Definitely slowing down a bit here....I did finish this book a couple of weeks ago, and haven't posted about it, but I'm in the process of 2 other books right now, and just can't seem to get focused on reading again.
For those of you who don't know, Kevin Smith is director (Clerks 1, 2, and soon to be 3, Dogma, Chasing Amy, Jersey Girl, Red State, and some others) and is a very funny man. Now, that being said, I probably wouldn't recommend this to anyone who 1) isn't a Kevin Smith fan or 2) doesn't already know who he is. He claims to make his living "off of dick and fart jokes" so if you are offended right now by that, don't pick up his book. =]
However, I LOVE Kevin Smith. I had recently watched "An Evening with Kevin Smith" and "An Evening with Kevin Smith 2" and had been exposed to quite a bit of him through Zach, and decided to read this book. Above all, Kevin seems to be one of the most genuine, unfiltered, and open people in show business, and I just want to be best friends with him. [I do not care in the slightest if this is something he consciously works towards to create a persona, but I really don't think it is.]
The follow-up to reading this is that I got Zach tickets to An Evening with Kevin Smith for his birthday (he was doing a set at the Chicago comic book convention.) Seriously - I love him. I felt so much better about life after sitting and listening to him talk for 2 and a half hours. [And considering the morning we'd had getting to Chicago, there was a LOT of stress to relieve.]
Anyways, since this was a collection of articles, I'm interested in reading his other book.
And now to find motivation to read the next 41 books....
Saturday, May 11, 2013
Monday, April 29, 2013
Book 8: The Good, Good Pig - Sy Montgomery
So, I finished this book awhile ago and just never got around to writing about it, which seems fitting for my experience with this book. I got this book as a birthday present from my aunt Lisa in 2006, and I meant to read it many times over that period, and just never got around to it...until now!
This book was delightful. For anyone who has a pet or a love for animals in general, it is quick read and very entertaining. This is a memoir of Sy Montgomery's life with her pet pig (complete with pictures) and various other animals. It was entertaining and endearing, and there was a lot of little tidbits of information about pigs that I didn't really know. I also found it really interesting to see how similar the silly stories about Christopher Hogwood (the pig) were to my silly stories growing up with my dogs Doc and Ranger. Not necessarily that they were the exact same stories (although Ranger definitely shared a very similar obsession with food), but they just resonated in a very familiar way. I hypothesize that the sentiments that people have about their pets are universal no matter what the pet is. (Since my experience with pets has been limited to dogs, a bunny, and fish, I can't vouch for this, yet.) Also, I couldn't help notice the similarities in physical descriptions [especially in regards to noises] between Chris and my delightfully snorty bulldog, Abe. =]
I'll also admit that after reading the book, I was definitely obsessed with having my own pet pig [something I won't give up on, but know it won't happen anytime soon]. I'm also really interested the author herself. She is, basically, a nature writer. Her life sounds extremely interesting with lots of trips around the world to research and observe animals in their native habitats for her books and other publications. She's definitely someone who I'm going to add to my list of authors to read more of.
Now, how to get a pig.....
This book was delightful. For anyone who has a pet or a love for animals in general, it is quick read and very entertaining. This is a memoir of Sy Montgomery's life with her pet pig (complete with pictures) and various other animals. It was entertaining and endearing, and there was a lot of little tidbits of information about pigs that I didn't really know. I also found it really interesting to see how similar the silly stories about Christopher Hogwood (the pig) were to my silly stories growing up with my dogs Doc and Ranger. Not necessarily that they were the exact same stories (although Ranger definitely shared a very similar obsession with food), but they just resonated in a very familiar way. I hypothesize that the sentiments that people have about their pets are universal no matter what the pet is. (Since my experience with pets has been limited to dogs, a bunny, and fish, I can't vouch for this, yet.) Also, I couldn't help notice the similarities in physical descriptions [especially in regards to noises] between Chris and my delightfully snorty bulldog, Abe. =]
I'll also admit that after reading the book, I was definitely obsessed with having my own pet pig [something I won't give up on, but know it won't happen anytime soon]. I'm also really interested the author herself. She is, basically, a nature writer. Her life sounds extremely interesting with lots of trips around the world to research and observe animals in their native habitats for her books and other publications. She's definitely someone who I'm going to add to my list of authors to read more of.
Now, how to get a pig.....
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
2013 Book 7: Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
Despite being an avid reader for basically as long as I can remember, taking AP English in high school, and graduating with an English degree, I've never read Fahrenheit 451. Until now.
It was a super quick read (I actually finished it several days ago) and really interesting. It definitely got me in the mood for utopian/dystopian fiction. [As a side note, I took an upper level literature course in my senior year of college titled "Utopian Fiction" which was extremely interesting (and taught by possibly my favorite professor [possibly, because we all know I can't pick favorites] and after that course, the books we read, and the intense discussion we had, I will never be able to separate utopia from dystopia because they are not at all mutually exclusive.]
Alas, if you haven't read this, I highly suggest it. 1: It's not a time suck. 2: It immediately draws you in. 3: It makes you reevaluate the society we live in now, where society could be headed, but more importantly how you are living your life.
The book in it's entirety started out as a short story that Bradbury wrote in the late 1940s, which developed into a novella, which developed into the book [the first US copy was printed in 1953], which later developed into a million other medias. The only reason I'm sharing that is to point out that this whole concept was basically developed in the late-1940s!! I cannot believe how how everything Bradbury describes is still so fitting (or even more so) to this day and age. It just blew my mind, and, as I said earlier, made me think more consciously about how we are living nowadays. Without getting on a soapbox here, there's way too much that people take for granted. Definitely in most recent history, but especially now. Most shocking, infuriating, and dismal is how often people take knowledge for granted. Books! Read books! They're amazing! Think! Think for yourself! Take advantage of the resources all around you and be open to learning and thinking and creating your own thoughts and opinions! You can learn, you can experience, you can travel - all within a book. [Key theme song to Reading Rainbow]
It was a super quick read (I actually finished it several days ago) and really interesting. It definitely got me in the mood for utopian/dystopian fiction. [As a side note, I took an upper level literature course in my senior year of college titled "Utopian Fiction" which was extremely interesting (and taught by possibly my favorite professor [possibly, because we all know I can't pick favorites] and after that course, the books we read, and the intense discussion we had, I will never be able to separate utopia from dystopia because they are not at all mutually exclusive.]
Alas, if you haven't read this, I highly suggest it. 1: It's not a time suck. 2: It immediately draws you in. 3: It makes you reevaluate the society we live in now, where society could be headed, but more importantly how you are living your life.
The book in it's entirety started out as a short story that Bradbury wrote in the late 1940s, which developed into a novella, which developed into the book [the first US copy was printed in 1953], which later developed into a million other medias. The only reason I'm sharing that is to point out that this whole concept was basically developed in the late-1940s!! I cannot believe how how everything Bradbury describes is still so fitting (or even more so) to this day and age. It just blew my mind, and, as I said earlier, made me think more consciously about how we are living nowadays. Without getting on a soapbox here, there's way too much that people take for granted. Definitely in most recent history, but especially now. Most shocking, infuriating, and dismal is how often people take knowledge for granted. Books! Read books! They're amazing! Think! Think for yourself! Take advantage of the resources all around you and be open to learning and thinking and creating your own thoughts and opinions! You can learn, you can experience, you can travel - all within a book. [Key theme song to Reading Rainbow]
"Do you know why books [...] are so important? Because they have quality. And what does the word quality mean? To me it means texture. This book has pores. It has features This book can go under the microscope. You'd find life under the glass, streaming past in infinite profusion. The more pores, the more truthfully recorded details of life per square inch you can get on a sheet of paper, the more "literary" you are. [...] Telling detail. Fresh detail. The good writers touch life often. The mediocre ones run a quick hand over her. The bad ones rape her and leave her for the flies."
Read it; it's delightful.
Friday, April 12, 2013
2013 Book 6: The Visible Man - Chuck Klosterman
Ugh.
Chuck Klosterman has really just been losing it for me. This book was ---- pretty bad. Klosterman excels at non-fiction. I really [mostly] enjoyed his non-fiction pieces, and I really like the collections of essays. I think he does a really great job focusing on both music and sports. BUT - it's clear that Chuck thinks he's an expert, and he gets really pretentious really fast.
This book is supposed to be FICTION. And I can't help but hear Chuck's voice throughout the whole thing. There were several times where I couldn't believe that an editor [or even a friend who read it prior to being published] didn't take some of that stuff out. It's most apparent in the music references that have NO BEARING AT ALL on the story that Chuck is trying to tell. If you're writing fiction, you need to take yourself out it. At the very least on the surface.
Overall, I think the concept was interesting, but the execution was beyond poor.
Chuck - perhaps I'll read Killing Yourself to Live [by far my favorite of his] and like you again, but you're really just getting on my nerves now.
Chuck Klosterman has really just been losing it for me. This book was ---- pretty bad. Klosterman excels at non-fiction. I really [mostly] enjoyed his non-fiction pieces, and I really like the collections of essays. I think he does a really great job focusing on both music and sports. BUT - it's clear that Chuck thinks he's an expert, and he gets really pretentious really fast.
This book is supposed to be FICTION. And I can't help but hear Chuck's voice throughout the whole thing. There were several times where I couldn't believe that an editor [or even a friend who read it prior to being published] didn't take some of that stuff out. It's most apparent in the music references that have NO BEARING AT ALL on the story that Chuck is trying to tell. If you're writing fiction, you need to take yourself out it. At the very least on the surface.
Overall, I think the concept was interesting, but the execution was beyond poor.
Chuck - perhaps I'll read Killing Yourself to Live [by far my favorite of his] and like you again, but you're really just getting on my nerves now.
Sunday, April 7, 2013
2013 Book 5: Live From New York (An Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live)
I have been an on and off fan of Saturday Night Live for years. (As I think most Americans are, even if they don't realize it.) I remember my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles talking about different sketches over the years (far before I was allowed to watch it). I remember catching episodes here and there from the mid- to late-90s. I very specifically remember going to prom my junior year of high school (on a Saturday night), staying for maybe 3 songs [I don't even remember if we danced to any of those songs] and then leaving to go to my date's house where we watched SNL with his dad.
In the last two years or so, Zach and I have been watching SNL on a pretty regular basis. (Actually, I'm sure we haven't really missed any episodes. Thank you, Hulu.) Since Zach and I have been together, I've gotten into the comedy world a lot more (Thank you, Zach.) and I've been getting a lot more interested in some of the history of comedy, and I think SNL is a really interesting cross-section of the comedy world.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book because it is very anecdotal. The book is written (or rather compiled) by Tom Shales & James Andrew Miller, but it is "told by it's stars, writers, and guests." Basically, they interviewed a bunch of people and organized all kinds of direct quotes into a chronological history of the show. As I said, I really liked the stories - I liked hearing about all the personalities, the struggles, and the highs and the lows of all the cast members.
I had two complaints (sort of) about the book: 1) I wished it was a little more current. I don't know if there'd ever be a revision that includes later casts, but I'd really like to see a lot more from people like Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Jimmy Fallon, Will Ferrall etc, especially to see how their thoughts about the show evolved and how they look back on it after having left. 2) There's just something that didn't quite work with the format. It's not that I don't like the format, because I read Please Kill Me: An Oral History of Punk Rock 5 or 6 years ago, which is done in the same exact way and I loved it. I think the subject matter fits a little better. I think the topic of music lends itself better to this format. Mostly, I just wanted to see this book as a documentary - because I really would have liked to see some of the sketches that they addressed, and I think the people they interviewed would have been really fun to watch on video, to actually see the animation and the emotion as they recall their time at SNL.
Anyways, overall, interesting book. In closing, one of my favorite lines from the book was:
"Alan Zweibel: I remember Gilda used to say that she would search through Lorne's desk hoping that she'd find a note in there that said, 'I really like Gilda.'"I laughed when I first read that, but there's so many other emotions tied into that statement, and I think it sums up the feelings of most cast members (and not even necessarily tied directly with Lorne Michael's, but the show itself, too,)
Monday, March 18, 2013
don't know when, but a day is gonna come
I have a cleaning problem. Once I start, I just can't stop. [The key words in the statement are "Once I start"] For some reason, cleaning is a huge stress reliever for me. There's something really invigorating about the actual process of cleaning, and the reward at the end is soooo nice. I love being exhausted and collapsing on to the couch or the bed or whatever, and looking around and seeing everything in it's place, with everything smelling so fresh and so cleanclean.
The issue comes in when I get really obsessive about it and don't know when to stop. I regularly spend my entire day off on Friday cleaning for 7+ hours straight. And I'm starting to realize that as good as that may feel sometimes, I also need some down time to just relax.
My solution for this past week was to clean as usual BUT to set a timer for each room, and to stick to the timer. Now I'm new at this, so I didn't do an awesome job at following the timed guidelines, but I think I did pretty good, and it worked much better than my usual routine.
I know you're all [who reads this anyways?!?!?] wondering why I'm telling you this, so here it is. So many people are really good at prioritizing, but I think most of those same people really underestimate how bad they are at time-management. This is far outside time-management in terms of getting as much stuff done as you can in a certain amount of time.
This is making sure that you're managing your time well enough to take care of your mental self. I think what happens often is that people think they're doing themselves good by doing things that they love - and that's the idea, to a point. But if you're doing something you love, you're probably not thinking about how that same thing can probably give you some added stress. Somewhere down the road it's going to catch up with you.
I got to the point where I was just feeling exhausted, like I never got a day off. I felt like every day was just rushing to get to the next, and I realized that I was doing that to myself. Here I thought taking my off day to clean for the entire was relieving my stress, but, especially in this case, it was adding to it. I'd be exhausted because I never got a day to just relax, and as soon as I finished cleaning, a new mess was already being made so I was constantly feeling behind. [For the record, I'm still struggling with going from living on my own to having a roommate.]
It's a super simple idea, but seriously, TRY IT. I felt so much better partially because I felt like I had more structure to my cleaning routine, but also because when I got to the end of the total amount of time I allotted, I didn't look around and say "There's so much more to do"; instead, I looked around and said, "Wow, look how much I've done!"
The issue comes in when I get really obsessive about it and don't know when to stop. I regularly spend my entire day off on Friday cleaning for 7+ hours straight. And I'm starting to realize that as good as that may feel sometimes, I also need some down time to just relax.
My solution for this past week was to clean as usual BUT to set a timer for each room, and to stick to the timer. Now I'm new at this, so I didn't do an awesome job at following the timed guidelines, but I think I did pretty good, and it worked much better than my usual routine.
I know you're all [who reads this anyways?!?!?] wondering why I'm telling you this, so here it is. So many people are really good at prioritizing, but I think most of those same people really underestimate how bad they are at time-management. This is far outside time-management in terms of getting as much stuff done as you can in a certain amount of time.
This is making sure that you're managing your time well enough to take care of your mental self. I think what happens often is that people think they're doing themselves good by doing things that they love - and that's the idea, to a point. But if you're doing something you love, you're probably not thinking about how that same thing can probably give you some added stress. Somewhere down the road it's going to catch up with you.
I got to the point where I was just feeling exhausted, like I never got a day off. I felt like every day was just rushing to get to the next, and I realized that I was doing that to myself. Here I thought taking my off day to clean for the entire was relieving my stress, but, especially in this case, it was adding to it. I'd be exhausted because I never got a day to just relax, and as soon as I finished cleaning, a new mess was already being made so I was constantly feeling behind. [For the record, I'm still struggling with going from living on my own to having a roommate.]
It's a super simple idea, but seriously, TRY IT. I felt so much better partially because I felt like I had more structure to my cleaning routine, but also because when I got to the end of the total amount of time I allotted, I didn't look around and say "There's so much more to do"; instead, I looked around and said, "Wow, look how much I've done!"
2013 Book 4: Fargo Rock City - Chuck Klosterman
Remember how I read the last book in 2 sittings?? This was the complete opposite. This was a relatively short book. This took me forever to read. I happen to love Chuck Klosterman. Marley got me hooked on him a couple of years ago, and I've enjoyed pretty much everything of his I've read. This was a little different.
However, I'm not saying I didn't like it, but it was definitely the hardest for me to get into, and the lowest ranking of all his books (that I've read). I think my biggest issue with this book was my expectations of it. Fargo Rock City is a book about metal music. (For those of you who don't know, Chuck is both a music and sports journalist, which is what I find so interesting about him - he is very knowledgable on both ends, and I enjoy his perspectives on both.) I think I wanted a history of metal out of this, and there was definitely a bit of that. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is semi-interested or semi-informed on metal music to begin with.
Being a child of the 80s (specifically a child of parents who were teenagers in the 80s and therefore raised on the 80s) I was pretty familiar with a lot - probably most - of the bands mentioned. However, Klosterman is always name dropping (which once in awhile gets obnoxiously pretentious) so there were a lot of mentions about obscure metal bands, which I would have loved to know more about, but Klosterman just never went there. I'm guessing that I was not Klosterman's target demographic in writing this, and I think now that I'm finished with the book, I'm feeling okay with that.
One of my favorite things about reading Chuck Klosterman is his anecdotes - they almost always seem perfectly placed, perfectly relatable, but perfectly individual all at once. And that quality definitely saved my impression of this book. I was most impressed with the last 1/3 to 1/4 of the book (which is a perfect example of why I always finish a book I've started.)* It's in the end that Klosterman kind of brings everything back together and ties it in to his life.
And to end, my chosen quote has nothing to do with metal music at all, but I thought it was funny and true.
However, I'm not saying I didn't like it, but it was definitely the hardest for me to get into, and the lowest ranking of all his books (that I've read). I think my biggest issue with this book was my expectations of it. Fargo Rock City is a book about metal music. (For those of you who don't know, Chuck is both a music and sports journalist, which is what I find so interesting about him - he is very knowledgable on both ends, and I enjoy his perspectives on both.) I think I wanted a history of metal out of this, and there was definitely a bit of that. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who is semi-interested or semi-informed on metal music to begin with.
Being a child of the 80s (specifically a child of parents who were teenagers in the 80s and therefore raised on the 80s) I was pretty familiar with a lot - probably most - of the bands mentioned. However, Klosterman is always name dropping (which once in awhile gets obnoxiously pretentious) so there were a lot of mentions about obscure metal bands, which I would have loved to know more about, but Klosterman just never went there. I'm guessing that I was not Klosterman's target demographic in writing this, and I think now that I'm finished with the book, I'm feeling okay with that.
One of my favorite things about reading Chuck Klosterman is his anecdotes - they almost always seem perfectly placed, perfectly relatable, but perfectly individual all at once. And that quality definitely saved my impression of this book. I was most impressed with the last 1/3 to 1/4 of the book (which is a perfect example of why I always finish a book I've started.)* It's in the end that Klosterman kind of brings everything back together and ties it in to his life.
And to end, my chosen quote has nothing to do with metal music at all, but I thought it was funny and true.
"Booze is the greatest of all equalizers. Rich drunks and poor drunks both pass out the same way."*There is one book that I started reading that I haven't (yet) finished. (For some reason I feel an obligation to tell you all.) I started reading We Were the Mulvaney's probably 7 or 8 years ago, and I just couldn't get into it and I still haven't finished and I feel inexplicably awful about it to this day. Which means I'll probably get around to finishing, or rather re-starting, it eventually.
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