Accidental beginnings, and more intentional habits.

 Three weeks into January seems a little early for a resolution/habit check in, but since it is a 2022 resolution, it is probably a bit late. 

As I wrote in this January 2022 post, the habit started a bit by accident. Partially due to a hibernation week, staying home in the snow after a possible Covid exposure, and partially due to Amazon tracking my reading days on the Kindle (thanks big data), halfway through January I found out that I had read thirty-one days in a row. Since I had the streak going already, I resolved to read every day of 2022.

I made it through 2022 successfully, reading at least a few pages every day of the year. Then I continued the streak through every day of 2023 and into another January. After a bit of math, I have figured that I have now read 765 days in a row. 

As I written about previously, I was not much of a reader growing up. Though both of my parents were consistent readers, I barely cracked a book until I was in my twenties. For the past thirty plus years though, reading has been a semi-consistent part of my life. I've found insight, relief, solace, joy, and other worlds on and between the pages. The amount I read changed year to year, falling in and out of the habit. My mental health seemed to improve when I was a consistent reader, but like any other habit it was hard to re-start when I drifted away from it. Failing at re-starting became its own mental struggle. 

Like most of us, I have probably failed more than succeeded at resolutions, New Year's or otherwise. In 2011 I put a twist on it and had a different resolution each month. It was an interesting exercise in habit development and was a relative success. Part of the lesson, which should be obvious but isn't always, is that developing the habit is much more important to your success than your desire for the resolution's outcome. I can resolve and desire all I want, but until I put the work in through the development of a habit, then there is no path that will get me there. 

To keep the reading streak alive, I obviously put the work in each day, but the simplest of tricks is what made it actually happen. I have a reminder on my phone that goes off at 9:00 each night asking, "Did you read yet?" The reminder sits on my phone until I clear it. Sometimes it gets cleared at 11:45pm, and sometimes only a few pages are read, but for 765 days in a row I have answered "yes" to the reminder. 

So, how did the habit change the amount I read? Below are the recaps from Goodreads for 2021 (pre-habit), and then 2022 and 2023:

I plan to keep the streak alive again through 2024. I have set my arbitrary goal of reading 30 books again this year, and I hope to reach it again, but maybe not hit 40 this time around. There are some other goals, habits and hobbies I'd like to add (back) this year and spend time with. The past couple of years have been difficult, but I am seeing a bit of light again. This challenge and habit formation shows that I can still find some focus, even when my brain seems to be rebelling. Reading has felt like a bit of self-care when things feel noisy inside. I want to find more things that bring me a bit of peace.

Another 2024 resolution - more reminders set on my phone this year. 

Silly challenges and a resolution

 Sometimes you just have to trick yourself into things.

When I was stuck at home during hibernation week, I went for a lot of walks. Of course it was great to get out of the house, and the pup really loved the snow, but I wouldn't have walked quite so much if I hadn't signed up for a silly challenge on Strava. The challenge was to walk 50k for the month. I had largely forgotten about the challenge/goal until I was bored at home. I certainly would have gone on several walks anyway, but wouldn't have been motivated to go as often or as far. I ended up walking about 34 miles in December, more than half of it in the snow between Christmas and New Year's Eve with traction devices on my hiking boots.

Another challenge I engage in is to try and read a certain number of books each year. I have been using the Goodreads website to track my reading since 2008. I started using it mostly to keep track of books I had read. More than once I would return to a book series that I had stepped away from, picking up where I thought I had left off, only realizing three chapters in that I had already read this book. Now an even greater value of the website is adding to the "To be Read" list whenever I hear about an interesting read.

However the To be Read pile is growing faster than the Read list. I already have piles of physical books stacked around the house, and a massive virtual pile online, but there are so many books that catch my eye I can't resist adding another to the list. When I am looking for my next read, and none of the books in the house are hitting the spot, I pull up the online list. However, many of the books have been on there so long I have no idea where I heard about them, or what grabbed my attention in the first place. I end up reading synopsis after synopsis to jog my memory.

The last few years I have tried to read 30 books a year. I came close in 2018, but haven't ever been quite able to reach the magic (arbitrary) number. 

(Click to embiggen)

In 2021 I read 21 books. Nice numeric repetition there, but in a year when I had so much time on my hands, and so much desire to get out of my own head, I wish I had read more. 

So much of it is habit. I won't deny it is harder to read these days. I am, like so many others, easily distracted by my phone, the TV, and other shiny things to scroll through. I used to be able to fall into a book so much more easily. Didn't matter if I was in a crowded coffee shop filed with people and chatter - I could shut it all out. Not so much these days. There is this constant background hum tapping on my attention's shoulder. 

Along with the urge to get the miles in during the last week of December, I was also trying to read a bunch. I wanted to try and re-forge the habit before work would once again get crazy in January, and hibernation week did make it a bit easier. I have been reading books on my Kindle lately and I saw this thing pop up on my phone.

Without intending to, I had a month-long streak of reading every day. May as well keep the streak going. I am going to try and read every day in 2022. It may not be many pages on some days (hello tax season) but I want to commit to reading this year. I know it will be good for me, moments of quiet in a noisy world. 

I have some other pseudo resolutions in mind for the year, one of which is to keep writing here and hopefully elsewhere, but we'll start with reading. If you have any recommendations for books that you loved, let me know and I will add them to the digital pile. I will try and get a few off the To be Read list to make room. 

Dry spells

A friend of mine announced in December that she was pregnant. A few of us were at their house to have a sort of a pod-safe gathering ahead of Christmas when they told us the news. After some cheering and rule-breaking hugging, we talked about what life would be like for them in the year ahead.

This being our biking group, we quickly recognized that the due date was right around the time we were signed up to ride Ramrod in July. The soon-to-be father was obviously out, and the rest of us more or less decided that we would train, but if the baby decided to show up on race day, we would skip the ride to be at the hospital. 

As we continued to chat, the mom-to-be mentioned that she had been filling the fridge with new non-alcoholic beverages to replace the wine and beer she was giving up, and she asked for other drink suggestions. I suggested we all give up drinking for January as a small show of support. 

I have participated in "Dry January", no alcohol for the month, a number of times. It is a reset after the holiday indulgence, and a check-in to make sure that setting drinking aside is as easy as it should be. This time around, even though it followed nine months of sheltering in place where drinking was more of a temptation, it was remarkably easy. 

I did have one slip up mid-month. My brothers and I had found a restaurant with an open outdoor patio, and we got together to discuss Mom's current condition, and I suppose to check in on each other as well. We were about an hour in when I shared that I had given up drinking for January. I said this while taking a sip of my second beer. 

I had just completely spaced, falling into a routine, I suppose highlighting that habits run along in the background unless we consciously make the effort to change them. I wasn't giving into a craving, just drinking without thinking. I added on four or five "dry" days at the beginning of February to offset the slip up. 

Unfortunately, three better habits have also gone dry this year. A slight modification of the grade school three Rs they are Reading, Writing and Running. These three habits are a big part of what keeps me healthy in both body and mind. My writing has obviously been neglected for quite some time, but through the 2020 part of the pandemic, I managed to keep up the other two when the world was turned upside down and making less and less sense. I was able to read 26 books last year, and though I had grander plans, I ran semi-regularly and covered a little over 500 miles. 

2021 has been an absolute struggle on all three fronts, and to be honest I am just plain struggling. I'll pick up on the running dry spell in the next post. 

Turning another page

The last year or so has been a bit of a struggle mentally and physically. No big events that triggered it, and I don't think it has reached the point of depression, but I have just felt unmotivated, uninspired, unworthy. Very "un" I guess.

I have slipped into the feeling of wanting to have done something, rather than actually doing it.

There are things that have been part of my life that I know would help, but I just can't seem to muster the energy to do them. I suppose they fall into their own poor alphabet of the three 'R's, reading, writing and running. I have slipped into that terrible hole that many of us fall into that leads to never really accomplishing what we wish. I want to have run, rather than to actually run. I want to have written, but now feel that I have nothing to say. I know that reading will help spark the writing, but I can't push away the distractions well enough to fall into a story.

I was not a reader growing up, though both of my parents have always been avid readers. I managed to avoid both parental and scholastic encouragement toward reading, once producing a book report by only reading the book jacket. I came to reading in my mid-twenties when Lightning struck (pun intended). Up until the past couple of years, I would always have a book at my bedside and took one with me nearly everywhere I went. I would easily fall into the story, shutting out the chatter and noise of the coffee shop.

I still love to read in coffee shops. To be alone in a crowd, with a nice cup of coffee and hopefully a comfy chair. Now however, I find it so much more difficult to shut out the noise, both real and imagined. The background world of conversation around me is a part of it, but these days it is more the distraction of the world behind the small screen in my coat pocket.

The lack of actual reading did not stop me from aspiring to have read so many books though. There are a couple of piles of books around the house and my list of "To Be Read" books on Goodreads stands at one hundred and twenty. I started using the Goodreads website almost ten years ago mostly to keep track of what I had read. More than once I would return to a series that I had stepped away from, picking up where I thought I had left off, only realizing three chapters in that I had already read this one. The past few years though, Goodreads has been more of a website of neglect (kinda like this blog). Whenever I saw an interesting book, I would add it to the reading list, and there it would sit gathering virtual dust.

I have been in a book club for many years, so that rather forces me to read at least a few books during the year, but it felt like more of an assignment than something I enjoyed doing. I tried to turn things around last year with partial success. According to my Goodreads tally, I read twenty books last year, but to be fair a few of those were shorter books on hiking. Twenty may sound like a decent number, but I have friends that managed to fit closer to fifty into their plenty busy lives. My mom may have pushed closer to triple digits on number of books read last year.

It is not about numbers though. It is how I choose to spend my time, and how I choose to take care of myself both mentally and physically. There is far too much screen time these days. Much of the screen time is not only time basically wasted, I think it is also chipping away at my ability to concentrate bit by bit (or byte by byte).

So, while I am still struggling to get running and writing out of the future tense and into the present, reading is making its way back into my life. I have been better about shutting off the TV, setting aside the phone, and diving into another world page by page. I just finished my seventh book of the year, and have really enjoyed losing myself in a book again. There have been some great books and I will try and pass them along in another post.

2017 feels like it was a year written off, like a year that I couldn't be bothered to care, which is a terrible way to live. I don't know if there will be better results in 2018, but I am focusing on effort this year. I don't know that it makes much sense to try and improve your life by regularly escaping to another through books, but it somehow makes sense to me right now.

Quote of the day

What an astonishing thing a book is. It's a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you're inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.

~Carl Sagan

On yer bike!

At some point between stowing my bike and losing much of the feeling in my cheeks, I reviewed the blind spots in my life, as a young man verging on the edge of drunkenness is apt to do. Everyone has such spots -  not obvious shortcomings, but the hidden flaws and conspiring circumstances that duck under the radar, usually until it is too late.

----

“On yer bike,” the bartender hollered in the direction of this seemingly comatose fellow. The scuttered gent found his footing and wandered for the door.

“That guy’s not really going to try to ride a bicycle home, is he?”

This brought such a roar of laughter from the gang in our booth that you’d have thought I’d just goosed each and every one of them.

The expression had caught my attention several times already during my Irish jaunt, but alcohol and other lively conversation had distracted me from further investigation. I was certainly thrown by it, since none of them appeared to be avid cyclists.

“It’s a clever way of telling someone to get off their arse and on with their life,” Brian explained. “Out the yard, up your socks, on yer bike.”

On yer bike . . . it was the very battle cry I’d been reaching for these many miles in the saddle. My eyes practically filled with grateful tears as I hoisted my glass.

“Gentlemen, on yer bike!” I toasted.

While not moved to my level of emotion, these newfound friends looked plenty amused as our glasses touched. Clearly, I was the only one at the table for whom the phrase carried untold depth and weight. And in the sober and thankfully gray light of an Irish morning the day after, it had only grown more valid as an evocation, rite, fight song, and prayer. Not the sort of thing you’d expect a Tibetan monk to offer up as a mantra, but who would argue with the clarity and simple wisdom of “get off your arse and on with your life”?

Some days I have to coax it from myself as a whisper. Other times I belt it out so loud and strong along lonely stretches of road that quail are flushed from the bush. As long as it rings true, I’m sticking by this as my operating instructions.

On yer bike!

~ two passages from the book, Riding Outside The Lines by Joe Kurmaskie

Book quote of the day

"There is a wonderful line in a book by J.M. Barie - and no, it's not Peter Pan, and I'm not going to ask you to clap if you believe in faries..."

Here everyone laughed again.

"But in another book by J.M. Barie called The Little White Bird...he writes..." He started flipping through a small book on the podium until he found the page he was looking for, and then he put on his reading glasses. "'Shall we make a new rule of life...always to try to be a little kinder than is necessary?'"

Here Mr. Tushman looked up at the audience. "Kinder than is necessary," he repeated. "What a marvelous line, isn't it? Kinder than is necessary. Because it's not enough to be kind. One should be kinder than needed. Why I love that line, that concept, is that it reminds me that we carry with us, as human beings, not just the capacity to be kind, but the very choice of kindness.

~ from the novel "Wonder" by R.J. Palacio

Book quote of the day

"I think there should be a rule that everyone in the world should get a standing ovation at least once in their lives."

~ August in the novel "Wonder" by R.J. Palacio

Sharing a good read with a stranger

“A book is not only a friend, it makes friends for you. When you have possessed a book with mind and spirit, you are enriched. But when you pass it on you are enriched threefold.”

~ Henry Miller
The Books In My Life (1969)

I love bookshelves. I love books of course, but I love to see books displayed. Lately I have been searching online for library books or ebooks, so I miss strolling through bookstores and walking past all those possibilities. I enjoy looking over bookshelves in people's homes, looking for new authors and insights. I even love seeing what complete strangers are reading at the coffee shop or bus stop, letting random novels catch my eye out in the wild.

I don't have any shelves these days. Downsizing has forced them into boxes, tucked away from sight. As part of the effort to carry around and maintain less stuff, I only hang onto books that I really enjoyed, and can imagine reading again or loaning out. I used to sell books back to places like Half Price Books or Third Place Books up in Seattle. They never offered much money, but the books went back out into circulation, and I received a little store credit for more books at a discount. I haven't found (or looked) for similar places down here, so the few books I had were starting to pile up. 

I have started using a site called Book Crossing. It is a book sharing, tracking, networking sort of world library. From their website:

Label. Share. Follow. Breathe new life into books instead of letting your old favorites collect dust - pass them along to another reader. Our online archival and tracking system allows members to connect with other readers, journal and review literature and trade and follow their books as lives are changed through “reading and releasing”.

You register each book you would like to "set free" and assign it an identification number. In that way, the book's travels can be traced as it makes its way around the city, state, country and maybe the world. You can buy labels or print up your own to let the next person know about the project. The site was started back in 2001, and it is similar to the way people have been tracking dollar bills at Where's George. But books, like the ideas and stories they contain, were meant to be shared, and their travels are usually much less random than bills changing hands. 

You can exchange books with the nearly one million members on the site, but more often books are set free in the wild - left at a bus stop, coffee shop, doctor's office, or wherever you imagine another reader might pick it up. They ask that you do not leave them where there might be a security concern (airports), or where it would be inconsiderate, like in or outside a bookstore. Along with the tracking label on the inside cover, I have been clipping a note to the front cover letting people know that the book was not forgotten, but that it is looking for a new home. 

I was watching an episode of Charlie and Lola the other day (well, it was on for Annabelle, and I was watching her). The episode was about something that many of us did as kids. They released balloons with notes attached, not knowing where they would land, hoping that someone would find them and send back a note to let them know how far it had travelled. Releasing these books is sort of the same thing, but with the gift of a new read, instead of just a deflated balloon. 

When I released my own balloon in grade school, I never heard back. I have only released four books so far, so it is a little early to tell what the results will be, but I hope to hear back about their travels. 

Share the Road

IS PUBLISHED!

My December goal was to get my first novel published by the end of the year, and I got it in just under the wire.

I finished off the latest edit back in October, and I sent off a copy of it to one of my beta readers to check for typos and grammar errors. While I was waiting to hear back, I read it again. And edited it again. This really could go on forever.

The book still needed a new cover before I put it up for sale. Back in May when I printed out a few copies, I put together a quick cover to experiment with some image software, and to see how the finished product would look. I used a nice shot I had taken at the Grand Canyon, but it had nothing to do with the story. I had some vague ideas what I wanted the new cover to look like, but I had done nothing for the past six months.

I took my vague ideas and a camera down the coast. I didn't find what I was picturing, but I ended up stopping at one of the beaches just to get something on film. Armed with a self-timer, I used benches, garbage cans, and the bike rack on my truck as makeshift tripods. I took several shots, dashing back and forth, trying out multiple looks, and trying to ignore the odd stares I was getting. I ended up with some good initial shots, and just seeing these first attempts gave me some more ideas.

I went out for another round a day later, and took home more good pictures, but nothing that really grabbed me. I showed the photos to a few people, and walked away with some good feedback and a better idea of what I wanted. Then I was in Seattle for eleven days.

I got my typo report back, fixed the, worked on the website and other background stuff while I was away, but I couldn't do anything about the cover until I got back in town. I returned the night of the 26th and headed out on the 27th for another photo shoot. After lots of dashing back and forth with the self-timer, I had thirty more photos. I couldn't really see how the photos turned out with the sunlight bouncing off of the camera screen, so I went home hoping I had something good. I ended up using the last photo I took, so I am glad I kept trying.

I updated the cover with the new photo, and was ready to submit it for file approval. And I was still messing with the text. I had to get this thing out of my hands. I uploaded it to CreateSpace and waited for them to make sure there weren't any formatting problems. I received their approval on the 29th and immediately ordered a proof. Now I had to wait for the hard copy to show up so I could make sure everything looked okay in print.

The anticipated ship date was sometime around January 6th, so I wasn't going to make my year-end deadline. But I was so close I was willing to call it a victory. Then, somehow, during the post-Christmas chaos of shopping and shipping, CreateSpace and the Post Office had the proof in my hands on the afternoon of December 31st.

I filled out all the last minute synopsis, author bio and pricing information and hit "Approve" at around 5:00pm. I was published. More or less. The book could have been purchased on the CreateSpace site that day, but it didn't show up on Amazon until January 1st. The listing still isn't completely ready as the web machines haven't attached the synopsis and preview, but it is available for sale!

So after much last minute scrambling, my debut novel is live.

I am still working on a website, and the Kindle version isn't live yet (Amazon appears to still be working off its New Year's hangover). There will be a Nook version as well, but the paperback version is now available for $7.99 at Amazon.com. Buy it through this handy Share the Road link, and I make an extra thirty cents on the deal.

My first novel. WooHoo!

Introduction to Vonnegut

Amazon has been doing a Daily Deal with a very inexpensive Kindle book each day. Today's offer was for Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut. I don't think I have ever read anything by Vonnegut, but Sean H had brought his name up recently so he was top of mind.

At 99 cents, the deal is already hard to pass up, but what really got me was the opening paragraph of the introduction they posted on Facebook.

"This is the only story of mine whose moral I know. I don't think it's a marvelous moral; I simply happen to know what it is: We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be."

Banned Book Week, 2011

Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment.  Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.

~ From the American Library Association site.

It is Banned Book Week again. Recent additions to the list include Harry Potter, Twilight and Hunger Games, but I think a better way to celebrate is to read books that are also on Radcliffe's list of the top 100 novels of the 20th century. May I recommend:

1. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
3. The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
4. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
8. The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
9. 1984, by George Orwell
12. Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
15. Catch-22, by Joseph Heller
17. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
40. The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien


But not
2. The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger

One more place to find a good read

Kindle ebooks are now available to be checked out at 11,000 libraries across the U.S. Though there are definitely some differences between checking out paper books, the process is pretty similar.

Since it is just data bits that are being sent out, it would seem there would be an endless supply of available ebooks. But of course authors and publishers still need to make a living. Just as a library purchases a certain number of hardbacks and paperbacks from publishers to loan out, with ebooks they purchase a certain number of licences.

The first Kindle book I tried to check out from the library was Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. The library has 33 "copies", and I am 103rd on the waiting list at this point. In this respect, it is just like paper books - there is a long waiting list on newer, popular books. I checked out a less popular Dean Koontz book in the meantime to test things out, and I was reading within a couple of minutes.

One advantage, as mentioned in the article on Mashable, is the ability to make notes:

The ebook rentals also gives readers the chance to do something libraries normally frown upon: marking up books...normally, making margin notes in library books is a big no-no. But we’re fixing this by extending our Whispersync technology to library books, so your notes, highlights and bookmarks are always backed up and available the next time you check out the book or if you decide to buy the book.

There are other advantages as well. Obviously there is no need to physically store the books. Even the book data comes straight from Amazon, so the library doesn't need more server space. Physical books are also moved between libraries to allow people to pick them up close by, so as ebook use increases, they can save a little gas. And I will save some as well since I don't need to pick up or return my books. The Kindle book is sent directly to me, and expires in 21 days, or whatever the normal checkout period is.

And as this CNN article points out, this is one more place where late fees are being eliminated. Just as Netflix has created a system that prevented late fees for DVDs, libraries don't need to worry about collecting late fees on ebooks, since there are no late returns. No books go missing, and the wait list doesn't get stalled by people who don't return books on time. They just disappear from the Kindle when the loan period is up, and are ready to go out to the next patron immediately.

I love walking through bookstores, and wish I could afford to buy all the books I wanted to read, but libraries are where I look these days. As much as I like my Kindle, I still prefer reading a paper book. I love looking at bookshelves and seeing what books people are reading on the bus, and that really isn't possible with ebooks. And there is something physical in the connection with a paper book that can't be captured on a screen.

But the Kindle experience is getting better and better.

Another one bites the dust

Borders book store has filed for bankruptcy, and the sell off has begun. It actually started on Friday and I was initially surprised at how much stuff was left today. A few months ago when they were trying to stay alive, they shut down some of their less productive stores. When I stopped by one of the earlier closures, it looked like a carcass picked nearly clean. Most of the floor space was empty, and the remaining shelves held only a few neglected books.

The store today was filled with shoppers and barely looked different from a normally stocked store. Aside from all the signs dangling from the ceiling that is.

I suppose it is early in the going-out-of-business sellathon, but the deals were not that great. Most books were 10% -20% off, which isn't much better than typical. I didn't really have any money in the budget for books, but I wanted to stop by for some reason. Maybe to note the passing of another brick and mortar store. I did pick up a magazine for 40% off though.

I hadn't been in a Borders in a while, and I suppose that is part of the problem. Many people buy online, or have moved to e-readers. Borders was late to adjust to the new market and suffered the consequences. Their initial online presence was actually built and run by Amazon.com, one of the companies that put them out of business. Barnes and Noble seems to be struggling but surviving, having jumped online early and created their own Nook e-reading device.

The big box stores chased out the small bookstores, and now they have been pushed out by online stores. I think there is still a place for a brick and mortar bookstore, but it may be back at the smaller level. For all the "If you bought this, you might be interested in this" recommendations spit out by online algorithms, there is nothing like a recommendation from a knowledgeable reader and bookseller. There was a great little store where I used to live, and I always enjoyed stopping there for a new read.

To save money, I haven't been buying many books anywhere lately. I had a small stack of unread books, but most of the books I read these days come from the library. But I hope bookstores can survive in this new climate. There really is nothing like wandering the stacks with a cup of coffee, letting a cover or glowing recommendation lead you to a new author, and a whole new world.

Incredible journeys

I just saw the end of a couple of epic journeys last night.

I finished up the book, Without a Paddle: Racing Twelve Hundred Miles Around Florida by Sea Kayak by Warren Richey. From GoodReads.com:

As far as Warren Richey knew, his life was on course. A reporter with a beautiful wife and talented son, Richey couldn’t imagine how it could be any better....Then his marriage falls apart and he can’t imagine how it could be any worse.

The divorce leaves Richey questioning everything, while struggling to find a way forward. To get his bearings, he enters the first Ultimate Florida Challenge, an all-out twelve-hundred-mile kayak race around Florida.

The race is literally around Florida in any a boat without a engine. Ten participants start out in Tampa, travel south around the Keys, then head north along the east coast. Of course Florida is peninsula not an island. The racers have to paddle upstream on a winding river toward the center of the state, carry their boats overland for 40 miles, and then head downstream on another river to reach the Gulf of Mexico once more.

The author does a nice job describing the challenges he faced racing around the clock, covering 1200 miles in a kayak. The race is a free-for-all of fatigue and sleep deprivation. Along the way, he looks back on his past failures, but spends as much time planning for his future. It sounds like a pretty incredible race and the book does a good job of taking you there.

Then tonight we watched a movie called 10mph. Two friends drop out of the corporate, cubicle life, move to Denver and start a production company. Then they come up with the movie concept - they would ride a Segway across America, from Seattle to Boston.

They run into plenty of obstacles and have to constantly scrounge for cash to pull off the 100 day trip. The movie is an entertaining look at the not only crazy way they decide to cover the 4,000 miles, but the characters and places they see along the way. They end up meeting many great people who support them and take them in. I thought it was great.

"If I had the chance now, I would ask him: Where did you find the strength and courage to keep moving? In many ways it is the obstacles that define the man. How far you walked is not nearly as revealing as how far you crawled." ~ From Without a Paddle.

"...why not live it up, take the risk and do the thing that you're supposed to do."  ~ Hunter and Josh from 10mph

Don't let it happen

The e-book is here to stay

Yes, it's finally happened. The digital book has overtaken the paper book on Amazon.com. And this time that isn't only true about hardcover books. Now we're talking paperbacks.

In reporting its latest earnings, Amazon said that it was selling more Kindle books than paperback books, though the score is still close. Since January 1, for every 100 paperback books Amazon sold, 115 Kindle books were sold. To top it off, the company says that since the beginning of the year it's sold three times as many Kindle books as hardcover books.

cnet story

When I heard that e-books were outselling hardbacks, I wasn't that surprised considering the economy. A$25 dollar book is a tougher sell these days. But I did not expect e-books to bypass paperbacks anytime soon. I figured the e-book, though growing in popularity, was still a niche item.

I have been reading a blog turned book called The Newbie's Guide to Publishing. It is interesting to see the author's change of perspective as time passes. He is a traditionally published author with several books in hardback and paperback. In his earlier posts, he discourages authors from self-publishing and dismisses e-books. As the Kindle and other e-readers gain in popularity, his tune changes. He has released several earlier books (previously rejected by brick-and-mortar publishers) exclusively for the Kindle. Many are outselling his traditionally published works. From what he can tell, the primary (only?) reason is price point.

He has no control over the pricing of the books under contract with his publisher. This is true of both the paper and electronic versions. The paperbacks are generally $7.99 and the Kindle versions are around $4.70. The ones he has control over vary in price from $.99 to $2.99. He has found that the e-books at the lower price not only sell more items, but actually produce more total revenue than the higher priced ones set by his publisher.

I have been reading up on this because I am considering releasing my novel as an e-book and maybe even a paperback. The jury (of one) is still out whether it is worth releasing on the world, but I did finish the first round of revisions yesterday. I have no real expectations, but it would be pretty cool if I could sell a few copies.

I was also an early nay-sayer on the e-book. I thought the tangible experience of reading a paper book was something that couldn't easily be replaced. But I love my Kindle. I don't think the paper book will ever disappear, but it appears the e-book has finally found a toehold in the market.

I have been getting my newspaper delivered to the Kindle for about two years now. It does not replace the physical newspaper as well as it does paperbacks, but it is still a good product. I did wake up to this though this morning:

This is the first time the "paper" has been late, and it actually showed up about 15 minutes later. I don't think any paperboy could boast only one late paper every two years. And of course it is never soaked with rain.

Banned books week

Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment.  Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.

~ from the American Library Association site

According to the American Library Association site, the top ten most frequently challenged books of 2009 are:

1. ttyl; ttfn; l8r, g8r (series), by Lauren Myracle. Reasons: drugs, nudity, offensive language, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group
2. And Tango Makes Three, by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson.  Reasons: homosexuality 
3. The Perks of Being A Wallflower, by Stephen Chbosky.  Reasons: anti-family, drugs, homosexuality, offensive language, religious viewpoint, sexually explicit, suicide, unsuited to age group
4. To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee.  Reasons: offensive language, racism, unsuited to age group 
5. Twilight (series) by Stephenie Meyer.  Reasons: religious viewpoint, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group 
6. Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger. Reasons: offensive language, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group 
7. My Sister’s Keeper, by Jodi Picoult.  Reasons: homosexuality, offensive language, religious viewpoint, sexism, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group, violence
8. The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big, Round Things, by Carolyn Mackler. Reasons: offensive language, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group 
9. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker.  Reasons: offensive language, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group
10. The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier.  Reasons: nudity, offensive language, sexually explicit, unsuited to age group 

Now, in all honesty, I have only read two of these books (Catcher in the Rye & To Kill a Mockingbird), and only heard of an additional three (Twilight, My Sister's Keeper & The Color Purple). I will say, I am tempted to read #8 from the funny title alone.

Of the two I have read, I would be happy if no one read Catcher in the Rye, simply because I think it isn't worth reading. To me, it seems that the only reason it is popular is for the shock value for the time it was written. I don't think the book has much value in and of itself.

I feel the same about the movie The Graduate. It probably pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable at the time, but without the shock value, I found it a pretty ordinary/boring movie that didn't age well. I would steer people away from both because they aren't worth your time, but I certainly wouldn't stop you if you insisted.

But To Kill a Mockingbird is a fantastic book. It would probably sit near the top ten if I ever tried to make a list of great books I have read. I saw the movie a year or so later, and it also ranks high on the lifetime list.

But of course the book deals with some difficult subjects, and I did read it as an adult. So I guess this is where the fuzzy line comes in for me. My knee-jerk reaction at banning books (especially something as good as To Kill a Mockingbird) is to rail against the 'small-minded fools' that would keep such a classic out of a reader's hands. But maybe the themes of the book would be better appreciated by someone older. I can't say for sure since I didn't read it until I was in my 40's. Would I have enjoyed it as much when I was at that 'impressionable age'?

Of course there will always be subjects that you don't discuss with children because it is not age appropriate. But by high school, I think most topics are on the table. Other than the language of the time, I don't think anything in the book would offend the sensibilities of a high school reader. To pretend that you can 'protect' them inside a bubble of innocence is both unrealistic and hardly helpful in raising mature adults. And I think if parents and teens read To Kill a Mockingbird together, it would lead to some very worthwhile discussions.

And as always, check things out for yourself. Don't take for granted that anyone's opinion of literature matches your own.

Born to Run

A friend recently sent me a link to "40 free (or cheap) things you can do in San Diego". I clicked on the link yesterday and found a few interesting things to do. One recommendation was to attend book-signings at the Warwick's Book Store in La Jolla. After clicking over to their site, I found out that Christopher McDougall (author of Born to Run) was speaking today. I read his book back in February, and it was excellent, so I decided to go listen to him speak.

The author was on assignment on a different story when he saw an article on the winner of the Leadville 100 endurance race. The accompanying picture showed a 52 year old man running in what appeared to be sandles made with soles of old tires. He dropped what he was working on to find out more about the story. It lead him to the reclusive Tarahumara tribe in Mexico who have the uncanny ability to run hundreds of miles, and display a serenity that leads you to believe that this is what we were born to do.

Upon discovery of these 'natural' runners, the author seeks to understand their secret from both the natives themselves, and scientists who have been studying human evolution and history to explain how our makeup sets us apart from other animals when it comes to covering great distances. One of the major factors that set us apart is our ability to dissipate heat through sweat. Early hunters likely survived by running animals to exhaustion and death.

The Tarhumara run on very minimalist sandles, and during his research the author encounters a few runners who believe running completely barefoot helps runners to avoid injury. This is the topic that has garnered the most press coverage and controversy. It has helped start a growing trend toward running in less structured shoes, if not going completely barefoot. The author himself used to be frustrated with a list of injuries, but going barefoot has allowed him to run again.

The story leads up to a 50 mile race that includes both the Tarahumara as well as some American ultra-runners. The blend of narrative, history and science make for an interesting read. And it turns out the author is a pretty good speaker as well. Tonight he expanded on the topics covered in the book, and interestingly didn't touch on barefoot running until the last couple of minutes. However, during the question and answer period, barefoot running was once again a hot topic.

One major lesson beyond all the history and science of running began with that first photo of the Leadville 100 winner. The author spoke with a running coach that saw the eventual winner at about the 60 mile mark. He was standing at the top of an embankment which punished the already weary runners. When the author asked about the Tarahumara runner, he was looking for information on the runner's style, gait and form. But all the running coach kept saying was, "you should have seen the smile on his face".

Beyond all the arguments about science and running with or without shoes, the Tarahumara have a way of looking at running as fun. It is probably no coincidence that they also experience much lower rates of disease and depression than most any other society. Toward the end of the author's presentation, he said his hope was that after all the barefoot-running debates die down, that people will look closer at the joy of running displayed by the Tarahumara. That could be the real lesson of the story.

Lit

I just finished the book Lit by Mary Karr. It is a memoir about her struggle with family scars, marriage, motherhood, and becoming a writer all through the hazy veil of alcoholism. The book details how her dependence on alcohol pushed her away from life, and ultimately tore apart what she knew of it. Later in the book, she struggles to get sober, and through her support group, grapples with "letting go and letting God".

I have read a number of "my life sucked, let me tell you about it" memoirs over the past few years. At some point they all seem to run together, and I need to step away from this genre. I'm not sure what online snippet led me to put this book on my 'to-read' list, but it lurked there for almost a year before I sat down to read it.

I had some difficulty getting into the book initially, but about a third of the way through it grabbed on to me. She has an unflinching way of writing about how alcohol blew apart opportunities and relationships, without playing the victim and glossing over her part in the collapse. Though she is descriptive in the details of the demise of her marriage, she is clear that her descriptions are not only filtered through a haze of alcohol, but her own perceptions of what happened. She allows that the story would be quite different if told by her ex-husband. As she notes in the book, "I would’ve preferred that my ex vet this manuscript and correct the glaring flaws. Wisely, he balked – I’d have hated to see his version, too."

Many dependency recovery programs have a strong element of prayer and faith. Mary would have none of it initially, and it is interesting to read about her reasoning and struggle as she grapples with letting go of control and preconceived notions. She walks a rather crooked path before entering the doors of church, and even when she sits down in the pew, she brings something to read in case she is bored. Not a quick conversion by any means, but I found her path interesting.

As a side note, I have been marking good passages in books over the last year or so. If I own the book, and particularly if it is a work of non-fiction, I will highlight good passages or turns of phrase in pen. If it is a book on loan from a friend or a library, I have been using these little Post-It flags. This is what Lit looked like when I was finished.

A bunch of flags is usually a good indication that I enjoyed the book, but not always. There have been a few books heavily flagged that I thought weren't the best. Although, some of them were read when I was going through the toughest part of our separation, so it makes me wonder if I was just not in the right mental place.

On the flip side, Lit may have been really enjoyable for me because I read it at the right time. The author's struggles with depression, dependency, divorce and despair may have hit me at the right time. Who knows, if we had read it in book club back when life was different, I may have written it off as just another woe-is-me memoir. But I don't think so. I think this one stands above the others, no matter when I picked it up. Worth a read.