Mahsdad's (Jeff) 2019 Thread - Q1

Welcome to thread #1 for 2019.

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. Like last year, I received many wonderful books from our Christmas Swap and SantaThing, so I think that will provide me with a good list to start with.

This is my 7th year in the group, but my 6th after stepping out of the shadows and started being an active participant.

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

Come on in and sit a spell...

Welcome!

2018 Statistics - Q1

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

March
26. Sacred Stone - Clive Cussler (A)
25. Caliban's War - James S.A. Corey
24. Daily Show: An Oral History - Chris Smith (A)
23. Cinnamon and Gunpowder - Eli Brown
22. We Were Liars - E. Lockhart (A)
Favorite: Cinnamon and Gunpowder


February
21. The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett
20. Likely Stories - Neil Gaiman (GN)
19. Friday - Robert Heinlein (A)
18. Ex-Heroes - Peter Clines
17. A Field Guide to Getting Lost - Rebecca Solnit (LL)
16. A Gambler's Anatomy - Jonathan Lethem (A)
15. Friday Black - Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah
14. Umbrella Academy Vol 2 - Gerald Way (GN)
13. Johnstown Flood - David McCullough (A)
Favorite: Friday Black


January
12. Umbrella Academy Vol 1 - Gerald Way (GN)
11. The Gun Seller - Hugh Laurie
10. Long Way Down - Jason Reyolds (A)
9. I'll Be Gone in the Dark - Michelle McNamara (A)
8. Uncommon Type - Tom Hanks (A)
7. Leviathan Wakes - James S.A. Corey
6. Paper Girls 5 - Brian K. Vaughan (GN)
5. Hillbilly Elegy - J.D. Vance (A)
4. Captain America - Vol 1 - Ed Brubaker (GN)
3. Star Wars - Darth Vader - Kieron Gillen (GN)
2. From a Certain Point of View - Elizabeth Schaefer (A)
1. If You Come Softly - Jacqueline Woodson (LL)
Favorite: Long Way Down

Audiobook Narrators

Jonathan Davis
Ashley Eckstein
Janina Gavankar
Jon Hamm
Neil Patrick Harris
January LaVoy
Saskia Maarleveld
Carol Monda
Daniel José Older
Marc Thompson - From A Certain Point of View
J.D. Vance - Hillbilly Elegy
Tom Hanks - Uncommon Type (plus a few others for 1 story)
Gabra Zackman - I'll Be Gone in the Dark
Jason Reyolds - Long Way Down
Edward Hermann - Johnstown Flood
Mark Deakins - A Gambler's Anatomy
Hillary Huber - Friday
Ariadne Meyers - We Were Liars
Oliver Wyman - Daily Show An Oral History (Plus MANY others to read all the correspondents and guests)

Early Review Books



Rating
- 3
- 18
- 2
- 4
- 1
- 2 (DNF)

TBR - 1
Total Read - 28
Didn't Receive - 2

2013
Top Down - Jim Lehrer -

2014
Upside Down in the Middle of Nowhere - Julie T. Lamana -
Acts of God - Ellen Gilchrist -
Invisible Beasts - Sharona Muir -
Ancillary Justice - Ann Leckie (DNF) -
Dr. Mutter's Marvels - Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz -
The Future for Curious People - Gregory Sherl -
Furious Cool - David Henry -

2015
Get in Trouble - Kelly Link -
He Wanted the Moon - Mimi Baird -
All The Days and Nights - Niven Govinden (Never Received)
Among the Ten Thousand Things - Julia Pierpont -
Tenacity - J.S. Law -
Slade House - David Mitchell -

2016
God of Beer - Garret Keizer -
Dodgers - Bill Beverly -
The Invoice - Jonas Karlsson -
I Am No One - Patrick Flanery -
Souvenirs and Other Stories - Matt Tompkins -
The Sunlight Pilgrims - Jenni Fagan -
The Vegetarian - Han Kang -
Hag-Seed - Margaret Atwood -
Human Acts - Han Kang -
Things We Lost in the Fire - Mariana Enriquez -

2017
New Boy - Tracy Chevalier -
Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker - Gregory Maguire (Never Received)
Strange Weather - Joe Hill -
The Feed - Nick Clark Windo (DNF) -
The Parking Lot Attendant - Nafkote Tamirat -

2018
The Bar Harbor Retirement Home for Famous Writers (And Their Muses) - Terri-Lynne DeFino -
Apollo 8: The Mission That Changed Everything - Martin W. Sandler -
Agent of Utopia - Andy Duncan -
Amsterdam Noir - Rene Appel - TBR

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 - 28

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

Hugos Read

Ongoing bucket list to read all the Hugo winning novels.

Bold : On the Shelf
Strikeout : Completed

Total Read - 36

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.
2016 - The Sellout

2018 Recap

Total Read - 67

Didn't quite meet the goals for the year, but plenty of good reads were perused. The full list is still in my 2018 Thread (see above), but in no particular order, here are my 5 favorites from last year.



A Man Called Ove - Fredik Backman
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle - Haruki Murakami
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing - Hank Green
Norse Mythology - Neil Gaiman
Moonglow - Michael Chabon

I think that's it.

Welcome back!

Hey there Jeff. Welcome back.

Hi Jeff and Happy New Year! Dropping off my star for 2019.

Hello, Jeff! Just dropping a 🌟 and looking forward to your reading thoughts this year.

>5 mahsdad: I may steal your Pulitzer list. That's a great idea...!

and maybe the Hugo Awards. Hurry up and post it already. ; )

>14 Berly: Sorry about that, here you go >6 mahsdad:

Happy New Year Jeff!

Happy reading in 2019, Jeff!

Happy new thread!

Thanks everyone who has and who might stop by this New Year's Eve. Welcome to the new year and my corner of it.

Narrowed down my top 5 for 2018, check it out >8 mahsdad:

Glad to see you loved A Man Called Ove! I did too :)

I feel like I am missing out on something by not getting into Haruki Murakami. I tried to read The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and had to bail. It was just too, something. Weird, maybe?

Oh yeah it was really weird. That is how I'd describe everything I've read of his. His style just hits me in the right weird places.

I wouldn't say you are missing out, I would never suggest that there's something bad about not getting a certain author or book, there's plenty of books praised around here that I just don't get. If its not tripping your trigger, then just move on.

The classic example for me was EVERYONE LOVED Ancillary Justice, but I couldn't connect and took a pass.

Happy New Year, Jeff. Moonglow was one of my favorite reads as well. Chabon is one of my favorites.

Happy New Year! I really enjoyed a Man called Ove as well.

1 Day mostly down and 2 books finished. That certainly can't continue. :)

Happy 2019
A year full of books
A year full of friends
A year full of all your wishes realised

I look forward to keeping up with you, Jeff, this year.

Hello. Dropping a star here and wishing you a happy new year.

I agree on the hit-and-miss of some authors. I am another who *doesn't get* Murakami and probably several other authors who are big hits on LT. But then, that's why there are so many books out there, right? Variety is the spice, and all that jazz! :-)

Two books already completed??!!?? I was so pleased to have completed one before noon today.

Happy New Year, Jeff and Happy New Thread. Looking forward to sharing another year of books with you! I like your best of List. I hope to bookhorn in, Moonglow in the coming months...FINALLY.

1. If You Come Softly - Jacqueline Woodson : Book 1 of Life's Library (John Green's online communal book club). It is a lovely but tragic YA novel written 20 years ago, but is still very prescient today. A modern quasi-retelling of Romeo and Juliet. Ellie a young white girl from an affluent family going to a prep school in NYC. Jeremiah is a black basketball star from an equally affluent (albeit broken) family who is just starting at the same prep school. They are immediately drawn to each other, but wary of letting their friends and especially family know of their budding relationship. It touches upon race and acceptance and in the wake of Black Lives Matter, could have been written today. Like all good tragedies, it ends as expected.

This was a very easy/quick read and I'm certainly not the target demographic, but it was a worthwhile read.

7/10

S: 12/26/18 - 1/1/19 (7 Days)

>27 EBT1002: To be fair, I didn't START these books today, I was just about finished with them when the day began. A little bit of a cheat, but I'll take 'em. :)

Thanks Chelle, Beth, Anita, Paul, Jessi, Ellen and Mark for stopping by. Always nice to see so many visitors at the start of the new year.

>28 msf59: Anything by Chabon is a must read for me. Speaking of must reads, maybe 2019 might be a year for a new Jess Walter? One could only hope.

Hi Jeff! Happy new year and happy first thread of 2019. I see you live in SoCal – I was born and raised there (Inglewood, Hawthorne, LA, Redondo Beach, Diamond Bar, Canoga Park, Sunland, Glendale, Tujunga) before moving to NC in 1991. Where are you in SoCal, if you’re willing to share?

I’ve read 18 of the Pulitzer Prize books you listed, which actually surprises me. I’ve only read 6 of the Hugos which doesn’t surprise me since SF is not my main genre (mystery is).

I loved A Man Called Ove. I don’t usually like old-men-are-adorable-when-they-are-grumpy-or-eccentric novels, but this one really got to me. I really liked the Murakami, but not as much as 1Q84 and Kafka on the Shore.

Congrats on already having two finished – I have several started that I didn’t get finished before the end of the year, too, and they shall become part of 2019’s total.

>32 karenmarie: Hey Karen

I basically did the opposite of you. I grew up on the East Coast (Pittsburgh, close enough) and then moved out to California in '89. My wife and I have lived in San Pedro since '96

When I started my Pulitzer and Hugo list originally, I was surprised by how many I had already read without really trying. Not that I'm trying now, its just fun having that bucket list challenge out there for me.

Ove - I think I actually liked My Grandmother Asked Me to Tell You She's Sorry a little more

Murakami - Those two, I haven't read yet, but they are definitely on the list.

2. From A Certain Point of View - Elizabeth Schaefer (editor) : Listened to this book on audio. On the occasion of the 40th anniversary the first Star Wars file (A New Hope), 40 authors were commissioned to write a story about a character from the film, but not the characters you'd expect. Kind of like Rosencrantz and Guildernstern Are Dead, that traces characters thru Hamlet, but not the main narrative. From finding out what R5-D4 was doing in the Jawa's crawler, to finding out that Aunt Beru was famous for her blue milk cheese, to a bureaucrat on the Death Star who "lives" for filling out the proper forms, to the Rebal flight controller watching the Death Star battle on her monitors, to an argument with a couple of Whills on how the Journal should be written (aka the Opening Crawl from the A New Hope).

The audio version had a whole cast of narrators and music and sound effects that made it a really fun read. (Though when listening at 1.25x times, hearing a sped up version of the Cantina band music was quite jarring :) )

9/10

S: 12/18/18 - 1/1/19 (15 Days)

>34 mahsdad: An interesting opening salvo in the Disney war on the previous canon.

Okay one last Murakami "Rah-Rah" from last month. When I come across them, I like to make note of interesting quotes and such. I generally put then in a document on my phone, fully intending to put them in my review when I finish the book. With The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle I totally forgot.

So I'll post them here, for your enjoyment...

I took the money from the envelope and put it in my wallet. The envelope itself I crumpled and threw in the wastebasket. So this was how secrets got started, I thought to myself. People constructed them little by little.

On occasion, after the momentary satisfaction of having decided something of his own free will, he would see that things had been decided before hand by an external power cleverly camouflaged as free will, mere bait thrown in his path to lure him into behaving as he was meant to. The only things that he had decided for himself with complete independence were the kind of trivial matters which, on closer inspection, revealed themselves to require no decision making at all.

Its a three-character alphanumeric password. You have ten seconds to input it after the prompt shows. Get it wrong three times, and access is denied... Clever huh? If you calculate all the possible permutations and combinations of twenty-six letters and ten numbers, it's practically infinite.

(I thought it was so quaint for a book written 20 years ago to think that a 3 character password was secure)

>34 mahsdad: Hello Jeff. I had the book in my hand, but the two stories I started with were missing something. I'm no sure if my feelings about the new era are clouding my enjoyment of these ANH stories, but Disney is lacking some integral ingredient in their fiction division that is leaving me frozen in carbonite.

>34 mahsdad: What a fun book! I am going to buy it for my dad, who is a huge Star Wars fan, and then steal it to read myself!

>37 brodiew2: Sorry Brodie that it didn't connect. I love the Star Wars universe, as well as Trek and Potter as well. I love the idea of author's' outside of the fold (as it where) taking a crack at their take on the world. My favorites from the Legacy books (pre-Disney) were the Bounty Hunter stories and the book focusing on the history of the Millenium Falcon. As far as Potter goes, I always thought that there was enough room in the world for Rowling to let others in.

>38 Cait86: Glad I could provide an early BB, Cait.

Hi, Jeff. Two days...two books...you're setting the bar pretty high, there, sir. Better pace yourself.

Yeah, don't look for that trend to continue. I'm only about 15 percent into my current book (500+ pages).

What is impressive and won't continue either was 2 days and 2 reviews

>41 mahsdad: "2 days and 2 reviews" Live in your glory!!!

Happy Foto Friday Folks. The first one of 2019, and hopefully, I'll be able to keep up the new streak. :)

Today's image is a horrifying one to us bibliophiles. This is the hazard of reading while eating dessert. Tho it is a fairly artistic swath of chocolate, if I do say so myself. :)

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Book Update - >2 mahsdad:
Read a couple graphic novels that aren't necessaryily "literary", but I'm going to count them anyway. My List, My rules. :)

Reading - Leviathan Wakes by James S. A. Corey. My kid is reading this series and they've been staring at me on the shelf, plus I keep seeing The Expanse on my Amazon Prime Video list, so I thought I'd pick 'em up. About 25% thru, I'm enjoying it, hard science fiction and interplanetary politics.

Listening - Hillbilly Elegy by J.D. Vance - After I finished the Star Wars book, I looked thru the "What's New" list on Libby and this stuck out. Being from Western PA, and going to school in WV, I am Hillbilly adjacent and am enjoying this.

Graphic Novel - Paper Girls Vol 5 by Brian K. Vaughan - I know this series is a popular one around here. Its the latest and for those who care, go look for it.

>43 mahsdad: I always count graphic novels. Sometimes I count Kindle singles, too, because I read plenty of loooooong books to make up for it.
Like you, I was kind of astonished at how many award-winning books I’d already ready read, more or less by accident. I take a desultory (read “lazy”) approach and just read as the mood strikes me.

>43 mahsdad: BLASPHEMY!! HORRIPILATION!! BURN THE PERPETRATOR!!

I will say of the Corey series that I like the show very, very much, and hope you'll find your way to it soon.

ETA that I got your probably unintentional Yule gift of a bookmark you left in An Agent of Utopia, which has arrived. Thanks for both!

Happy Foto Friday, Jeff!

>43 mahsdad: And here I was thinking it was printing error or, God forbid, purposeful. It does look like some kind of bird. :-P

>45 richardderus: Does it have a picture that looks like this?



I was wondering where that went. :)

Hi Jeff!

>33 mahsdad: I’m very familiar with San Pedro – my college boyfriend lived there and was the maritime reporter for the News Pilot in the early/mid 1970s.

>43 mahsdad: *shudder* It does look like a bird.

I used to eat in-the-shell sunflower seeds while reading and several the oldest paperback books on my shelves still have shell parts in the pages.

Trying to catch up.

When I read Two Years Before the Mast several years ago, the author talked about time spent in San Pedro, and I couldn't figure out where it was. Dana (just noticed, incidentally, that today (1/6) is the anniversary of his death) described Los Angeles as being quite a few miles from the coast. But Google is my friend and I found it. I even saw your house on street view. Creepy, huh?

Chabon is a favorite. One of his I don't own but would like to re-read is Wonder Boys.

Hillbilly Elegy is lost in the TBR, but I ought to dig it out and read it. I worked for many years with a lady who grew up in Middletown, graduated from the public high school there, and went on to Cornell and Ohio State Law School. Her oldest brother, also a product of Middletown High, went to Harvard for both bachelor's and master's degrees. She and her many siblings took issue with Vance's characterization of their hometown and particularly his pose as Middletown High's only Ivy-Leaguer. So I'm curious.

Hey Bill, thanks for stopping by.

I think I have to put Two Years Before the Mast on my WL. Dana is a big namesake around here. In Pedro specifically, one of the local middle schools is named for him. And, of course, Dana Point (a town further south) is named for him as well.

And yes it is a little creepy that you saw my house. Not quite so much when I remember that you do have my address. :)

About Elegy, its pretty good. Mostly a memoir of his and his family's life. I'm not sure if I mis-heard it, but he didn't seem to say that no one but him went to Ivy league from his high school, but no one from his class. But you're right he may be exaggerating things for effect.

>47 mahsdad: That's it. And now it's mineminemine. *nyah*

>51 richardderus: Enjoy. Just so you know, I took the picture, its of a statue by an artist called Ted Gall (http://www.theodoregall.com/) and my wife made the book mark itself. You have a good imagination, and I'm sure you can come up with some meaning for "J" "H". :)

So, I'm reading Leviathan Wakes and while it is in paperback, it is a doorstop. As are, at least the 2 sequels that we have in the house.

My question/curiosity is in the publishing/book design process. How are decisions made in terms of font sizes and margins. This book has 3/4 inch margins. How many physical pages would be saved if they went to 1/2 in, or stepped down the font size by 1.

Totally rhetorical, but when I'm lugging it around, its the things I think about. :)

One major consideration is reading fatigue: Wide margins are shown to decrease the perceived effort of reading a book. Small-font issues are frequently cited by US consumers when UK publishers want to find out why their imports aren't so popular. Balance against that the kitten-squisher issue: How many people carry around a true kitten-squisher? Does that mean some sales are lost? Usually, if that's the case, publishers opt to discount ebook editions for treebook buyers. Easy at B&N or Ammy, less so with indies.

>54 richardderus: Well I guess perception is reality. Didn't think that the wider margins make things "easier" to read. And yes, I am one of those that will carry around a "kitten-squisher" (tho I don't necessarily agree with your choice of imagery :) )

Hello Jeff! I hope your day is going well.

Did you miss me in >46 brodiew2:?

>56 brodiew2: >46 brodiew2: My humble apologies, I did miss you! To answer your questions, the swath was certainly not purposeful, chocolate sauce drippings. And yes it does look like a bird. Couldn't duplicate it again if we tried.

The day is going well, enjoying the low 60's weather that is winter in Southern California and binging Lucifer on Netflix, rather than getting work done.

Fantastic Foto Friday Folks!

Hope all is well in your world. Today's image is just an interesting building we saw during our college visit to Cal State Pomona (one of the schools, my kid is considering going to). While its an interesting looking building, its apparently a bit of a boondoggle. After the fact, they discovered that a triangle shaped building doesn't lend itself to office planning, and its built on a fault line and isn't earthquake safe. D'Oh. :)



Book Update
Current List : >2 mahsdad: Audiobook Narrators : >3 mahsdad:

Reading - Leviathan Wakes - James Corey : Almost done. Enjoyable hard sci-fi/solar system politics
Listening - Uncommon Type - Tom Hanks : A collection of short stories by yes, THAT Tom Hanks
eBook - A Darker Shade of Magic - VE Schwab : This one is taking a long time, since I so infrequently am without a physical book, I forget about eBooks on my phone. Its my "emergency" book.

>58 mahsdad: - Sounds like some architect may have had to look for another job, after that one...;-)

Are you enjoying the Tom Hanks audio? I am not a fan of short stories but borrowed the audio because I knew that if anyone could get me to buy in, it would be Hanks himself! And he did. Overall, as I suspect might be the case with most collections, I liked some better than others but was impressed with his writing chops. We already knew he can act!

>59 jessibud2: Hey Shelly, Yep. In fact the tour guide said that after their experiences, the school mandated that all architects they use have to have been graduates of the school, so at least they have some "pride of alma mater" to not screw them over.

I am a fan of short stories, but you're right some may be gems and some may be duds. Maybe that's what I like.

I am enjoying Hanks so far. He's obviously an excellent narrator and the first story was pretty good.

My heart aches for this man...

https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/books/revisiting-the-ruins-of-a-home-and-its-li...

It is stark counter point to all the talk about Marie Kondo and her philosophy of "tidying up" books.

>58 mahsdad: Whoa. Not even earthquake-proofed is, IMO, tantamount to malfeasance! As to the shape, well, the client signed off on it so that's entirely on Cal State.

>61 mahsdad: My god. Oh that poor, poor bastard. If he was a 75er, we could hold a fundraiser for him.

>62 richardderus: You are absolutely correct. A point that the tour guide conveniently forgot to mention. :) You would have thought there was some oversight on the design and location.

Lost books - my immediate thought was how can I send him my extra books.

>8 mahsdad: Great list, Jeff. I have read 3 of them - I just finished A Man Called Ove yesterday - and added the other two to the BlackHole.

>63 mahsdad: Hm. Permaybehaps we can...lemme think on it.

Everyone is a flutter about Marie Kondo and her advice that books should be considered clutter and you should keep only the ones that "spark joy". Ideally, LESS than 30. Ack, hypocrisy.

But I had an epiphany. Its not that you should KEEP 30 books or less. You should let GO of 30 books or less. I just did a quick run thru the stacks and found about 15 or so books that I could definitely part with. But to only have 30 books in my house, that is the definition of pure insanity.

>66 mahsdad: - Marie Kondo totally rubs me the wrong way and I never understood the hype over her *method* of anything. I'm with you, especially about the books. In fact, I read her book (the first one; I understand there have been others since) and well, I could easily toss that one out. Just saying...

I'd hate to visit her house....;-)

Thing #1: Books.
Thing #2: Food.
Thing #3: Bed.
Thing #4: Shower.

There. I'm down to 4 things.

::eyeroll::

>66 mahsdad: - A friend just sent me this link; is this what you were referring to?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/keep-your-tidy-spark-joy-hand...

;-p

Sheesh. I think she must be from another planet.

>66 mahsdad: Nearly every single book of our 2110 books spark joy to me, the few that don't sparkle after reading are donated :-)
We have culled in the past, due to lack of space, a very hard task. We tried to find them good homes.

>68 richardderus: I would add a couch as #5 and be perfectly happy with 5 things ;-)

>58 mahsdad:

The Triangle is the only thing that stops that building from being completely ugly, though it does have that Leaning Tower vibe.

>69 jessibud2: Not that specific article, but yep that be her.

>70 FAMeulstee: Exactly. If I even have to think about whether or not to get rid of a book, its staying.

>71 m.belljackson: I wish it would have been a better sky day, because, at least to my odd sense of style, it is a very photographic building.

>66 mahsdad: I like your book philosophy much better than that ridiculous clutter-cleaner's advice. Culling 30 seems reasonable. Maybe.

A couple of videos for your evening, or morning, or afternoon, or whenever you stumble back to my neck of the woods.

https://youtu.be/nQkz_X1Rg60 - An interview/profile of Roald Dahl from the 80's

https://youtu.be/UTtDb73NkNM - CBS Sunday Morning profile of Tom Hanks, on the occassion of his book (which I'm listening to now) Uncommon Type

>73 Berly: Thanks Kim. 30 would probably be hard for me as well anyway. The 15 or so that I did pull out are still sitting on a chair waiting for my better half's right of first (or is it last) refusal. If she wants to keep it, then it stays. :)

>74 mahsdad: I really liked Uncommon Type--hope you enjoy it too!

>75 mahsdad: Well, of course. LOL

How comes the Uncommon Type ear-read? I've got it here, am slowly getting around to it.

Foto Friday next! Yay!

I'm liking it a lot. Hanks is, of course, reading it so that works just fine for me. The stories are fun. A couple sci-fi types in including one where the main character time travels back to the 1938 worlds fair.

The thru line, that is just a bit contrived, is that each story mentions, uses, leverages a typewriter of some sort. Just a bit. After the first couple stories I started anticipating when the typewriter would show up. Given that Hanks is a big antique typewriter collector, I'm not surprised.

IMO, its a worthwhile read.

One always looks for a chance to ride one's hobbyhorse. Typewriters is a little bit off the beaten track, but hey! They're legal and moral. Bet R. Kelly wishes he could go back in time and collect typewriters.

>78 mahsdad: - That time travel story was my favourite of the collection. I am not generally a fan of short stories, but it was TOM HANKS, for crying out loud! I also did it via audiobook, for that very reason.

When we talked about this book last year, I think it was on Kim's thread, I recommended the documentary film I had just seen, called California Typewriter. It's probably not playing at theatres any more but if you can find it on Netflix or something, it's a real treat. Tom Hanks figures in it, more than a bit. And it's one of the most fun docs you will find.

Thanks Shelly! I'll look for it

I'm putting Beloved on pause. I started it, after finishing Leviathan Wakes and it just isn't connecting for me right now.

No worries, I'll come back to it later. But in the meantime, I'm picking up, instead Hugh Laurie's first book The Gun Seller, maybe that will scratch my book itch better.

That is all, I return you to you regularly schedule internet browsing.

It's Foto Friday Folks. It finally stopped raining around here (about 5 straight days, which is nothing to shake a stick at in So Cal). Here's an image I took from my front balcony looking eastish towards Long Beach during a lull on Saturday before it really got going.



Book Update
Reading - The Gun Seller by Hugh Laurie.
Listening - Just finished Uncommon Type a collection of short stories by Tom Hanks. Haven't picked a new audio yet.

That SKY! And the light is gorgeous.

Oh man, nice photo in >83 mahsdad:, Jeff.

Happy 2019! Wonderful to see The Windup Bird Chronicle on your list of favorites from last year.

Thanks RD, Joe!

>83 mahsdad: Beautiful. I'd almost fly to California to see a day like that. Our sunshine quotient has been in the cellar for a long time.

You're welcome anytime Charlotte. :)

7. Leviathan Wakes - James S. A. Corey : In a future solar system, Mars and the outer moons are now populated, but Earthers, Martians and the Belters don't necessarily get along. Political tensions are high. Ice miner, Jim Holden and his crew witness their ship being destroyed by mysterious attackers, they get another shot out from under them and they commandeer a Martian space fighter as a Solar war breaks out. They pick up an out of work police officer from Ceres as they try to stay ahead of the battles and work to stop the corporate greed and experimentation that might be the root cause of the war.

Good hard science fiction/space opera, space fighters, vomit zombies (yeah, I know) and the sparks of alien life. This is the start of the Expanse series, and its a good one.

8/10

S: 12/28/18 - 1/12/19 (16 Days)

Marie Kondo: I started to cull my books, trying to get down to a sparkly joyous 30. But I put the culls in my secret book closet.

>90 weird_O: - Just one? One secret book closet? LOL!!

>91 jessibud2: Well, for now. But...lots of library book sales in the offing in 2019. Bwwaaaahahahaha...

>92 weird_O: Ha! Too true.

If I ever won the lottery and could build my dreamhouse, a full on library would have to figure prominently.

A fun little video from a Math channel I follow on YT. He explains the way the check digits in ISBN numbers are calculated.

https://youtu.be/WTzyd3e107Q

Forgot to add a fun quote that I noted in my Leviathan Wakes "review", so here it is...

Holden was imagining what several hundred rounds of Teflon-coated tungsten steel going five thousand meters per second would do to human bodies when Alex threw down the throttle and a roomful of elephants swan dived onto his chest.

Nice imagery

8. Uncommon Type - Tom Hanks : Listened to this on audio, read by Hanks. This might have made the book more of an experience, but I'm sure I would have liked this even in the dead tree edition.

This is a debut collection of 17 short stories by Hanks. I found them very endearing and engaging. Some are just simple human stories, and a few bordering on full-on science fiction. The first story is the story of a 3 week love affair that ultimately doesn't go to plan. I really enjoyed Alan Bean Plus Four, a preposterous tale of a bunch of kids who decide to go to the moon, as well as A Special Weekend, about a man traveling back in time to visit the 1938 Worlds Fair. Also liked Steve Wong is Perfect, about the bowling phenom in the local town.

There is a couple through-lines that roughly link the stories; there is a typewriter featured, some prominently, somewhere in each story. Also, there several interludes, called Our Town Today with Hank Fiset, opinion column in the local paper perhaps, plus some shared characters. It gives the impression that all of these stories could live in the same literary universe.

All the stories are read by Hanks, with the exception of the last (and not credited on my audio) story; Stay with Us, which is a play/radio drama about a very famous rich man finding peace of mind at a small town resort. Peter Gerety, Peter Scolari, Cecily Strong, Holland Taylor and Wilmer Valderrama provide the voices here.

Recommend.

8/10

S: 1/9/19 - 1/18/19 (10 Days)

I'm looking forward to that one, which I got as a gift this year, in a "dead tree" format.

>94 mahsdad: I knew the one for ISBN-10 because I worked in publishing during the 1980s and 1990s. Somehow I never learned the one for ISBN-13 which is so much simpler!

>95 mahsdad: Heh. Some very good lines in that book, but ultimately I really prefer the TV series (now on Prime).

>96 mahsdad: Awaits me at the library! Can't wait.

Hi, Jeff. Finally getting around to visiting the threads and dropping a star. Hope all is well with you and your family. Loving Foto Friday...well except for >43 mahsdad:. The horror!

>94 mahsdad: I also enjoy watching Presh Talwakar! Although when he says his name, I always think it should be Preshtel Walker...

>98 richardderus: Hey RD. Algorithms are fun. I used to know the one for credit cards. I wrote a credit card validation function for some business software I was supporting. It was during the early days of the internet (probably pre-google), but it was fun to learn.

Regarding The Expanse, should I wait until further into the books before starting the TV series, or does it diverge quickly?

>99 rretzler: Hey Robin, thanks for stopping by. The family is good. Just today found out the kid will have to go back to school after 6 days at home due to the LAUSD strike. Huzzah!

I always start one of Presh's videos thinking, yeah I'll try THIS one on my own, but I always skip ahead to the answer. There are some that even after I know how its done still make me shake my head.

Expanse trivia: book 1 = season 1 plus some changes that advance certain characters' presence. So read book 2 without fear, though before February 8th. The day seasons 1-3 drop.

>96 mahsdad: I thought you might like that one. ; )

>101 richardderus: >102 Berly: Thanks to both of you, for completely different reasons. :)

Hey we made into the State of the Thing newsletter this month, in the Did you Know section...

"Did you know that the 75ers challenge group is one of the most active groups on the site, year after year? Members challenge themselves to read 75 books in one calendar year. Give it a try, and join the group on Talk"

Yea!, the more the merrier.

Saw that! We should be seeing some new folks over the next week or so because of it.

>104 mahsdad: Wow....free PR!

It's Foto Friday Folks! Yippee, that means it's almost beer-30 for the week.

Today's image comes from a light show/display that the LA Arborteum was having around Christmas/End of the Year. It was Chinese themed and had also sorts of lanterns and displays around the park. My thread topper was taken there as well. Have a great weekend!



Book Update
Reading - The Gun Seller by Hugh Laurie. Hilarious spy type thriller. Just realized this is my 2nd famous actor turned author book for the year. I don't think 2 will make a pattern. Tho...
Listening - I'll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara. A true crime search for the Golden State Killer. The worst serial killer in California history that I didn't know about until this book. Published posthumously by her husband Patton Oswalt. Another famous actor turned book publisher. Okay, 3 is not a pattern, I promise.
Up Next - A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit. This is the 2nd book in John Green's Life's Library Book Club. Should prove interesting. Or at least different.

Hey there, Jeff, that is a *gorgeous* dragon and photo of same. I'm thrilled, like I know you are too, that the poltroon in chief caved (for three fig-leafy weeks, snort) since it means I can *eat* next month! Phew am I fatigued. I posted a TL;DR teaser for my review of The King's Evil. I'm still wrestling that bad boy to the ground. It was an intense read and I want to get all the way into it, wrench open the cupboard doors and saw the green logs into what *I* see as their proper form. I know from the resounding silence that greets those reviews of mine how MEGO-inducing that is for others...and I still want to.

So I'm taking an hour off the romp among the threads.

Happy Friday, Jeff. I am glad you are having a good time with Informed Delivery. LOL. I hope you are enjoying I'll Be Gone in the Dark. It was very disturbing but I thought it was excellent.

Lurking...lurking...

And gone. Happy weekend!

>108 richardderus: "Poltroon in Chief" Ha, love it. MEGO-inducing? Not sure I know what that means. You may not get much commentary on your reviews, but know that some (or at least me) do read them. They, at times, do increase the damage of the BB's you're slinging. :)

>109 msf59: Yeah, I know, I'm geeky like that (re mail). I am enjoying I'll Be Gone in the Dark. I just got to the part after Michelle died. I kinda wish they would have changed narrators. I know its her stuff, but there is a definite shift.

It must be a week of murder, cause I'm also watching the new Ted Bundy documentary, on Netflix : Conversations with a Killer : The Ted Bundy Tapes. Very creepy.

>110 weird_O: Lurk away. Happy Weekend to you too!

MEGO = My Eyes Glaze Over

My teaser's up on my thread and I am Done with the blog version! No more tinkering!

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. With a list carefully selected by John and Rosianna, the book club will introduce you to great books you may not have heard of. We’ll read them closely and thoughtfully and discuss each book over the course of the six weeks on the Life’s Library Discord."

TAG - Life's Library

1. If You Come Softly - Jacqueline Woodson -
2. A Field Guide to Getting Lost - Rebecca Solnit - TBR

(Next time I create a new thread, I'll add this to the standing posts at the top, but I thought I would start the list here)

>112 richardderus: MEGO, that's a new one on me. Thanks!

9. I'll Be Gone in the Dark - Michelle McNamara : Listened to this on audio. McNamara was a true crime blogger/writer who became obsessed with a series of violent rapes and murders in the 70's. The crimes started in the Sacramento area and the suspect was dubbed the East Area Rapist (or EAR). He later moved south to Santa Barbara, other points south until he got to Irvine. He was also dubbed the Original Night Stalker (or ONS). Then in the late 80's his activity stopped.

McNamara heard about these crimes in the mid-2010's and became obsessed with solving the case. She worked with the various police departments, compiling thousands of pages of interviews and boxes of evidence. This became the basis for this book. Unfortunately, she passed away before it was finished, and her husband Patton Oswalt tasked her researcher and a journalist friend to complete this opus.

It is a very excellent read, recreating/revisiting the crimes as well as discussing her point of view and history and how she came to want to work on this subject. The introduction was read by Gillian Flynn, the book proper is read by Gabra Zackman, and Patton reads the afterword.

Recommend.

8/10

S: 1/18/19 - 1/26/19 (9 Days)

10. Long Way Down - Jason Reynolds : Listened to this on audio. Will just found out that his brother has been shot and killed. There are 3 rules in his family; Don't Cry, Don't Snitch and always Get Revenge. Will find's his brother's gun and goes out fully intending to seek vengeance for the death. He gets on the elevator at 9:08am and presses the button for the lobby. What follows is the longest minute of his live as the elevator proceeds to stop at each floor going down and picks up a passenger (ghost?) from Will's past to tell their story of gun violence and the consequences. When he finally reaches the ground, will he or won't he carry out the 3rd rule? The style/conceit of the story brought to my mind some of A Christmas Carol, or Mitch Ablom's Five People You Meet in Heaven, but much deeper and more profound in impact, in my humble opinion.

This is an excellent (albeit short) novel about gun violence and its impact on black youths (or any youth for that matter). Oh and did I mention that it entirely in verse? I honestly didn't realize until I was almost done. I'm not one for poetry, but this was a very effective decision, it was almost a song.

Reynolds' and this work won a lot of acclaim and awards in 2018, including being a Newbery Honor book and a Printz Award Honor book. Highly Recommend.

9/10

S: 1/26/19 - 1/26/19 (1 Day)

I always ascribe to the adage Read the Book, then Watch the Movie.

So when I saw a trailer for a new interesting looking sci-fi movie called the Umbrella Academy (Trailer - https://youtu.be/0DAmWHxeoKw), then I found out it was based on a GN written by Gerard Way (of the band My Chemical Romance), I was immediately intrigued.

The GN is available on Hoopla (at least from my library) and I devoured volume 1 in a day. Not sure if the movie will be quite as surreal and "comic-bookie" as the GN, but I'm looking forward to checking it. out.

He (Way) also released a music video for the trailer music. A remake of the Bangle's Hazy Shade of Winter. Very cool. https://youtu.be/ZTCrqXpKHec

Happy Foto Friday Folks.

For my frozen friends further east, I give you today, an oldie but a goodie (IMHO). A little reminder that spring will eventually arrive. Its a picture I took of some Foxglove, and then played "spin the color selector" in my photo editor until something interesting came out. Enjoy...



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook Narrators

Reading - Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adje-Brenyah. Short stories. Just got thru the first couple, boy are these intense. Enjoying it, isn't the right word, but its excellent so far
Listening - The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough. Being from Western Pa, I've always knew of the flood, just not all the details. Amazing. Of course, its McCullough, so its going to be excellent on that alone, and its being narrated by Edward Hermann, so that makes for an even more profound listen
Graphic Novel - There's only 2 volumes on Hoopla, but I'm really enjoying The Umbrella Academy

To all of you freezing your proverbial asses off back East, here's something else to hopefully warm your day. Here's what us fruits and nuts in California do when it rains (which its doing right now, with ACTUAL Thunder and Lightning)

https://youtu.be/1m4hryJ4Nag

>118 mahsdad: Foxglove trippiness!

>119 mahsdad: Ha!

>96 mahsdad: I have that one on audio; it will be one of my spring "reads" when the temps allow me to walk to and from work.

>118 mahsdad: Okay, I must have had a stroke yesterday, or it was wishful thinking. TODAY is Foto Friday. D'oh!

Only change in the book update is that I just finished The Johnstown Flood, just another reason I'd never want to go back in time and live in the 19th century.

>121 EBT1002: Hey Ellen. I hear you, my audiobook and podcast counts went way down when I stopped commuting. I can only listen to audiobooks when I'm not doing anything; like working out, running, long distance driving

>115 mahsdad: I'm planning on reading this book later in the year. So many of my friends have read and recommended it, with the caveat that it is terrifying!

>Hey Cait. It wasn't necessarily terrifying to me, but it was certainly intense.

Mini book haul this afternoon. Took the child for a little drive (he's practicing before he can take his driving test) and went to a used book store in the local mall called Book-Off. Totally forgot it was there. We also, went to Barnes & Noble. Two book stores in 1 day, my kind of afternoon.

Sorry Please Thank You - Charles Yu
Ex-Heroes - Peter Clines
Mr. Adam - Pat Frank
We Are What We Pretend To Be - Kurt Vonnegut
Post Office - Charles Bukowski (2nd in a trilogy that my son is reading. He read Ham on Rye as an assignment for school)

>124 mahsdad: Lovely haul! I love that your son's eating up Bukowski.

>125 richardderus: Me too. I've never read anything of his (bad Jeff). Amazing since he lived out the end of his life in San Pedro and is buried about 3 miles from my house.

JEFFERSON DAVIS HELM!! GO GET Ham on Rye THIS INSTANT AND READ IT!!

It's in the house, I WILL read it soon. I bow to you for forgiveness

*tsk*

Imagine such carryins-on, your son reaching for some strong, strong waters with dad lookin' on there with his teeth in his mouth!

*tut*

Marlon James on Seth Meyers recently. He was on to talk about his new book; Black Leopard, Red Wolf. He tongue in cheek, referred to it as the African Game of Thrones.

https://youtu.be/nZgavGUlLkI

I want to read this, plus I still haven't read A Brief History of Seven Killings - it is on the TBR pile, tho.

11. The Gun Seller - Hugh Laurie : Many know Hugh Laurie as the curmudgeon Dr. House, somewhat fewer know him as the half of the hilareous British sketch comedy duo Fry and Laurie. But even fewer still know that he's an author of spy thrillers, or at least one. And its pretty darn good.

Thomas Lang is a former Scot's Guard soldier and is offered a ton of money to assassinate an American industrialist, but he decides to warn him instead and puts him on the path to battle evil billionaires, seducing beatiful women, and trying to save the world from the mililtary industrial complex. Part, Robert Ludlum, some Ian Fleming and a very generous dose of Douglas Adams. One of the funniest books I've read in a long time.

Rayner, I estimated, was ten years older than me. Which is fine. Nothing wrong with that...But Rayner was also three inches taller than me, four stones heavier, and at least eight however-you-measure-violence units more violent. He was uglier than a car park, with a big, hairless skull that dipped and bulged like a balloon full of spanners, and his flattened, fighter's nose, apparently drawn on his face by someone using their left hand, or perhaps even their left foot, spread out in a meandering, lopsided delta under the rough slab of his forehead.

I once met an RAF pilot who told me how he and his navigator had had to eject from their very expensive Tornado GR1, three hundred feet above the Yorkshire dales, because of what he called a "bird strike". (This, rather unfairly in my view, made it sound as if it was the bird's fault; as if the little feathered chap had deliberately tried to head-butt twenty tons of metal travelling in the opposite direction at just under the speed of sound, out of spite.)

Don't go to Casablanca expecting it to be like the film. In fact, if you're not too busy, and your schedule allows it, don't go to Casablanca at all.

8/10

S: 1/12/19 - 1/29/19 (18 Days)

>131 mahsdad: How satisfying that Hugh Laurie can write as well as he acts.

>131 mahsdad: Like those quotes, Jeff. Have to look for Mr. Laurie.

13. Johnstown Flood - David McCullough : Listened to this on audio. I am from Western Pennsylvania and had always knew about the Johnstown Flood, but never really new the details. From the famous industrialists who created a hunting club near the dam that may have help contribute to its collapse (famous names I've heard all my life; Carnegie, Frick, Phipps), to life in the late 1800's, knee deep in the Industrial Revolution, but still so close to the fallout of the Civil War, to the horror of the flood itself. Its hard to imagine 14+ million cubic feet of water coming at you.

In the days of telegraphs and trains, the information and disinformation flows were as fascinating as the flood itself. Was very surprised to learn that Clara Barton (the President and Founder of the American Red Cross) brought her team to Johnstown after the flood in what would be their first major disaster recovery effort. She stayed for 5 months.

In our litigious days, you'd think that someone would be held liable for the disaster, many tried, but no lawsuits were able to successfully assign blame.

A fascinating read. Only made more so, just because it was by David McCullough and read by Edward Herman.

8/10

S: 1/26/19 - 2/1/19 (7 Days)

>134 mahsdad: Frowning from On High was then, and is now, sufficient to quash a truly inconvenient lawsuit.

>118 mahsdad: Love that Photo Thursday Shot!!

>131 mahsdad: I loved Laurie in House and those quotes are funny. Hmmm....

>135 richardderus: There were several parallels between then and today, not the least of which was the cheap labor (in 1880's it was the Hunky's - Hungarians working in the steel mills) that were padding the pockets of the robber barons.

>136 Berly: Thanks Kim (for the photo love)

So I finally watched The Dark Tower. As a movie, I'll consider it in a different parallel universe from the Stephen King book. Shades of what could have been, but really not what a Dark Tower adaptation should have been. LOVED Idris. I do think he was very good as the Gunslinger. The kid playing Jake was pretty good, and Mcconaughey was just stunt casting. Overall, a disappointment.

What it did do is make me want to read all the books again.

Curious thing I've noticed lately with book cover images. At least the ones I get by copying the link address from their LT work page. If you are in LT in "secure" mode with HTTPS://, any images that were created from a "non-secure" version (HTTP://) won't show. And vice versa. In fact, they are completely different links. Amazon must have changed some process in how they store the images.

If you see someone's threads and the images aren't showing up, toggle between HTTP:// and HTTPS:// to see if there's a difference.

For example - I can't see both of these images at the same time.

HTTP - http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/P/0671207148.01._SX450_SY635_SCLZZZZZZZ_.jpg

HTTPS - https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/P/0671207148.01._SX450_SY635_SCLZ...

Its Foto Friday Folks. Hope its a good one for you. Its a bright sunny chilly day around here. (Okay, I know chilly is a relative word around here, but 54 is pretty chilly for CA :) )

Today's image was taken the other day during one of the bouts of actual weather around here. We have netting across the railings on our front porch, essentially to keep the cats from escaping. But, of course, it doesn't work. I happened to look out and see the drops collecting on the grid. A nice image, but honestly it doesn't do justice to what my inner eye saw.



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: : Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: : Audiobook Narrators

Reading : A Field Guide to Getting Lost by Rebecca Solnit. Reading for the Life's Library book club. Its a book that usually would never come onto my radar; "An amalgam of personal memoir, philosophical speculation, natural lore, cultural history and art criticism". Not, on its face, my cup of tea. But I'm really enjoying it.
Listening : A Gambler's Anatomy by Jonathan Lethem. Found during a session of scrolling and scrolling and scrolling thru "What's Available" on Libby. I've read several of Lethem's stuff. All with a weird sensibility. This one is no different.

>140 mahsdad: That's lovely! I know what you mean about the inner-eye thing. It's almost always the background that does in my vision for what I wanted to see.

Oh, that’s a great shot!

Thanks RD, Jim!

For all, totally forgot to mention, the other day, the Fam and I got to go see Madeline Albright discuss her book Fascism: A Warning with Larry Wilmore. An excellent event. She was very funny, informative and if I'm half as vital and with it when I'm her age, I'll be happy. She was asked if she was an optimist or a pessimist. She said she's an optimist that worries a lot.

>140 mahsdad: Love that! It's really quite stunning. Good eye.

>143 mahsdad: Very jealous! And I love her outlook on life. I may borrow that.

>143 mahsdad: "An optimist that worries a lot" is just perfect. Describes being a parent and a voter!

Its coming! May 31st

https://youtu.be/BsrPO8qslBE - Good Omens Title sequence.

Happy Valentine's Day!! ❤️💚💗💙


>140 mahsdad: I love that photo!

Thanks Chelle!

>148 mahsdad: Oi!! You!! It's Foto Friday for six more hours, make with goods.

It's Foto Friday Folks, Yippee!

Today's image was some lovely flowers taken on my stroll around the block to the neighborhood sandwich shop to get lunch today. Enjoy...



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed List
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook narrators

Reading - A Field Guide to Getting Lost - Rebecca Solnit. Memoir type essays. Lovely language. Not usually my cup of tea, but I'm reading for the Life's Library Bookclub. Its a good read, almost done.
Reading - Ex-Heroes - Peter Clines. Zombies and Super Heroes, what's not to love
Listening - A Gambler's Anatomy - Jonathan Lethem. High stakes backgammon and brain surgery. Weird stuff.

>150 mahsdad: OOOOOooooo such a beautiful color! *happy sigh*

>131 mahsdad:, >132 richardderus: Hugh Laurie is disgustingly versatile. In addition to acting and writing, he is a fine musician...he plays piano and guitar and sings the blues. Search for him on YouTube...

>152 laytonwoman3rd: +1

+2

Internet's down at home, so I'm getting some work done at Starbucks. Went to goto the library, grab a table and spread out, but oops, its President's Day and they're closed.

Just wanted to report that I finished binging the Umbrella Academy on Netflix last night. I really enjoyed it, I want more. Downside of binge watching, now have to wait probably a year for season 2. Oh well.

Trailer - https://youtu.be/0DAmWHxeoKw

At least when I get home, if the internet's still down, I have a pile of books to keep me entertained.

We just watched the first two episodes of The Umbrella Academy, Jeff. It’s encouraging to hear how much you liked the whole thing. We liked the first two, and decided to stick with it (in part because we’re Ellen Page fans), but wondered how they’d do with tying all the different storylines together.

>156 jnwelch: Have you read the graphic novels? There are 3. I've read the first 2 (the only ones on Hoopla), and they are WAY more out there than the show is, but I think the show made good decisions on what to keep/change/leave behind. They can both stand on their own.

They did a good job, IMO, of tying everything together and definitely left you wanting more in the end.

15. Friday Black - Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah : A collection of powerful, interesting collection of short stories from the African American experience. It was an excellent read. As with most story collections, they weren't all tremendous, but there are enough that are that make this worth your time. Seemingly all told in the same "world", some told in the same Sporting Goods/Walmart analog clothing store where Black Friday becomes Night of the Living Customer (Friday Black). The Finkelstein 5 and Zimmer Land are both takes on the "stand your ground" and Black Lives Matter. The former is what happens when a white man brutally kills some innocent young African Americans and how the community seeks to get vengeance. The latter shows one way to channel one's fears and tensions into a Westworld like simulations, essentially to cut down on crime and violence. Some of the stories had a Twilight Zone feel, like the very profound Lake Street, to post apocalyptic science fiction like After the Flash which crosses nuclear annihilation with a time bubble. A debut collection, but one worth your time.

8/10

S: 1/29/19 - 2/5/19 (8 Days)

Happy Foto Friday Folks,

Hope all is well in your neck of the woods. So Cal is experiencing what I can only describe as WINTER this year. It continues to be FREEZING around here, and by freezing I mean unseasonably chilly. It's 11a as I type this and it is about 56F. Currently dry, but we've been getting dumped on with rain (and snow in increasingly lower elevations) and I love it. One article I read said that California has received just in February so far, 18 trillion gallons of water. Too bad a lot of it can't be stored and rolls right off into the ocean. At least there's ton's of snow in the Sierras.

Today's image isn't weather related, its just some plates in the cabinet that had a cool shadow/reflection. Enjoy...



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: Audio Narrators

Finished everyhing I was reading last week, completely new set today.
Reading - The Color of Magic - Terry Pratchett. I promised myself that my next book would be something that's been on the shelf for a while. This popped up.
Listening - Friday - Robert Heinlein. Every once in a while you have to go back to the classics. Other than Star Wars/Star Trek books I read as a kid, I think this might be the first science fiction book I read
Graphic Novel - Neil Gaiman's Likely Stories graphic representations of 4 of his short stories. Art by Mark Buckingham

I read one of the Umbrella Academy GNs, Jeff, and thought it was okay, but didn't pursue it further. I remember the author, Gerard Way, is a member of the band My Chemical Romance, right?

I think we're on Episode 8 or 9 of the first season. Luther has gone off the deep end after finding out the father never even read his Moon reports, and has been dancing shirtless in a rave in all his hairiness. Klaus tried to save him from the jealous boyfriend and his buddies and almost died. Hazel is running away with the donut lady, and Cha-Cha is pissed!

>159 mahsdad: Oooh aaahhh purty!

56° = Winter. *snort*

I know, I know. And I'll be wishing for this weather come September when its 30-40 degrees warmer.

Have a great weekend RD!

Thanks, Jeff, y'all do the same.

>160 jnwelch: Yeah, Way is the lead for My Chemical Romance. I think that's how I found out about UA, I saw a music video he did for Hazy Shade of Winter he did for the show.

Karl Lagerfeld was apparently a complete book nerd. He would have fit right in with the 75.

https://onedio.co/content/lagerfelds-amazing-library-will-surely-steal-the-heart...

Hello Jeff. I hope all is well with you.

>124 mahsdad: I look forward to your thoughts on Ex-Heroes. I greatly enjoyed his 14 and have The Fold and Paradox Bound TBR.

So where's the Friday Foto? It's almost noon here and...
...
...this isn't Friday? How'd that happen?

>166 brodiew2: Hey Brodie, thanks for stopping by. All is well. I enjoyed Ex-Heroes quite a bit, I'll have more thoughts on it later. The only other of his I've read is The Fold, pretty interesting if I recall.

>167 richardderus: I'm with you there Buddy! Friday can't come quick enough. Stay warm and read on...

I just binged season 1 (or series 1 to be geographically accurate) of Broadchurch on Netflix. Boy what a gut-punch of a series. A beautifully shot show (tho perhaps a bit heavy handed on the slo-mo) and well acted by pretty much every major BBC actor.

Heck there were 3 Doctor Who's on the show, plus a future Queen of England.

Now to take a break, or barrel on thru series 2.

Happy Foto Friday Folks!

Its been a pleasant week, weather-wise (still below average temps, but its all relative), but looking at some rain tomorrow. Today's image is one of my children just chillin'



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook narrators

Reading - Cinnamon and Gunpowder by Eli Brown. Romance and fine cuisine on a pirate ship in the 1800's. Got this from a Little Free Library. Looked interesting
Listening - We Were Liars by E Lockhart

An since RD, is so feline adverse, I'll share another FF image, of a nice fluffy cloud... :)

>171 mahsdad: Thank you most kindly, Jeff. And that (cloudy) image is gorgeous.

Both Foto Friday pictures are wonderful!

>158 mahsdad: Good review of Friday Black. I loved this collection too.

>171 mahsdad: LIKE!

Happy Saturday, Jeff. I remember you were a big fan of Long Way Down. I finally got to the audio yesterday. Excellent read. I even listened to the 2nd half again, because it was so short and I loved the verse narrative. I will be reading more of this talented author. I have Ghost (Track).

I am enjoying Black Leopard, Red Wolf. About a 100 pages in.

Thanks RD, Lori, and Mark for the photo love.

Mark - Yeah, I am a big fan of Long Way Down, the verse snuck up on me but in retrospect, it was a very effective technic.

Also, I picked Friday Black as my favorite book from February (ack, how did it get to be March already)

16. A Gambler's Anatomy - Jonathan Lethem : Listened to this on audio. This is my fourth Lethem novel, and I generally love his stuff. This one was OK, but it firmly cemented my opinion that he writes some really weird stuff.

Alex Bruno is an international backgammon hustler. He finds that over time he's developed a "blot" that blocks his vision and begins to affect his game. It turns out that the blot is a growing tumor. It's going to take some radical surgery to correct it and he finds that a super rich/shady friend from high school is willing to fund it. After surgery, along with the tumor being gone, he finds that his game is gone as well. He has to work at his friend's dive-y burger joint to pay him back. There's a lot more here, not the least of which is Alex's self belief that he is a psychic and that those powers help him with this backgammon skills. Its a very odd tale

7/10

S: 2/1/19 - 2/16/19 (16 Days)

>170 mahsdad: What a handsome critter! May I just use your thread as a bulletin board for anyone who hasn't found the Jon Clinch thread yet for March's AAC? Thank you.

Hey Linda! Bulletin away, I'm sure I'm not the most frequented thread around here, but more the merrier! :)

17. A Field Guide to Getting Lost - Rebecca Solnit : This was the second book in the Life's Library Book Club. It is a series of autobiographical essays, where Solnit expolores the subjects of loss, getting lost and losing one's self in the world, whether it be the wide open spaces of the American West, or the urban decay of New York. Not generally my cup of tea and not one that I would have selected on my own. But that's why I joined the Life's Library Club, its exposing me to new authors and styles that are outside of my comfort zone.

This was an excellent read and worth your time.

The simplest answer nowadays for literal getting lost is that a lot of the people who get lost aren't paying attention when they do so, don't know what to do when they realize they don't know how to return, or don't admit they don't know. There's an art of attending to weather, to the route you take, to the landmarks along the way ... to the thousand things that make the wild a text that can be read by the literate. The lost are often illiterate in this language that is the language of the earth itself, or don't stop to read it.

America was conquered, but not discovered, that the men who arrived with a religion to impose and dreams of gold never really knew where they were, and that this discovery is still taking place in our time.

Vacant lots like missing teeth gave a tough grin to the streets we haunted. Ruin everywhere, for cities had been abandoned by the rich, by politics, by a vision of the future.

8/10

S: 2/5/19 - 2/17/19 (13 Days)

>170 mahsdad: Nice photo!

18. Ex-Heroes - Peter Clines : In a dystopian zombie filled world, the superheroes of Southern California are protecting the surviving humans in a fortified Paramount Studios. A fun amuse bouche of a story. I enjoy the superhero genre and like when the author comes up with their own take on the usual tropes, and Cline does not disappoint. Stealth, Gorgon, Zzzap and the Mighty Dragon, to name a few. This is an interesting look at what happens when a world that has super/meta beings come crashing down during an Ex-human (Clines' world doesn't like to use the Z word) apocalypse. Its the start of a 5 book series, that I'm going to have to continue.

8/10

S: 2/8/19 - 2/20/19 (13 Days)

Has anyone heard of IMDb's Freedive service? Its an ad-based streaming service that has some pretty decent movies and TV shows.

Right now I'm watching The Colour of Magic, yes a DiscWorld movie. I didn't know one existed. David Jason (don't know who he is) is Rincewind and Sean Astin is Twoflower. Tim Curry is in it as well as Christopher Lee as the voice of Death. So far its pretty weird, but just about weird enough to keep up with Pratchett.

The trailer for it is https://youtu.be/I6R6UX8uMaM

Freedive is at http://www.imdb.com/freedive

I got so excited when I saw your mention of a new ad-based streaming service but sadly, it is restricted to the US market. That is okay because now it is on my radar (some of these services do transition outside of US borders) so I am ready for if/when that happens. Thanks for the heads up!

Bummer Lori. You'd think ad revenue was ad revenue. But I guess not. Stupid copy-right and licensing laws. :) Why can't we watch everything when we want it, where we want it.

We love the Big Bang Theory, and over the years we purchased the first couple seasons from Amazon for streaming. But now that CBS has their own streaming service, they've stopped allowing Amazon to stream. We can still watch the seasons we've purchased, but we can't purchase anymore.

Here's a question for the room...

What's the oldest book on your shelf. Not the "oldest", cause I'm sure that at least some of us have a copy of the bible or the Odyssey, or the collected works of Shakespeare, or some other ancient tome, but the book you've had on the shelf the longest.

For me its The Original Illustrated Sherlock Holmes. Its a collection of reprints from the original Strand Magazine, including all the illustrations (thus the title). I'm pretty sure I got this for Christmas from one of my Grandmothers when I was 14. According to the copyright date, I've had it for 39 years. Its so old, it doesn't even have a bar-code (though it does have an ISBN). :)

Its one I don't think I'll ever part with.

>185 mahsdad: Mama's 1946 Bantam edition of Citizen Tom Paine. It's so well-made that it's survived 73 years! It's so tanned that it looks like a Floridian, the film lamination on the cover is peeling like a snowbird, but it was important to her and I cherish it.
Cover:

Endsheets! In a paperback!

Okay that's a better story than mine, and I love it

>185 mahsdad: I love this question. I'm having a bit of difficulty answering it, though, since I have a stack of very old textbooks that belonged to my husband's grandparents (I think); they are on a shelf above my computer monitor in a stack, and covered with (Richard...don't read this part) tchotchkes and I have a purring cat on my lap at the moment, so I cannot possibly investigate their actual age. I also have a Bible in Slovak which was in my grandmother's house, and probably belonged to her parents, because she did not read or speak the language...so that is likely the oldest volume here. But if we're talking about the oldest book that belonged to me originally, that would have to be a tattered copy of Favorite Poems Old and New Selected for Boys and Girls by Helen Ferris, which I've had since I was 8 or so. It was a gift from an aunt who had very good taste when it came to gifts for children, despite never having any of her own. I have recently purchased a new edition of the same book for my nephew's impending first born...his wife has requested meaningful books with personal inscriptions in lieu of greeting cards at her baby shower. So this auntie is complying thus.

>188 laytonwoman3rd: *dum dee dum dee dum*

...can I look now?

>186 richardderus: - Sounds lovely but, boo hoo, nothing is showing, Richard!

>185 mahsdad: - I also have 2 books that were my mother's. She was born in 1933 so these were in her possession, I would guess, in the early 40s. One is Peter Pan and Wendy by J. M. Barrie. The publication dates say, first published in 1915, with several reprints, last one being 1936. It's a smallish orange soft-covered book, with the spine somewhat in tatters but so far, no pages are loose. The pages are silky smooth and the illustrations are black pen and ink.

The second one was a favourite of mine, growing up. She would read it to me often and I loved it. It's around the same size as the first one, red hard-covered, more intact but with a water stain on the cover. It's A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson, illustrated (gorgeously!) by Myrtle Sheldon, published by M.A. Donohue & Co, Chicago. There is no publication date at all. The illustrations are also black pen and ink, with only one coloured illustration at the beginning of the book. My mum's name and address and phone umber (2 letters and 4 numbers!!) are printed in her hand in pencil at the very front on the book. Like Richard, I cherish these slim volumes.

Happy Foto Friday Folks!

Today's image comes to you by way of Mother Nature and an architect in the 60's who designed the roof of my local YMCA building that allowed the rain water to drain off in such a unique way. It was going like this for at least 10 minutes.



Video of slo-mo Waterfall

Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook Narrators

Reading Cinnamon and Gunpowder - Eli Brown. Fine dining and piracy
Listening Daily Show An Oral History - Chris Smith. A history of one of my favorite shows, as told by the writers, producers and correspondents. Only downside is that they couldn't get the actual people to read their own parts. So its kinda weird knowing its Jon Stewart, or Stephen Colbert or Lewis Black's words but not hearing their voices.

>191 mahsdad: That's a great drainage design! Make a virtue of necessity.

>191 mahsdad: That is pretty unique, Jeff.

Have a great weekend.

>191 mahsdad: Nice!

Cool!

Thanks everyone for the photo love.

And to celebrate this, I give you a list of 50 "must read" books suggested by Stephen King. Gave me just short of 30 new BBs. (Like I needed anymore to add to the WL)

https://bookriot.com/2019/03/11/books-recommended-by-stephen-king/?fbclid=IwAR0k...

>196 mahsdad: Fascinating list, Jeff. I've read several of them, and he's not wrong about any of those.

Speaking of eBooks (which I now realize I wasn't here, but in the Message thread), I have the following from the TOR Monthly Book Club. If anyone is interested, PM me your email address and I'll get them to you, either thru Dropbox, or in an email.

I have ePub and MOBI (Kindle)

A Darker Shade of Magic
All Systems Red
All the Birds in the Sky
Eye of the World
Luna: New Moon
The Collapsing Empire
The Only Harmless Great Thing

>196 mahsdad: Interesting! A bunch were already on my TBR but I added 7 to my immediate wish list and put some holds on some, 7 to my long term wishlist and I've read 15 of them :)

Yea its Foto Friday time!

Hope all are well, weather is getting very spring like around here. Today's image comes from a little walk the wife and I took at a local park. It is the Point Vincente lighthouse on the Palos Verdes penninsula. Its been in service (now automated) since 1926.



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Finished Books
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook Narrators

Reading Caliban's War by James S. A. Corey. Book 2 in the Expanse series
Listening Daily Show : An Oral History by Chris Smith

>200 mahsdad: What a lovely vista. Very peaceful.

Thanks RD. Its about 10 min from my house. The land you can see off in the distance is Catalina Island

>200 mahsdad: LOVE this foto, Jeff. Happy Friday, my friend. I am just coming off two 5 star reads, so I am flying high. If you have not read Laura Pritchett yet, do yourself a big favor!

>200 mahsdad:. Gorgeous. What a beautiful “neighborhood” you have, Jeff.

>203 msf59: Thanks Mark. I'm not familar with Laura Pritchett, but I'll certainly put her on the list. You've never steered me wrong.

>204 jnwelch: Thanks Joe

>200 mahsdad: Lovely picture. I do miss living by the sea.

New Netflix Animated Anthology Series - Love, Death + Robots. Think Heavy Metal for the modern age. I just watched the first episode and its pretty darn intense. Hard R, not for the faint of heart

Nor is this trailer - https://youtu.be/ghJkKclfpjY

But its worth it. Also, it doesn't hurt that one of my favorite authors John Scalzi wrote the source stories for 3 of the episodes.

Quick Book "review" blitz, so as not to get too far behind...

19. Friday - Robert Heinlein one of Heinlein's later novels, written about 5 years before his death. Its one of my first (perhaps the first) science fiction books I've read. It tells the story of Friday, an enhance clone living in a world of corporate states and laws and societial prejudices against her. She is a courier that starts the novel stranded across the border and tries to get back to her company. Like some of the other Heinlein's I've reread in the past, my memory of the first reading is a little bit better than this time, but its still a favorite. 8/10

21. Color of Magic - Terry Pratchett This is the first Discworld book, but not my first. Because of this, I can recognize a lot of the cool features that Pratchett will flesh out in the coming books, but it was a lot of fun seeing the "origin" story, of Reincewind, Twoflowers and Luggage. 8/10

22. We Were Liars - E. Lockhart A "classic" YA novel about Cady, a member of a rich family who spends summers on an island, where she spends her time with her friends. They call themselves the Liars and this year she's dealing with memory loss and migranes about an accident she suffered several years ago. Its advertised with a big twist ending, and it indeed have a big twist ending. But I wish they hadn't really told us about it. It would have more of an emotional impact for me, if I hadn't been looking for it. 6/10

>200 mahsdad: Wow, great shot!

Thanks Chelle!

Hey all, its that time again - Happy Foto Friday Folks! Hopefully, I bring to you another image that you all enjoy. With all the rain that Southern California this winter, has brought about a bounty of wildflowers. (go google images for 2019 wildflower bloom. You won't be sorry, I'll wait). Now here's my little contribution. Taken on a run the other day. Hope all have a bright and cheery weekend.



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook Narrators

Reading Caliban's War - James S.A. Corey Book 2 in the Expanse novel. Still enjoying this series.
Listening Sacred Stone - Clive Cussler. I needed a non-taxing thriller as a palette cleanser, and Cussler is my goto thriller author.

I've seen reports on the incredible wildflower bloom (poppies, in particular) and the traffic jams it has caused. The pictures are almost unbelievable. I like the simplicity of yours much better, actually.

Thanks Linda. Yeah there's a couple places where they've closed roads and made people get shuttles. As much as I'd love to make the trek to see them, my dislike of crowds overrule. It too popular.

23. Cinnamon and Gunpowder - Eli Brown : "The year is 1819, and the renowned chef Owen Wedgwood has been kidnapped by the ruthless pirate Mad Hannah Mabbot. He will be spared, she tells him, as long as he puts exquisite food in front of her every Sunday without fail." But how do you make a gormet meal on a pirate ship with no kitchen, and practically no food. That, in itself, is an intriguing thread in this fun narritive, but then tack on that Hannah is chasing, and being chased by another notorious pirate; The Brass Fox, as well as menacing the Pendleton Trading Company (think Dutch East India Company) and its flotilla of cargo and war ships. A really fun read that kept the excitement up for both the planning of incredible meals and staying alive thru incredible sea battles.

Shaking, I said, "I will not take insults." "Take? Not take, that would make a pirate of you. No, they are given freely. In your company, I find I am positively wealthy with insults, and I don't mind lavishing them upon you."

What skills I learned I used to the benefit of England. And besides, though despots may whip the world to war, a brioche did not sail against Trafalgar. Cathedrals were never shelled with chevre. The one exception to this rule is the boiled cabbage I encountered in the monasteries, which is a weapon in a bowl. The proper way to treat a cabbage leaf, of course, is to blanch it ever so briefly, wrap it around a piece of thinly sliced ham, and dip it in hollandaise.

Mr. Apples ... hurled a basket onto the deck of Laroche's ship, where it broke open, dark clumps scattered like quicksilver. I saw that the contents were alive, and I recognized then the scuttle of his pet scorpions. At the time I thought it was a ridiculous attack, but as I write this, I understand that this was not a weapon of battle as much as of vengeance and the sowing of fright. The creatures sped for the cover of shadow and small places, the ship would be haunted for weeks by venomous beasts hiding in the murky nooks and crevices that ships are comprised of.

9/10

S: 2/27/19 - 3/9/19 (11 Days)

Just started listening to an almost 2 hour podcast where Tim Ferriss (author of the 4-hour work week) interviews Neil Gaiman

https://tim.blog/2019/03/28/neil-gaiman/

Right now he was talking about his (Neil's) writing process. He writes all his first drafts in fountain pen. It was fascinating hearing him describe the different kinds of notebooks he uses. He used to use Moleskin's until they changed the paper quality and got too much bleed thru. Love this guy.

Happy Foto Friday Folks.

Today's image is another from the Palos Verdes Peninsula. I like odd angles and depth of field, and for a phone picture, I like the way this one turned out.



Book Update
>2 mahsdad: Completed Books
>3 mahsdad: Audiobook Narrators

Reading : We Crossed a Bridge and it Trembled by Wendy Pearlman. This is the third book in the Life's Library Book Club. It is a collection of interviews and observations from Syria. First hand accounts of the uprisings and retributions in a troubled country. Very intense.
Reading : The Rebirths of Tao by Wesley Chu
Listening : Sacred Stone by Clive Cussler

Ver nice picture, Jeff, I like these kind of pictures.
Nice contrast between the sharp view on the texture of the wood and the blurred background.

Thanks Anita!

Q2, time for a new thread...