Tag: Photos

Updates

Lunch Break Interlude

Geoff W

Today has not been the most productive of days. I’ve gotten a decent amount of work done in the office, but I’m just not motivated. In hopes of motivating myself I thought I’d take a few minutes to share a neat photo found online and my two newest book additions and neat finds on my random Tuesday off this week.

I randomly stumbled across this rather ingenious photo on a 404 missing page at Scribd. It really does sum up what I feel like when I’m trying to find my next book to read unless something serendipitously comes along and suggests what I should read next. For example, I am currently reading Madame Bovary as I missed a trivia question about the story and then realized French literature is woefully lacking in my life (I believe I’ve only ever read Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo and that was in High School)!

The second photo I took of the random things I bought while driving my sister up to Keene, NH for grad school (so it wasn’t that random, but of all days to take off in a week Tuesday really turned me around). There was a Borders still open so I went in to see if the sales were any better than those Boston had when they closed all our stores. The sales were minutely better (but the staff if-possible even more rude) and I splurged and bought a copy of The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet by Reif Larsen, which I’ve read before and heard him speak and loved it (and him), and a combined A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations by Charles Dickens for $11.00 total (saving like $36.00 or so. I also went to Target and bought some deodorant (I wouldn’t share this generally, but it was a double pack for $3.99 and a regular stick is $4.56 on its own!) and two neat Moleskine notebooks for $3 and a Green whiteboard/corkboard for my cubicle for $5.00.

And a final picture of my lovely corkboard hanging up in the office:

Also, last week I got my copies of The English Patient, Waiting for Snow in Havana, and Fun Home in preparation for the Boston Book Festival! I’m very excited to re-read Fun Home and even more excited to finally read the first two which have been on my book list for over three years!

Updates

August 2011 Update

Geoff W

July was a crazy busy month, but I was somehow able to read/post EIGHT books.  I actually read Tropic of Cancer and Slammerkin in July, but didn’t have computer access this past weekend so those posts were the first two of August.  I’m reading Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and it’s interesting to say the least.

On Goodreads yesterday I found this AWESOME stat (above) where it tells you the number of pages (or books, or the year of the books in a graph format) of the books you’ve read that year.  My current tally sits at 10, 775 pages.  Given books vary in the editions you read it could easily be off, but it’s still pretty neat.If you’re not on Goodreads, Join! And FRIEND ME!

I’m also very excited as over the weekend the Boston Book Festival announced the author lineup for the 2011 festival.  I’m probably most excited for Alison Bechdel (Heck yeah Fun Home), Michael Ondaatje, Booker Prize winning novelist of The English Patient, and Carlos Eire author of Waiting for Snow in Havana: Confessions of a Cuban Boy.  October 15, 2011 can’t get here soon enough!

On a personal note, I work for on one of the Harbor Islands, and this month is a busy month, as are the next few! We’ve had graduations off and on over the past few weeks, a family event this coming weekend, a 4k trail run next month, a reception in October and a lot of correspondence going out by the end of the calendar year.  But one of the perks of the job, is the fact that I work for an island and occasionally have the opportunity to get out of the office and work from/on the island.

Today I was out on the island for a graduation ceremony and ended up waiting for a later ferry, and got to sit on the dock in the sun and read for a half hour (left, you can almost see the city in the upper left hand corner)  in the lovely Adirondack chairs (right).  So even though sometimes I feel like I’ll never catch up on work, or that I can’t quite complete a project to the perfection I want, the opportunity to visit the island and to interact with the countless students we serve and the donors who visit the island, and something as simple as getting to read for 30 minutes on the dock truly makes it all worth while.

Random

I got a Kindle!!!

Geoff W

As you may have guessed from my fairly obvious title, I got a Kindle.  I’m sure it had something to do with my blog post (July Update) including Tom’s cameo (among other things) or Tom’s rekindled, notice I didn’t say new, appreciation for books.  He gave me a gift certificate to Amazon for 2/3 of the kindle because I didn’t want him to pay for all of it.  It was a bit of a decision because I could have gotten 20-25 used books easily, but I really did want a Kindle so I bought it.

It arrived last Saturday and I immediately uploaded 25 books, three I paid for including The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson, and the rest were pre-1923.  I realized pretty quickly that the books are pretty expensive (compared to used) and I will purchase books, but I can’t wait until the public library starts loaning Kindle e-books.

Everything was going great until Monday morning on the way to work. Less than 48 hours of owning it I gave myself a mini-heart attack by dropping it in a parking lot. If you know me, this isn’t too surprising, but I was petrified and swore at myself for not just shelling out the money to purchase a cover when I got it.  The back casing partially popped open and there is now a lovely scrape (smaller than a dime) on the back left corner, but thankfully it still worked/s.  This scare necessitated my lovely blue case to the left. It doesn’t photograph very well and Amazon doesn’t show the color very well, but it’s a nice blue, maybe a bit lavender-ish depending on the light.  I splurged and got the one with the light because after the mini-heart attack I needed something special.

I’ve had it for nearly a week and so far the pros definitely outweigh the cons.  It responds significantly faster than  my Sony Pocket e-Reader which isn’t that shocking considering this is the third generation Kindle and I have a first generation Sony.  The formatting of the novels is great, but I wish rather than it automatically starting you on the first page with text, it would start you on the cover page.  I absolutely LOVE the notes feature, although you can (and I did) go overboard as you’ll see in the quotes section of my next post.

The two biggest negatives are the side navigation buttons (personal preference) and the lack of page numbers.  The navigation bothers me because for some reason I’m convinced the left should be backward and the right forward, but both sides have a large forward and a small backwards button.  The lack of page numbers really bothers me, especially as I like to see how many pages to the next chapter.  You can check the page numbers, but you have to pull up the menu screen and hope that the publisher included them.  I’m sure I will get used to both the navigation and the page numbers as everything else works seamlessly.

Culture Corner

Temporary Hiatus

Geoff W

Clearly this is not announcing a hiatus, it is pointing out the obvious. Life has been crazy recently and I haven’t stopped reading! I’ve read five books and am working on the 6th since my last update. I’ve clearly failed at updating, so I’ll have to force myself to do it this weekend or next.

Chihuly Exhibit, Museum of Fine Art - Boston, MA
Chihuly Exhibit, Museum of Fine Art – Boston, MA

I’ve been doing all sorts of other cultural things like joining the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and attending the Symphony (not the real BSO, which I’ve attended before, but the Video Game Orchestra, which was brilliant). And starting a Copy Editing class, which is interesting and has already taught me a lot and has reinvigorated my mind.

Above is a picture of the upcoming Chihuly exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts and below is Symphony Hall.

Symphony Hall - Boston, MA
Berklee College of Music presents the Video Game Orchestra, Symphony Hall – Boston, MA

We have a huge Gala coming up next week at work, so I don’t know if I’ll actually get to post the books I’ve put off, but they will be up soon! I’m also excited as the Island opens up soon! People are already on the Island and the first group of kids will be out there next month. The weather is already improving down by the waterfront, but so is the fish smell so it’s a bit of a trade-off.

Random

Halloween

Geoff W

This is completely random, but I absolutely love this photo and it sort of ties in to this blog. In honor of Halloween the photo is here and growing up I read countless Star Wars novels. I want to go back and reread them, but they’re all in storage right now. I originally saw it on Geekologie, but Tell Us Something Good blogged it today.