Virtual Bookshelf Meme
Dangit, I’ve been tagged by Spencer for one of these foofy meme things. This time, the theme is books, which is something I don’t have a handle on nearly as well as I might, say, my music collection. [No worries: once I finish moving into the house, I have a cataloging task ready that's roughly analogous to The Great CD Preservation Project. Details on that at a later date---as if you care, or something.]
Total Number of Books I Own: Like Spencer, I have no count on this. Once I’ve catalogued my library, I’ll know. I’m guessing on the order of … 500. I honestly have no idea.
Last Book I Bought: For me, it’s two books purchased from Amazon, one of which I mentioned as I bought it:
Books I’m Reading Now: The aforementioned two books are what’s riding around in my backpack right now. I’ve worked ~55 pp. into Flow, and I haven’t cracked Code open yet. Sometimes, I read multiple books at once. And actually, now that I think about it, I’m going through Garrison Keillor’s We Are Still Married: Stories and Letters from time to time. It’s a collection of short stories, which fits my reading habits. My reading habits very, very much skew non-fiction these days.
Books That Have Been Important To Me:
- The Bible. I’ve read and owned an NIV traslation, but lately, I’ve been loving the NRSV.
- Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. The thing I love about this book, viewed dispassionately? It has to be how Christians of most every denomination and doctrinal leaning claim it for their own.
- Blink : The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell. I just dig it—I’m an instinctual decision-maker, but I also ruminate over lots of things. It works for me, and it drives other people crazy—but Gladwell’s book made me feel not-so-crazy.
It’s kinda sad that my list of influential books is so brief. I’m sure there’s something huge that I’m missing, but honestly, I don’t have many huge “Ah-ha!” moments when reading books. Most of what I read is not in long form, for better or worse, these days, and I only gained an appreciation for literature late in my high school years.
But there is a quote from Sir Francis Bacon that I dearly love about writing; I’ve forgotten its source, but I reckon I could find it: “Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man.” I wholeheartedly agree.
Five People I’ll Torture by Passing This on to Them:
- John Wilson.
- Amy.
- Kari, my favorite librarian … who will either love this or hate it. I’m hoping love, because I’m still gunning for an invite to Mike’s birthday party. [Hee.] Read Kari’s responses.
- Lara.
- Andy Osenga. [Okay, so this is a cheap excuse to get Andy to read GFMorris.com.]
[...] es it feel? (to be on my mind), my love is a fever :
I’m getting around to the book and the movie meme things that have been passed to me, I just don’t re [...]
June 5th, 2005 at 23:58[...] I’m getting around to the book and the movie meme things that have been passed to me, I just don’t really have that many movies and I don’t usually keep my books after reading them… so they are a bit harder than the music one.Anyway, today was…. Well, I’m frustrated with myself because….Sometimes I feel like….Okay, I’m really having trouble getting started. But tonight I’m reminded that nothing ever changes. I still struggle with the same insecurities and fears that I started my life with 29 years ago. I still crinkle up internally at the first sign of disappointments. I still let other people’s words have way too much control over my emotional state. And I still think that loneliness is the worst feeling ever.I called an old friend today. One that I know I should have no expectations on… because he alternates between being an amazing friend and being an amazing asshole, but the thing is, the last time we talked, it was a really great conversation. And so I thought I’d try back today, see how he’s doing, whatever. Such a bad move. And that’s all I’m going to say about that. Because anything more would border a territory I’m just not willing to go to here.Mandy (my car) is at the shop because after a car wash, she was very reluctant to start. Perhaps she noticed that they really didn’t do that great of a job washing her and she wanted to protest, but after a bit of coaxing I did get her to turn over and start, although the whole ride to the shop (I wasn’t going to risk going home and taking her in the morning), she seemed to want to stall between 1st and 2nd gear. Silly car.Anyway, back to my day… I’ve been so isolated this weekend, which I think is why I’m so pissy now over virtually nothing. Even though I’ve gone out a lot, and even went on a great long walk this afternoon, it’s all been solitary. I seem to fall apart when I lose all sense of community. (Or course, it doesn’t help that the book I’ve been reading is making me cry about every 15 pages). So much love. Inside me. And honest to goodness, if I don’t find the right place to channel it to soon…(You can also view this post at withinwithout.org.) linkReply [...]
January 19th, 2007 at 15:45