March 7, 2008

What!?

What has happened to the real news?! I'm watching Nightline on ABC tonight and so far Terry Moran has covered how the media covers Britney Spears too much - the real coup of this report was going to a book store and asking the employee how many covers Spears is on per week. At one point, an interviewee points out how depressing it is that his content (covering Britney) is more viewed than real world news.

Commercial Break

Terry Moran comes back and starts talking about the brassy hip-hop group "Salt N Pepa". I turn off the TV.

Seriously, Terry, there isn't some sort of major crisis that almost caused a war in South America this week that you could spend a couple of minutes talking about; there isn't a war going on in Afghanistan and Iraq; there isn't a major political race happening; there isn't anything else that you could cover?

Good grief.

February 20, 2008

No, I'm in the book business

And you thought Barnes and Noble sold books...

Today I ran into Barnes and Noble, walked up the escalator, over to the 'new fiction' section, grabbed the new Chip Kidd, and headed for the cash registers. This all took approximately 2 minutes. I then had to spend at least 5 minutes explaining that,

"No, I don't have a membership"
"No, I don't want a membership"
"No, I don't want to save 6 dollars today by spending 25 dollars on a membership"
"No, I don't want a gift receipt"
"No, I haven't heard about the new return policy"....

I used to work at the Barnes and the Noble and hated (hated!) asking people if they would like a membership (so I didn't).

**But it's only 25 dollars and you save 10%! That's about the cost of tax! You can now buy books essentially tax-free for a whole year if you pay us 25 dollars now.**

See, if Barnes and Noble sells a book they make a couple bucks at the most, but if they can sucker someone into signing up as a member they make 25 dollars. So they hire people that know nothing about books but everything about pushy salesmanship. I was always disappointed when fellow employees wouldn't have an answer to the question, "What are you reading now?"

Even the cafe asks you to buy a membership for pete's sake! You can save 20 cents on this coffee if you buy a membership. Your total today? 27.00 for a small coffee. Now if you purchase all of your coffee here for the rest of the year, you just might break even.

It is the worst deal out there and they keep pushing the membership card like its some sort of revolution for the bookbuyer. I hate it so much that I usually never go to Barnes and Noble anymore because I don't want to hear about the card again.

Chip Kidd's new book better be really good.

February 2, 2008

That's Right

In an effort to make all weekend nights as fun as possible, yesterday night...
I totally fixed a toilet.
That's right, a toilet: mineral deposits and all.

It took longer than it should have because the pipe that connects the water to the tank came a little loose while I was replacing the flapper valve which caused leak number 1.
Number 1?
Yes, if you have to number the leaks, you have more than one.
For some idiotic reason, after I took the flapper valve out and installed the new one, I forgot to replace the gasket over the locknut. That is a colossal mistake.
Upon first practice flush, the entire contents of the tank found their way onto the bathroom floor. Leak #2. If you call a sudden gush of a gallon of water a leak.
At least I didn't crack the porcelain, right dad?

So the tank comes back off and the gasket gets installed. And now?
The house is quiet again,
and the toilet isn't running.

Of course, with the 10 inches of snow that were dumped on us, I'm not running either. Har-har.

January 3, 2008

Best Books I Read in 2007

I didn't read as much as I'd hoped this year but I guess teaching three Honors classes and taking two grad classes a term will do that to you. Here are my favorite books from 2007 followed by a list of all the books I read - for posterity's sake.

Top 5

#5 - The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip : George Saunders
A nice, little modern fable about sharing work and being generous and whatnot. You will find a new appreciation for nice neighbors and perhaps a love of fences. The illustrations are by Lane Smith who has also done Squids will be Squids and The Stinky Cheese Man.

#
4 - Icelander : Dustin Long
A crime novel where the author chronicles the murder of a detective whose life is also the subject of a fictional collection of crime stories whose author is also a character in the book so there are really fours layers of narrative to keep track of including the footnotes by the 'editor' of the Icelander but you end up forgetting about trying to figure out the murder because it's not really about that at all. The book is really a terrific romp and never seems "Barth-ian" and in its postmodern gimmicks.

#3 - The Worst Hard Time : Timothy Egan
A nonfiction account with a narrative flow of life during the Dust Bowl. There was a lot of talk about global warming this year, but if you want to see what happens when the Earth gets really pissed off, this is a book to check out and marvel at the statistics and what humans are willing to put up with in the pursuit of the land, and money, and worth.

#2 - What is the What : Dave Eggers
The autobiography of Deng, a Sudanese refugee, told by Dave Eggers is told through flashbacks when Deng attempts to make connections to Americans by telling them of the things that he's been through and how he ended up in America. Symbolically no one ever hears the tales Deng tells, much as how the plight of millions of refugees around the world are never heard.

#1 - One Hundred Years of Solitude : Gabriel Garcia-Marquez
I fell in love with Magical Realism this year. I've always liked South American culture but this is an entirely different way of writing and looking at the world than I'm used to reading. The book is brilliant and while keeping track of all the characters will the same names can get a little confusing, every page is filled with imagery and sentences that are truly fascinating and vulgar and sexy.

The Big List: