I'm enjoying reading again.

Strangely fantasy got me out of my reading rut. A customer from the store lent me Dragon Prince Book 1 by Melanie Rawn. He bought it upon the recommendation of a Chapters employee and asked me to check it out. He wanted to make sure that it wasn't "mushy." It was. Reading it I couldn't help but picture the employee as a overly romantic 16 year old girl. And I had forgotten all the sex bits that fantasy tends to have and had a couple great giggles over Rawn's sketchs of her protagonist's eager penis. And sadly for John though, the customer, it had nothing to do with dragons. But I enjoyed reading something as nothing more than a story. **Big breath in** I'm also reading Mary Queen of Scotland and the Isles for the same reason. Historical fiction has penises too; although they're usually 'flaccid' and old. Not eagar and embarrassing. Penises! They're everywhere.

Also in the middle of reading The Vinyl Cafee Unplugged - one of 5 McLean's books courtesy of Kim's dad. I'm mixed about his books. The Dave stories are hilarious to me for the same reason that I enjoy Everyone Loves Raymond (as none of my cynical friends do) and Tool Time. It's the clueless man schtick and family stories I enjoy. Maybe I'm secretly into clueless men. Hmm. McLean's nostalgic sketches of Canada as small town aren't engaging though. I can't relate to small town stories about that day twenty years ago when the taps at the old pub failed and everyone got free beer. And I'm not sure what it means that it is so popular south of the border.

And today? Today, I treated myself to some shopping therapy regardless of my promise to finish the 30-to-reads lining my shelf. And instant happiness!

Although my quest to find "Twentisomething essays" (a fortitious title kara!!) was thwarted, I wandered around and in another fortitious turn found a book of Bukowski's poetry, The Flash of Lighting behind the Mountain. It's exciting b/c it's style is like mine (if I can be so bold) and b/c I loved the irreverance of Post Office (ah-ha, MORE penises!). I also found Junk Mail, a book of Will Self's non-fiction, and I'm loving it.

Afterthought: Another rambly pointless post.

Synopsis: I've become bogged down by all this seriousness. Getting back to irreverance. Loving my new books and trying to get my shit together.

www.seedmagazine.com/news/2006/08/thank_you_for_polluting.php

Eileen... Can you give this a read? What are your opinions on peer review as the absolute catch-all for 'Good Science' as that Gibbon's guy seems to believe?

(I'm thinking about your description of funding meetings as power games.)

Politics and politicking in science isn't a new thing. So many conflicts between science and government/religion spring to mind that it's dizzying.

A lot of people have read this book. In fact, most people I know have. There is little original revelation that I can share. All I can say is I enjoyed it - a lot. From the perspective of someone who is reading to get inspired to write, this book made me really want to have something to say. It wasn't the anti-racist message that touched me, but the quiet pleasure of the children's lives. The details of their day to day living I found beautiful and fun.

There could be no Tom Robinson in this book and no Bob Ewell, and I think I would have gotten the message loud and clear just from the lives and interactions of the characters. If I wanted to complain about anything, I'd make Atticus less perfect. But that can be forgiven since it is from a loving daughter's perspective.

This book goes to show, I guess, that good writing is in the small things, not necessarily in the big.