June 2011
76 posts
May 2011
59 posts
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Day 08 – Most overrated book.
The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larson is one of the more recent books that I have found to be very overrated. I read it last year and I enjoyed it but I think the craze behind it is a bit much. I will finish the other three books in the series at some point but I’m not in a big rush to pick them up. The story has some compelling characters but the plot is a bit too drawn out and...
“To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift”.”
– ~ Steve Prefontaine, R.I.P.
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Day 07 – Most underrated book.
The Debt to Pleasure by John Lancaster was an accidental type of book. Something that you just stumble across. It’s not the type of book that you frequently hear being recommended, which is disappointing to me.
I guess I should warn you, the book is about food but it is also about horror. Two subjects I find that are often blended together. This is a revenge tale, but a beautiful one. Like...
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Day 06 – A book that makes you sad.
Silent Spring by Rachel Carson is one of the most informative and enlightening books I’ve read in the past 10 years. A non-fiction account of the horrors of DDT and its effect on our environment. A book that anticipated the creation of the EPA - Environmental Protection Agency, Silent Spring is thoroughly researched and filled with some of the most wonderful prose I’ve ever had the...
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Angry!
Warning: RANTING AHEAD.
So what was at the heart of yesterday’s morning of anger and frustration? A really ignorant guest.
There are many different discounts that are offered through our chain: military, CAA/AAA, Senior, Employee, Travel Agent, etc.
Some of these can be offered when a guest walks into the hotel, some cannot as they need verification from other systems to confirm that...
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Day 05 – A book that makes you happy.
Yesterday was a stressful day, a day I probably should have picked up a book that makes me happy. As a result, I failed to complete yesterday’s challenge and post. That means you’ll get TWO 30 Day Book Challenge posts, lucky you.
So a book that makes me happy? Hmm. Lunch Poems by Frank O’Hara. This small collection was given to me by my ex-gf. And despite our falling out and...
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“303.65 km / 188.67 mi”
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Day 04 – Favorite book of your favorite series.
Terry Brooks’s Shannara Series is my favourite series and my favourite book in that universe would have to be Elfstones of Shannara. It’s hard to describe this world without giving too much away but it has elves, magic-stones, powerful-spirits, demons, trees, epic quests & more. It’s what you expect when you read genre fiction of this nature. I think I enjoyed this particular...
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Day 03 – Your favorite series.
Terry Brooks long running Shannara Series is a favourite of mine for a number of reasons. The first is that I discovered this series at the age of 22, despite being a long-time reader of the fantasy genre. This particular author and series was overlooked somehow and so when I stumbled upon this beautiful cover.
I couldn’t help but pick it up. Two things popped into my head: “You...
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““Another cat? Perhaps. For love there is also a season; its seeds must...”
– For Mrs. Faith :-)
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Day 02 – A book that you’ve read more than 3...
The Hobbitby J.R.R. Tolkien is a book I’ve read at least three times (and many more, I’ve lost count). It is one of those books that I can casually turn any page to and pick up reading. I frequently turn to the riddle scene with Bilbo and Gollum. It is one of the first fantasy novels I ever read and I still feel the same way when I pick it up, a sense of wonder and mystery. Everything...
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Day 01 – The best book you read this year.
The best book I’ve read so far this year was Bret Easton Ellis seminal L.A. novel: Less Than Zero. The novel is probably one of the most disgusting novels I’ve read in my life thus far, full of: violence, drugs, abuse - sexual & physical. Filled with characters that live out empty lives with no purpose other than to fuck and get high. And yet it is written in the most compelling...
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30 Day Book Challenge
Found this floating around, I thought it would make for an interesting post a day challenge. I could wait to start this at the beginning of next month but I won’t. So look forward to some fun book-related posts.
Day 01 – The best book you read this year
Day 02 – A book that you’ve read more than 3 times
Day 03 – Your favorite series
Day 04 – Favorite book of your favorite series
Day 05...
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It works.
It’s 4:45 a.m. I look at my phone and think to myself: “Why did you set the alarm this early? Are you INSANE!?”
I worked a 13 hour shift yesterday. I wanted to run, I NEEDED to run last night. But, our neighbors were throwing a party next door and my family said it would be rude for me to not show up for a little bit. So I went next door and had a glass of wine and some pasta....
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“It felt like being a child again, though it was not. Being a child is like...”
– Embassytown by China Mieville
Community
“I’m envious and a bit intimidated of runners like you. It’s like this select group/cult and community.” - Miss Emily
My friend Miss Emily made this comment while we were having coffee earlier this week. I think there is a lot of merit to this statement. When I’m running along the parkway and I pass by another runner: there is this certain look/nod that we give...
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“For this, be sure, tonight thou shalt have cramps, side-stitches that shall pen...”
– William Shakespeare
Tower of Babel LITERALLY MADE OUT OF BOOKS. →
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Bookstore Musings
I had the pleasure of walking around a bookstore earlier this week (twice!). Since the purchase of my Amazon Kindle, I have not frequented the bookstore as much as I once did. To be fair this might also be a result that my ex-gf used to be 5 minutes away from the bookstore and it was a common/familiar hang-out, now that we’ve broken up, not so much.
As I was strolling around in the stacks...
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“Technology doesn’t make us dumb. It just allows us to make others aware of...”
– @capricecrane
What would you save if your house were on fire? →
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Cool Running
The Cool Running website has been an invaluable source of information and inspiration. It is where I found the Couch to 5 km work-out plan. I subscribe to their twitter feed and earlier they posted a question:
What are your rules for running? What advice would you give other runners?
I thought that it would be fun to share my own personal rules for running. [Wow, look at me giving athletic...
“What’s the matter? Was Tumblr down?”
– Jon Stewart (via fuckyeahthedailyshow)
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Book Review
I just finished The Blue Light Project by Timothy Taylor. Taylor is a west coast writer from B.C. I’ve only read one other book by him (he’s written three), Stanley Park which was a CBC Canada Reads pick from 2007.
What I enjoy most about Mr. Taylor’s writing is the way that he infuses his story with politics. Stanley Park was about a struggling chef and his estranged father, a...
Someone needs to find a way to bottle the feeling I get as I finish the last 100 pages of a good book.
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Just dl’ed the new My Morning Jacket album Circuital. :-) Perfect music for the great weather we’ve been having all week. Has a very electronic/80s/Simon & Garfunkle feel to it. Lots of trippy keyboards and filled with folksy ballads. Reminds me of a more electronica version of Z. Some very catchy tunes. Perfect for rolling down the windows on the highway and cranking the volume.
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Meme:
1. The Book I’m Currently Reading:
I am currently reading Timothy Taylor’s The Blue Light Project. An interesting look at media and culture surrounding a group of people who are caught in the middle of a horrific hostage crisis. Timothy Taylor is a West Coast B.C. writer who wrote the award winning Stanley Park, one of the first truly Canadian books I ever picked up about 10 years...
