I wasn’t quite as caught up on reading my magazines and newsletters as I thought I was. One day this weekend I saw the book bag I had packed for our two summer trips. In it was one volume of The Annals of America, which I use for history article and essay ideas. Also in it were about five mags/newsletters I had taken on the trips but never read. So I put them back in the mag pile, along with two others that have arrived since I wrote my last blog post. Maybe I’ll read and finish one tonight. I’m way ahead of where I expected to be on my current book.
But my mag piles at work seem to be growing. I didn’t think I received that many. I don’t subscribe to a lot, but some come to me as a result of having attended a conference and visited a booth and been put on a mailing list. Then there are three or four that the chairman of the board sends me. I try to go through something in a mag every day, but still never catch up.
Because these are piling up, and because magazines were on my mind, I decided to go through my piles and make an inventory of what comes my way, and how many issues per year.
Arkansas Asphalt News – 4
Stormwater – 6
Environmental Connection – 4
Geosynthetics – 6 (gonna ditch this one soon)
Grading & Excavation Contractor – 6 (this one as well)
APWA Reporter – 12
CE News – 12
Journal AWWA – 12
Erosion Control – 7
Standardization News – 6
Opflow (newsletter) – 12
Pollution Equipment News – 6
Missouri PE newsletter – 4
Kansas PE newsletter – 4
Arkansas PE newsletter – 4
Arkansas Drinking Water Update – 4
Land & Water – 6 (not sure I’m still subscribed)
Water Environment & Technology – 12
If my non-calculator math is correct, that’s 129 mags a year, which I should get through in 220 or so working days. No wonder they are piling up.
For the more important mags, I try to read them closely. Many articles and news items are of importance to my work. Heck, even most of the ads have information in them about products I ought to know something about.
So they pile up. I get through at least one article a day. Some days I do more, even a whole magazine of the lesser important ones. I think, because I’ve been diligent with these as of late, the piles are actually a little shorter than the were at the beginning of the summer.
Right now, I’d better close this and see where I left off in the May 2010 issue of Erosion Control.
Arkansas Asphalt News???
Yeah, the magazine of the Arkansas Asphalt Paving Association. It's not of great value, but on occasion they have a good article or notice of continuing education.
D