No Dinosaurs on a Farm

***formerly known as "Cold & Calculating"

Friday, November 11, 2005

Blogger's Block

When I started blogging, I thought I would never go so many days without entering a post. Yet, here it has been some time, and I wanted some kind of explanation. So I analyzed the situation and discovered something very interesting--or at least as interesting as anything else on this blog: all of my previous blogs were composed while riding my bicycle.

Does that explain the gap in blogging? Certainly, because I have not been riding my bike recently due to poor weather conditions. Nor will I be riding again for quite some time. So this leaves me wondering whether I will only blog during warm months.

Nevertheless, I would hate to create a blog containing only speculation. I take the bus now instead of biking, and that means that I can read on my way to work. (Incidentally, I have perfected the skill of reading while walking--even descending stairs--but I haven't the guts to try it on a bike.)

Here is what I have been reading the last two weeks:

The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by Washington Irving
Various Stories, by Edgar Alan Poe (Tell-Tale Heart is my favorite)
The Sparrow, by Mary Doria Russell

What have you been reading?

11 Comments:

  • At 11 November, 2005 22:05, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I just finished "A Million Little Pieces"... raw, but a very truthlful look at addiction.

    And I just got to Helaman 10.

     
  • At 12 November, 2005 02:18, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    "Tale of Genji" by Shikibu Murasaki.

    If you ever decide to try the biking-riding combination, I know a little secret ninja method involving clothespins, a brake line, and a giant umbrella.

     
  • At 12 November, 2005 23:49, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    "Dinner With a Perfect Stranger" by David Gregory

    At least you haven't started reading and driving on the freeway as I saw one man doing one night. I really wouldn't recommend it. I wondered when I was going to have to stop and do CPR.

     
  • At 13 November, 2005 00:41, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    The Red Tent by Anita Diamant. I really liked it, some of my friends were offended by it, and my husband just shuddered and figured it was a menstrual book. It had marvelous messages about mothering and women-ness, so I'm not sure if men would enjoy the book so much? I haven't talked to a man who has read it, so I don't know. But it did cause controversy in my book group, so I was SURE to read it, at first simply for no other reason! Plus, the cover was great. Around here, we judge books by their covers--the art makes or breaks it, baby!

     
  • At 16 November, 2005 02:36, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Hey, I started reading the Red Tent, but then had a baby and haven't had the chance to read about mothering because I'm living it! I guess I could be reading a book now though, instead of Brian's blog.
    Which is more dangerous, reading while biking or reading while mothering (an infant and preschooler)?

     
  • At 16 November, 2005 19:11, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I'm a guy who has read "The Red Tent" and while I wasn't offended nor did I shudder, I couldn't really relate, and I doubt many guys could. I did however, very much like how the story was presented.

     
  • At 21 November, 2005 01:31, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Forrest just read 302 books this weekend! (Or so he claimed). I was in a delima. It was a contest at school to read as many books as you could over the weekend. So he started with all the little baby books in the house, you know the kind with one word per page and only 8 pages (1/2" think ea.) per book, and worked his way up through the beginner reader books (4 words/pg and 20pgs/book), and finally into the "real" books. Well, I wasn't sure if it was possible to read 302 books in a weekend. It was a huge pile of books, nearly all the books in the house. I didn't want to be an untrusting father, but I also didn't want to encourage any cheating either. So what to do? Well, the inner-CPA from my past life as an evil auditor kept nagging me all weekend to audit his numbers. I finally gave in and did a standard test: I picked 6 random books, timed him as he read them aloud to me, took the average, divided it by the estimated number of hours spent reading (13), applied a read aloud/read silently ratio (the ratio is subjective, I admit, but plausable at 3:4), and determined that "Yes, within a non-material deviation he could indeed read 302 kiddie books this weekend." (btw: that's 2.6 minutes per book). Now I'm not sure If I was just being a good father or if I'm truly pure evil. He even asked during the audit "Dad, do I have to read ALL the books to you?"

     
  • At 22 November, 2005 00:26, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    david, I'm impressed with your methods. I'm also wondering if that took more time than just counting the pile of books he read? Just a question.

     
  • At 22 November, 2005 15:14, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I definately counted the books, but I had to validate that he actually read them, and didn't just simply flip through them looking at the pictures.

    And back to your original question Brian, my latest books:
    "AgePower" by Ken Dychwald - how things will change as the baby-boomers retire and we experience the largest population of elderly people in history.

    "Banker to the Poor" by Muhammad Yunus - how lending very, very small amounts of money to people in poor villages helped bring themselves out of poverty.

    "21 Financial Myths" by Dan Wyson. Who?

     
  • At 24 November, 2005 11:19, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    ah, good parenting indeed.

    I'm supposed to be reading Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy right now.

     
  • At 11 December, 2005 03:26, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Finished Hitchhiker. Very funny. Dry, british humor. Lots of irony.

     

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