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	READING			READING NOW
	i used to read one book at a time. i used to read that book in a very regimented manner, like fifteen or twenty five pages a day, depending on how simple or dense the writing. i used to set a schedule and track my progress making it so i knew when i should be done with the book and if i completed the book as expected. sometimes i finished on time, and other times, i never finished at all. the never finishing at all business bothered me. like a lot. i found that a slow moving or not right for this moment book could stall my reading, all my reading. i knew changing the book might clear the block but consequences loomed. this is the ocd side of me. while this quirk sometimes debilitated me, other times, lots of times, my quirk helped me over many of life's saw horses. i needed this to be one of those times. so, i made a small tweak to my reading routine (somewhere along this journey, i stumbled upon the bionic power of small properly-placed tweaks). instead of focusing on one book, i now read four - six books at a time. and instead of reading in a genre rotation like i once did (e.g. fiction, history, literature, non-fiction, psychology, fluff, repeat), i read all genres at once. and instead of reading for a set amount of pages per day, i read for a set amount of time, thirty minutes. when the reading window comes up, i set the timer, pick one of the books from the currently being read stack, open to the bookmarked page and collapse into another person's world and experience. now when i stall, i stall for bigger, more meaty causes, the sort of things one should set their book down for. not just because the lead character in the book blows or the author and i aren't jiving at the minute. this i can live with.			Stranger in a Strange Land Robert A. Heinlein Wherever You Go There You Are Jon Kabat-Zinn Bleak House Charles Dickens Stumbling on Happiness Daniel Gilbert Endurance: Shackletons' Incredible Voyage Alfred Lansing Mindset Carolyn Dweck
	READ BEFORE	BOOKS FROM : 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
		The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane Kate DiCamillo 12.2006 bella's kindergarten class has a reading program where kids are encouraged to track the amount of time spent reading. when bella gears up to add to her minutes she carefully selects a book, grabs a watch marty loans her for the purpose and hunkers down in her reading spot of choice. once settled she opens the book on her lap, positions her finger on the first word to be read, trains her thumb over the stopwatch's start button and with olympic-like accuracy depresses the button and utters the first word aloud at the very same moment. bella came to me and said she was tired of reading on her own and asked if i would read to her (which is allowed) i was glad to help. in her hand was a birthday present i had given her, edward tulane. so we sat down, snuggled close and i leafed to the first page of the text. bella asked if i was ready. i said i was. the high tone of the stop watch grabbed my attention and i looked at it in her hand. bella turned to me frantically, "READ FATHER! START READING! READ! THE TIMER'S GOING!". startled i was barely able to mumble a childlike 'huh?'. i heard the high tone of the watch beep again. bella shifted in her seat to look me in the face. "father! i asked if you were ready and you said you were. when i start the clock you have to start reading." oh. sorry. now i understand. she reset the watch and asked, more slowly this time, if i was ready. i positioned my finger on the first word of the page and reported that i was. i heard the high tone sound and i shot out of the blocks with bella-exacting precision. now that i was properly schooled, bella and i moved through the book with routine ease, until late in the story. tulane is a creative, adventurous yarn that takes an unexpectedly serious turn towards the end. serious to the point that i found my spoken words beginning to crack with emotion. nestled on the couch one sunday morning when bella and i were the only ones yet awake, i found myself fighting back tears as i read the final pages. in lieu of this i started taking long pauses between sentences trying to compose myself. each unnatural silence was met the same "read father. you're not reading. you gotta keep reading. do i need to stop the watch because this time can't count?" unsurprisingly, these repeated scoldings kept my clenching chest in check and allowed me to champion my way through the last moments of this short but touching novel. much of the sentiment was lost on bella, but it certainly hit the mark with her reading partner. and in case you're wondering why i cared if i cried in front of my five-year old daughter, i don't have an answer. i was just compelled not to. link to this review
		Blink Malcom Gladwell 11.2006 blink is another one of those novels that discusses a facet of human nature most people are acutely aware of, but don't understand; the human brain's ability to process certain pieces of information with blinding, even unreasonable, speed. it is a phenomenon so mysterious that it has historically bordered on the supernatural. but gladwell, through a variety of cases, employs both hard and soft sciences to try to explain and understand what is happening as if he were debunking his very own x-file. in the end it strikes me as a work not meant to teach you how to do it but instead to appreciate that an identifiable chemistry is at work. in many of the examples used, people don't know how they are able to do what they do and/or often aren't aware it is happening. furthermore, these moments occur at an individual level, like when the right combination of details are put in front of a person with the right combination of education and experience a little spark flashes in the room and left behind is a magic gobstopper, constructed out of thin air and with no intentional planning. on the suck side, much study has gone into taking commercial advantage of these cerebral reactions, which gladwell dips into, in the name of profit. i always find that side of science quite distasteful. in this case though, i feel it is good to know, even though i'm seemingly impotent to deflect the practices at hand. aside from this one dark matter, the book holds a bevy of entertaining curios. link to this review
		The Fourth Hand John Irving 08.2006 the fourth hand tracks a character so devoid of redeeming or interesting characteristics one would be pressed to hold a four minute conversation with a real-life version of the guy. aside from the man's noteworthy maiming, this human has no business getting a novel's worth of attention. and he surprisingly proves as uninteresting after his incident as he was before. i mean, the story here is as gripping as reading three hundred pages about an attractive high school quarterback who suffered a knee injury mid-season. as i read, i kept wondering how the inventor of garp, owen meany and the berry family could divine a personality so lacking or more to the point, be satisfied with the flow and outcome of the story. anyone who has read more than one novel by john irving knows he's a solid maker of curious characters. had someone else written this, maybe, and i stress the 'maybe', i'd garner an ounce of passion for the lead. but i expect more from irving because he is irving. and, i hate to be part of that 'you're only as good as your last set' mentality (because i think it's wholly unreasonable), but such is the way of a medium that requires such a time commitment from its audience. link to this review
		The Naked Sun Isaac Asimov 04.2006 the worlds/societies asimov divines are breathtaking. couple that with his very simple style of narration and the guy is savant-like in what he does. i mean it's one thing to dream up some previously untapped scenario but it's another to think through so many of the nuances of your vision making the reader walk away with a real sense of familiarity. and everything i've read by him comes off so effortlessly it makes it seem like he's personally visited these worlds. his depth and art of description appear limitless. link to this review
		The Paradox of Choice Barry Schwartz 03.2006 the topic of this book resembles grammar and time management, we all know the basic workings, we just don't know what all of the doo-hickeys are called, thus making it very much of a head-nodding experience. but while it validates the science behind your actions and encounters, being able to envision the math does not necessarily help the palatability of it all. furthermore, the lengths the work goes to illuminating the various trends and behaviors of individuals seem for naught for the recorded observations are trends and behaviors for quite a good reason; it is who we are. very much of what is discussed here deals in a person's hard-wiring. how do you get someone who roils over a high dollar transaction to not experience angst? the short answer is, you don't. simply, you're either a roiler or you're not a roiler so thank or bad-mouth your folks accordingly for it is they who are responsible. and curiously i started reading this book at the same time i started looking for a job. for the first few weeks i had no prospects and was miserable. and then an incredible and incredibly viable option presented itself and i was elated. a few weeks after that a second promising offer came up and i was again miserable. having no options sucks and having too many options sucks, in some ways even more, leaving the only blue-sky scenario to having one right and good choice. unfortunately for us folks living in the dollar-whore society that we do, fewer choices just ain't gonna happen. doubt me? go buy a toothbrush. one like you grew up using. then we'll talk. link to this review
		Eragon Christopher Paolini 02.2006 i was told this book was written by a twelve year old. i bought it thinking this. i later learned it was not true, although paolini was quite young, impressively young even, starting it at fifteen and completing it at nineteen. since it was already on the shelf i decided to give it a look. it jumps at you right quick. no playing around, no setting the scene. just right to business. while the pace continued fine, it was ultimately and unsurprisingly not able to maintain the initial punch in the face (much like the film star trek VI : the undiscovered country). i don't read a lot of fantasy. sci-fi, sure. especially recently but not much of the molly-hatchet-cover sorts of stuff. i'd place this into that realm and feel a little unqualified to speak to its effectiveness. additionally, i don't know how much of it was actually unique or innovative for the genre. the closest thing i could liken it to is tolkien's works which seems wholly unfair. but as i think on it, i finished it which, especially as of late, says something in its favor. link to this review
		The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe C.S. Lewis 01.2006 c.s lewis is the anti-tolkien. tolkien could make mowing my lawn into a six-volume series (and my lawn could fit inside my living room). lewis on the other hand could recount the birth and evolution of the universe on a post-it note. his story began: there is a place called london. they had a war. for protection-sake, the children were sent to the country. four kids went to this one house where one of them opened a door and they found a magical land. there are seven, perhaps eight more sentences in this novel. i don't want to spoil it for anyone who plans to read it so will stop there. unfortunately, an inordinate amount of attention is given to the biblical aspects of this work. it is not necessary to track these details to enjoy the narrative. i know this to be fact because i thoroughly enjoyed this adventure. link to this review

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