What I read: May 2021

LHC#119: "How to listen to Jazz" by Ted Gioia. I guess this came from my self-improvement phase of requests. It was published in 2016, so not that old, but its pre-pandemic publication shows. There's a whole long section where he discusses the concept of virality as if the medical sense would be new to people. Interesting, though.

I might have gone a little too hard on this one. I listened to a ton of jazz while reading it, and discovered a couple of tracks I loved, and some whole subgenres I apparently loathe. Eeew, cool jazz is so not for me.

LHC#120: "The Country Girls Trilogy" by Edna O'Brien. Not sure if this should be one or three, but it's one volume so for here I'll count it as one. In my annual tally of books read (maintained elsewhere) I'll count it as three. Very much worth reading. It's pretty clear why it would have been banned a lot though. Wow.

LHC #121: "The Memento" by Christy Ann Conlin. The voice in this is great. I enjoyed it very much.

LHC #122: "The Trojan War Museum and other stories" by Ayse Papatya Busac. Short stories obviously. I really liked "The History of Girls", "The Dead", "The Gathering of Desire" and "Mysteries of the Mountain South", the rest were meh. Short story collections are like that. I think I'm better off reading a short story collection and something else at the same time. Reading short after short by the same person overloads my brain.

I also read the last chapter (I've read all the chapters, just not this month) of a novel by this guy on the OWW. It was great fun.

Best TW feedback ever

Over at the dayjob, SMEs are feverishly trying to get documents back to me all marked up, in preparation for the release that's supposed to happen the week I'm back from VP. Today's best comment: Unfortunately not true. SMEs, they're so cute.

What I read: August 2023

"The Absolute Book" by Elizabeth Knox. I got it for Christmas. It was delightful, even if maybe some stuff wasn't explained completely. Or maybe that's part of why it was delightful. "Crucial conversations" By Joseph Grenny and three other old white men. Another office book club selection. The word "candor" comes up a lot. I really resented this book. LHC #220: "The Goldfinch" by Donna Tartt. There was a girl at my previous company who wanted to have an office book club, and she had this book on her desk for months and months. I can totally understand this. I found portions crazy stressful to read. Like, I would be skipping ahead to see how much more in the section, could I get through it, pacing around, etc. I wanted to know how it ended, sure, but I was having weird stress dreams and stuff. If it wasn't a library book I might not have finished it at all. It was such a relief when Boris showed up again and something happened. I di

In Progress -- July 2023

Wind/Water/Salt Chapters 39-51: Still n eed to take up comments and revise. Persephone (probably not its real name): Nothing but thoughts. Short Stories: As I mentioned last month I had a dish-washing epiphany on a story that wasn't going well. I'd already changed the POV character, but I knew that wasn't enough because I had no ending. It has an ending now. Critted 4 Got back 0 I really need to post something new. Submissions 0 Out there 0 Rejects 1 Knitting Tay Tartan cardigan (Martin Storey). Finally finished the danglers and minor seaming and chose buttons, then had to wait to block because the space I normally block in needed to be cleared, and this would be very disruptive to my work, so I waited to block it for the night before I went on vacation. It would appear that the finishing of this sweater took 4 months, which may be a new record. It fits for the most part. Yay! Cathar (self). Started the month just about done with the body edging.

Robynettely

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