It helps to commute by public transport. Enables me to read 2 books a week.
Mostly fiction though. Don’t really feel the need for note taking.
9 Likes
Actual books are too stimulating for just before bed. So we recite good night moon in the almost-dark.
How do i get her out of bed and onto the potty in the morning? Books. How do i get her in the car or to walk home from the park? Books. How do we get her to sit for a nebulizer treatment? Books.
One of our cats bit a book a week ago. She’s 2 and still holding a grudge.
7 Likes
I average about 40-50 books a year. It’s a mix of fiction, history, biography, poetry and graphic novels (with a little philosophy thrown in). My commute used to be longer, so last year I read less. I refuse to read business books.
4 Likes
I make notes a little differently, marking the passages that strike me with a pencil on the page and a paper flag then copying out those passages on my computer when I’m finished, erasing the pencil marks and removing the flags as I finish them. In essence, I read the book through once, reread the flagged passages as I type them, and once again as I proofread them. Some of my book notes are available at http://hubeventsnotes.blogspot.com
1 Like
This is a trick you need to learn. If you are not enjoying a book it is best to just put it down. Even if everyone is telling you it’s a great book, just put it down and find another.
In the Acknowledgments of Beyond Religion by the Dalai Lama he states why he wrote the book and what he hopes it will lead to, but he ends it with.
" If the reader finds anything written here to be of a benefit, then our endeavors will have been well rewarded. A reader who finds no such benefit should not feel awkwardness about setting this book aside"
14 Likes
That’s some quality parenting there.
I’ve cut off the books on the potty though, helps keep potty sessions to less than 15 minutes that way. Usually.
3 Likes
…could use a manual on ignoring Rachel Maddow until she’s warmed up then taking her at her word when she says ‘people go do {thing X}!’ rather than looking for follow-through.
JimmyShelter> Mostly fiction though. Don’t really feel the need for note taking.
What is your Franzen like, in Cannuckistan Script?
2 Likes
what’s your opinion of this phenomenon?
3 Likes
I’m getting the feeling I’m missing the reference.
So I need to cut out 2/3 of my reading in order to understand how the world works, make better decisions, and live a good life? Sorry, not doing that.
2 Likes
The Exotic Canada reference is a wild-ar… guess, but Jonathan Franzen has some novels that beggar complexity, or at least make a show of juggling an extra 20 characters. (Have a Heller McAlpern review of The Portable Veblen by Elizabeth McKenzie instead? If I want to think of Franzen’s Purity as a new novel I’m 5 years late, you see.)
1 Like
I am not at all convinced. I am not a “blank sheet”, so I know plenty of mostly useless stuff about many subjects. Stuff I don’t know much about I usually don’t care enough to read about more, or it stresses me out massively, or gives me a A Really Bad Mood (what some people call depression, rather wrongly).
One example?
Taxes.
And I know about as much about taxes as to fill at least one sheet of paper.
So, how exactly is this going to work for anyone who isn’t, parodon the wording: an idiot*?
'* As used in latinitas senior, which I know probably less about than would fill a blank sheet of paper. I would have to try this one out. But it probably would take more time to think about what to write down than reading three Wikipedia entries and deciding I would currently not need to read a book about late Latin.
Sorry, I simply couldn’t resist. Reading tips like this give me a rash on the back of my head I need to scratch by being sarcastic.
Bottom line: If I had time to read books, I would not be on boing boing BBS.
Oh my, here I go again. I feel a Bad Mood rising. I feel trouble on the way.
2 Likes
Yeah, pottying takes a while. But she’s still just learning, so she needs the time and distraction to let her body do what it needs to. If we try to ask her to just sit and pee, she focuses too much and can’t. And just getting her on the potty is still a priority. She does have a two book/story limit. We try to keep only the short books in the bathroom.
We read to her at least an hour a day between the car, potty, before bath , etc. She loves books and stories and we try our best to encourage that.
1 Like
We have potty-specific books we break out for that.
2 Likes
Considering I doubt my future is in academia, it hardly matters.
[ETA] BUT… I do think that writing for a broader audience, especially in my field is important. I don’t think we should “dumb” our stuff down for a non-academic audience, but we should aim for a broad audience of people who are interested in our specific fields of study.
But the problem isn’t just that books aren’t marketed or written for a broad audience (because there is an audience for academic books outside the academy). It’s the amount of time we all have to actually read the vast amount of reading material out there. Without good marketing to a broader audience (which most academic presses really can’t afford to access, so they end up hawking books at conferences and directly to academics), you’re not getting into that market. You’ll not get your books on the front kiosk at B&N and you won’t get invited to give a talk at a major book store.
It’s not just a problem of academics being too obscure or not writing to a wider audience, it’s a problem of the market and access to that market too. Going with an academic press (which people NEED to do to get tenure) will not get you into the mainstream.
5 Likes
I’m more of a genre reader, and thank Glorb, the epic doorstoppers by Steven Erikson for example have wiki’s online with all the references I need.
1 Like
My (technically) granddaughter is just the right age to be read cool stories. Sadly, that would mean her sitting still and shutting up for protracted periods of time, which she feels would be better utilised rootling around in the ‘No’ cupboard, running round on circles and bouncing on beds. So no happily reading stories to smalls for me 
2 Likes
Loved that treatment of a bad guy as someone who had memorized the phone book (and the Green Book) as his main threatening mode. Of course he got matched a few times as a trope. No idea who all ran it…
1 Like
I am fully aware how lucky we are that so far, our kid can and does sit still for books. It’s part of why we read so much now- she might change. I love books and I’m fortunate I can share that with her.
Though when she is fidgety, she stands while we read, so she can bounce in place. Might be worth trying if you haven’t.
2 Likes
