books!
September 30, 2003
Notes from the Road
Though I am not technically on the road at the moment, I have spent way too much travelling this month… it's fun, but tiring. Because I fly a good deal, I sometimes get free upgrades to Business/First class. A few days ago I was taking an 8 a.m. flight out of Chicago and got upgraded to First. With all the cutbacks airlines have been making lately, First class isn't as lavish as it once was, but it's still more comfortable than coach. I'm always amazed at how much some people drink on airplanes, and in First it can be truly excessive. I mean, if you order Scotch at that hour on a Sunday morning on an airplane, I think it's fair to say you might have a problem. I mean, I know the drinks are free and all, but it's 8 a.m. for god's sake.
Onward to the goodness… I discovered a wonderful new novel while in Chicago, Audrey Niffenegger's The Time Traveler's Wife is a charming and romantic book with a unique twist. Niffenegger is both a writer and a visual artist. She shows at Chicago's Printworks gallery. I really like her works on paper, and the fact that her first novel is so excellent fills me with both joy and envy. I'm about half way through and loving every chapter. Check it out ASAP.
September 03, 2003
Moneyball notes before I sleep
I should be asleep right now… I do this thing where I keep myself up just a bit extra every night as an insurance policy for a good night's sleep. My problem is I have a 12am-8am internal clock on a 10pm-6am lifestyle. Those two hours are killers.
I finished Moneyball last night. It's quite interesting and I would recommend it to anyone with even a passing interest in baseball, business, or life in general. It exquisitely illustrates how habit and conventional wisdom can become unquestioned fact, and how the inefficiencies of an established system can be capitalized upon to create structures and systems to surprise and exceed the capabilities of that establishment. It will also make you an Oakland A's fan. Having lived in San Francisco for the past ten years I should theoretically be a Giants fan, but I have never really connected with the team… Barry Bonds is obviously an exceptional athlete, but he sort of overshadows everything else… The A's are more in the spirit of baseball, America's pastime… a team made up of the unexpected…underdogs, but individuals with unrecognized mastery that come together (many nights at least) to achieve success and some measure of greatness. Now that's baseball. The A's are like the Red Sox reinvented, not such a large payroll, no “curse,” but still the appeal of the underdog. I know, I don't really know jack about baseball, but I'm learning a bit, and Lewis' book taught me a bit more. I recommend it.
August 20, 2003
BBC News Styleguide
Yesterday I became aware of the BBC News Styleguide, by John Allen, thanks to a link over at Lockergnome. Though specifically aimed at professional broadcast journalists, this is a guide that would benefit many a weblog author. From the BBC Training & Development page:
Nigel Paine, head of BBC Training & Development, says: 'This is not a 'do and don't' list but a guide that invites you to explore some of the complexities of modern English usage and to make your own decisions about what does and does not work.'
Richard Sambrook, director BBC News, says: 'This styleguide will help make your journalism stronger and connect better with audiences. As my first news editor on a small weekly paper used to say:“Keep it plain and keep it simple.” It still holds true.'
This is an excellent guide, complete with nice subject heading bookmarks in Adobe Acrobat to make navigating to a particular section quick and easy. Other pluses: it's free, and it's advice from the most respected news organizations in the world.
August 08, 2003
New Manual of Style
You know you're a geek and a bibliomaniac when the publication of The Chicago Manual of Style: Fifteenth Edition gets you all excited. I get the print edition of the New York Times and sometimes I get a day behind on some sections, so I just read this article today about the publication of this new editon. I love how thrilled the editor is about the book, it's contagious:
“I am so excited about this manual I can't even talk!” Ms. Samen said, interrupting herself on the phone the other day as she was describing the proper use of regular size and smaller size capital letters.
There's something about pretty reference books… the promise to make me a better writer… to answer all my style questions… to make me correct… that fills me with a certain contentedness by simply having them on my desk.
July 12, 2003
new books section
I've successfully added a “books” section to my right-hand column. Hopefully it won't get too crowded over there. Thanks and credit goes out to the authors of the MovableType plugins I am using: BookQueue by Jacob Hesch and MTAmazon by Adam Kalsey. I find it exciting and comforting to be able to refer to the world of print from within the world of e-reading. While it can be tempting to think of things published on the Internet as rather ephemeral, we all know better… still, books provide a tactile intimacy while feeling more permanent or “finished” in some way.
July 09, 2003
A.S. Byatt on Harry Potter
You'd think an excellent novelist like A.S. Byatt (I loved Possession) would have better things to do then get severely snooty and rip into J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter books with a simplistic Freudian analysis in an Op-Ed piece for the NYT, but if you thought that, you would be wrong. Author Caleb Carr, who also makes far less money than Rowling, piles on with praises to Byatt's piece in Letters to the Editor. It must be interesting to be so awfully high-brow. (via boingboing)
April 22, 2003
portland whirlwind...
I flew up to Portland yesterday to pick up a group of books that I bought a few weeks ago… 73 boxes, each 18×12×12 = heavy! I'm rather exhausted. All this because I have the idea of opening a general used bookshop one day. This of course is folly… but I've always been in favor of learning by doing (also, that seems to be the only way of getting things through my thick skull). Anyway, now I have a 5×10' storage space completely filled books, maybe 175 boxes total…. that's probably 4500 or so volumes… just a start… after all, you can't decide to open a bookstore one day and then magically obtain 20-30,000 books… at least not at an advantageous price. I do feel good about the quality of the books I have purchased so far, which is a good thing.
I'll write more about the folly of bookselling and art dealing in a future post… for now suffice it to say that the intersection of passion, commerce and success in small business isn't on any map.