Banned Books Week

Hey!  Guess what!  It was recently Banned Books Week!  In case you didn’t know.  I guess some people don’t pay attention to celebrating banned books.  Personally—probably because I pretty much only follow libraries, publishers, and authors—my Twitter feed was exploding with #bannedbooksweek and #bannedbook, and of course #MCL150 since Multnomah County Library’s sesquicentennial celebrate magically coincided with BBW.  The party for MCL was amazing—marching bands, ballet, opera, Bollywood dancing—the entertainment was top notch, and the food—Salt & Straw, Case Study Coffee (special biblio blend!), Voodoo Doughnuts—really showcased Portland’s love affair with caffeine and sweets.  And, of course, MCL’s giant library card came out.  I was pleased that the late September weather was cool enough to justify fall wear, I got to break out the cool “bookworm” socks that kinda-sorta matched my tights.  

Aside from the awesome shindig that was the MCL 150 party I (sadly) didn’t do much to celebrate BBW.  I think the books I read that week were almost all proofs, some of them may have even been too new to have been banned yet (knowing about all the crazy people out there I am sure most of them will be censored somewhere, by someone, at some point—guess I was observing BBW with future banned books).  In reality I celebrated by doing homework, more homework, and hanging out at the library; pretty much how I celebrate every week!

Vocabulary Lesson - Homophones (part 1)

Nobody is perfect.  Everyone makes mistakes when writing—typos, grammatical errors, silly misspellings, not noticing that auto correct has “fixed” your nephew’s name (Dex, with a "D" auto correct!) until after you’ve sent the text.  I myself am absolutely terrible at putting commas after prepositional phrases at the beginning of a sentence while I am typing, (most of the time it’s because I rewrite the sentence 8 times, combine with four other sentences and then move it to the opening paragraph because that’s where that idea really should be anyway) but that’s what editing is for: to catch, and fix, mistakes before it’s too late.

I don’t care about informal writing.  If it tickles your fancy in informal writing to throw in numerals, or drop vowels, or only write every third letter that’s fine by me—with the one giant caveat that you get your point across with a minimum of fuss for your intended audience.  Because communication is the point of writing.  Which brings me to my point.  WHY CAN’T PEOPLE WRITE?  I'm not talking about small children, these are college and graduate school educated people.  In my day, a missing Oxford comma was grounds for Comment (yes, with a capital C!) from the professor, and ridicule from classmate.  Then again, I was educated in Scotland where we had undergraduate gowns, and ran into the north sea at dawn on May 1, and they whacked us on the head with a bit of leather at graduation.  Perhaps an American education is less strict about punctuation. 

For most of the last two years I have been working a variety of temp jobs, I’ve been in HR in offices and universities, I’ve worked in law school admissions, and I’ve worked with college students seeking employment.  In nearly all the positions I’ve worked in the last two years, cover letters and resumes have crossed my desk on their way to hiring managers, and admissions officers.  With that many cover letters crossing my desk, I expect to see the occasional mistake, the key word there being OCCASIONAL.  The number of times I have seen the sentence “my interest was peaked…” is no longer a statistically probable typo, it’s a choice people are making.  While it is entirely possible all of those people did, in fact, mean that their interest had either reached a summit or was sickly looking, I feel the more likely scenario is that they simply don’t know the difference between “peaked” and “piqued”.  I always have a nasty little urge to write to them saying “While enjoying a delicious piquéd¹ chicken sandwich at lunch, I peeked² at your cover letter; my interest was piqued³ by your use of “peaked”⁴, is it possible you picked the wrong homophone?.”  I always imaging a confused look followed by their head exploding.  

 

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1 adj. of meat, flavored with strips of bacon, larded.
2 v. to glance at, to pry (among many other meanings)
3 adj. characterized by an arousal of a feeling, esp. curiosity or interest (among many other meanings, none synonymous with “peaked”)
4 adj. (1) having reached a peak or point, (2) sickly looking

The End of the Summer Reading

Another year of summer reading is officially over.  :(  I spent about half the summer volunteering at the Capitol Hill branch of Multnomah County Library handing out prizes as kids and teens filled in their game cards (only about half the summer because my shift was Wednesday afternoons and I got a job in late July).  I had a ton of fun as a volunteer (and got a pretty spiffy shirt!) and hopefully I can do it again next year.  The little kids were adorable when they brought up their game boards and picked their prizes, many of them seemed more excited about the free stickers than any of the coupons or books, but the parents were pretty into coupons and books for their kids.  Thursday we had an end of summer reading party with pizza and root beer floats and a big water balloon fight in the parking lot.  I suppose the only downside to summer reading was that I forgot to turn in my adult summer reading game board at MCL and only turned in about half the books I read to Lake Oswego’s Lazinfest summer reading program.  Oh well, there’s always next year I guess!

Imminent Forcible Disruption by Kittens

There are certain things I have not missed about being a student.  Well, ok, mostly just the guilt.  I have not missed that awful feeling that I really should be doing homework instead of wasting six hours every night sleeping.  I have also not really missed textbooks except as a rather effective cure for guilt inspired insomnia.

Something I’ve only just realized recently I missed is the schedule.  I know people talk about students sleeping until noon and napping in the afternoon and generally just lazing about all day, and that isn’t what I mean.  My alarm goes off about 7:45 (though I am usually allowed to hit snooze a couple times) and I have Things To Do now-a-days, being a Grown Up and all. I do Things for which polite society generally requires wearing real pants, like walk the dog or go to the store to acquire milk.  Admittedly, I do try and avoid anything that requires real pants before noon, but I hardly keep to my uni-days hours.  What I am rediscovering however, is just how much I like working at night.  There is something wonderfully peaceful about starting your work after the sun goes down, a nice cool breeze in the window and lovely quiet outside.  Mornings can be quiet too, but it’s different: early morning quiet is for sleeping, or reading, or practicing looking as though you are contemplatively staring out the window holding coffee cup while you are really sleeping with your eyes open.  

Apparently, I still do my best work between 10pm-2am, I don’t even know why I bother trying during the day.  Most of the time I spend three times longer than I should reading each article or writing anything if it’s daylight outside.  The internet is too vast with too much frivolous drivel that I MUST READ RIGHT NOW, because god knows Facebook will cease to exist if my eyes aren’t on it at least three times an hour.  Of course that doesn’t explain my crazy focus in the middle of the night, I can sit an write an essay for four solid hours in the middle of the damn night, but I literally can’t go five minutes without finding out which Doctor Who companion I am during the day.  Maybe it’s just that I get all my distractions away in one long guilt ridden Buzz Feed quiz session during the day...or maybe cute kitten videos are reverse vampires and when the sun goes down they have to go into hiding or die. 

Superfluous Verbiage

I like words, and having an interesting vocabulary means you can be more precise in communications with others; or at least it would make communication clearer and more precise if I didn’t have to stop and define half the things I say.  Sometimes it’s as simple as “yes, I did really just use ‘fortnightly’ in conversation.  No, it’s not ‘adorable’, it’s a perfectly normal word.” and other times it’s a bit more complex “Oh no, ‘zeks’ is totally legit to use on words with friends, I mean, what other word would you use for people confined to a forced labor camp in the U.S.S.R.?”  Seriously, look it up, real word.  I know this because sometimes I read the dictionary.  I love the dictionary, when I look things up (in print or online) I get to read all the words around the one I meant to look up as well.  Most of the time I don’t get to use these words, “clitic” doesn’t come up in natural conversation ever—and it’s derivatives “proclitic” and “enclitic” can really only be used in very specific grammar conversations.  Other times, however, I not only get to use the word in everyday conversation, but I can even incorporate it into a haiku-tweet!

This past month I have working on getting “obganiate” into casual conversation.  I was surprised how often opportunities presented themselves, not only were people obganiating, but it was entirely appropriate for me to discuss it (I was not the recipient of the obganiation therefore I could discuss it without becoming a nag myself).  It didn’t even take much prodding to get my hiking buddy to work it into her conversation as well!  That’s how you know you’ve succeeded, when you are no longer the only one in the conversation using the nearly obsolete word you stumbled upon while reading the dictionary.    

I’m beginning to think this might cause issues with some of my upcoming group work in a class.  Somewhere in the reading there was a suggestion we should strive to avoid our sesquipedalian tendencies.  Only the reading said it in many, many more words.  And that’s the problem: if I avoid superfluous verbiage I make myself incomprehensible, but if I don’t I can’t say a damn thing in just a few short double spaced pages.

Summer Reading

Soon I will begin volunteering at Multnomah County Library with the Summer Reading Program.  I love summer reading programs, which is why I participate in Lake Oswego’s Lazinfest every year.  In one of my classes last term we talked about reading bills of rights and things and I shared the Lazinfest Bill of Rights (below) which prompted a discussion on how there are all sorts of bills of rights out there but nothing about responsibilities.  So, naturally, I created a (boringly named) Reader’s Responsibilities list and opened it up to my classmates to add to/comment on.  I still feel like it needs work, but one classmate already said it should be posted in libraries “everywhere” so I guess it’s in a sharable state, and maybe a list like this should always be a work in progress.

Reading Responsibilities List

• You have the responsibility not to judge others based on their reading taste
• You have the responsibility to treat library books and other materials with respect so others can read/use them after you
• You have the responsibility to return materials to the library in a timely fashion so others can enjoy them as well
• You have a responsibility to respect the space of the library both in your own use of it and how your use affects others
• You have the responsibility to not give away the ending to anyone who hasn’t read it yet (unless they ask)
• You have the responsibility to respect other readers opinions, even if you think they are wrong
• You have a responsibility to be fair to authors (before bashing a book you didn’t like think about if the book really was a bad story or poorly written, or if maybe it just wasn’t the right book for you)

YOUR LAZINFEST READING BILL OF RIGHTS

• You have the right never to apologize for your reading tastes.

• You have the right to read anything you want.

• You have the right to read anywhere you want... in the bathtub, in the car, in the grocery store, under the porch, or while walking the dog.

• You have the right to read in bed. Under the covers. With a flashlight.

• You have the right to carry books in your baggage at all times.

• You have the right to read in exotic settings.

• You have the right to move your lips when you read.

• You have the right to read the good parts out loud to your nearest and dearest.

• You have the right to refuse to read the good parts out loud to your nearest and dearest.

• You have the right to read and eat at the same time. (This right, however, does not include the right to use food as a bookmark when you are reading library books. Even if it's the very best potato salad.)

• You have the right to read naked.

• You have the right to read as many books as you want at the same time.

• You have the right to throw any book on the floor and jump up and down on it (provided that you paid for it first).

• You have the right to ignore the critics at the New York Review of Books.

• More importantly, you have the right to ignore the critics in your immediate family.

• You have the right to stop reading a book whenever you decide it's not worth the effort, or that you simply don't like it.

• You have the right to refuse to read any book anyone else picks out for you. Even if it's a birthday present. (This is associated with your right to refuse to wear any necktie or perfume you receive as a gift.)

• You have the right to skip all the boring parts.

• You have the right to read the last chapter first.

• You have the right to read the last chapter first and then put the book back on the shelf.

• You have the right to refuse to read any book where you don't like the picture of the author.

FINALLY, and most important:

• If you do not have a book of your own, your tax dollars will ensure that that you have access to one through your local public library.

James Munkers Super Freak by Lindsey Little

It’s always exciting when a friend gets a book published; it’s even more exciting when the book is actually really good.  Sometimes a friend gives you something to read and all you can say “well, ahhhhh...I really liked that bit right at the end!” (you know, that bit where the drivel finally stopped).  But then sometimes a friend gives you something to read and it’s rivetingly-un-put-downably-can’t-wait-for-the-sequel good.  Happily, the latter was the case with my good friend’s soon to be published book, James Munkers Super Freak, and all I can say is thank Bragi for that!  

I got to read about James last November when I was visiting my lovely friends for their wedding in Tasmania.  I’d been pestering James’s author for quite some time to let me read the book—after all, I worked in children’s books for a long time so I could give a professional opinion.  Finally she relented and handed over her computer: all it took was a flight to rural Australia, a not-exactly-hostile honeymoon takeover (with help from other friends!), and couple demands that bordered on hysterical.  Easy peasy.  

Within 24 hours I’d read James 1½ times.  I eventually had to stop reading and be “social” with my friends.  I’d been hearing about this book and about James for so long long I was worried that finally reading it would be a letdown after all the anticipation.  But—O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!—all that waiting and pestering was worth it!  James is funny, and smart, and engaging, and perhaps just a bit mad, exactly as a 15 year old reluctant hero should be.  The writing is excellent (I know I’m biased, but I’m also a bit of an expert in the field so I think my opinion can be trusted), and James’s voice is just so engaging I wish we could have been friends when I was in high school.  I read the whole thing in one day, I wanted to really savor it but once I started it several hours passed very quickly and I’d suddenly run out of story to read.  I guess I shall just have to savor it the next time.

While I can’t guarantee that everyone’s first reading of James will be as memorable as mine, I should note that after the first read through two whales appeared and started frolicking right in front of our rental and if that’s not magical I just don’t know what is.  Alas, there were no more whales while I was reading it though again, but I can’t really blame James I suppose, he did have rather a lot to do in the story without breaking through from the world of fiction to fetch me more whales.  

Recommended: emphatically 
Published by IP Kidz
 

Asynchronous Frustration

Being a student again is...weird.  I have to participate in discussions, which is really really hard.  Normally when I am in school, I do the reading, go to class, and am relatively quiet.  It’s not that I don’t participate or prepare, it’s just that I’ve just never been one of those students who always has to be at the centre of every week’s discussion.  If I have something to add that isn’t just reiterating everyone else I will add it, otherwise I am probably going to pretty much stay quiet.  I don’t really like discussions where everyone just says the same things over and over.  I think that’s why this whole online discussion thing is so damn hard; I, and everyone else is my class, types out our discussion contributions before sending them off into the void of the internet to wait until someone deigns to read and respond.  It feels as though everyone is screaming their opinions at everyone else without listening to most of what is being said.  When I read the “responses” to posts I’ve made most of the time they aren’t really responding to what I’m saying, and when they do respond there is little more than “I agree!”.  That’s not to say I’m not totally guiltless in this, part of our grade is based on contributing to discussions so I’ve been just as guilty as everyone else of posting not to further discussion but to just get something out there for the week.  And then of course there is the fact it’s all asynchronous, nothing flows because it could be hours or days between the initial post and the response.  I’m trying to get used to it, and I try to make sure I respond (really respond, not just saying “I agree!” or hitting “reply” and saying something that has nothing to do with the post to which I am ostensibly replying) to at least one post a week, but sometimes it is just too hard to add to the noise knowing that whatever I say is just going to be drowned out by everyone else trying to make sure they meet the participation requirement.  It’s a frustrating system, metaphorically screaming my opinions into the silence and hoping to get an answer from someone in the void, but at least if my best ideas about the reading come to me in the middle of the night I don’t have to try and remember them until the next time the class meets!

Shelf Space

I have a problem.  The first step towards solving the problem is recognizing and acknowledging it right?  So I say again, I have a problem.  I went to have a quick tidy of my room this morning—tidying my room is a favorite activity when I have looming essay deadlines—and I realized I have a few books to integrate onto my shelves.  By “a few” I mean a stack taller than I am (at 5’3” it’s not all that hard to have a stack of books taller than I am).  Up until yesterday the stack was of a reasonable height of just under 5 feet tall, but then I went to the Central Library where they have the Friends of the Library store, which had some books I’ve been wanting for a very long time (real long time as in years, not fake long time as in days) and supporting the library is good thing right?  So this morning I looked at all the books that need to get on the shelves and all the shelf space I have left and realized things just can’t go on like this.  I might not get everything on the shelves this time: I HAVE A PROBLEM.  And to make matters more complicated another book just arrive; a proof from Simon & Schuster that was a total surprise.  I didn’t request it on Goodreads as far as I know, unless I’ve started entering free book giveaways in my sleep.

Now, the obvious solution (I hear you say) is to have someone give me the library from Beauty and the Beast because it’s not really possible to build more shelves in my tiny room that already has wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves.  I can’t exactly expand out into common areas either, what if someone borrowed a book without telling me and then put it back in the wrong place?  It could mess up the whole system and be lost for weeks.  Sadly, I don’t think anyone is planning to buy me the Beauty and Beast library any time soon (though I do have a birthday coming up!) and a personal library of that scale is not really practical for city living, so I think the most reasonable solution here is stacks.  Wouldn’t it be great to install a trapdoor in the bottom of my closet leading to an underground labyrinth of stacks?  The only foreseeable problem with that plan is, naturally, finding a minotaur.

Acting Out (of Character)

We had a few inches of dry powdery snow this past weekend and while most of the country wouldn’t be snowed in, here in the PNW we know that powdery snow is going to compact into a solid couple inches of ice once the freezing rain hits, so we all pretty much sheltered in place and had a nice long panic.  I did, however, with my parents brave the weather to walk to my grandmother’s house for tea.  All was fine and dandy until someone brought up Sherlock Holmes.  This is always a topic that makes grandmama sigh deeply, clasp her hands, and shake her head.  It is not, as one might think, because she dislikes Sherlock but rather because she likes him so much in his original form that she believes he should be “allowed to die” rather than be re-imagined by and for modern audiences.  While this wasn’t some big new revelation it was the most Scrooge like proclamation I’ve heard in regards to the great SH, and the first death wish.  It always bothers me when she (or anyone) gets so upset about re-imagining characters like Sherlock Homes.  I mean, in most modern adaptations he’s still a smart, socially awkward drug addict; what’s the problem?

Most of the time I don’t have a problem with reworkings stories.  Admittedly my favorite film adaptations of books often have at least some input from the author (Princess Bride, Stardust) but I don’t necessarily think author input is a requirement of a good movie adaptation.  I really love retellings/reworking of fairy tales because it is interesting to see how different people take the same story and re-imagine it for a new setting or different audience, it’s great and exciting, and keeps old stories new and fresh.  In fact I think there has only ever been one I’ve really taken issue with: the incredibly stupid movie “version” of Howl’s Moving Castle.  I think it’s because so much was changed in the stupid movie version it was barely recognizable as the same story.  Also, it was a stupid movie.

Judging People by their Book Covers

With the start of class this past week for everyone has been doing the rounds of “introduce yourself and tell us what book you are reading”.  I suppose it is quite natural given the bookish nature of the program that the question about what any one of us is reading at any given moment should come up, and it is fascinating to read people’s answers.  Having worked in children’s books for quite some time I’m not all that surprised by how many people admit they are reading children/YA books; I am surprise at how many of these YA loving book people are discovering Harry Potter for the first time.  I am also shocked by how many people admit they “aren’t really reading anything at the moment” (okay, maybe two people, but still, that’s a lot).  I actually don’t know how to react to that, people like that just aren’t in my realm of experience.  I start to panic if I’m only reading one book, usually I have at least two or three going so I can switch around based on my mood.  I’m more likely to max out a library card (the most I’ve ever maxed out at one time was three!) than I am to max out my only credit card—which has an astonishingly low limit, I couldn’t even use it to buy my plane ticket to Tasmania the limit is so low (why would I need a higher one? it’s only for emergencies).  I don’t understand people who “aren’t really reading anything at the moment”.  I’m not sure I trust them, seems shifty.  

The exciting thing about getting to pry into all my new classmate’s reading lists is that I unabashedly judge people by what they are reading (or not, if you aren’t reading anything, I just back away slowly).  My judgements usually consist of something along the lines of “OH MY GOD WE READ ALL THE SAME BOOKS!  WE SHOULD BE BEST FRIENDS!” or “Twilight? ewww!  Are you reading that ironically or do you really like sparkly vampires?”.  And the flip side is,  I fully expect people are judging me by what I’m reading.  I assume other people look at what I’m reading on the train or the airplane or in the coffee shop and judge me, just a little, by my book.  I take it for granted people think “Oh my god, she’s reading that? ewww!” or “hey, I loved that book! she must be cool”.  But even more than judging people by what they are reading I judge them by what they say about what they’re reading.  The thing that get’s the most respect from me (even if you are choosing to read A Clockwork Orange for Children*) is having an opinion about the book: good, bad, mediocre, I don’t care as long as you’re forming some sort of judgement about whatever you’re reading.    

I very clearly remember a conversation from several years ago with a friend of a friend about what he was reading at the time.  I’d gone to a pub to see my friend’s band play and was introduced to this guy whose name I have since forgotten who was reading a book while waiting for the band to set up.  The conversation went like this:

Me: What are you reading?

The Pretentious Git: Oh, you know, Catcher in the Rye, by Salinger.

Me (not judging yet): Oh, neat.  Are you liking it?

TPG (looking at me like I’m possibly stupid): Uhh, it’s Salinger.

Me (starting to judge a little but trying to be nice): Ok, have you read it before?  What do you like about it?  

TPG (looking at me like I’ve just admitted to enjoying eviscerating kittens): Well, it’s SALLLLINGERRRR.

At this point he stopped talking to me, turned around and kept reading.  I don’t think he ever actually turned the page and the book was angled a bit too high up for comfortable reading, but just the right way for everyone in pub to see what book he had.  Also, at this point, I got pretty judgemental and promptly renamed him The Pretentious Git.  

See, the problem wasn’t that he was reading Salinger it was that he couldn’t articulate what he thought about it (I still don’t know if he liked it, but I know he knows who wrote it).  I have far more respect for someone reading Fifty Shades of Grey (even though the writing is poor and there are much better books out there if you’re into that kind of thing) if they can give me a reason for reading it beyond projecting some persona to world.  TPG was clearly reading SALLLLINGERRRR because, in his mind, it presented whatever image he wanted to present; unfortunately for his carefully constructed image of himself, his inability to even tell me whether or not he was enjoying the book presented an much more asinine persona than he probably intended.

*actual title of a manuscript I received while interning in the editorial department at a publisher.  Yes, it was exactly what it sounds like.

Once More With Feeling

I started re-reading The Princess Bride this week.  I love re-reading books: I always pick up on little details I’d forgotten, or nuances I hadn’t picked up before.  Sometimes I realize I’d forgotten major details and it is like reading a whole new book!  I know my mom experiences the whole new book phenomenon almost every time she re-reads something because she can’t remember a story once she’s finished.  It is very frustrating to talk to her about what she’s reading because once she’s put the book down she has no idea.  Just this weekend we were at Nana’s for dinner and when mom announced she’d finally finished her book, she wasn’t able to tell dad anything about how it ended; less than twenty four hours after finishing she’d completely forgotten the plot!  She always ends up accidentally re-reading books because she can’t remember if she knows the story.

On the other end of the spectrum I have a very good friend who never re-reads books; he buys books, reads them once, then keeps them like trophies (sometimes he buys books he’s already read but didn’t own just to have the trophy).  It’s odd and it’s more than slightly distressing; maybe it’s because he’s Dutch.  It is one of the few issues we just can’t come to any sort of agreement on.  Not re-reading a single book that you didn’t particularly care for is fine, not re-reading any book ever as a policy is downright weird.  I don’t plan re-read every book I’ve ever read, reading new books is exciting too.  Most of what I read are new-to-me books, but I just can’t understand people who won’t read a book again, it’s like eating mac and cheese and saying “well, that was good, but as a matter of policy I’ll never eat it again”.

Back to The Princess Bride, I’d forgotten how much I love this book!  I suppose I should thank my Tasmania friends, since they had someone do a reading from this book at their wedding.  I’d been thinking I really should re-read it, but listening some random man dressed as Miracle Max read from it in a tent in a paddock in Tasmania really brought home just how much I need to re-read it now.  So here I am, re-reading it.  The way things are currently going I might very well re-read it again as soon as I finish.  It has certainly been nice to read a bit of comfort literature after discovering the author of the last book I read primarily writes romance novels.

Just before the re-read started I finished a YA steampunk novel (the best description was the Goodreads review that called it “a bookish chimera”) which I enjoyed, even though it had a few irritating points.  The most irritating point came in the form of a wholly unnecessary time traveling character (time travel, really? you’ve already got Sherlock’s niece (Mycroft has a child? really?), Bram Stoker’s little sister, a cult that worships an Egyptian goddess, all set in a steampunk alternate history–do you really need to add unnecessary time travel into the mix?).  Now, I could get past the time travel thing (though I think the author had covered pretty much every other possible thing currently popular in YA fiction and would have been justified in leaving out something) had it not broken one of Mark Twain’s 19 rules governing fiction.  To be specific, it oblivionized rule 4, which states “that the personages in a tale, both dead and alive, shall exhibit a sufficient excuse for being there.”  The time traveler did not, in my mind, exhibit sufficient reason for being there (there are quite a few other members of Goodreads who share my opinion on this).  Perhaps he will justify his existence in the sequel; equally appealing is the idea that he will be sent back to future or simply killed off, thus ridding the story of it’s least agreeable feature.

Obsoletism

I impressed the girl from New Zealand who is staying with us at the moment—impressed and maybe horrified just a little—when I asked to pop into the room where she’s staying and just grab a book from the reference section.  I guess it’s a little atypical to have a reference section in your bedroom, but where else am I going to put my dictionaries?  I didn’t try explaining that the general reference section does not include craft reference books (what kind of a crazy person would have their Knitting Bible next to their Grammar Bible?), nor does it include pre-modern reference books; I want my Anglo-Saxon dictionary by my Anglo-Saxon texts.  She was doubly impressed (or horrified, still not sure which) when I was able to walk right over to the shelf and grab Charles Lipson’s Cite Right almost without even looking; ah! the power of organizing your books!

I usually avoid telling people how I organize my books until I know them fairly well, once people find out your fiction sections are organized by intended audience, genera, author, and original publication year, “because it’s easier that way”, they tend to think you’re crazy (if they didn’t already decide you were crazy when it slipped out you have a “fiction section” on your shelves.).  I’ve also started getting really cagey about exactly how many books I have: before moving to London I culled it down to “between four and five hundred [495] if you don’t count proofs” and obviously any ebooks are excluded.  Since moving back from London I’ve added about 20 feet of books onto the shelves.  Yes, I measure books in feet when I add them to my shelves because you can never buy just one!  But I need them all, and have actually read most of them.  And of course I use my reference section all the time (including the pre-modern western European languages reference books).

I think my new Kiwi friend was bemused that not only did I own a book all about citations (she didn’t see the one I had checked out from the library as well), but I was actually using it.  Most people I know have switched to the internet as a primary source of knowledge for things like citation examples, in part (I’m sure) because information changes so rapidly things in a book can be made obsolete before they’re even published.  I also actually use my Grammar Bible, various punctuation guides, and even my hard copy Oxford English Dictionary (the all-in-one version with the little magnifying glass for added fun!).  This practice confounds people (along with my habitual use of “fortnightly” in conversation), half the time when I pull out my dictionary they look at me like I belong in a museum; more than half the time, however, I find the definition of a word in my book before their phone finds it on the internet.

Words Words Words

I had dinner with my Grandmother this weekend and she chastised me for using a particular word (sabbatical rather than sabbatic) incorrectly.  Of course, the particular word in question can be either a noun or an adjective in modern speech, but over a dinner of homemade mac and cheese I was told in no uncertain terms that sabbatical is and only should be an adjective—it was also rather heavily implied that this was the sort of thing that was causing the downfall of western civilization as we know it.  As I sat there, staring blankly at her shaking head (which she also managed to cradle in her hands for added emphasis that I was willfully contributing to the less than dignified slaughter of the English language), I couldn’t help but think “LANGUAGE CHANGES ALL THE TIME!  I’M RIGHT!  I WAS 100% ACCURATE IN MY WORD CHOICE! STOP ACCUSING ME OF NOT KNOWING WHAT I’M SAYING!” (I think I actually said something like “mmhmm” and tried not to giggle).  This is not the first time she’s bemoaned the butchering of the English language by those one or two generations removed from her own.  

That’s not to say that every instance of correcting a person’s word choice is wrong: I am personally quite disdainful of people who are past  the third grade and have yet to figure out your-you’re, or their-there-they’re.  With the exception of (actual) gross inaccuracies, I’m unlikely to correct someone at the dinner table; I will, however, admit to pedantically correcting certain friends of mine in private just to get their dander up—there is one friend in particular with whom I view this activity as a kind of sport.  No matter how much fun I may have at my little game with my dear friend (who hasn’t yet figured out she’s playing making it all the more fun and all the easier to get a rise out of her) I don’t generally assume that civilization will crumble if people have are a little bit fast and loose with verbiage in everyday speech.

DON'T PANIC!

I'll admit to being a bit wary of an online course; it's not that I don't think I can do it, but I think I'll miss the food.  My last course had a grand total of 4 people.  That was it, the whole department; Rebecca, Laura, Katie and me: 4 people, 4 countries represented, and one helluva lotta good food.  I know that seems like an odd thing to be thinking about in an assignment assessing whether or not I’m ready for an online course, but so much was about team work and how that works online it seemed natural to think about my last course, and my last academic team.

The Beginning...

There were two lectures to watch for the class, though I think I absorbed more by reading the transcripts after watching/listening to the videos.  They were all about team work, so of course I thought "great, I like people and working with them, how awesome to learn about applying that skill to my online schooling" (well, I probably thought something like "huh, neat" but the sentiment is the same right?).  According to Dr Haycock’s presentation my last academic team was barely qualified to use the term, but actually I thought we were just about the right size.  With only 4 of us we really got to know each other really well; we became familiar with the way we each approached challenges, and we influenced each others’ understanding of the materials in profound and meaningful ways.  Isn’t that an important part of team work, at least in an academic sense?  I want more from a team than just getting the assignment done, I want to actually get to know the people with whom I am working so maybe we can support each other beyond handing in the assignment.  I think it's easier to really get to know people in smaller groups, which is why I like smaller teams.

Dr Hancock went to cite research about the five dysfunctions of teams, all of which I think will be more pronounced in bigger teams and in an online environment.  It’s going to be a whole lot harder to trust the faceless messages in my inbox than it was to trust the smiling Englishwoman giving me tea.  The nature of an asynchronous environment is going to make all the dysfunctions more prominent and the early more conflict laden stages of teamwork longer.  The asynchronicity will also change the way I have to think about collaborating with teammates (emphasized quite a bit by both Haycock and Irwin); less traditional discussion, more emailing back and forth spending ages hashing out what could have been done in moments around a traditional table.  Without non-verbal cues communication has to be more formal and reserved or risk being misinterpreted and causing unnecessary trouble, I think this will also add to the challenges of teamwork in an online environment.

To be perfectly honest, I like teamwork.  I like collaborating with my fellow students and I always find the conversation is interesting and enlightening even (or perhaps especially) if we stray a bit off topic every once in a while.  I think it’s great that I can work with people whose approaches are quite different to my own and I think people can be more daring in their ideas and work when they are confident their weaknesses (real or perceived) will be buoyed by the collective strengths of the group for the benefit of all.  It's going to be tricky learning how to do all this with out the natural social aspects (and the warm fuzzy feeling when your new teammate offers the homemade brownies round the table); but talking to teammates is the key in person so I guess it makes sense both lectures heavily emphasized communication early and often.

I have to say I did not find either Haycock or Irwin particularly reassuring on the topic of online team work: if anything I am more nervous about online teamwork now than before.  I'd never before considered it a monster and Haycock's assumption that all people hate teamwork was, frankly, off putting.  Their tips were sound, but felt a bit like common sense at times (maybe it was just because I was annoyed at the assumption I, the audience, would rather work alone than on a team), but maybe the point was to remind people to take a respectful and common sense approach to teamwork in order to optimize the team's success. Maybe I hadn't thought about it enough to be worried, but I've always felt like as long as everyone makes the effort to communicate ideas, needs, worries, etc with their teammates teams can not only make the work more fun, but everyone can merrily enjoy the exultation of community learning.

Part Two: With My New Found Trepidation Towards Online Teamwork, Am I Ready For This?

The online assessment seems to think I’m ready, which is great!  Not that anonymous online surveys do all that much to assuage my fears my computer will spontaneously combust and The Internet will miraculously come to life and decide it hates me and won’t let me use it any more even if I get a new computer.  If you haven’t gathered it by now I have a slightly over active imagination and a totally irrational set of mildly neurotic fears; it’s why I put my phone on silent, take the battery out, and leave it at home before going to the cinema.  I like a challenge, which is good because I think this will be challenging, it’s new, it’s exciting, but there is an element of isolation that I think will be one of the most difficult things. 

I like working independently, but school and academia have always been more than just the work for me: the social aspects are, in my opinion, just as important.  I supposes it would be called “networking” but sometimes you don’t want to network, or do work, or talk about you dissertation you just want to go to the pub with your mates and read the Codex Argenteus over a couple of pints.  So that’s going to be hard for me.  The discussion areas will allow for some interaction with my fellow students, but if anyone is ever in Portland we should go for a pint an some non-shop talk.  After listening to the presentations I’m looking forward to teamwork with a little more trepidation that usual, but I think I’ll enjoy getting to know my classmates in courses when I work in teams.

I always love when the question comes up about organization.  I like organization, it’s fun, it makes life easy, and organizing your life makes for excellent procrastination.  I love my paper calendar, my Google calendar, my phone’s calendar and I have an unhealthy relationship with spreadsheets.  I have a color coded Thanksgiving cooking chart so I can cook a whole dinner for twelve from scratch (including bread and pie crust) in one day in a small, unfamiliar, British kitchen.  I scheduled wine breaks and panic attacks, just to be sure.  Of course sometimes the organization can get in the way of time management, I can get a bit too involved organizing things and suddenly I’ve barely enough time to finish (though I do turn in assignments on time and my books are organized by reading level, then author, then original publication date which is just lovely).

I’ll admit I laughed a bit at the thought it’s more reading that other courses.  I know I shouldn’t, I haven’t done it yet how could I know right?  But I just can’t believe that I will be in for more reading than the term I read a novel a week, plus supplementary reading for just one class.  I think the hardest part will be the type of reading—I doubt I’ll be reading a novel a week for class.  On the bright side I’m hopeful that all my readings will be in English, or at least a living language, so that will be exciting and new.

I guess to sum up I’m not totally sure if I’m ready and I think that’s a good thing.  I won't get complacent if I'm constantly a tiny bit afraid I've gone completely bonkers signing myself up for an online thing.  I’ll find support when I’m struggling, I’ll work though the difficulties I come across because I want to be here, and I hope my classmates do too.  I’ll get ready and be fine, this whole online school thing may be a path I tread ostensibly alone; but, I am by no means the first to do so and the path should be pretty well marked.  And if I’m not in a physical classroom with my classmates I’ll get to eat all the candied bacon chocolate chip cookies myself.

Unconquerable Imagined Difficulties

Starting my MLIS this week I was totally thrown by the question "what are you currently reading or what was the last book you read?".  I get asked this a lot when I attend friends' parties and don't know a lot of the other guests, they find out I'm an English lit major and they breath a huge sign of relief because surly they can engage an English lit major in a conversation about books.  It seems an innocent enough query; but, it is always one of my least favorite questions because I'm never quite sure how to answer it.  Do I tell the truth, that I am reading a stupidly long list of books, and yes I can keep all the stories straight in the my head; or do I try and pick just one (or two or three) that I feel that particular audience might be interested in (or not if I no longer really care to be speaking to the asker of the question)?  Usually the look of panic and the stuttered "uhhh….what I am reading?" causes the asking to back away slowly.

I'm down to one book I am deliberately reading at the moment, but a mere three days ago I was still in the middle of reading two others (or was it three?).  I started a book on the airplane flying to Tasmania in November but it's still buried somewhere in the exploded piles of holiday (and Holiday) debris, does that count as currently reading?  What about the copy of Jane Eyre that mysteriously disappeared between Portland and St Andrews third year of university, I don't think I finished that, am I "currently" reading it?

Then there is the problem of emergency books.  I've got the Kindle app on my phone so (as long as it's charged) I've always got a selection of books in my pocket for times when I don't have my on-purpose book.  Usually I read non-fiction tomes as an emergency book, but I'm working my way though Les Miserables again and I'm always happy to re-read about Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses.  I've also got a few random hard copy books stashed in unusual places for emergency situations (cars, cupboards, sock drawers) that I may or may not be in the middle of reading.

The fact that I am usually reading about 8 books at any given time (though the list can change almost daily) means I have similar problems figuring out what I should say when people ask me the last book I read.  I mean, I finished a book between when I first read the question online and when I actually got around to answering it in the discussion forum.

Maybe I'm over thinking the whole thing, but I always feel like I'm going to seem rather pompous if I list all the books I'm "currently" reading or have recently read and then people will stop talking to me and I'll be the one standing in a corner by myself at the party trying to figure out if there is anyway I can use all my letters in one go on Words With Friends.

Second Edition

This blog originally started as a way to organize my book elevator pitches; what would I say to a customer on a busy Saturday afternoon at the bookshop to make them want to read that one perfect book?  No more than a couple hundred words, whatever I could say in a single breath.  Then I moved from London to New Jersey and New Jersey to Portland in just a few months and started a brand new job where I didn't get to talk about books all day and the whole thing kind of fell apart.  Somewhere I have all sorts of notes and quick reviews of books that maybe I will get around to posting but for now I think it's best to just carry on. 

So the new, with luck improved, blog will be a bit different: I'm starting an MLIS at San Jose State which means I will probably end up writing about things other than books but sort of kind of related to books.  Ideally I'll be posting at least a couple times a month (I'd say every week, but I doubt I'll do that) to organize my thoughts and keep a nice record of things for myself later.  Sadly I will probably have to schedule time on my calendar to do this and only post when I get an email reminder from Google.  Mostly I'm guessing I'll be about the only one reading this so it will probably seem odd and scattered to anyone else.  If anyone does happen to read this let me know, having an audience will make me fret over the whole a bit more but will also inspire me to write more often (maybe) and perhaps less insanely.