Books plus other stuff
Since I read at lunch pretty much every day, I often are asked the same questions. One is "how long does it take you to finish a book" or "how fast do you read" or the like. I never know how to handle this because the time it takes depends on many factors such as the length of the book, the difficulty of the book, and how busy I am at work. For example, if I'm reading a 200 page modern-ish best seller (like say Neverwhere) and can take somewhat long lunches, I can finish it in under a week. If I'm reading a longer, older, denser text, it'll take much longer like Dream of the Red Chamber or Atlas Shrugged took me multiple months. Sometimes I feel like I give answers which make me feel like I'm slow and stupid, especially when I'm reading something dense.
But the more interesting question and understandable question is "what's your favorite". I'm really bad at picking favorites like Chidi from The Good Place. I think it's especially difficult when its lots of different genres and different types of books. But this made me think about what are some of my favorite books. I also looked through my library yesterday to think about it some more, but here is a noncommittal, non-ordered list of some top books.
Top Books in no order
The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley
I keep saying that The Mists of Avalon is the best book that I've read recently, but it turns out that I read it like a while ago, more than 5 years. So it definitely should be moved from "the best book that I read recently" to "one of the best books that I've read". I mainly read it as a recommendation from Angie. At first, I was afraid that it'd be too feminist, but I didn't think it was that at all (unlike say Queen of the Damned). The book definitely focuses on female characters, but some of them are terrible and incompetent so its not "that" type of feminism where every problem is because of men. I also thought Arthur was fine.
In general, I think The Mists of Avalon does a great job building a world which is familiar (Arthurian) but different enough that its new. The conflict between paganism/druidic tradition (it was a while, so the specific religions could be wrong) with the Christianization of Britain was done well. I also thought Morgan Le Fey (Morgaine) was such a great character, possibly one of my favorites. She is multifaceted with flaws, but "with flaws" doesn't mean "incredibly annoying" like it often does. So in general, I was a huge fan of this book.
The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov
The End of Eternity is generally what I'll say is my favorite book by my favorite author. Its a stand alone which actually is referred to in other series books as a legend or something (towards the later years, Asimov tried to tie more and more worlds together). Its a very interesting concept about time adjusters who try to help mankind. Eternity, as it's called, is not portrayed as a perfect place has plenty of flaws. To me, it seems like there are lots of themes of questioning dogma and the utility of making so called mistakes for oneself.
I think like many of Asimov stories, the characters aren't necessarily the most interesting or memorable. But the book stands on an interesting premise and some twists and turns along the way.
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
This is actually one of my old favorites. Circa 2000, I would have said 1984 was possibly my favorite book. Nothing really happened to hurt its quality; I'd just say I read lots of books since then and I've become more indecisive. If anything, current events actually make 1984 more relevant now than ever, scary as it seems.
I generally like the characters, mainly Julia and Winston. I also am a huge fan of non-happy endings, so I like how depressing and negative the last part of the book is. I think it'd be easy to have the heroes overcome everything, but having them both broken actually made it more impactful. And of course, 1984 is one of the precursors to so many post-apocalyptic books which I generally enjoy.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
I read this before The Remains of the Day and would say I like it more. In general, I'd say I'm a big fan of Ishiguro (along with critics apparently). He always seems to have a sense of dread in his stories which start out with a very familiar feeling. Never Let Me Go is much more science fiction than the other books of his that I read, which may be a reason that I enjoy it more. It deals with fairly standard themes, especially the "what does it mean to be human". The relationship between characters are portrayed very well and I felt feelings during it, which isn't overly common. The movie is pretty good too.
The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
It goes without saying, but LOTRs pretty much created modern fantasy, and by modern, I mean fantasy of the last 50 years. I also think Tolkien gets way too much grief for his writing, which I didn't think was so bad. (The first time I read it, I thought it was more difficult though.) You pretty much have all the aspects which every fantasy novel/world tries to use now. But if I have to convince you that LOTRs is great, you probably won't believe me anyway. I also think The Silmarillion was quite good, but I can understand why its much less popular.
Other things that are really excellent that I'm not going to go into detail about are:
Metamorphoses by Ovid - Great collection of short stories/myths which are woven together. Its a summary of Roman mythology and stories.
Dream of the Red Chamber by Cao Xuequin - Massive scope with tons of characters, which are unique and different. Tons of symbolism, which makes me want to read it again.
Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut - I like Vonnegut in general and I really liked the ending of this book. Cat's Cradle is also really good.
In work news (I'm surprised that I talk about work too!), I've been doing a system validation. Its TONS of writing with GDP (Good Documentation Practices). It reminds me of how things used to be when we had paper notebooks. All the writing and all the documenting corrections and such. I think I spent more time copying statements than actually running the system. But I guess it gives me appreciation for our ELNs (electronic lab notebooks), which I like to complain about since they're kind of stupid and very slow.
Apparently, we might set a high for temperature today at around 60°F, then its supposed to snow, potentially 7 to 10 inches tonight. Its some wacky weather but I'll bring my laptop home today and hope we get snowed in!
Speaking of Snow, I'm pretty much done with the hunts in Final Fantasy XIII. And by "done", I mean annoyed to the point where I'll stop, not "completed". I do think the combat system is fairly flawed. Its way too "die and use that information to try again" based. While a "try again" button sounds like its nice, it really let the designers get lazy with difficulty. Boss X is immune to all status debuffs, okay, after I die, I'll retry and change my team to not include a saboteur. Same with if they use physical attacks, magic, etc. The "hard" enemies seem to be all about dying, trying again, customizing your team/equipment to defeat it. I don't like it.
But anyway, I stopped in that Titan's arena thing, which was pretty repetitive anyway. So I'll go back and beat the game. Apparently, you another level of potential levels after beating the game (which is odd), but I don't know if I'll use all my extra CP and try more hunts. I imagine after beating the game, I'll just stop. But in general, I think I enjoyed FFXIII. The characters, setting, and general story was pretty good. I think Lightning is an incredibly good character. I like her a lot. So I'll try to continue with the sequels.
We also watched 24: Legacy yesterday. I never watched 24, but I guess the commercials for this new series were good enough. After one episode, its good enough to continue with, I'd say. It kind of reminds me of Homeland, but probably with more focus on the dudes doing stuff than the CIA agents. So I'll see how it goes.
Trump Stuff
Its just hard to believe that he hasn't gotten any better since he became president. I'd say he's gotten worse where he says dumber, crazier, wronger things. Like just in the last week, he has tons of controversies (not to mention the previous ones like voter fraud, inauguration numbers, feuding with a tv host, I'm sure more that I forgot since its hard to keep up with).
Like Trump's list of under reported attacks include some of the biggest media stories of the year? Did anyone know there was shooting in Orlando? Or a truck attack in Nice? Or something... may have happened in Paris... I honestly thought his "list of under reported terror attacks" would have been things from the Middle East or Africa or something. You know, areas of the world where terror attack are probably under reported by the media. I just don't understand why he would even say something so outrageous. The Big Lie?
I also wonder how he'll spin his statement that murder rates are the highest they've been in the last 40 years. He even said how everyone is shocked by it when he brings it up, probably because he's super wrong (they're close to the lowest in 40 years). Since he apparently brings it up often, I imagine he can't say "he misspoke".
Yesterday, Paul Ryan was asked something to the extent of "are you concerned about Trump's grip with reality or ability to see reality" or something super outrageous (for a normal person). The sad part was that Ryan had to say nothing committal. Like you'd imagine the reporter would have been shot down and derided for such a stupid question, but not with Trump. I really wish I had the clip, but I saw it on the news and couldn't find it today.
I also found it funny that Trump said about his travel ban, "A bad high school student would understand this." He definitely knows his supporters' demographics. I think I always switch between if Trump just plays a role, targeting a group of voters and appealing to them. Or if he's actually what he's showing, which is extremely thin skinned and seems to delude himself. Who really knows?
But the more interesting question and understandable question is "what's your favorite". I'm really bad at picking favorites like Chidi from The Good Place. I think it's especially difficult when its lots of different genres and different types of books. But this made me think about what are some of my favorite books. I also looked through my library yesterday to think about it some more, but here is a noncommittal, non-ordered list of some top books.
Top Books in no order
The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley
I keep saying that The Mists of Avalon is the best book that I've read recently, but it turns out that I read it like a while ago, more than 5 years. So it definitely should be moved from "the best book that I read recently" to "one of the best books that I've read". I mainly read it as a recommendation from Angie. At first, I was afraid that it'd be too feminist, but I didn't think it was that at all (unlike say Queen of the Damned). The book definitely focuses on female characters, but some of them are terrible and incompetent so its not "that" type of feminism where every problem is because of men. I also thought Arthur was fine.
In general, I think The Mists of Avalon does a great job building a world which is familiar (Arthurian) but different enough that its new. The conflict between paganism/druidic tradition (it was a while, so the specific religions could be wrong) with the Christianization of Britain was done well. I also thought Morgan Le Fey (Morgaine) was such a great character, possibly one of my favorites. She is multifaceted with flaws, but "with flaws" doesn't mean "incredibly annoying" like it often does. So in general, I was a huge fan of this book.
The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov
The End of Eternity is generally what I'll say is my favorite book by my favorite author. Its a stand alone which actually is referred to in other series books as a legend or something (towards the later years, Asimov tried to tie more and more worlds together). Its a very interesting concept about time adjusters who try to help mankind. Eternity, as it's called, is not portrayed as a perfect place has plenty of flaws. To me, it seems like there are lots of themes of questioning dogma and the utility of making so called mistakes for oneself.
I think like many of Asimov stories, the characters aren't necessarily the most interesting or memorable. But the book stands on an interesting premise and some twists and turns along the way.
Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell
This is actually one of my old favorites. Circa 2000, I would have said 1984 was possibly my favorite book. Nothing really happened to hurt its quality; I'd just say I read lots of books since then and I've become more indecisive. If anything, current events actually make 1984 more relevant now than ever, scary as it seems.
I generally like the characters, mainly Julia and Winston. I also am a huge fan of non-happy endings, so I like how depressing and negative the last part of the book is. I think it'd be easy to have the heroes overcome everything, but having them both broken actually made it more impactful. And of course, 1984 is one of the precursors to so many post-apocalyptic books which I generally enjoy.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro
I read this before The Remains of the Day and would say I like it more. In general, I'd say I'm a big fan of Ishiguro (along with critics apparently). He always seems to have a sense of dread in his stories which start out with a very familiar feeling. Never Let Me Go is much more science fiction than the other books of his that I read, which may be a reason that I enjoy it more. It deals with fairly standard themes, especially the "what does it mean to be human". The relationship between characters are portrayed very well and I felt feelings during it, which isn't overly common. The movie is pretty good too.
The Lord of the Rings by JRR Tolkien
It goes without saying, but LOTRs pretty much created modern fantasy, and by modern, I mean fantasy of the last 50 years. I also think Tolkien gets way too much grief for his writing, which I didn't think was so bad. (The first time I read it, I thought it was more difficult though.) You pretty much have all the aspects which every fantasy novel/world tries to use now. But if I have to convince you that LOTRs is great, you probably won't believe me anyway. I also think The Silmarillion was quite good, but I can understand why its much less popular.
Other things that are really excellent that I'm not going to go into detail about are:
Metamorphoses by Ovid - Great collection of short stories/myths which are woven together. Its a summary of Roman mythology and stories.
Dream of the Red Chamber by Cao Xuequin - Massive scope with tons of characters, which are unique and different. Tons of symbolism, which makes me want to read it again.
Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut - I like Vonnegut in general and I really liked the ending of this book. Cat's Cradle is also really good.
In work news (I'm surprised that I talk about work too!), I've been doing a system validation. Its TONS of writing with GDP (Good Documentation Practices). It reminds me of how things used to be when we had paper notebooks. All the writing and all the documenting corrections and such. I think I spent more time copying statements than actually running the system. But I guess it gives me appreciation for our ELNs (electronic lab notebooks), which I like to complain about since they're kind of stupid and very slow.
Apparently, we might set a high for temperature today at around 60°F, then its supposed to snow, potentially 7 to 10 inches tonight. Its some wacky weather but I'll bring my laptop home today and hope we get snowed in!
Speaking of Snow, I'm pretty much done with the hunts in Final Fantasy XIII. And by "done", I mean annoyed to the point where I'll stop, not "completed". I do think the combat system is fairly flawed. Its way too "die and use that information to try again" based. While a "try again" button sounds like its nice, it really let the designers get lazy with difficulty. Boss X is immune to all status debuffs, okay, after I die, I'll retry and change my team to not include a saboteur. Same with if they use physical attacks, magic, etc. The "hard" enemies seem to be all about dying, trying again, customizing your team/equipment to defeat it. I don't like it.
But anyway, I stopped in that Titan's arena thing, which was pretty repetitive anyway. So I'll go back and beat the game. Apparently, you another level of potential levels after beating the game (which is odd), but I don't know if I'll use all my extra CP and try more hunts. I imagine after beating the game, I'll just stop. But in general, I think I enjoyed FFXIII. The characters, setting, and general story was pretty good. I think Lightning is an incredibly good character. I like her a lot. So I'll try to continue with the sequels.
We also watched 24: Legacy yesterday. I never watched 24, but I guess the commercials for this new series were good enough. After one episode, its good enough to continue with, I'd say. It kind of reminds me of Homeland, but probably with more focus on the dudes doing stuff than the CIA agents. So I'll see how it goes.
Trump Stuff
Its just hard to believe that he hasn't gotten any better since he became president. I'd say he's gotten worse where he says dumber, crazier, wronger things. Like just in the last week, he has tons of controversies (not to mention the previous ones like voter fraud, inauguration numbers, feuding with a tv host, I'm sure more that I forgot since its hard to keep up with).
Like Trump's list of under reported attacks include some of the biggest media stories of the year? Did anyone know there was shooting in Orlando? Or a truck attack in Nice? Or something... may have happened in Paris... I honestly thought his "list of under reported terror attacks" would have been things from the Middle East or Africa or something. You know, areas of the world where terror attack are probably under reported by the media. I just don't understand why he would even say something so outrageous. The Big Lie?
I also wonder how he'll spin his statement that murder rates are the highest they've been in the last 40 years. He even said how everyone is shocked by it when he brings it up, probably because he's super wrong (they're close to the lowest in 40 years). Since he apparently brings it up often, I imagine he can't say "he misspoke".
Yesterday, Paul Ryan was asked something to the extent of "are you concerned about Trump's grip with reality or ability to see reality" or something super outrageous (for a normal person). The sad part was that Ryan had to say nothing committal. Like you'd imagine the reporter would have been shot down and derided for such a stupid question, but not with Trump. I really wish I had the clip, but I saw it on the news and couldn't find it today.
I also found it funny that Trump said about his travel ban, "A bad high school student would understand this." He definitely knows his supporters' demographics. I think I always switch between if Trump just plays a role, targeting a group of voters and appealing to them. Or if he's actually what he's showing, which is extremely thin skinned and seems to delude himself. Who really knows?