Weird_O Bill's Bookish Whatchamacallit

Starting 2021 with a few good reads…

Current Reading



 Current Reading  

Covers of books read, Winter Season 2021

 # 34  # 33  # 32 

 # 31  # 30  # 29  # 28 

 # 27  # 26  # 25  # 24 

 # 23  # 22  # 21  # 20 

 # 19  # 18  # 17  # 16 

 # 15  # 14  # 13  # 12 

 # 11  # 10  # 9  # 8 

 # 7  # 6  # 5 

 # 4  # 3  # 2  # 1 

Books Read, Spring Season 2021

May (2 read)
34. Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell (5/13/21)
33. Summer Lightning by P. G. Wodehouse (5/7/21)

April (8 read)
32. How Music Works by David Byrne (4/29/21)
31. Humans by Brandon Stanton (4/28/21)
30. The Italian Secretary by Caleb Carr (4/22/21)
29. Freddy and the Bean Home News by Walter R. Brooks (4/19/21)
28. Freddy the Magician by Walter R. Brooks (4/17/21)
27. The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (4/14/21)
26. The Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway (4/10/21)
25. Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson (4/9/21)

Books Read, Winter Season 2021

March (8 read)
24. The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins by Dr. Seuss (3/27/21)
23. This Is a Bad Time: A Collection of Cartoons by Bruce Eric Kaplan (3/27/21)
22. Maigret and the Killer by Georges Simenon (3/25/21)
21. Some Buried Caesar by Rex Stout (3/21/21)
20. Andy Warhol Was a Hoarder by Claudia Kalb (3/20/21)
19. The End of the Alphabet by CS Richardson (3/14/21)
18. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster (3/12/21)
17. The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson (3/9/21)

February (9 read)
16. The Five Red Herrings by Dorothy L. Sayers (2/28/21)
15. Gone Fishin' by Walter Mosley (2/19/21)
14. Home Truths by David Lodge (2/18/21)
13. A Promised Land by Barack Obama (2/15/21)
12. Art at Work: The Chase Manhattan Collection by Marshall Lee (2/12/21)
11. Strong Poison by Dorothy L. Sayers (2/8/21)
10. The Library Book by Susan Orlean (2/7/21)
9. Pretty Good Joke Book, 5th Edition by Prairie Home Companion (2/5/21)
8. One of Our Thursdays Is Missing by Jasper Fforde (2/3/21)

January (7 read)
7. The Brinksmanship of Galahad Threepwood by P. G. Wodehouse (1/30/21)
6. Obama: An Intimate Portrait by Pete Souza (1/26/21)
5. New York From the Air by Antonio Attini (photog) and Peter Skinner (intro) (1/18/21)
4. The Golden Spiders by Rex Stout (1/15/21)
3. The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben (1/7/21)
2. One Story by Gipi (1/4/21)
1. Born a Crime by Trevor Noah (1/1/21)

2020 Reading Stats

Books read: 81
Authors read: 73
Single-read Authors: 62
Multi-read authors: 11
New-to-me authors: 33

Reads/month
January: 8
February: 9
March: 9
April: 9
May: 6
June: 4
July: 8
August: 7
September: 7
October: 5
November: 4
December: 5

Rating
Meh: 4
OK: 9
Good: 31
Very Good: 35
GREAT!: 2

Author gender
Male: 57
Female: 14

Author Birthplace
Germany: 1
India: 1
Ireland: 1
Russia: 1
UK: 13
US: 52

Dead or alive
Currently breathing (afaik): 43
R.I.P.: 28

First published
>1800: 0
1800–1925: 3
1926–1950: 7
1951–1975: 21
1976–2000: 13
2001–2010: 19
2011–2020: 18

Binding
Hardcover: 33
Paperback: 35
Mass-market paperback: 13
Other: 0

F/NF
F: 61
NF: 20

Genre
General fiction: 26
Classics: 3
Crime/Mystery: 15
Sci-Fi: 10
General nonfiction: 3
History: 8
Biography/autobiography/memoir: 2
Contemporary matters: 0
STEM (Science/technology/engineering/mathematics): 1
Drama: 1
Humor: 8
Art/photography: 1
Short stories: 2
GN (graphic novel): 1

Age group
Adult: 78
YA: 3
MG: 0
Kids:0

Source
Acquired new in 2020: 6
Acquired used in 2020: 13
Gift: 1
ROOT: 61
Library: 0
Loaner: 0

Reviews posted: 24

Pulitzer winners: 7
Booker winners: 0

My three youngest granddaughters

   

   L. to R., Olivia, Lia, and Annie.

Have at it, ya animals. Ah ha ha ha ha ha....

And keep up with my friends here, Bill. Have a great 2021.

You da winner, Paul. I'm giving you a free pass to this thread. Good for the entire year!

Happy New Year and Happy New Thread!

Happy new thread Bill, and wishing you a happy and healthy 2021.

I love the grands' matching pjs - very festive.

Another big pile of books to gawk at in your topper?! Where do you keep them all? I still haven't read Trevor Noah's book, despite many many many recommendations.

Happy reading in 2021, Bill!

I loved both The hidden life of trees and Born a Crime. It will take a while before I get to A promised land, the waiting list at the library is very long.

Happy New Year, Bill! Your granddaughters look adorable.

Happy new year and new thread, Bill. That Haring in the topper is quite a chunkster!!
And such adorable grandies!

>11 charl08: - Charlotte, if your library has Trevor Noah's book on audio, go that route. His voice
and the way he does all those African languages, alone, is worth it. But even if not, it's a great read.

Happy New Thread, Bill. Happy New Year. Your granddaughters are beautiful. That is a mighty stack up there in the topper. I recognize more than a few gems. Look forward to your thoughts on Evicted, the new Larson and Mitchell and Underland, among others. I also want to get to The Hidden Life of Trees.

Happy New Year, Bill. I lost track of your thread last year, so I'm happy to start 2021 on better footing. Your granddaughters are beautiful. How old are they? You said they are your youngest -- how many other grandchildren do you have?

Happy New Thread and Happy New Year!

Happy New Year and Happy New thread!

Happy newness, Oh Weird One! I might have drooled a bit over that stack in the topper - Circe and The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle are full of fabulous. And I want to read the Nesbø and a bunch of the others...

Your youngest granddaughters are full of gorgeous, and that Annie looks like she's planning something - I approve.

Hooray for one book done already, and what a great one to start with - Abby loved it. I have it on audio and plan to get to it soonish.

Hi Bill! Happy New Year. What a lovely stack of books for the new year, and there are so many good ones there.

>3 weird_O: Congrats on the first book of 2021. Excellent way to start off the new year, IMO.

>5 weird_O: I love your stats, especially the New-to-me authors. I keep track of it but have never reported it before, so will start doing so. I’ve just added it to my spreadsheet’s summary tab. And reads per month just made it onto my summary tab, too.

>6 weird_O: Sweet photo, such cuties.

Hope you have a great year of reading!

Welcome back!

Happy New Year, Bill. Your granddaughters are adorable.

Happy new reading year, Bill!

Thank you, Jeff, Charlotte, Anita, Diana, Shelley, Mark, Laura, Silver, Anita, Mamie, Karen, Lori, Jim, Beth, and Katie.

>11 charl08: The matching pjs were what they wanted. They do look good. Books: Where do you keep them all? For now, I've got that stack on top of our chest of drawers. I kinda like to just admire them. BUT...I have to methodically read each one and put in a new stack—location not yet determined (after all I've only read one book)—labeled "2021 Reads."

>14 jessibud2: That book, Haring, IS a chunkster, Shelley. Around our Thanksgiving, the Philly PBS station ran an episode of "American Experience" that was about Haring. It was a beg-a-thon, and the book was offered as the main product you'd get for contributing. I added it to my Amazon wish list and my wife got it for me. It has an enormous collection of his work. (He grew up about 10-12 miles from here.)

>15 msf59: The Hidden Life of Trees is a lode of information about forests. Surprising.

>16 lauralkeet: Altogether, we've got six granddaughters. Son the Younger is, in fact, 11 years younger than his brother, so his girls, Liv, 10; Lia, 6, and Annie, 2, are younger than their cousins. Son the Elder has twins Helen and Claire, both 19, both in college, and Gracie, 15, a sophomore in high school.

Here are all six in a photo taken about 2 years ago.

>25 weird_O: Thanks Bill. That's a lovely photo of them all together.

Hello, Bill!
Lovely photos of those granddaughters of yours - thanks for sharing!

>25 weird_O: Lovely photo! Thanks for sharing.

I think I'm planning too much.

Just READ, damn it!

By the way, One Story, a GN by Gipi, is amazing. The story is a spiral looping through the present day and World War I, the present day and World War I, passing through isolation on the street, in an institution, in the family, on the desolate battlefield. Sparse narrative, demanding you study the artwork, inhabit Landi's mindset, and worry out the tale. Remarkable illustrations—scratchy pen and ink, impressionist watercolors, cutting fast from one to the other.

The TREE! My gosh.

I highly recommend it. I just might page through it again tomorrow.

The Touchstone needs some human intervention, but I doubt it will get it. What I've picked, "Una Storia", is the only one in the list with Gipi's name. He's Italian and his book was published seven years ago in Italy and is only now available in translation in the US. There are a couple or three titled "One Story" but they lack author names.

>25 weird_O: Lovely young women, all.

>29 weird_O: I'm always pleased to see translations making the rounds. Something the country's lacking is input from outside our social bubble.

Reading well is the best revenge.

>25 weird_O: What a wonderful photo, Bill.

One Story sounds like a winner. I have not read a GN in nearly 2 months. I am going through withdrawal.

>6 weird_O: What a wonderful photo. All good wishes for a wonderful, and healthy 2021.

Dropping my star here. Happy new year.

Hi, Bill. Happy New Year to you and your family, especially all those lovely granddaughters! Happy reading.

In spite of the turmoil of the last couple of days, I have achieved contentment. The mailman delivered the parcel of Christmas gifts Son the Younger mailed to us. The son who lives just a 75-80 minute drive from here. The son who invested all but 11 bucks for Priority Mail 2-Day, back last year. 12/18/20, to be specific. Expected delivery 12/21/20. Of course, today is 1/8/21.

Local historical hero Frederick Leaser hauled the bell now known as the Liberty Bell from Philadelphia to Bethlehem to Allentown, to keep it out of the hands of the British. Used his horse-drawn freight wagon and made the trip in a day. Of course, he didn't have to cross the Delaware River. Maybe that accounts for the extra week or two USPS needed for the trip.

Annnyway. The package contained something for Gram, and two books for Gramps. The latter being How Music Works by David Byrne and How to Be an Anti-Racist by Ibram X Kendi. I will read How Music Works in April for the AAC. I'll read the Kendi pretty soon, both because it's so highly regarded by LT members, but also because it's important for all of us to read.

Also, I finished The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben.

Comparing my actual bedside TBR stack with the photo of it (the topper of this thread >1 weird_O:), I realize that, although I've extracted and read three books, the stack is now bigger. Of course, I am adding the two newly arrived Christmas books. But I also added a couple of titles I started reading more than a year ago but never finished.

The one longer in limbo is Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed by Jared Diamond, which I borrowed from Son the Elder years ago. I got as far as Part Four: Practical Lessons. I was so depressed by that time that a stout draught of hemlock was what I craved. (That was all the further Jeremy got, he confided.) I've gotten my own paperback copy, and I do want to read what those "practical lessons" are.

In limbo for a shorter time is Lincoln at Gettysburg: The Words That Remade America, a Pulitzer Prize winner by distinguished historian and writer Garry Wills. At some point last year, Benita reviewed the book and pretty much directed me to read it. So I shall.

I've also added the prequel and first sequel of Carlos Ruiz Zafon's Cemetery of Forgotten Books series. Those books are The Angel's Game and The Prisoner of Heaven. The final book in the series, The Labyrinth of Spirits, isn't in my collection as yet. Maybe in 2022.

So I've retired three books from that topper stack but added six more books. Typical.

>35 weird_O: I feel your pain, Bill. I'm tracking several packages still en route to us. I think the earliest shipped 12/9. It's been in limbo somewhere in Philly for ages. I had to send a late-delivered gift to my daughter and because of all this I decided to use UPS. It cost me more than USPS but it only took a day to get to Brooklyn.

My brother (living in Vermont) sent me something in mid-November. Still waiting for it to arrive. Yup, mail...!

>39 weird_O: - Good grief.

>39 weird_O: OMG, that is perfect!

Happy Saturday, Bill. I still have The Labyrinth of Spirits to get to, to finish the quartet. It has been excellent and I hope to read it this year. I also liked How to Be an Anti-Racist.

Hi Bill!

>35 weird_O: Glad you’ve achieved contentment. I’m not quite there yet. Yay for your late Christmas presents. I read How to Be an Anti-Racist last October and agree with you 100% about its importance.

>36 weird_O: Oooh. I’ve got Lincoln at Gettysburg. I just had to move 10 bags of Friends book donations away from the shelves to put up the stepping stool to get to it. It’s now safely in the Sunroom, where I do most of my reading. Thanks!

>39 weird_O: I’m shaking my head, but it IS amusing.

This tweet posted by Patrick Chovanec encapsulates the mindset of most GOP lawmakers:

It was Antifa but it was no big deal but it was patriots fighting for their country but everyone condemns what happened but if you punish Trump they might do it again but it's censorship to prevent them but what we need to do now is just heal and move on.

>43 weird_O: - Is that the Republican version of saying *like* every other word?

*rolls eyes, shakes head*...

>45 weird_O: It is every dodge the GOP dead-enders are spouting in one run-on sentence. Every vapid excuse for avoiding consequences.

>43 weird_O: Accurate, timely, and revolting. Like everything else to do with Atgolf Twitler.

>39 weird_O: Brilliant!

Where's Weirdo? Hope all is well, with Bill and family. Hope he is just hunkered down with those books.

Since you asked, Mark, here's where I am hunkered down: Next to the phone, waiting for a call from the hospital, telling me to come and take my beloved off their hands. She was having pain in her shoulder for several days, and finally she agreed to a trip to the nearest "express care" center. As night follows day, that trip extended to the hospital ER and at least one sleep-over for "observation". I was allowed to stay with her in the ER, but no visitors are permitted in the hospital. I've been kept informed by various doctors and nurses, but there's always one more thing and one more thing. And while the thing itself takes but 10 or 15 minutes to do, you have to wait an hour or two to be wheeled all the way to Jibip for your 15 minutes of being checked. Then the doctor who can interpret the results of the check is booked and will give them a quick look ASAP. But not right this minute. We all know the drill.

I'm fairly content, though damned impatient, and I know Judi is less content than I and way more impatient.

She was tested for COVID and flunked the test. So that's good. We were masked the entire time, as was everyone else.

The ER is new since our last visit there, and it is vast and spectacular.

When I started this journey, I knew Mr. Obama's book wasn't one I wanted to tote and try to concentrate on, so I grabbed whatever Rex Stout opus that was atop the stack. Turned out to be The Golden Spiders. I'm more than halfway. But see, here I am "composing" rather than reading. I just want my Cupcake back.

Eek. Better safe than sorry and hope they don't find anything interesting. But still, a hospital anywhere is not where one wants to be these days for any reason. Hope you are both home soon!

>49 weird_O: what >50 jessibud2: said

"Interesting" and "exciting" are words we do not wish to hear from healthcare providers' mouths in reference to us or our loved ones. Like, ever.

>49 weird_O: Sorry, Bill, I hope she is back with you soon.

Sorry to hear about Judi's trip to the hospital, Bill. I hope she's discharged and back home with you soon.

Bill, so sorry to read about Judi. Hoping she gets to come home soon. Keeping you both in my thoughts.

Fingers crossed that Judi gets back home soon, Bill.

So sorry to hear about Judi's stay in the hospital. I hope she can get back home soonest!

Hope she gets home soon! We had to deal with this with he whole ER in the age of Covid when the mother-in-law came down with pneumonia. It's definitely a stressor!

Your family is in my prayers.

>50 jessibud2:, >51 richardderus:, >52 FAMeulstee:, >53 lauralkeet:, >54 Crazymamie:, >55 scaifea:, >56 katiekrug:, >57 drneutron:, >58 SilverWolf28: Thank you all so much for your support. I got my honey home this afternoon. For her, it was mostly boooorring. She commented that the docs committed themselves to "a wild goose chase," which I thought was okay, so long as they didn't actually catch one. Of course, her shoulder still hurts, and no one ventured an opinion as to the cause. Several possibilities were eliminated through blood tests, x-rays, cat scans, MIRs, etc.

Life goes on. Need to buy more Tylenol tomorrow.

I did finish the Rex Stout mystery. Nero Wolfe figured out that the murderer killed 'em. Without leaving his house! It's good he has first rate minions.

So glad to hear Judi is home, Bill! Hope her shoulder sorts itself out...

Happy Sunday, Bill. Glad to hear Judi is home, where she will be cared for and loved.

I'm glad Judi is home again, Bill. Best wishes for her continued healing.

Hi Bill.

>59 weird_O: I’m glad that your honey is home. Glad she flunked the Covid test, sorry they couldn’t find what was/is causing the pain.

Yay for finishing The Golden Spiders. Who’da thunk it – the murderer killed them. It's always good to have a nice, light read for when you really can't concentrate on Serious Reading.

Oh, yay for having your honey home again! I hope her shoulder sorts itself soon.

>59 weird_O: Great news dear fellow.

>59 weird_O: So happy to read Judi is back home with you, Bill.
Sorry no cause was found for her shoulder, I hope the pain is managable.

>60 katiekrug:, >61 msf59:, >62 lauralkeet:, >63 karenmarie: You all are "glad" and so am I. I'm glad you are thank, and for your being glad, I am thankful, or, you know, appreciative.

>64 scaifea: Thanks for the "Yay", Amber. I think I used that term myself.

>65 PaulCranswick: Great news indeed, Paul. I wish/hope you can hear similar news about your mum.

>66 FAMeulstee: Thank you, Anita.

I'm reading Obama's memoir, and Friday night, I thought to extract my copy of photographer Pete Souza's collection taken during Obama's presidency. Not too much text in that, but I've already spent worthwhile time paging through it. Hmmm. Putting a couple of complementary books for back-to-back reads works for me.

Then I thought to couple that with a Michelle Obama book. Judi read Becoming at Christmas 2019, and it's been looking at me from a bedside bookcase since. So I should add it to the "Obama Set". I think the idea's been composting in my head since reading in the January AAC thread that several people are reading either Barack's or Michelle's book for the years' first challenge. I joining them.

(Yes, yes. I did say I was reading Henry and June by Anais Nin, since Henry Miller and Ms Nin were a couple for a time, even while he was married to June and she was married to Hugo. The named book would be a re-read, but a conscientious effort has demonstrated to me it isn't as appealing as the Obama Sagas. I may complete the re-read, but not for the AAC.)

A second set I want to read pairs Tony Horwitz's book about John Brown and his band with James McBride's fictional take on Brown, The Good Lord Bird.

A quick scan reveals that I have a couple of books about William Faulkner in my chest-of-drawers topping TBR stash. Becoming Faulkner by Philip Weinstein and The Life of William Faulkner by Carl Rollyson. Another reading set.

>67 weird_O: Thank you, Bill. In all fairness she is doing far better than I ever imagined and the panic stricken message from my brother of probable cardiac arrest on the way to hospital thankfully didn't materialise.

I ran across a link to a twitter thread about Lincoln's first inauguration. I knew that Lincoln took a circuitous route to Washington to evade mobs intent on preventing his assuming the presidency. I also knew Gen. Winfield Scott was in a steep physical decline. Having toddled through this thread, I want to find a good book on this event. The thread was posted by Matt Palmquist, who describes himself as a "Connoisseur of the last Civil War", adding "Here's hoping we avoid another one. I block neo-Confed and MAGA."

https://twitter.com/CivilWarHumor/status/1349448630113996800

I can't believe that you already read the Trevor Noah book! That is some fast reading. I guess I missed your reaction to it on your previous thread.

Lincoln at Gettysburg is worth reading but I will warn you that it isn't necessarily easy reading. It is very academic and there are pages and pages in it about the art of rhetoric and what the study of rhetoric meant in 19th century USA. It made me think that education today is lacking in some aspects, (but I also think it is doing better in others - so we still have a balance.) It certainly is a book worthy of study.

I am currently reading and engrossed in another timely book. Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR's Great Supreme Court Justices by Noah Feldman. It is a long book and I am only half done with it and have been reading on it for two weeks. I was surprised to learn that even in 1940 Supreme Court Justices did not consider an appointment to the Court to be a lifetime job. The Chief Justice in 1940, Charles Evens Hughes, was appointed to the court twice. Once in the Nineteen Teens and again in the later 1920's. Hughes left the court to run for President and was defeated. He was reappointed to the court by Harding or Hoover. Justice William O. Douglas didn't consider his appointment to be permanent. He wanted to run for President. So did Justice Robert Jackson. It shows how things have changed so much.

This book was published in 2009 and I wished I had read it then. I am also surprised at how narrative this book is. It reads so easily. Not like the Lincoln at Gettysburg book at all in that regard. If you see this book at one of those used book stores or sales in the future, buy it and read it. I don't think you will be sorry.

Happy New Year, Bill.

Love the stack of books at the top. Of course, the Murakami jumped out at me. The Wind-up Bird Chronicle is a special one, probably one of his top two in most people's views, along with Kafka on the Shore. He's got another book of short stories coming out this year.

Thanks for the photos of your youngest grandkids and their moms (if I got that right). They're cuties, and it's fun to see them.

I missed all the healthcare drama. Really glad to read that your other half is home, and hope the painkillers work.
Kudos on the Obama themed read. I guess there is no word yet on when his second volume is coming out?

>69 PaulCranswick: Good to hear that your mum is faring better, Paul. Panic is seldom productive, but I can really relate to your brother's state of mind.

>71 benitastrnad: Trevor Noah's book was easy reading, although his report on living conditions under apartheid were very stark. That the whites who took over the territory that became South Africa were so intent on suppressing anyone who wasn't white was so sad. Noah's mother certainly had chutzpah.

Lincoln at Gettysburg is on my 2021 reading list, though I'm wary of slotting it at any particular time. Maybe I will run across that book Scorpions, if we ever do have library sales again.

>72 jnwelch: Oh, I do enjoy looking at that stack o' books myself, Joe. But I've got to stop enjoying just looking and dig in with the reading already.

The two photos, >6 weird_O: and >25 weird_O:, show only grands, not moms. I don't know when we'll be able to get together, and maybe get a photo or two of the whole family.

>73 charl08: I wish Judi and I could have missed the healthcare drama too, Charlotte. I failed to press the docs on figuring out what was cause the pain and what could be done to alleviate it. The matter is on-going.

^ Sure hope so!

>75 weird_O: Oh, that’s great!

>75 weird_O: *happy grin*

>75 weird_O: I love a story with a happy ending. Can we please have that one?

I'm very much looking forward to the day when I can simply kick back, put my feet up, have a house elf keep my cup full o' joe and my plate laden with delectable munchies, and read excellent books in amongst the refreshing naps. Too bad it isn't going to be today, or any day soon. I'm that house elf. Haw haw.

Still, it's quiet quiet quiet. I've had me first cuppa, and I have a choice of crullers, fastnachts, nuts and cheeses to lard my plate. Yes, Barack is calling me, and so too a pair of televised
football games. See how long I can veg before being called to duty.

>76 jessibud2:, >77 drneutron:, >78 richardderus:, >79 Crazymamie:: Glad you share this sentiment, Shelley, Jim, Richard, and Mamie.

^I was wondering if you had this volume on shelf? If not, it would be a good fit for you and that cover is a knockout.

Howdy, Bill. I have not seen you around much lately, I hope all is well.

>81 msf59: - Not sure about Bill, but it sure appeals (and speaks to ) me! ;-)

Hi Bill! Happy Monday to you.

>68 weird_O: I’m still chugging away at A Promised Land. I have Becoming on my shelves, too. It’s always fun to see what we already have on our shelves – nice reading sets you are thinking of. In fact, I love the idea of reading sets and may attempt one or two sometime this year.

>74 weird_O: I’ve got Lincoln at Gettysburg on my shelves. Let me know if you start it this year and I might join in.

>75 weird_O: Excellent. I’ve sent it to my Bill and hope it brightens his morning at work.

>80 weird_O: ‘House elf’ immediately made me think of S.P.E.W. in the 4th Harry Potter book, of course. Sigh. Crullers and fastnachts. They would go so well with my coffee but alas! I’ll have to settle for bacon and a bagel w/cream cheese and raspberry jam.

>75 weird_O: The Republicans in the Senate (or not enough of them) will countenance that, Bill. Shame really because the rhyme is nicely done!

Sir Weird sir...most people around these here parts are monthly-wrap-uppers. I decided to join 'em. Turns out I did very well indeed since my goals got met or monstered.

Hoping you're busily beavering away on a bunch of good reads.

I've been putting off posting this; it's too difficult. But…



Judi, the light of my life for the past 51 years, died Wednesday night, January 27, 2021. Her health was in decline for years. Ironically, radiation she received in 2001 to treat a brain tumor, a treatment that surely saved her life at the time, ultimately led to her death. (I don't know what is done now, but a month-long regimen of whole brain radiation is not it.)

Judi's been cremated and at some point, I will scatter her ashes on our hillside on the Schoharie Ridge here in PA's Lehigh Valley and along the coast of Maine, as she desired. We—my children and I—are going to have a wake in the summer. Somewhere. Sometime. I'll never forget her, and neither will her children and grandchildren, her siblings and mine, the friends she's made throughout her life.

Judi and I had three children and now have in addition two daughters-in-law and six granddaughters. Son the elder, Jeremy, married Tara Gilligan, and they have twin daughters Helen and Claire, 19, and a singleton Gracie, 15. They live in Easton, PA. Daughter Becky is single. She lives in Quincy, MA. Son the younger, Ned, married Sam (Sandra Trautz) Hylton, and they have daughters Olivia, 10, Lia, 6, and Annie, 3. They live in Haddon Township, NJ.

Really, life has been good. We shared a long and happy life together. Our family ties are strong. Nonetheless, I am bereft.

Bill, I am so very sorry for your loss. Sharing more than half a century with someone and then having them suddenly not there must be staggering. What a lovely family you have made together, and I thank you for always being so generous about sharing them with us. The photo you chose is such a sweet one - what a lovely smile she had. Please know that all of us here at the Pecan Paradisio are thinking about you and holding you and yours in our hearts.

Oh, Bill, I am so sorry to hear this. I hope the memories that you made together, and the legacy she leaves, will be a real comfort to you in these difficult days. I also hope that somehow, your children will be able to come together to be with you, at least for a short time, so you won't have to travel this road alone, especially now.

{{hugs}}

>86 weird_O: I'm so sorry for your loss.

Bill. I am so, so sorry. Thank you for sharing the photo of her - just looking at that smile and the light in her eyes I can tell she was a wonderful person and I wish I had met her. I'll be keeping you and your family in my thoughts and in my heart.

Bill, I am so very sorry. That photo of Judi just lights up my screen and your tribute is equally beautiful. I will hold you in the light, as the Quakers say. I know you will find solace in family but hope you also know that the LT community is here for you, too.

I'm so sorry for your loss. This was a wonderful remembrance of her and your love.

My condolences, Bill.
Thank for sharing your love for her, it shines through all the words you wrote.

I'm sorry, Bill, that your lovely wife, Judi, has died. Your tribute is beautiful. You and your family are in my thoughts and prayers.

I'm so sorry to read this Bill. Sending every sympathy.

Oh, Bill, I'm so sorry to hear of your loss. The photo and tribute are lovely, thank you for sharing a bit of Judi with us. Take care.

I am so sorry to hear your news, Bill. I was just looking at the pics of your grand daughters, and had started a message saying how lovely they are...when I kept scrolling and saw your devastating news. I hope your family can help see you through this, and that some solace can be taken from all of us LTers thinking of you, and that we really do care.

Vale Judi. Safe journey home.

Bill, there are no words. {{{Bill}}}

Unabashed fan of the Harry Potter Series 

>100 weird_O: - A force to be reckoned with! Great pic!

I find I am still here, but...you know...feeling pretty sad. A new for me take on "weird."

I am reading, though I'm looking for that "lighter fair". My daughter (OUR daughter) is staying with me indefinitely. She and her cat, Malcolm, who's been here before but is nonetheless giving me a wide berth. We got snowed in, of course, about two feet deep. Plowed out only yesterday.bum

A new project I'm undertaking is scanning of selected b&w negatives to compile an album of Judi photos. I started with photos I shot within a couple of weeks of our meeting, back in the summer of '69.

>102 weird_O: - Good to hear that your daughter is with you. I think that's a good move and I'm sure she will be a comfort to you (and vice versa). As for Malcolm, you never know. Having a project is also a good plan, I think. It will give your days some structure when your instinct is probably feeling moorless. Be good to yourself, Bill.

>101 jessibud2: A force to be reckoned with!

One of my daughter's long-time friends commented on FB: "The woman that could drink 3 espressos in a row. I’m so sorry to hear this old friend. She was a force as are you."

Seems that Judi's force is well-known. That makes me happy.

>35 weird_O: Bill, I am so very sad to learn of the news of you and your family and the loss of Judi. During our time after the Bethlehem book sales, I heard you speak of Judy so lovingly.

I understand the grief of losing someone you loved. Two years later, I still miss Will terribly.

Please know I am thinking of you and sending all good thoughts your way as your heart and soul and mind try to understand the pain and loss.

>100 weird_O: I so admire those with unabashed enthusiasm for stuff :) And, handling 3 espressos in a row! I can only dare to dream...
(((hugs)))

It's been close to two weeks now that she's gone. I'm not alone here; Becky's here. But the house feels empty.

Shit.

I've been thinking of you, Bill. I'm glad to see you here. I'm glad you are not alone. But I also understand the feelings of emptiness. Sending you a virtual hug.

Bill, I am so sorry to hear the sad news about, Judi. I was out of town last week and I am catching up on the threads. My deepest condolences, my friend. I am so glad your daughter has decided to stay with you. Fantastic idea.

>108 lauralkeet: Laura has said it so well that I'll just add my hugs to the pile, Bill.

Another hug from me, Bill. Take care.

Hi Bill!

>100 weird_O: A woman after my own heart.

>102 weird_O: I’m glad to hear that your daughter and Malcolm are there. I love your idea of putting together an album of Judi shots. I hope you share one or two here.

>107 weird_O: {{hugs}}

>86 weird_O: I’m very sorry to hear of your loss Bill. Glad that your daughter can be there with you at this time.

I just got the news, Bill. My condolences. That’s a long and successful marriage. You’ve created a great family together, and I’m sure you have many treasured memories of Judi. I’m glad Becky is with you, and we’re here for you, too, buddy.

Just saw this Bill. I am so sorry you lost your dear Judi.

So many people have already spoken much more eloquently than I can, but I just wanted to add my own voice and let you know that I'm thinking of you and your family while you grieve this loss. I'm so sorry to hear of Judi's passing, and I hope the process of putting the album together is really cathartic for you as you're able to remember some of the happy memories as well.

So sorry to read of the loss of your beautiful and spirited Judi.

Your thread has always inspired me because of the photographs of your Grandchildren.

Best wishes to you and the welcome love that surrounds you from your daughter and her cat...

Just stopping by to say hi, and to reiterate my (our- LT is in this together!) feelings of sadness for you. I hope you continue to remember Judi here, and share her images and stories with us.

Dear Bill,

>86 weird_O: That is a terribly moving tribute to your Judi. She really looks like she was a warm hearted soul.

I feel so sorry for your loss and it is good that you can share your grief and memories with us. You have so many of us in the group that care for you and I for one will keep you in my prayers.
((((((HUGS))))))) to you dear fellow.

Just catching up with you here only to see the sad , sad news. I am so sorry for your loss. Sending you many hugs your way.

I am so sorry for your loss, Bill. My thoughts and prayers are with you.

>107 weird_O:...Bill, my heart goes out to you. The feeling of an empty house, simply is difficult to frame into words. I was so very glad that Will's cousin's, who came all the way from Indiana, were here before, during and after Will's service by Leaser Lake, a place Will loved.

It was comporting to have people with me who knew and loved Will. I wish the same for you. I hope those with you bring comfort as you share beloved memories.

There are not words to express the emptiness and complete, over whelming feeling and knowledge of loss.

Thinking of you. I send a lot of healing thoughts your way.

Hey Bill,

I lost track of your 2021 thread and I just found it and come over and see the loss of your wife, my condolences. Know that I'm thinking about you. Be well!

Hello Bill and Happy Belated New Year! I hope all is well with you.

>89 thornton37814: When I saw Mark's reference to 'Weird', it reminded me of another book, not a direct comparison, but similar in them. Rascal making a difference. It's a good one.

HOLY MOSES! I got shot yesterday. Don't worry, I was at the hospital when it happened, so experienced and caring hands were all around me. I pulled through. I believe it was what the ol' westerns referred to as a "flesh wound". Actually, it went so well that they want me to reenact it in three weeks.

Listening at this moment to David Crosby's greatest hit, "Almost Cut My Hair", because I AM going to get a haircut Monday (weather permitting the drive to the salon). Be a sob-fest, since the cutter is Judi's sister-in-law.

My Judi album is expanding. I've got lots of memories to sift through.

From the summer of '69.

Congrats on getting *shot*, Bill! I probably won't get mine turn till summer if not later. Things are just so messed up here with regards to the rollout. And I am beyond jealous of going to the salon. My hairdresser will probably kill me as I've been doing it myself, a real chop job....

>125 weird_O: - What a gorgeous photo! She looks like a flower child...:-)

Bill, it's great to hear from you and also great to see your sense of humor shining through. That's a stunning photo of Judi. Now I wonder ... is there one of you from the same year? 😀

Ditto what Laura said - all of it!

>125 weird_O: What an absolutely lovely shot.
And I am glad that your 'shot' occurred too. We here in NZ have just started our vaccination programme. The vaccinators first, then the border workers, them medical people, then...probably the elderly and then the rest (which includes me!).

>127 lauralkeet: >128 katiekrug: Now I wonder ... is there one of you from the same year? 😀


It just happens that there is a shot of me:

Yessssss! Thanks Bill!

Great photos of the two of you, Bill! Ah, the summer of '69. I remember it well.

Good news re your getting shot. That does sound a bit odd, doesn't it. Good luck with the haircut, buddy. I left those behind when I started going with the Jean Luc Picard look.

Love the pictures Bill. Judi looks like she stepped out of a film.

I'm so sorry to learn about your loss, Bill. My deepest condolences. I understand that feeling of an empty house, and it's good that your daughter is staying with you to put even a little dent in that.

Lovely pictures of Judi.

Hi Bill!

>125 weird_O: Yay for getting shot. I was shot again last Wednesday. I love that pic of Judi - what a beautiful photograph of a beautiful woman.

>130 weird_O: You’re a hoot.

Morning Bill- just reporting in from the other side of the globe to say that that we are gearing up for a warm one here, and this happens to coincide with me having a day off. So that's all from me.
I hope you are somewhere in the OK/alright/getting by region today.

Hey Bill, Hope all is well.

Saw a comment you made on Mark's thread and I thought I'd bring my question over here.

You said you have been scanning negatives and editing them. May I ask what you are using for scanning? Do you have a specific flatbed scanner designed to scan negatives? I'm curious, as I have a crate full of old pictures and negatives that have been sitting in my closet for 20+ years that I want to do something with.

>137 mahsdad: I'm using an Epson Perfection V700 scanner I ordered, as coincidence would have it, 11 years ago today. Scans color and b&w negatives, transparencies, just about any sort of reflective art. I have maintained the notion, over the years, that the bundle included a copy of Photoshop Elements Nine and a Russian-made text scanning software. But I also ordered a copy of the Photoshop software the same year as the scanner, just a few months later. CRS.

This particular scanner has a slideholder for 12 2x2 slides, a holder for four 6-frame strips of negative film, and an adjustable holder for larger-format negs (or transparencies).

I've only used it on a Windows computer.

I imagine scanner technology has advanced just a bit in 11 years.

>138 weird_O: I should invest in something like that one of these days. My dad left about 3000 slides, his primary medium for family photos beginning in my early childhood. Every so often we'd spend a family night evening viewing sleeves of slides from a particular time period. There are a lot of memories there. I've been daunted both by the magnitude of of migrating them to some other format, and by the expense of paying a service to do it. It seems important to have decent equipment so the job is more fun than chore.

>139 lauralkeet: I sent most of my father's slides, and most of mine, to a service overseas that will do them in bulk. It worked out really well. I'll get you the name. I had a slide scanner but it wasn't very good and the work was extremely tedious, so I was glad of the service. I'll see if I can find the name.

eta: Ah, it was ScanCafe. They did a really good job. I recommend you cull as many duplicates and 'nice tries' as you can, and then order one of their boxes for x number of slides.

I was left with over 20, maybe over 30 carousels of slides from my father, plus my own over the years. Being able to send them in bulk was terrific.

Happy Friday, Bill. How are those books treating you? An update would be appreciated. Looking forward to seeing more photos too, preferably of you not digging for gold.

>138 weird_O: Thanks Bill, I've always thought I should spring for a proper flatbed to do this. Thanks for the incentive. :)

>140 ffortsa: Thanks Judy, I'll look into that!

Hiya, Bill.

Just dropping by so you know people are thinking about you, dear fellow, more than half a world away.

Hey, I got less than 100 pages in The Splendid and the Vile to read. Like, you know, 98, 99. Less than 100.

Random trivia: Granddaughter Helen got together with the five college friends she's most comfortable with. In the course of just "hangin' out" she learned that three of them had a twin, as does she.

>146 weird_O: That is one heck of a coincidence. I'm a twin too.

I think of you as being one of a kind, Paul.

>148 weird_O: Haha and hopefully in a positive way, Bill.

Absolutely, Paul. In a positive way.

My grandmother gave birth to two sets of twins, my lovely other's father is a twin, and he has twin aunts as well, yet even with two sets each on each side, we were never blessed with two at once! Crazy :)

I finished me book (Erik Larson). To commemorate the passing yesterday of Norton Juster, I'm starting The Phantom Tollbooth, which I've had for at least a year.

>151 LovingLit: As far as I know, no twins in the lineage of either mother or father. Just a happy surprise.

>151 LovingLit: Hani miscarried twins in between Kyran and Belle so we could easily now be blessed with five instead of two. It was a traumatic time for the two of us because we had just moved to Kuala Lumpur and I am convinced that the stress and effort of moving resulted in what happened. Counting blessings though because the three we have run us ragged still.

>153 PaulCranswick: Yikes, Paul. I'll bet that was traumatic. What a hard thing to have happen. I can't even imagine. I'm glad you and Hani have such a strong partnership and now have your three great kids.

Hi, Bill. I wondered how you were liking The Splendid and the Vile. I really enjoyed that one.

>154 jnwelch: I sometimes think that the beneficiary has been Belle, Joe, because Hani gave her a much easier time than Yasmyne or Kyran who came before the miscarriage. I don't think it was intentional but I think subconsciously it softened her a little - at least with the kids!

Gonna get shot again. In just two hours. Second time's the charm, I hear.

>156 weird_O: Hope all went well, Bill.

Sending you warm wishes from tropical climes.

>157 PaulCranswick: It went just fine, Paul. No aftereffects that a number of friends have experienced.

------------

Here it is Pi Day. It's fitting, I think, that March 14, in addition to being Pi Day, is the birthday of Albert Einstein and the day that Stephen Hawking passed away. I'm wearing my math socks today.

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Granddaughter Helen observed a street-art outside the Strand Bookstore in NYC.

Happy Sunday, Bill. Happy PI Day! Congrats on getting your second dose. How are those books treating you?

>152 weird_O: Erik Larson is a bit of a hero really, isn't he? He writes so many informative and wonderful books.

>158 weird_O: Love the art. Well spotted by the granddaughter. I am looking forward to being able to get out and about in a city again.

Greetings from Quincy, Mass.

I'm reading Andy Warhol Was a Hoarder by Claudia Kalb. About a variety of mental disorders as displayed by dozen celebs, none still alive. From Darwin and Lincoln to Betty Ford and Christine Jorgensen. Actually quite timely.

I'm seeing my daughter's Quincy abode for the first time. She moved here from East Boston during the pandemic and couldn't be happier. She came to stay with me right after Judi died, but 'twas time she returned to her own home. For one thing, she's got a Covid jab appointment at the end of the month and is supposed to self-quarantine for two weeks.

Gonna return home tomorrow. I got stuff to do!

Happy visit, safe trip home.

Thank you, Richard. I'm home once again.

Jiggity jog.

Did some reading on my sojourn, not a whole lot. I'm close to the end of Andy Warhol Was a Hoarder, but last night, I was surfeited with mental disorders and started Some Buried Caesar by Rex Stout. Just a chapter was enough (Oh ye gods, Nero Wolfe has not only left his NYC home, he's confronting a champion bull in the bull's own pasture). I'll finish with the troubles of celebs, then get back to Nero and Archie.

Ha! I remember NW actually leaving home in Some Buried Caesar. Miracles do happen.

I’m glad you’re back home, Bill, and enjoying your reading. I’m a March Madness b-ball nut, so this already is a grand weekend as far as I’m concerned. I hope you have a good one.

Hi Bill.

You’ve been busy with 2nd doses and seeing your daughter’s new digs. Nero Wolfe is a wonderful way to settle down and escape. I think this is the book where Archie gets christened ‘Escamillo’. One of my favorites.

>165 jnwelch: Hello, Joe. I've never been much of a basketball fan. My weekend should be...I say should be...devoted to tackling bits of various jobs that for me are all too easy to put off. Just a half-hour doing A, a half-hour doing B. And so, here I am musing on my productivity, thereby scuttling my productivity. Ah hahahaha...

>166 karenmarie: Karen... Hello. The Nero Wolfe I'm reading is one I got from you (thank you very much), two copies in fact.

>167 weird_O: musing on productivity can indeed induce a lack of productivity!

Glad you are home, and that you can get back to putting off jobs, like the rest of us ;) I am putting off tidying right now, in fact!

Good to see you back.

Since Friday last I've been confronting the reality of living all alone in a fairly large house. It's a house that, in the thirty years since we built it, I've never been alone in for more than a day or two. While I am an introvert and I do require lots of alone time, heretofore I've fulfilled that just by retreating to a separate room. Having a companion just a few steps away, just within a shout, was always reassuring.

Becky stayed with me for about six weeks, but last week I drove her back to her own home. Being the only one here now is unsettling.

>170 weird_O: - Very understandable, Bill. It's quite an adjustment. I hope with a little time it will get easier for you. Thinking of you...

>170 weird_O: Hi Bill. That's a lot of space to rumble around in, what with every nook and cranny filled with memories. I share Katie's hope that it will get easier with time.

Good luck moving forward, Bill. Remember, you can always find warmth and friendship right here.

There is such a comfort in knowing you are in close proximity to a caring soul. It must feel very different and strange. ....like Mark said, there are alternative sources available for the meantime. And, thanks to time differences, I bet there will often be an LTer at hand if you need one!

>170 weird_O:

Hello again,Bill - have you thought about going to a Dog Rescue, with a leash...?

Hi Bill! My RL situation has been hectic to say the least and I have been woefully absent on LT and haven't been to your thread in ages. My bad. I am so sorry to hear about Judi passing. Sounds like you had a wonderful life together and many happy memories. Love the photos. I wish you good luck figuring out whether you want to stay in your big house now that it's just you. I hope some of the nooks and crannies are a comfort. Big hugs.

Power's out. Pshaw! The utility is projecting a 4 p.m. power up. I hope so. A windy day, nature pruning the deadwood and pulling down cables. A lot of work for the utility to restore power to 20 or 30 of us.

When the lights went out, I decided to do a little book-shopping at a Goodwill store across the road from a Lowe's emporium. Got some interesting stuff at GW, and at the Lowe's I selected a headlight, one of those little things you strap to your head. (Works pretty darn good. A worthy investment.)

When I drove home, it was darktime, but there were lights on at several houses. Ha. Those were the folks with generators. I'm a holdout. I got a headlight!

I also have a reasonably nearby son who ordered me to spend the night at his place.

Also. My vaccination is now fully vested.

I have a little headlight, for reading. I bought it one year as my contribution to Earth Hour, that one hour on Earth Day that we are supposed power off all electricity. I thought (and still think) it's a rather token activity but I felt righteous enough to read with my little headlamp. I think your headlight is a great idea, and probably a lot more practical than mine.

# 23. This Is a Bad Time by Bruce Eric Kaplan Finished 3/27/21

The Weird Report^TM  

Got this a couple of days ago and it's so easy to page through these cartoons. Samples:

 

 

I did a bad thing a couple of days ago. I compiled a list of the books I've acquired this year so far. Holy Sh*t! In the absence of library sales, Goodwill has become my opium den. And GW has dens all over the place. I've hit seven of them altogether, although three I visited only in 2020, not yet this year. Ignorance is bliss, and my gathering and sorting is informing me. So much for bliss.

Stand by.

You're definitely an addict, but what a lovely habit to have. You've got me beat in acquisitions so far this year by about 50 or so.

>179 weird_O: Excellent cartoons. Never heard of BEK before, but his cartoons sort of reminds me of Thurber's.

So okay, Karen, how is it you can calculate that I've got you beat "in acquisitions so far this year by about 50 or so"? Eh? Eh?

--------------

My daughter-in-law was making chicken noodle soup for her ailing father. At the time, I was a visitor in her home because my electricity was used up (or something). Because I was anxious to leave, she packed up prepared ingredients for me to assemble in a soup pot, which I did. And, yes, it was nourishing and tasty. I mention this because the noodles were "Pennsylvania Dutch" brand. And "Pennsylvania Dutch" is a registered trademark of the American Italian Pasta Co. Distributed by a company based in Oak Brook, IL Melted in that cultural hotpot.

I know now how Karen determined how many books I bought this year so far (sorting my catalog's books by entry date, newest to oldest). She could subtract the number she's both from my number to find I'm a mere 50 buys ahead of her.

Here's my quarter's acquisition, all in one place.

Aw, Bill...your recent post in the AAC thread made me realize I'd been missing your personal thread since the beginning of the year. My condolences on losing Judi. There might be books that purport to help you deal with this, but ultimately you have to find your own way ahead. The picture project will surely help. And, btw, >125 weird_O: is Summer 1969 in a nutshell.

We've scanned multiple carousels of slides (ours and those my FIL took for decades) with some form of flatbed scanner made for that. I don't know if it handles negatives or not. Because when I say "we" I mean my husband did it. All I know is that the results are very good. I am personally engaged in scanning a lot of old print photos on my own little HP machine, using the built-in Microsoft software that comes with Windows 10. It will handle a bit of editing, so I can reduce the effects of age...spots and creases, etc. It will take me the rest of my natural life, and then probably no one else will ever want to look at most of them. But it keeps me out of trouble much of the time.

>183 weird_O: Wow, Bill! That is a lot of books for 3 measly months. Will you mix these in with the general population? I see one that says birds on it. B.A.G.

>183 weird_O: that is an excellent first-quarter haul :) I am as impressed as I am happy for you.

>183 weird_O: Secret’s out… Lovely shelving and books. The more books the merrier, I always say.

>184 laytonwoman3rd: I wasn't really thinking that Anne Tyler would offer how-to or uplifting advice, just that I was curious about her thinking about the death of a spouse. In March I got a short novel called The End of the Alphabet by C. S. Richardson, of who I never heard. Ambrose Zephyr flunks his annual physical because, he's told, he has a mysterious disease that will end his life in one month. He and his wife Zipper (Zappora) Ashkenazi embark on an attempt to visit a place for every letter of the alphabet that he loved or always wanted to visit. The end left me weepy.

>184 laytonwoman3rd: My photography project continues, but it has not been allocated many hours lately. I have an Epson flatbed scanner--I bought it at least 10 years ago--that handles negative film and reflective stuff. It will process twelve 35mm slides at a time, or four negative strips of six frames, keeping each frame separate and writing the individual image files to the hard drive with sequential filenames. It works very well for me.

How have you dealt with slides in carousel trays? The projector I got--hmmm--50 years ago expired a couple of decades ago and I've always dithered about getting it repaired. The slides aren't conveniently accessed without a working projector.

When I got the scanner I also bought a copy of Photoshop Elements, which will do more manipulating than you can do with Microsoft or Google Photos.

>183 weird_O: Apart from being more than a tad jealous of your spiffing shelves, I'm really not seeing anything too terribly unusual in that quarterly haul. What's done is done, Old Sport, and the beautiful thing about Goodwill is their doors open inwards as well as outwards.

I mean, should you go utterly mental and desire to deaccession those lovely, lovely books, that is.

>185 msf59:, >186 LovingLit:, >187 karenmarie: A lot of books. Yeah. Mark asked: Will you mix these in with the general population? Bill answers: Yes, eventually. I have a two-part bookcase project just underway (bought plywood just today), but completing the units won't dramatically reduce the shelf-shortage crisis. I've got a five-year plan...

>190 richardderus: I kept telling my wife that the books will be the easiest possessions for the heirs to dispose of. Unlike so much of the OTHER STUFF crammed into this spacious house. Books can go to Goodwill or to library sales.

>183 weird_O: It looks such a lot of books when you put them together like that!

I have been known to add one or two books myself but I reckon my steady progress this year does not match your own. I am averaging about 1 book added per day this year which is steady by my standards. My "best" year was 1,210 additions (not counting kindle adds) in about 2013/2014.

Good luck with the shelving and do share the results.

>189 weird_O: We do have a working projector, although it's getting VERY difficult to get replacement bulbs for it. If you think you can get yours fixed, I think it's worth it. We looked at everything, and made comprehensive lists, numbered the boxes and labeled them by subject, date etc. and numbered the slides within each carousel. THEN my husband took them, one carousel at a time, and did the scanning, putting the slides back where they came from afterward. It was my job to take the handwritten lists and rename all the computer files with the names we had given the slides. (There ought to be a college degree of some kind awarded for the completion of this project.) We have stacks and stacks of the boxes, and can't bring ourselves to get rid of them. The slides just look so much better through the projector, even though the scanned pictures are pretty amazing too. My father-in-law was at one time a professional photographer, so the lighting and composition of the slides he took are flawless.

>193 laytonwoman3rd: That's a really good approach, Linda. I actually favorited this message because I swear one of these days I'll do this for my dad's slides. My dad did photography as a hobby, but his slides are (I think) mostly family photos with (I suspect) less attention to composition and lighting. Still, your systematic way of going about this makes a lot of sense.

>193 laytonwoman3rd: Thanks for that information, Linda. I salute you and your husband for your methodical approach, your attention to organizational detail. I'm not sure I could sustain such an effort. Something else to keep me busy.

>195 weird_O: I will say it didn't happen all at once...and I still have a list here, now that I think about it, of about 100 files that still need to be renamed.

You can scan slides if you want - but remember the best form of preservation is to leave the slides in their box. Make sure they are separated so they don't touch. Store them in a cool dark place and leave them for the future. Slides should last about 50 years before they start to change color. Changing the format isn't permanent. Many people I know put home films on videotape. Or put their slides on floppy disks. The new desktop that I just got at work doesn't even have a CD/DVD player in it, so how would I view any of the slides that members of my family put on DVD's? I would have to purchase a separate player. More expense.

I got my FOM—First of the Month. Not some bird. A book. The first read completed in April. Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson. What I was looking for: an engaging read that I could stick with; started yesterday and completed today. I give it a capital VG. A thumb up.

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The Eagle Shat on Wednesday, right into my checking account. The Stimmy. Already I spent some in a locally owned and operated hardware store, buying a battery-powered garden pruner—a mini-chainsaw. Very fine tool I'll be using during the next couple of weeks, pruning the tree branches that always try to behead me when I'm mowing.

----------------

>196 laytonwoman3rd: I do believe my photo-scanning project will last my lifetime, Linda. You'll get done before I will.

>197 benitastrnad: Thanks for the tips, Benita. I've been at this photo stuff for a few years, don't ya know? I have the slides my father shot in the 1940s. The Kodachrome has been stable for 80 years; Ansco film, which he used from time to time, has really faded and shifted in that same period. My younger son, Ned, roomed in college with a high school buddy whose dad had an 8mm projector, and my dad also exposed two or three dozen reels of home movies. So Ned projected the films on a wall and shot them with a digital camera and made CDs that were shared with my siblings.

>198 weird_O: my husband has been eyeing one of those battery-powered chainsaws, Bill, especially after a couple of days trimming trees with manual tools. Enjoy your new toy!

I've yet to organize the slides I've had scanned. Most of the ones I sent out came out well, not like the ones I scanned on the little home scanner that was never quite in focus, alas. I've put some of them up on Shutterfly for the family, and plan to back up the organized ones, once they are organized, to external drives, thumb drives, and/or online places such as Shutterfly or Google. I'm sure technology will change, but conversions should be available.

I have a small metal box of the first color slides my father took, and they are as crisp as the day they were created, but they are not the standard size, so I can't send them to ScanCafe. One day I'll have to bite the economic bullet and get them professionally scanned. The last time I checked, it was a lot of money.

Happy Saturday, Bill. Congrats on your FOM. I also really enjoyed Nothing to See Here. I also really liked the other two books, I have read by him.

Yay for stimmy, bravo for FoM, and a happy weekend's reads ahead.

Hi Bill!

>198 weird_O: The Eagle Shat on Wednesday, right into my checking account. Excellent way to put it. Go Stimmy.

Criminee! Hoping to get the case for the shelves assembled last night. Ran out of biscuits. I had counted the number of biscuits still in the jar when I started and had just the right number. I think maybe the shop rats ate some.

Didn't quite finish the book I'm reading, The House on Mango Street. It's short, but...

It could be that the IRS siphoned the last of the biscuits off in exchange for their check...maybe change flavors...

I'm adding my "two" cents regarding twins. I am the grandmother of two lovely boys. My daughter was told she would not be able to become pregnant. She and her husband tried invitro.

The doctor actually said that in checking the eggs, there were three very healthy ones and thus they could have triplets if that is what they wanted. They chose two.

The babies were born, and they discovered they could indeed get pregnant after all. Along came baby Zoe. Thus, there were three babies in 13 months.

Jack, the dancer, and Lule, the "brainiac" are now 18. Beautiful Zoe, recently became a member of the National Honor Society, is now 17.

There are three children in the house, and three dogs as well. One month before the twins were born, my younger daughter had a beautiful baby girl. Thus, it fourteen months, I became the grandmother of four.

Here is a photo of when they were little:

>204 weird_O: I did finish The House on Mango Street. Today. Also bought biscuits; 100 of 'em, #20. Now reading How Music Works by David Byrne. Maybe a dip into Henry & June, and/or America America, and/or Midnight Rising, three books I started but haven't embraced to conclusion. Jes' pokin' along.

>205 m.belljackson: Ah, the IRS had nothing to do with it. The stimmy came to me from Social Security. So far as I know, these biscuits are available in only one flavor: birch. :-)

>206 Whisper1: I remember the photo you posted of dancin' Jack. Wow. How come I didn't know or remember that Jack has a twin brother? Lovely group; like to see them now, Linda. If the twins are 18 now, doesn't that mean they'll be graduating from high school in June? Or have they already graduated? In college?

Hoo hoooo. Grands are great, ain't?

Hi Bill, and happy Monday to you.

Live and learn - I was wondering why you were trying to feed the case for the shelves then did a quick duckduckgo search and realized what you were really talking about. Woodworking biscuits are so cute!

There are woodworking purists, Karen, who eschew biscuits and other novelties of the machine age, but using them appropriately saves a lot of time. My bookcases projects will use quite a few of them. Too bad I can't whip up a batch in the kitchen. :-)

----------------

I got off the bookcase enterprise for about a week, but objects to put on those shelves keep falling into my hands. My smarter younger brother announced he was coming to check up on me. I asked him to lend me a few volumes of his Freddy the pig collection. When he arrived, he had five Freddy books in one bag (loaners) and six books gleaned by his wife from the book-sales corner of the Pottstown Library, of which she is the president. (Yes, they paid for them.) (Only one was a dupe: A Legacy of Spies by le Carre.)

     

In the next episode, set two days later, the manna continued to fall. So tune in next time...

This episode of "Books Falling into My Hands" opens on Saturday, as I started scrolling through the thread Joe's Book Cafe 5 in an effort to learn what the proprietor meant by "That's the best i can do guys. i'll try to fix it up a bit later." As well as what cafe visitors meant by comments like "Quite the accomplishment to get a new thread going, IMHO. You are doing amazingly well and we're all here to cheer you on. Do feel free to let off some steam. One day at a time, my friend.". Well, no answer in thread 5.

The answer had to be somewhere amongst the 488 posts in Joe's Book Cafe 4. The challenge confronting me? How the hell to scroll through a Joe's Book Cafe thread without getting distracted by discussions of Dr. Seuss books, Obama-Springsteen podcasts, what intriguing books are being read and recommended, what grandkids are doing, and dozens of other tasty topics.

But the proprietor has to stir things up. &$#*^%!! In post # 105, he asks: Question What are some of your favorite oddball books? I like ones that are different, like My Sister, The Serial Killer. His helpful visitors suggest several titles that pierce me, BBs that rip holes in my self-discipline (which is pretty tattered as it is).

Timeline by Robert Crichton
Six of One by Rita Mae Brown
S. by Doug Dorst

The day's agenda is blown. Road trip! Firefly Bookstore just might have a couple of these. The Crichton, for example. Or the Rita Mae. I've been meaning to order a couple of Wodehouse titles anyway. Maybe they'll have a Maigret. Or sumpin.

     

I returned home with these, plus two Wodehouse titles on order. Because...well...Timeline was absent from the shelf, but there was The Great Train Robbery by the same author with a latent BB from he who recommended Timeline (My favorite Crichton of all time...). No Six of One, though lots and lots other other Rita Mae Brown books. No Maigret, but a lone Wodehouse, a collection of Wooster 'n' Jeeves short stories. Then a swing past the two $1 book carts, where I found the Mohsin Hamid title (a lingering BB from Jeff's thread) and Polar Star—I had it for years, I'm sure I read it, but it vanished. And a BB fired by James Mustich still stings. So...for a buck.

But one more BB book was to fall into my hands...

>206 Whisper1: very sweet Linda.

>183 weird_O: Bill, that 100 Bradbury stories book that I spy will keep you busy. A small treasure.

>198 weird_O: Nothing to See Here was a favorite for me. Glad you liked it too!

>183 weird_O: Love that you are not holding back on your book acquisitions. ; )

Happy Tuesday.

>210 weird_O: I love this post, Bill!

Are you collecting those hardcover Wodehouse editions with the lovely covers, like this one?


My husband picked up a whole mess of them at a used bookshop in Philly a couple years ago. You would have thought he won the lottery. I have to say, they do look mighty fine on the shelves.

>213 lauralkeet: I am interested in those very Wodehouse editions. The two volumes I ordered are those. I should be so fortunate as to discover an affordable cache of them.

For you and Joe, today's favorite oddball book award goes to Thomas King's
GREEN GRASS, RUNNING WATER. Still mystifying halfway through...

>215 m.belljackson: Is that a book to earmark for reading in July for the AAC? Native American Authors and Themes.

------------
I just had a call from my younger son, Ned. It reminded me that on Sunday, during our family Zoom call, his oldest, Olivia, who is 10, read some song lyrics she liked from The Hobbit, which she's reading for the third time. And later, I realized that while my favorite 10-year-old is reading The Hobbit, I'm reading about Freddy the pig and his cohort in books written for 10-year-olds. Oh my...

But, but, but. I'm also reading How Music Works by that Talking Heads guy, and it's a lot for an Old Geezer to absorb. But fascinating. Also started a Sherlock Holmes tale commissioned of Caleb Carr by the estate of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, called The Italian Secretary. So I'm not totally in thrall to the juvies.

>216 weird_O:

Yes, Thomas King, author of GREEN GRASS, RUNNING WATER, is Cherokee, along with Greek and German,
certainly a hefty combination.

>218 weird_O: Priceless.

I myownself think Firefly Books owes Joe a commission.

>217 m.belljackson: See if I can keep that book in mind 'til July. Long way off.

>219 richardderus: Innit though. Had to share.

--------------------

Finished The Italian Secretary, the Sherlock Holmes mystery penned by Caleb Carr. It was a real page-turner. And still I am reading David Byrne. Trying to cover a chapter a day. It needs to have a sound track. I believe I'll gobble up another page-turner, until I get through Byrne's opus. Going to hold off on consuming another Freddy until, maybe, next month, which of course is eight days away.

>220 weird_O:

My daughter said that the oddest book she ever read was Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy.

July is on its way, though it's still freezing at night here in Wisconsin.

I'm stuck in neutral.

Okay, okay. I got 'er in gear. Yes, a forward gear. Zoom, zoom.

Let's go riding with a book.

Hiya, Bill!

What'cha reading?

>224 karenmarie: Why, Karen, I'm reading Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell. Since I'm about 100 pages shy of the halfway point, it's not going to be chalked up as an April read. First one in May, certainly. 'Twas passed to me by everyone's favorite birder, who claimed to like it a lot, and who am I to doubt him?

Last evening I finished How Music Works by David Byrne. The night before, I finished Humans by Brandon Stanton. Had the three books going at one time. A lot of good stuff scrapping for my attention, like Summer Lightning by P. G. Wodehouse, Freddy Goes Camping by Walter R. Brooks, The Great Train Robbery by Michael Crichton. Or how about Circe by Madeline Miller, or Great Fortune: The Epic of Rockefeller Center by Daniel Okrent. I believe one or two other unread books are on the shelves.

End of April. I've read 32 books so far. Puts me on pace to read 96 for the year. Here are the 32 in one stack (less The Splendid and the Vile, which my daughter spirited back to New England when she returned home).

>225 weird_O:
That sounds like my reading last week. I had two many irons in the reading fire and it took me some time to get my head back above water. I will finish the books I had started but not before the end of this month.

>218 weird_O: absolutely hilarious :)

Everybody loves stats, don't they? I've got some to report.

2021 Reading Stats
Jan–Apr

Books read: 32
Authors read: 29
Single-read Authors: 26
Multi-read authors: 3
New-to-me authors: 14

Reads/month
January: 7
February: 9
March: 8
April: 8

Rating
Meh: 1
OK: 2
Good: 11
Very Good: 17
GREAT!: 1

Author gender
Male: 24
Female: 4

Author Birthplace
Germany: 1
South Africa: 1
France: 1
Canada: 1
Italy: 2
UK: 5
US: 21

Dead or alive
Currently breathing (afaik): 20
R.I.P.: 8

First published
>1800: 0
1800–1925: 0
1926–1950: 7
1951–1975: 4
1976–2000: 4
2001–2010: 5
2011–2020: 12

Binding
Hardcover: 21
Paperback: 7
Mass-market paperback: 4
Other: 0

F/NF
F: 21
NF: 11

Age group
Adult: 29
YA: 1
MG: 2
Kids:0

Source
Acquired new in 2021: 0
Acquired used in 2021: 9
Gift: 9
ROOT: 20
Library: 0
Loaner: 2

Reviews posted: 0

Pulitzer winners: 0
Booker winners: 0

Nice stats, Bill! You've reminded me I need to do mine for April...

>228 weird_O: You've been a busy reader, Bill! One GREAT! in four months of reading is a terrific batting average.

>229 katiekrug: Get busy, Katie.

>230 richardderus: Wait... One GREAT! in 32 reads works out to .031, doesn't it? That's not so hot. I should have included a stat for suspended reads. And maybe for reads avoided.

No, it's 18 not 1...gotta count the Very Goods, too. That's 0.18 so far, and 0.210 is average....

Howdy, Bill. Are you still reading Utopia Avenue? Enjoying it? I also liked Midnight Rising. It made a perfect companion piece with Cloudsplitter.

>233 msf59: Mark, I am still reading Utopia Avenue, though I admit to delving into Summer Lightning, one of Wodehouse's Blandings Castle stories. The Plan, of course, is to finish 'em both up before the weekend. But serendipity happens.

Hi Bill!

>228 weird_O: Excellent stats. You’re just chooglin’ along reading-wise.

>231 weird_O: Ooh. A new stat. Reads avoided. I do keep track of suspended reads, what I call abandoned, but reads avoided. Gotta mull this one a bit.

Hi Bill, Summer Lightning was my very last book of 2020. Although I didn't review it, I enjoyed it very much. I'm finding it's hard to go wrong with the Blandings books.

>233 msf59: >234 weird_O: Yippee more Mitchell. I hope you like it. I really enjoyed it last year.

I've been reading (as I pointed out in previous posts) P. G. Wodehouse's Summer Lightning, apparently the third volume in his Blandings Castle series. Naturally, the health and safety of the Empress of Blandings is of paramount interest. Coincidentally, I spotted this photo on the Internets and wondered if, just maybe, this is the Empress (the old sow).

>238 weird_O: "Like"

Hi, BIll. It was fun to see the references to my thread up in >210 weird_O:. I hope you figured out what the hell I was talking about.

I"m glad you liked the oddball book question and answers. I"m reading another oddball book right now. I"M on a train trip authored by Helen Oyeyemi in Peaces, but have no idea where we heading or what the hijinx are all about.

Utopia Avenue seems well-suited to you. How's it going? i liked that one a lot.

>238 weird_O: awesome! I wouldn't cross her.

>235 karenmarie: "Reads avoided" as a statistic category just slipped out, Karen, just uncensored. Sort of: old geezers say the funniest things. Very much susceptible to fakery. I should open a category for DNFs or delayed or stalled readings. As a category, do you note it once and done? Or do you chart the number as something that easily becomes ever increasing?

How about addressing "suspended reads" as cataloging notion? A separate collection or just a tag. I had a collection labeled "Stalled". Hmmmm...

>236 lauralkeet: I'm liking Summer Lightning, and I just might stay up tonight, reading it to the end. And the bookstore called me to say that Thank You, Jeeves, which I ordered as the same time as SL, has arrived.

>237 mahsdad: I'm liking Utopia Avenue, Jeff. Is there a link between Jasper de Zoet and Mitchell's book The Thousand Autumns of Jacob De Zoet? I noted that he resurrected Robert Frobisher's one composition in Cloud Atlas, Sextet, to inspire Jasper De Zoet.

>239 jnwelch: Yes, I did find out what was ailing you. Glad your recovery is progressing well.

I did shop for the oddball books recommended and failed to find used copies. I already have My Sister, the Serial Killer. I copped The Great Train Robbery, which Jim cited as his favorite Crichton, when I couldn't find a copy of Timeline, the Crichton book Jim suggested in the oddball realm. (Coincidentally, I got a hardcover copy of Timeline just today. At a library book-sale, about which more later.) Since I was in the mood, I bought a new copy of S. by Doug Durst, which Micky suggested.

Be interested in your reaction to Peaces.

>240 ffortsa: Now that you pointed out the evident disposition of the photo model, Judy, I remember that the Empress has a nose ring. Makes it easier to lead her.

>241 weird_O: A category of 'stalled' or 'suspended' might be very useful to me. I tend to drift off some non-fiction and they pile up.

>241 weird_O: Interesting comments, Bill, on stalled/suspended reading. It happens so often to me that I ought to take that up to as a "thing". I rarely re-start where I had left off but set about reading it from the beginning again. I never count a book as "read" if it is actually suspended or stuck and it does distort my figures a little bit as my page count would probably be significantly higher.

>242 ffortsa: I too think such a category (I'm thinking more of a tag than a category) is apt, Judy.

----------------------
Hey, FWIW, library book-sales are starting up. I'm not sure what the trigger was, but I checked booksalefinder.com and discovered some sort of book sale scheduled for every weekend in May here in eastern PA. I went to one in Manheim, Lancaster County, on Thursday. Came home with 35 books, including two on my active wish list, one for my DiL, and two YAs that stowed away in my tote. The others grabbed me. The tab was $37.

There's a book sale Saturday at the Emmaus Public Library. Next weekend features book sales in Lancaster and in Scranton. Lititz library has a sale May 21-22. Two local-for-me sales (in Shartlesville and Fogelsville) are booked on the final weekend in the month.

No, I won't go to all of them. But it's swell to get out.

Heading out shortly to a family meetup in suburban Philly.

When I return, I've got a stack of books to catalog, a bookcase project needing some attention, and, of course, a book to read.

Hiya Bill!

>241 weird_O: I have tags for ‘abandoned’, typically for ER books that I have to keep on my shelves to keep the ER gods happy but that I physically don’t own anymore, and ‘started’, which is actually rather ridiculous since if I went back to a book I’d have to start from the beginning. 54 of them… I’m too lazy right now to change them all back to tbr.

>245 weird_O: Have fun in Philly.

Say hi to Philly for me, Bill! Did I see somewhere that you're visiting the Bryn Mawr College campus? My younger daughter came *this close* to going there, until a wait list spot opened up at her first choice (Kenyon, where her sister also attended). Anyway, we really liked Bryn Mawr and were a wee bit sad that we wouldn't be able to just show up unannounced on her doorstep.

Hope you have/had a nice day with family.

Book sales!!! What a joy, Bill, haul the nets tight.

Comparing Docs with Claire and Gracie.

Our daughter posted a Mother's Day homage:

I'll continue to celebrate my mama on Mother's Day, even on this first without her. Today I will play in our garden, wear a striped shirt, eat some seafood, and have a beer in your honor. And wish you were here ❤

That's lovely, Bill. And a beautiful photo, too.

>243 PaulCranswick: You snuck in with your post, Paul, just as I was posting mine. I agree that taking up a stalled read at whatever point you suspended reading can be trouble. Just last night, I picked up Midnight Rising, Tony Horwitz's account of John Brown's raid on the federal arsenal in Harper's Fall, and commenced reading where I left off. But I had started the book this year, and I had stopped between chapters. But other books, sidetracked years ago, I have to start at the beginning.

>246 karenmarie: Oh now, that's a harrowing situation, Karen. ER books. I don't seek them out. Scrolling through thousands of books to "edit" a hundred of the entries is one of those niggly bits.

>247 lauralkeet: >246 karenmarie: I did have a good time on Saturday. Claire's winding up her second year at Bryn Mawr, majoring in the Classics. The college's campus is so lovely. So our classics major is living in the dorm designed in the late '50s by Louis Kahn as an homage to Scottish castles. Poured concrete and slate. To me it looks bleak and, frankly, pretty shabby. She and her roomies want to be in a different dorm next year, but she's the only one in the group who wants to be in a traditional stone gothic building.

>248 richardderus: I did pick up some books that have been on one wish list or another. The shopping was unharried, selection wasn't unmatched, but pricing was good. And the drive to and from was pleasant.

I'll post a list.

>250 weird_O: That is a lovely post from your daughter, Bill.

>250 weird_O: Y'all's daughter has the right idea.

Looking forward to the list.

The bookcase extension isn't completed yet, but already the shelves are being populated.

May 6, 2021: Manheim, PA, Public Library sale
Blockade Billy by Stephen King (hc)
Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis (hc)
Pennsylvania Dutch Night Before Christmas by Chet Williamson (hc)
Zealot by Reza Aslan (hc)
Timeline by Michael Crichton (hc)
MaddAddam by Margaret Atwood (hc)
The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick (hc)
Home Town by Tracy Kidder (hc)
Skinwalkers by Tony Hillerman (hc)
Three novels by Ruth Rendell (in one volume) (hc)
   The Secret House of Death
   Shake Hands Forever
   A Judgement in Stone

The Life of Brian by Monty Python (pbk)
Washington National Cathedral Guidebook (pbk)
The Travels of Ibn Battutah edited by Tim Macintosh-Smith (pbk)
The Voice at the Back Door by Elizabeth Spencer (pbk)
The Minority Report and other classic stories by Philip K. Dick (pbk)
Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage by Haruki Murakami (pbk)
Abel's Island by William Steig (pbk)
Matilda by Roald Dahl (pbk)
No More Dying Then by Ruth Rendell (pbk)
Murder Being Once Done by Ruth Rendell (pbk)
Some Lie and Some Die by Ruth Rendell (pbk)
Welcome to Hard Times by E. L. Doctorow (pbk)
The Breaks by Richard Price (pbk)
And the Hippos Were Boiled in their Tanks by Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs (pbk)
Waiting for Lefty and Other Plays by Clifford Odets (pbk)
The Red Leather Diary by Lily Koppel (pbk)
Charlie Martz and Other Stories by Elmore Leonard (pbk)
Tender at the Bone by Ruth Reichl (pbk)
Lies My Teacher Told Me by James W. Loewen (pbk)
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace (pbk)
Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power by Jon Meacham (pbk)
+
Thunderstruck by Erik Larson (for Tara)
+
Two YA titles I didn't intend to buy

>256 weird_O: Quite the haul! Zealot, The Minority Report and Other Stories, Welcome to Hard Times, and the Odets are all good reads indeed.

>255 weird_O: Oh WOW!! I am very jealous.

>238 weird_O: That is one evil looking pig!

>250 weird_O: I love this photo of you two (future topper??) and you know I like those binoculars around your neck.

>256 weird_O: A mighty haul. I expected no less from Wild Bill. Infinite Jest? Good luck with that one. Grins...

>250 weird_O: How beautiful. It was my first Mother's Day without my Mom too, and I couldn't quite think of an appropriate way to acknowledge that, but then I made pancakes for breakfast, and realized I had paid tribute without even trying.

Hi Bill!

>250 weird_O: How sweet and wonderful of your daughter. Of course she has to celebrate her mama! I still do, too. And my husband’s card to me had a hummingbird on it, which is also a tribute to my mother.

>256 weird_O: Oooh to all the Ruth Rendell books.

Sent you a list!

And I received it, looked it over, did some Googling, and have sent to a reply. So far, so good. Looking forward to meeting you in person on Saturday.

>257 richardderus: Glad you approve, Richard. The fun lingers for me.

>258 msf59: The binoculars: Photo taken at Hawk Mountain Sanctuary, close to where we live. It's on a migratory path for raptors, which is the first ridge (southeasternmost)
of the Appalachian Mountains. The updrafts keep the birds soaring, and the terrain has them arriving below the lookouts and rising up and over.

Infinite Jest? It's a jest for sure. Now I've got a copy, and fewer than 2000 TBRs ahead of it. That that DFW!

>259 laytonwoman3rd:

>260 karenmarie: Yah, Ruth Rendell. A Judgement in Stone is apparently her best book, and I've kept it in the back of my mind when book shopping. I had to take two stories to get the prize. Well, in for a dime... So I picked up three pristine paperbacks. I've only read one Rendell mystery and didn't think much of it. So WTF am I doing cluttering the shelves with six more?

>264 weird_O: Oh...some of Rendell is excellent. I haven't read a lot, and not A Judgment in Stone, but I have enjoyed her work.

Finished Utopia Avenue by David Mitchell. Maybe I should read The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet. Or not. I still have a hundred or so pages of Midnight Rising to finish. And 1,612 books in the TBR Colossus.

>250 weird_O: Love the photo. It was my first Mother's Day without my MIL. We held a little Zoom meeting and we all shared stories of our favorite moments with her. It was really nice. Hugs.

>262 weird_O: I hope to see photos of the Scranton mini-meetup!

Hi Bill!

>264 weird_O: I did not realize that A Judgement in Stone is considered her best book. It’s always been my favorite, so I’m glad to know I’m in good company.

Sir Weird_O. I trust you'll enjoy your F2F with our illustrious Linda3rd, and return your TBR to its proper over-2,000 status.

I really liked Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet and I think you would also. It is mostly historical fiction with a few elements of weirdness included. Typical David Mitchell.

Another fan of Jacob de Zoet here, FWIW.

I am very envious of the library sale, hope it is as full of opportunities as usual.

>273 weird_O: - Hmmm. an-ti-ci-pation.... but nothing there but a no entry symbol. Where's the haul?

>273 weird_O: I see a photo, Shelley...and I saw it yesterday when it was first posted. Gremlins in your interwebs, no doubt!

>273 weird_O: I can't see the photo, nor can I see the one in >255 weird_O:. These are both Bill's photos, vs. ones grabbed from elsewhere on the web. In each case the URL begins with https://lh3.google user content.com. *shrug*

Nor me. Sadness!

Whew, not my computer, then! I am patient, i can wait... ;-)

>276 lauralkeet:, >277 charl08:, >278 jessibud2: Yeah....really >273 weird_O: requires a secret code, and if you weren't at the Friends of the Scranton Public Library sidewalk sale yesterday, you ain't got it! I don't know what's with >255 weird_O:, 'cause I have never been able to see that one either.

>274 jessibud2:, >275 laytonwoman3rd:, >276 lauralkeet:, >277 charl08:, >278 jessibud2:, >279 laytonwoman3rd:

Can you see the photos now? When I first posted them, I linked to my images at Google Photos. I could see them here in my thread. The browser I use is Google Chrome. So...

I've now linked each image from Google Photos to a Tumblr blog and from there to LT. I can see them, of course, but can y'all?

>280 weird_O: - Yes, yay! That's quite the haul! So, now awaiting the list... ;-)

>280 weird_O: yes, I can see them, thank you Bill!

I really wish Google Photos allowed photos to be shared. Once upon a time many of us here used a site called Photobucket, but they changed their business model and began charging a hefty fee. So annoying. So now I just upload pics to my LT member gallery or junk drawer.

Anyway, that's an impressive book haul! And nice bookcases too!

Wow, looks like those bags contain multitudes... Thanks for reposting.

I can see the bookcase photo now too. (I could always see the book haul.)

I stopped at the Dusty Bookshelf in Lawrence, KS on the way home and added 8 books to my library. I was a bit disappointed because it is a used bookstore and the books were a bit on the expensive side. I spent around $80.00 and got 8 books. I am accustomed to getting a larger number of titles for that amount of money.

The Key to The Name of the Rose! Wish I'd know about that back when I was slugging through the darn thing.

Impressive. Glad you could top up your tank.