springs.

>208 benitastrnad: What are you working for the Colorado Tourism Board? Ha. LOL. Thanks for the suggestions!

Come on over to the new thread!