Book Corner 2019.08

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I was absolutely mad about this modern-day, black-humored GRAPES OF WRATH. It’s 10 or so years in the future, and the dollar implodes, leading to a nationwide economic collapse. We follow one family’s step-by-step decline into utter destitution, in the wider setting of New York City’s descent into lawlessness. But trust me, it was no dystopian downer; it was funny and riveting.
My five-star feelings only began to quaver after the portion set in the 2030’s ended, when we fast-forward into what I initially thought was, and then thought SHOULD have been, a brief coda, set another decade or so into the future. The action only sagged here, in basically one scene, where the characters who were the teenagers during the collapse are now disaffected young adults unable to hold my interest. As this portion of the book went on, I was grossly disappointed – ending with the 2030’s section was EXACTLY where it should have ended, I felt. BUT — she did pull off a good enough ending to make the too-long coda worthwhile. So I stick with 5 stars.

Mudroom Lit and Heated

The mudroom now has electricity, a variety of lights, and baseboard heating.

This makes a tremendous difference.

Above, you can see Xopher is already making himself at home. This is the site of a future util-a-tub. Hopefully plumbing work will happen this week. That’s the last major piece to be done; then it’s just furnishing and fixing and finishing.

Book Corner 2019.07

Strangers Drowning: Impossible Idealism, Drastic Choices, and the Urge to Help

by Larissa MacFarquhar

This book was put together in a creative way; it wasn’t just philosophy and it wasn’t just case studies, it was both, but interspersed chapter-by-chapter, sometimes multiple chapters of one followed by one chapter of the other, or vice versa.

MacFarquhar is fascinated by extreme altruists, or as she likes to call them, “do-gooders.” She interviews a wide variety of them and lets them tell their stories, sometimes directly with their own words, sometimes through her. In between, she ponders what we owe to others vs. ourselves, and how we each answer that question differently, and what we lose – as well as gain – when we put others’ needs above our own. “Others” in all these contexts means those who are neither ourselves NOR our family members, nor even our friends, acquaintances, or neighbors – the do-gooders chronicled here are all dedicated to helping strangers.

Personal interest: One case study involved a family that adopted 22 children, hailing from none other than my home state, in Barre, Vermont.

Enjoy her interview here with Tyler Cowen:
View at Medium.com

WW Cauliflower-Crust Pizza

It’s good, and not hard if you’ve got a food processor to rice the cauliflower.

17 Inches and 1 Degree

Mudroom Floored

The mudroom has a floor now. It’s vinyl. I don’t like a faux wood look very much; but Xopher helped pick it out. It was hard to find something not cheesy-looking, that we thought would look OK with the walls. I’m not entirely sure we succeeded… but, it’ll be covered in mud soon enough.

The vinyl goes slightly up the walls for ease of lots of wet mopping. That was one of Xopher’s few requests.

I got seriously complimented on my sweater today at the Hapless Bagel Store. That makes my day, and makes up for them being so hapless. It’s the Norwegian Fishmerman sweater. It is pretty impressive looking. It’s black and white, with just a touch of red at the edges. But the black and white makes such a great contrast, it just makes the pattern totally … impactful. Looks not handmade.

Book Corner 2019.06

Children of the New World by Alexander Weinstein

I rarely read futuristic fiction, so when I do, I’m usually like, “OMG, THIS IS SO CREATIVE!” But I think this was a very impressive collection of stories; only one clunker, the one about sending unlikeable kids up in rocket ships. Every story hooked me and left me satisfied.

Noodle Rocks the Kitchen

Looks awful. Tastes great. This is an old Cooking Light recipe I’ve used for eons. Instead of pork sausage, used turkey sausage, which dramatically increased my allowed WW serving size – that, and beans now being zero points on WW. I had it over riced cauliflower (bought frozen) with a side of simple kale steamed with sea salt & a touch of olive oil. “Tastes like mama’s manicotti.” That’s an obscure movie reference.

Book Corner 2019.05

Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson

Too thinky. Too suggesty. When plot does happen, it lands like a ton of bricks. About half dozen too many tragedies.

Vermont 251!

I’ve joined something called the “Vermont 251 Club.” The goal is to visit each of the 251 towns in Vermont. There are no rules. If you pay dues to join, you get to use their not-very-good website. Here’s my home page. I paid extra to buy a scrapbook. It’s spiral bound and lined and lists every town with a quarter page or more for taking notes. I’m printing out actual physical copies of my pictures and pasting them in. Yeah, with glue! I don’t know, I’m down on the entire Internet these days. I didn’t want this silly little project to be just another collection of selfies floating around. I wanted an artifact. And not all the pictures are even going to be selfies. Was a time when people just took pictures of what was around them. I don’t have to prove to anyone I was in each town. I know I was there and the project is my own little game.