Weasel’s Road of Good Intentions
At this very moment I’m looking at my supply of good intentions – sitting on my desk as it happens, and not paving the road outside my door. It would be interesting if my road were paved with my good intentions, since these take the form of books and that would be an interesting and colorful road. It’s tempting to chase a metaphor down the lane and state that if e-readers become any more prevalent we might as well use books as paving stones. Perhaps you’re like me and fighting the rising e-tide and keeping hold of paper and ink, but I fear we’re going the way of the dinosaur, the dodo, and the good job after college.
My stack is colorful, varied, and like all good intentions – mostly unused. It’s not really my fault. The covers are so bright, the fonts so enticing, the bindings so lush and there was a — okay, now I’m flashing on John Belushi in The Blues Brothers declaring the equivalent to a woman with an automatic weapon. Do you see my eyebrows raised over my soulful green eyes? Is it working? Do I need to run now?
Damn! Thought I had you there for a minute.
Books, books, and books. They line my walls at home, they slide around in the trunk of my car and at the bottom of my gym bag, and now they’re sitting at my desk waiting to go back to the library. I can take them, it’s just across the quad, but I’m loathe to give them up yet. I’ve only read one of them from cover to cover, made it halfway through another and merely perused the remainders. It’s not that they aren’t good titles, they’re delightful, but the problem is with me.
It’s like this; have you ever found yourself eating a bag of french fries for dinner when you could have had a salad? Gone for the cereal when the yogurt was sitting right there in the fridge? Picked up a cookie and ignored the apple? Those are the comfort-carb blues. I have tossed out many a bag of salad soup along with my best intentions and an empty cookie box, and these books are my mental equivalent. With this wealth of learning and entertainment at my fingertips, I have wasted my precious reading time with familiar novels and I’m not sure why. Look at my choices:
Narcissism: Denial of the True Self – Alexander Lowen, M.D.
Absinthe: History in a Bottle – Barnaby Conrad III
Adventures Among the Ants: A Global Safari with a Cast of Trillions – Mark W. Moffett
In Defense of Food – Michael Pollan
The Hundred-Food Journey – Richard C. Morais
Apollo’s Angels – Jennifer Homans
How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming – Mike Brown
Uncorking the Past: The Quest for Wine, Beer, and Other Alcoholic Beverages – Patrick McGovern
I made it all of the way through The Hundred-Foot Journey and even wrote a blog about it. Adventures Among the Ants was great but that trek ended three-quarters of the way through the book, (the photos are astonishing). Narcissism was informative and (self?) absorbing but more of a reference book. Absinthe, like the liquor itself, was not what I expected. Pluto might have been a great murder mystery but remains unsolved as far as I’m concerned. Pollan’s Defense of Food boiled down to the simplest sentence: Eat food, not too much, mostly plants. Apollo’s Angels is a history of ballet and really should be more exciting. The writer left in all the history but none of the gossip and snark that makes a good study of the arts. The Quest for Wine… still has a chance, it’s going back home with me tonight.
So why the failure on my part to reach my reading goals? It’s a perfect storm of reasons; partly my own unrealistic goal setting habits, partly the lack of time, but mostly just underestimating the need for a little mental comfort food right now. So many things are changing, personally and professionally, that a safe and familiar book is like an old bathrobe after a day in a suit and heels. My daily reading time doesn’t happen until after 10pm when I’m trying to wind down and go to sleep and maybe world food politics and technicolor bug closeups aren’t the best plan. If I’m going to browse this selection right before dropping into dream-time, I shouldn’t be surprised if a giant ant in a tutu shows up in my favorite bar and asks me if I want a cookie.
Yes, please.
What Flavor Will You Choose?
The story line is simple, the telling of it equally simple. I wasn’t surprised by anything in the plot although I was occasionally moved by his loss or delighted by his accomplishment. For me, the book was more about flavor than about story, more of a lengthy sampling of spices told with such expression that I was intrigued and entranced. Any foodie knows this feeling; it’s why we watch The Food Network or the Travel Channel the way some men watch porn. The description of flavors, preparations, and even shopping for the very freshest ingredients was a sensual revelation. If you’ve ever watched ‘No Reservations’ with Anthony Bourdain you know what I’m talking about. The difference is that when I watch a food travelogue I feel that I’m standing outside with my nose pressed against the window while the diners have all the fun. Reading about it so different, it’s intimate, it’s an invitation inside the restaurant, to a seat at the table, to hover over the chef’s shoulder as he picks and preps and creates something marvelous.
I said earlier that life is change. My life is all about change these days, small, medium and large. I once read that what people want, what they really want when all the wish-lists are stripped away, is for tomorrow to be just like today. Even if today was bad, it’s a bad we’re familiar with and know how to wear.
This story is all about food but not just food. It’s also about a person who’s early life was defined by change, partly against his desire and some by deliberate choice. Some of the choices were hard and involved letting go of one world to step into another, but each had their own flavor. He found a way to make something delicious out of them both. I like that, the thought that choosing a new life isn’t a rejection of what came before but an embrace of what comes next.
New choices, new flavors, new joys. The 100-Foot Journey: A Novel by Richard Morais
Weasel Ads Up
This adorable mower is very friendly, has all four wheels, a big engine that goes ‘Vroommm’, a sharp spinning thing that goes round really fast and frightens the lawn to death. It also has a big bag hanging on the back that the mortally wounded grass crawls into to hide, and a big handle that must not like me very much because it moves along the rows without me hardly touching it. The manual says it’s self-propelled which is an admirable personality quality that I wish I possessed. As much as I like the mower, it needs a younger and more active owner and besides, it doesn’t get along with my Roomba.
Weasel at Home
Imagine a book written about home; not your place but home in general. What do you actually know about your home? You know the obvious things, its occupants, furnishings, maybe even who built it and when, but do you know why your dwelling is a house and not a cave, a tent, or a hobbit-like burrow? Why do you have a kitchen in your home? For much of history kitchens were non-existent or detached for safety reasons. Do you have indoor plumbing, carpets, or a front entry hall? You might think those are such obvious questions they don’t even need to be asked, but then you wouldn’t be Bill Bryson.
Mr. Bryson is a travel writer and I’ve blogged about him before. He’s the one who travels to far-off and interesting locations and then walks all over the place, writing out his experiences and musings in a ‘whatever-strikes-his-fancy’ manner that is a pleasure to read. Going through one of his books is a bit like traveling with a favorite uncle who’s a bit of a character but certain to take you to interesting places. My favorite book of his to date is ‘In a Sunburned Country’ and very nearly made me want to visit Australia. If it weren’t for that pesky spider that gets so surly during the mating season and flings it’s enormous self at phobic tourists, I might even consider it. However, huge aggressive spiders are a very certain prophylactic against my presence so Australia is right out. Sorry Bruce, there’s not enough lager in the world to get me on the same continent as the Sydney Funnel-web Spider.
I’ve traveled a bit and as much as I enjoy it, that moment of finally coming home and crawling into my own bed is one of the happier moments in life. Perhaps that’s why Mr. Bryson’s recent book focused on a location near and dear; his very own home in Norfolk, England. His home is a former parsonage and sounds like a charming warren of little rooms and odd, forgotten spaces. Prowling around a place like that can be a real pleasure and may have been the inspiration for ‘At Home: A Short History of Private Life.’
The author takes us on a bit of a room by room tour of his home and then uses each room as a section of the book. It’s much more than just a description of the Bryson household because he digs into the origin of things we barely notice. Learning the history of hallways, sculleries, dining rooms and drawing rooms was a real treat. Each space launched a history lesson and I had never heard any of this before. I guess like most people I think of history in terms of significant dates, events, and important people, but the history of indoor plumbing and the flush toilet is not only relevant to my personal existence, it’s really fun to read. Education in America has a lot to answer for in that I’ve sat through years of history lessons that were deadly dull when the reality is that our past is utterly fascinating.
I won’t get into the details of each chapter but if you want to know why giving birth in a hospital used to be a REALLY bad idea (think of soap and water and not having any in a hospital setting and you’ll get the idea), or why the government of England in the 14th century enacted legislation known as Sumptuary Laws to control the who had rights to fashionable clothes. Anyone who thinks the government is currently in their business should imagine what it would be like if the fabric used in your pants was a matter of law. Yes, there really were Fashion Police before Joan Rivers got her own show. Read the section about dressing rooms to learn why shortages of wheat flour in the 1700’s led to riots and a national fashion crisis. If you had to choose between a loaf of bread and powder for your wig you wouldn’t have any problem at all, but the well-dressed man of 1770 would rather skip the muffin and make sure his curls were well-dusted. It may be hard for us to understand a fashion that required men to shave their heads bald in order to wear a huge wig of pink or blue curls, but just look at Donald Trump’s comb-over and you’ll see that crazy fashion ideas aren’t all that far removed from modern life.
In my rating system the Best Friend Read is the second best rating available and means I took my time and savored every moment of the book, as if it were a coffee date with my best friend. This book was like an extended and intimate conversation with a very best friend, in their own lovely and quirky home. It doesn’t matter if you like history or not, you’ll enjoy getting to know your own living space. You will be surprised and delighted, shocked and appalled, but you certainly won’t be bored.
At Home: A Short History of Private Life by Bill Bryson, published by DoubleDay.
Seven Weasels and 30 Chihuahuas
When your escort takes one look at you and stops dead, it’s either really, really good, or you’ve forgotten to put on your pants. This was really, really good. I’m so glad because the alternative would have really messed with my evening, although the entertainment value for the rest of the group may have been greater.
Don’t Judge a Book by Its Cover?
It’s different in the bookstore. Here the design reigns supreme. I have never stood with two books in my hands, counting the pages and dividing by the cover price to come up with the rational selection. What I do is open the book to the table of contents, skip to the middle of the book for sample of the writing style, and then skim the entire book looking for pictures. I won’t reject a book for lack of pictures but I might choose one if they’re included. As a visual organizer, the pictures help me absorb the information by giving me a mental image to help anchor the text. But the most important criteria is the cover.
A Furloughing We Will Go
My laptop won’t fit in my lap when my lap is full of wagging tails and my latest book is right there next to me, begging me to be bad and read the day away. But – I am resolute and take a firm stand on this; I always give in.
Hang On Baby
His previous books about Australia and a walking tour of England were much more entertaining, but I’m loyal and you never know when you might find a gem hiding in the collection. No gems in this one but it was a pleasant setting.
Beyond the Jet Pack
Most of all, I love the technology of Star Trek. I loved the medical scanners, the communication devices, ‘the transporter for ‘beaming’ down, and doors that SWOOSHED open. These were the stars of the show for me. My daydreams were based on a marvelous vision of the future, but the reality of becoming that society is proving a lot tougher than I expected.
