reminiscent of whom

Well, I've been on a bit of a carnival ride in my social software 23 things course. It does remind me of how I felt a few years ago when I discovered the biblioblogosphere. It was like I was no longer alone. There were other people whose ideas and thoughts were there for me to explore, AND I could talk to them!

Then I moved to California and became a branch librarian and my life changed. I could barely glance at LibrarianInBlack while on the reference desk, though I have staunchly kept her as one of my five Firefox home pages because she is a California public librarian! I should know what she says. But I often only get to read the subject and a snippet of a post. If there are links to follow, dollars to doughnuts a customer will come up with a question as soon as I start reading.

Therefore, I cringe to admit my Bloglines account has some 3,000 posts waiting for me to read. I keep trying to buck up, admit defeat, and delete some of the feeds, or at least clear the counters. But then I open it up and HAVE to read some Caveat Lector or Walt at Random or Tinfoil+Raccoon. I love Dorothea and Walt and Rochelle. And Meredith and the other Rochelle and way too many others to list. And this will NOT help me--I will just get seduced some more.

I keep wishing for better time management skills. However, the reality is that I spend much of my time as an extremely busy, extremely overpaid clerk. On top of customer needs, the fact is that I am not that speedy anymore. So that better time management desire translates into a need for more time.

Playing with web 2.0 stuff can lead to more time frittering, so I am trying for discipline. Unfortunately, for me, the techie toys are addictive. But I will be strong, and talk about a book.

It's the love of books that keeps me going. I finally got around to reading The Botany of Desire by Michael Pollan, after having recommended The Omnivore's Dilemma to everyone in shouting distance. It was fascinating, well-written, and fascinating. Science and history interwoven with philosophy and agriculture. One reader on LibraryThing commented, "I will never look at a potato the same way again". I feel the same way. But I won't think any plant the same way again. I look out at the hybrid tea roses off our balconies. I am sure they are shaping my view of the world. My only action is to occasionally deadhead them; my landlady and the gardener take care of the majority of their needs. But they may be training us in some way.

Pollan closely examines four plants and their interactions with humans: apples, tulips, marijuana and potatoes. Each section has revelations, none that I expected. Pollan is a gardener. I think he manages to get across the full spectrum of why we need plants in so many ways, and they need us. He probably makes the most cogent case I have heard for biodiversity, without starting with that intent or ever mounting a soapbox. I often read nonfiction to fall asleep, but I warn you, I found The Botany of Desire riveting. Thought provoking. Funny. Lyrical. Now there's a bunch of words that wouldn't make good tags!

(I also keep swearing to myself that I will clean up the tags on these the posts. Do you see how I get confused between de.licio.us conventions and Blogger? Plus these posts don't have subjects...didn't they warn us against indexing ourselves in that ASIS course I took??? OK, I fail some of web 2.0.)

(Some day, I'll stop using random lyrics or overheard comments and such as post titles. They are so utterly useless as jumping off or access points. Be grateful I don't list the songs that get stuck in my head.)

Good and bad

Contrary to some opinions, I haven't completely stopped blogging here. I keep working and nibbling here and there. In the meantime, I've started two new blogs. One is about my medical stuff. It is partly to keep track of stuff, and partly as a forum for when I need a one-person pity party.

I was concerned that some of that stuff was slopping over here. Even though I know that I am the bitch goddess of this here universe, I still want to compartmentalize the bad stuff. I know yin-yang one mind one body and all of that. But I still have a desire to have parts of my life that don't always answer or talk back to "the disease." I'm really writing there for myself. It's not unmitigated bad stuff, but it's more bad than good right now. The link was up in my profile for a little while, but I took it down. If you really want to follow it, email me.

I'm doing the InfoPeople's 23 Things at work, so now I have another blog for that, 23 Lakeside Things. One of my goals for the course is to get myself more active online. Let's hope it plays out a bit here.

So for good, we have A handbook to luck by Cristina García. It is good. I had a customer call on the phone and ask if we had a copy. When I said we did and started to offer to put it on the hold shelf for her, she asked how long we were open. I said about an hour and a half more that day, and she said "I'll be right there." I did a quick check to see if it was a new Oprah book I had missed. Nope.

The customer, a mid-twenties Latina, came in. I asked her why she was in such a rush, thinking it was for a class. She told me she'd been reading a copy from our neighboring branch. She hadn't quite finished it and wanted to renew, but they told her that another customer had reserved it. So she called to see if we had it. She said she would return it as soon as she finished. I told her no worries, it's yours for 21 days. After she left, I put a reserve on it for myself. I figured I had to read any book good enough to have a twenty-something rushing from library to library.

NPR synopsis: The journey of life is made up of a series of choices. But how much do the elements of chance and luck have to play when making those life choices?

Author Cristina Garcia explores these ideas in her latest novel, A Handbook to Luck. In it, three central characters — one from Cuba, a second from El Salvador and another from Iran — all have their lives intersect in America as each struggles to find their place in the world.

Good luck and bad luck and making your own luck. Luck runs through the intertwining stories of Enrique, Leila, and Marta. Unfortunately, I finished reading it several weeks ago. I somehow didn't have time to blog it before we went to Maine for my nephew's wedding (hence the photo with The Offspring in kimono) and now it is fuzzy indeed in my mind. Witness the first-ever non-Bcubed synopsis on the blog. Usually, everything here is original, or as original as received knowledge can be. But other than an admiration for the well-wrought triptych of the main characters, and a telling reanimation of the late 1970s and early 1980s, much of it is gone now. But I think I will keep the image of Marta's brother, Evaristo. He ran away from their abusive stepfather at some early age--less than ten. He took up residence in a large tree near a plaza in San Salvador, where he watched all kinds of events. In time, he witnessed the police brutalizing protesters, and eventually murdering citizens during the Salvadoran Civil War.

I had the good luck that The Boyfriend pre-ordered the new Matt Ruff, Bad monkeys . I can't quite figure out why the MARC record calls this a hardcover. It's more like a softcover. But not really a paperback--somewhere in between. The odd size, 24x13 cm ( 9.5x5.25 inches), makes it feel almost like holding a manga, say a Tokyo Pop title. It is not a graphic novel, but it could be, like an America super-hero thing. It's like a carnival ride set with ethics and morals tests.

The hero, Jane Charlotte, is being held in the psychiatric ward of a prison. She has been arrested for a murder, which she readily admits to performing. Jane Charlotte reveals in the course of interviews with the prison psychiatrist that she is a member of a secret crime-fighting organization. The organization has a bureaucracy, with hilarious departments: Catering, Malfeasance, Panopticon, Black Helicopters, Scary Clowns. Jane is part of "The Department for the Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons," or, colloquially, the Bad Monkeys. Bad Monkeys executes bad guys, using special weaponry that causes death by natural causes, stroke or heart attack, depending on the setting.

I read Bad monkeys on one of the flights to Maine. It was a wonderful airplane read--jokes, suspense, action. The only problem was I'd had about four hours of sleep the night before, so I kept nodding off. However, the gentleman on the window seat (I was on the aisle), had recourse to the restroom facilities four times during a five-hour flight. So, every time he woke me, I'd read a bit more of Bad monkeys, then doze off; rinse and repeat. So I started to get confused long before the ax-wielding Scary Clowns showed up. But looking over the book again, I have to doubt I would be any less confused reading it uninterrupted while fully rested. The turn-arounds, self deceptions, and fake-outs are so layered, that the reader is supposed to get lost. What a way to get lost. Escapism rarely offers such intellectual calisthenics.

The motto of Jane's organization is "Omnes mundum facimus"--we all make the world. Matt Ruff does such a great job of making his worlds (if you haven't read Set This House In Order, let me recommend it again). The joy is that reading his worlds informs how we live in this world. I already can't wait to read his next book! But first, when will I get the new Gibson (I'm number three on the reserve list)?

I just went and watched a spectacular sunset over the ocean in this world. Life is good.