More books

I just borrowed this book from the library yesterday. I think I'll give it a go. Its not a political book, per se. By that I mean its not, at least it doesn't so right now, a book that is "partisan," if you will. Its a book that seems to trace the conservative movement on side of a coin and on the other how the rest of the world views our country and the way we do things. It should be an interesting read. I hope it is because I am planning to buy it sometime soon.

I'm also planning to buy this book soon, too. I started reading it a few months ago, but was side tracked by other books and other life stuff. You know how that goes. I suppose, to be fair, I'll have to buy and read this book. It will probably teach me something and, believe it or not, I'm not afraid to learn.

. Now, this book... this book sounds fantastic! I've heard it described as "Harry Potter for adults" (who says the Harry Potter books aren't for adults? I've read the series twice and can't wait for the sixth book to come out!) and I've also heard it described as "JK Rowling on steroids." Perhaps its best for you to go and dig it yourself you'll get the feel for it. Its a friggin huge book. It comes in two different covers: black and white. I'm all about the black cover mainly because the white one gets dirty quicker.

I just finished reading this book yesterday. It wasn't bad, but it wasn't all that great either. I tried to read it four years ago when it first came out and didn't have any luck. I didn't get much further then the first 70 pages or so. If there are any comic book fans out there that read this little blog you may dig this. I'm not the biggest comic book fan, I did collect for a short while in college, but I didn't get all that involved.

My biggest problem with the book was this: I felt it was over written. Michael Chabon used too many words or at least awfully poetic ones that sometimes got in the way of the story (sometimes I just skipped over them... he used words I've seen before).

Here's the basic story: Pre World War II. European Jew escapes Prague by way of Japan (Joe Kavalier). He is spirited away in a large box containing a Golem (a Jewish totem/mythical creature/saviour). Kavalier is a trained escape artist. When he gets out of Prague he gets out of the box with the golem and finds his way to New York City. There he is united with his cousin (Sam Clay). Clay is an aspiring comic book artist-- he has the ideas just not the talent for it. Believe it or not Kavalier is a hell of an artist. They hook up and become partners and come up with a comic book character called "The Escapist" who fights the Nazi's and all naught totalitarian governments. Joe tries to get his kid brother out of Europe something bad happens. Clay finds out discovers he's gay. Kavalier has a girlfriend, she's pregnant, but guess what... japenese attack Pearl Harbor. Kavalier runs off to join the navy (he doesn't know that his girlfriend is preggers). Clay steps in and marries Kavalier's girlfriend. Blah... blah... blah... blah. I can't go any further. Read the book if you want to find out more.

I'm just a reading fool I guess. Oh well, it could be worse.

Literary Slobberknocker

Okay, I'm tired of it. I'm totally serious, I'm sick and tired of it all. I want it to stop. Stop killing trees, stop using ink. Just make it stop. I'm tired of the the Literary Slobberknocker (and I use the term "literary" very loosely here) that is taking place in the current affairs section of the bookstore. We can't keep this book in stock:. Its amazing; the book comes, the book is sold out in less then eight hours. It is on fire. Or, if you want feel free to click here for books about (for and against) one George W. Bush. I believe its the Left's turn this week to release their books about how evil George W. Bush is, last week the Right had its turn. Next week the Right will be up to bat again. I have made it a point not to read any of them. I have read one book about George W. Bush this year and this is it: I liked it. I learned alot about the family Bush. I can understand where Dubyah is coming from.

I did read one book this year that I really enjoyed and learned a lot from. This book was just fantastic. I learned so much from it. Its sad to say that Alexaner Hamilton's enemies outlived him by 50 years. He has his mug on the ten dollar bill, but that's about it. We, as Americans, don't really know much about him-- much to our discredit. If you compare Hamilton's views of government and economy versus Thomas Jefferson's you'd see that Hamilton actually had it more correct. Basically, Hamilton set up our government. I'd recommend this book. Its really worth the read.
There are two books, though that I am really looking forward to: and this one, too . I've read everything by him, well except for one of his mysterires that came out earlier this year. I have it, its signed (I saw him in Louisville a few months back) but i haven't read it yet. I'm an unabashed Kinky Friedman fan. Matter of fact, now that I mention it, this: . Yeah, that's right, The Kinkstah is running for govenor of Texas, trust me on this one: I lived in Texas for six long years... The Kinkstah might be really good for Texas.


p.s. dig the bad html stuff, eh?

Defeat John Kerry in '04!

So, John Kerry has decided to "lodge a complaint" with the government over the fact that there are some guys out there who have paid for ad time that state that John Kerry is full of shit when it comes to his Vietnam "exploits." Oh, yeah, John, that's good. Do that. Just proves to me, again, why you shouldn't be the ruler of the free world. Instead of standing up for yourself and trying to prove them wrong, you ask run to "teacher" and say the big kids are picking on you. Aww, poor John. Here, want a hankie? Suddenly, I'm hearing people saying Vietnam service shouldn't be an issue. Why not? Johny Kerry is the one who based his whole campaign on the fact that he was in Vietnam.....for four months, but don't tell anyone that last part. In four months John Kerry got three purple hearts. THREE! I guess he kept forgetting to duck.

John Kerry tells us we need to fight a "sensitive war on terror." I tell you what John Kerry, why don't you go to each and every family that lost someone on 9/11 and tell them that, I'd like to be there for that. Ah, I love the word "sensitive." That's such a good twenty-five cent liberal word. It gives me such a warm fuzzy. John Kerry, there's nothing sensitive or comapssionate about the times we are in. They drew first blood, to borrow a quote from a popular 80's flick. They drew first blood.

And I'm supposed to feel better about your toothy puppet of a vee-pee candidate? I hear John Edwards talk and keep my hand on my wallet. I feel like I need a bath everytime I hear him speak. He's a trial lawyer, a highly paid, legal con-man.

What do you stand for John Kerry? I can't keep up. You move this way and that, as soon as some light is put on a position, you run to the dark again and make me work. You remind me of a political cockroach.

Sorry, John Kerry, I'm going to run, not walk, to the polls on November 2nd and I'm going to vote AGAINST you. I can't wait. I really can't.

Opposing viewpoints welcome. I will respond as I see fit.

Bush/Cheney '04

Something new: a title

I am a book snob. I work for Barnes & Noble Booksellers. They have this nifty little perk (one of the few we get) that I take total advantage of: I can borrow hard cover books for up to two weeks. This is a very nice and good perk, however it does have its draw backs. The main one is this: I have to very careful with the book (I am usually careful with them any way, but this added pressure makes it difficult to read said book in, I don't know, a restaraunt for fear of spilling speghetti on the page... that'd be bad). Another one is I can only borrow the book for two weeks; that means I have to read it right away, quickly, and sometimes I just can't get the whole thing. I just start seeing words, but not getting them, if you get my meaning. Here's the big drawback: I have a hard time borrowing books from the library. Library books are dirty. Filthy. They smell like they've been held by hundreds of hands, smoked over, eaten over, thrown into corners, and lost in the backs of cars for days on end. And yet, those library books have a certain mystique. They are the soldiers of the literate set. Thank God for the library book. I'm a snob, though, when it comes to books. Either that, or I'm spoiled. Probably more the latter as opposed to the former.

Books to me are a gift from the gods. Really, I've said it before to many people: I think I could do without the internet and the television, but you take away my books and I'll be dead within a year. Here's the funny thing. I love to read and do so with great regularity. I have pretty good comprehension, but I can't follow written instructions. I have to literally take each line slowly and carefully, almost phonetically. I almost have to parse each word. I'm so thankful for instructions that have diagrams. I can do diagrams. I can usually figure out what needs to be done with diagrams, but if I have to put something together and all I have are written instructions it will take me twice as long, if not longer, to get the thing done. I'm a visual learner. Its even better if someone can SHOW me what to do, let me ask a question or two and then get out of the way and let me to it. I'll get it done, but it will be done the way I can get it done. I was always causing my teachers angst in that regard. Oh, I'd get the answer or to the end of the problem or the project, but it was done (as Ol' Blue Eyes hisself: Frank Sinatra once sang) my way.

I'm not sure I truly understand this. I'm stupid. Maybe I should just stay at the other site I use for blogging. Except there its an "an online diary." Is that a more pc term for it? I don't know. I just don't get this. I post something here and then I can't find it. I'm such a rube.

I had that discussion again the other day. You don't know what that discussion is, though, that's okay, but I should probably let you in on it. I am often accused of being "well read." I hate that term. I really do. I mean really bugs me. You see, I'm not well read. Not even a little bit. Not even close. Nope, not well read, but! I read alot. I can't even begin to tell you how many books I have read in the last year, forget that, the last six months, hell, lets be serious-- the last month! I simply don't know. I can't even begin to tell you what I have read. I'm not a hundred percent sure you'd really care, either. Let's just say I read alot. I can tell you this: right now I am reading the first volume of Shelby Foote's Civil War (I'm about 250 pages from the end). I just finished Fight Club (that took me longer then it should have, but I was reading it intermittently). I just picked up The Adventures of Kavalier & Clay (I read the first four or five chapters this afternoon after work). I have waiting (I borrowed it from the library) The Ghosts of 42nd Street. I also, as my "shit book" have Winesburg, Ohio (which is the direct result of reading the book A Circus in Winter and meeting the author). With all this going on, I still have this sneaking suspicion that I'm not doing enough. Not reading enough. Not learning anything. I'm scared I'm missing something. Not doing enough. Not... I don't know... just not. And that, my friends drives me absolutely batshit

I feel like writing. This is the first time in a long time that the feeling, nay, the need to write has descended upon my shoulders. I feel the need to write, maybe its the weather-- that has been wonderful the last couple days. Its the middle of August and I'm running around in a sweatshirt. Beautiful, beautiful. I feel like drinking, not fall down-drag-out-puke-my-brains-out-in-the-morning drinking, but silent sustained drinking, tipping back a cold one and letting the cool liquid slowly go down my throat and enjoy the sounds of the night around me. A cooler full of ice and packed tight with bottles of suds and conversation that's what I want right now, I need it; I crave it. I feel like drinking and talking about writing under the stars. Laying on a blanket and just talking about it all. Everything. Sadly, though, it would be a one sided monologue. I get tired of hearing myself talk. I don't have much to say. I say it, though. Badly.

I've been listening to Kerouac's On the Road as read by Matt Dillon. How unbeat is that? Driving home from work late at night, the windows up to keep the wind noise down and the cd player on playing an audio book. I wonder what Kerouac would think, probably not much. I feel like such a traitor, I do, I tried to read On the Road a couple times, but it never worked. I got a third, maybe halfway through, and then stopped. I didn't not like the book, I just didn't "feel it," know what I mean. I"ve become such a snob. Such a literary snob. Reading fiction, any kind of fiction is tough. So I listen to it and imagine it a teleplay or a radio dramatic monologue. Some how it seems to work. Maybe travelogues are best read aloud onto a cd.

I feel writing great works. Poetry, essays, stories, something... the need to write is almost painful. Great stones of ideas roll around in my head, but I am unable to find the opening, I can't find the hole to jump down and start the descent. That' s what writing is to me. A slide. A slippery slope. It has to be the weather. Its so nice. So, dare I say it... clean. Its light. This dark night is clean and light. Its condusive to writing. I need to write. This feeling will go away. It always does.

It will flitter away like a spring bird.

So, it has happened... again. I have forgotten, again, about this little wordisland in the middle of the great wordycyberspaceocean. This little oasis of a place. It took a friend of mine who has a blog here to bring me back. I'm starting to see a pattern, though. I shall promise to do my best to God, country, and the blog, but it won't happen. It'll fade. It always does. That wordfire that burns, intermittently it seems, will go out and the silent, sad embers of the confliguration will cool quietly to themselves and this blog will sit dormant. Silent. Unwritten in. Yet, I give it another try. I've read the three or four other posts that are here and they are worthwhile. I don't even remember writing them. Maybe I didn't. Maybe it just sounds like I did, but it was someone else. It must of been. That has to be it. It's not and I know that, but yet there is a slight, subtle, hope (is the right word) that there was in fact another me that did in fact write them.

If it makes you feel any better, this feels good. Writing here. I don't know if any one will ever read it, I don't care. (Frankly, its nice to write with capital letters-- i have another online diary elsewhere and there I use only lowercase. I'm not sure why, but I do). I think that other diary has turned me into a "character" I have a certain voice that I use there. There are almost certain expectations there, be they imagined or real, that I feel I have to keep up and measure up to. That's a drag (to say the least). I'm not complaining, I'm just stating fact.

So, I shall come back. I think I will. I can see myself back here. More importantly it feels right to be here, opening a new shop. Getting my words correct. Being me and being new all over again.