Category Archives: reading

Working Hard at Doing Nothing

I should go back and review the post I wrote on Friday, about looking forward to a holiday that was both productive and restful. I wonder exactly what I put down for the productive part. Whatever it was, I’m sure I didn’t accomplish it.

On Friday afternoon neighbors offered us their spare tickets to the Saturday afternoon Northwest Arkansas Naturals game. They are the AA farm club of the Kansas City Royals. The stadium is only 30 miles from our house, but we haven’t gone to a game in the few years they’ve been in the area. Part of that is busyness; part is hoarding of restricted recreational dollars; part is simply I’ve fallen out of love with baseball. That was the game of my early youth, till I played and became a fan of football. Then baseball progressively fell out of my favor as football’s star rose. The 1993-94 major league strike ended baseball for me, though I was just looking for an excuse. The later NFL strike didn’t impact my love of that game.

Don’t get me wrong; baseball is a great game. It’s just that football is a much better game for me, and so it gets my limited sports watching hours. But we decided that the diversion would be good, so we went. We had four tickets but had trouble finding anyone to go with us. Finally found one person. We both enjoyed the game. Fortunately our seats were just in the shade the whole game and we didn’t have to fight the sun. The Naturals lost to the Tulsa Drillers, mainly because of a stupid handling between the pitcher and first baseman of a foul ball. It would have ended the first inning. Instead the Drillers went on to score three unearned runs, and eventually won the game 5-2.

The rest of the weekend was marred by minor physical ailments. Last week I was fighting a mild summer cold. I thought it was pretty much over Friday night, but it came back Sunday. Spent most of that day and Monday just resting to try to knock it out. Also on Monday my rheumatoid arthritis flared up. Well, some of it may be osteo as well, in my wrists. Monday morning it was all I could do to crawl out of bed to my reading chair in the living room or to the sun porch. The only physical exercise I got was a ten minute walk down and up the hill and around the block Monday evening. However, by the end of the day I felt pretty good. Cold symptoms gone; rheumatoid gone; osteo better; energy level up.

I finished The Adams Chronicles on Monday and wrote my book review about it. Also on Sunday-Monday I wrote my next article on contract administration for buildipedia.com and sent it off. And I did research for and started writing my next stock trading article for suite101.com. I checked my reading pile for what I’m supposed to read next and decided I didn’t want to read that right now. Rather than re-shuffle the pile, and not feeling like tackling the magazines and newsletters that are piling up again, I decided to try reading Athanasius’ The Incarnation of the Word of God—in English of course. I got through a couple of chapters of it and kind of understand it. I’ll have to finish it when my powers of concentration are at their greatest and distractions at their least; and not necessarily in consecutive sittings.

Tonight I hope to finish and post that Suite 101 article, and maybe get through a couple of mags and/or newsletters. And I’ll take another look at my reading pile and see what looks good next.

Oh for a Holiday Weekend

Labor Day weekend is upon us. My supervisor, the CEO, usually comes around early afternoon and tells us we can leave early, somewhere around 3:00 or 3:30 PM. I usually don’t, but might do so this time. While it’s a holiday, with one extra day, I have much to accomplish. Here’s a sampling.

  • We had a strong rainstorm last night, and one of the skylights leaks in our living room. It was a slow drip, but it followed the ceiling slope to the wall and then down the wall. We protected the carpet right away, but now I have to deal with this. Water in the living room, water in the basement. What’s a homeowner to do?
  • Speaking of water in the basement, we are in a testing phase right now. Had the plumber out yesterday. He couldn’t find any water, but wants us to watch it for a while before we do the ceiling re-installation and then the carpet installation. Another week at least with The Dungeon torn up.
  • Speaking of The Dungeon, I’m going to at least clean up the mess in it this weekend. We put down plastic sheets to catch the sheetrock and dust, but the sheets were so old that they kind of crumbled. Who knew? So I’ll get them out and vacuum up all the stuff that fell through the sheet cuts.
  • Speaking of cuts, it would be nice if I could finish taking out that leaning tree this weekend. The cut I made through the large branch that is preventing the tree from falling is mostly through the branch, but it closed up under the weight and I’ve got to start a cut from the other side. Weather is supposed to be good this weekend for working outside.
  • Speaking of working outside, I’ll have a little grass to weed-eat, and maybe I’ll take out those two bushes Lynda wants taken out. That will take an hour. And a few other bushes need trimming. Another hour.
  • Otherwise, I have two Buildipedia articles under contract that I need to finish or at least work on. I have three others under contract that I should start on. And it would be nice to write two for Suite101. Ideas are on my mind; I need to help them find an outlet.
  • Otherwise, I plan on reading, reading, reading. 150 or more pages in the book I’m working on, three or four newsletters, one Geographic, and one Poets and Writers.
  • And last, it would be nice to begin work on the next Bible study that’s on my mind. Actually, I started it last Sunday, but quickly saw it was a lot more work than I had envisioned, and so laid it aside.

That sounds like enough. I’ll perhaps make a couple of posts to this blog, get a few walks in, play Scrabble with Lynda, and enjoy the weather on the deck.

Reading Magazines

Last night, about 9:45 PM, I pulled a book off the reading pile and began reading, mug of coffee at the ready. I’m sure I’ll give a report on it, 510 pages from now. For the last three weeks or so I’ve been concentrating on reading magazines. On the end table between Lynda’s and my reading chairs, we each have a stack. Actually I have two. One is a stack of books; the other a stack of magazines and newsletters. I tackle each as the spirit moves me. Actually the stack of books is not my reading pile. It is the current book I’m reading, plus a Bible or two, and maybe a study book. My reading “pile” is actually out of sight, on a bookshelf in my closet.

The magazine pile is quite varied. I only subscribe to one magazine, Poets and Writers, and that’s a one-year experiment. I’ll see in February if I’ll renew it. But we get lots of other mags or newsletters. There’s alumni magazines from the University of Rhode Island, the University of Missouri, the UoM College of Engineering, and I think Lynda may get something from the University of Kansas. We get a magazine twice a year from our timeshare organization, every month from our rural electric cooperative, and one a month from AAA. They pile up.

Then add to that the newsletters: Prison Fellowship, New Fields Ministries, our water utility, Focus on the Family, the Bella Vista POA, the non-official Bella Vista newsletter (almost a mag), and a couple more. These pile up as well. Lynda gets a couple every month from various stock trading organizations, though those may be more “buy our service” type of ads rather than true newsletters. I also classify as “magazines” things such as annual reports from insurance companies and stocks. We get a few of those.

Then add the mags we pick up at thrift stores, yard sales, or the recycling place. That one is amazing. When the magazine box is full, you have your pick of hundreds within reach. Conversely, when they’ve just emptied the box, you can’t reach any. We normally come away from there with just about the same number that we drop off. The National Geographic I’ve read recently came from there—though we’ve got years of the Geographic on shelves downstairs, waiting for me to get to them.

I try to read them all. Why? I feel like I’m probably missing something if I don’t read them. They come to me to impart knowledge, maybe even wisdom on occasion. How can I simply trash them? Certainly what I pay for I’m going to read. Every page. Even the ads. Those that come free I might skim. Oh, wait, most of those I actually pay for. The cost is just hidden in the utility rate or the overhead of the organization. The ministry newsletters are always interesting. New Fields is an organization of Russian-Americans who provide a wide range of Christian ministries in the countries of the former Soviet Union. They do a great work, including much humanitarian work.

So for the last three weeks, when reading time materialized, rather than go to my reading pile I grabbed something off the mag pile. As of Monday night the mag pile was left with only two things it in. One was something from Blue Cross Blue Shield that I just didn’t feel like reading. The other was the timeshare org mag, and that is almost as much sales pitch. So I felt caught up and grabbed the book from the reading pile. While it’s a rather large book, it will feel good to get back into that kind of reading. At ten pages a night and a few more on the weekend, I should finish this around the end of September or early October. By then another ten to fifteen magazines should have piled up.

Reading, Writing, and…Demolition

After a busy weekend last weekend, painting the walls in the family room and stripping wallpaper in the downstairs bathroom, I took it easy on the physical labor this past week. Did some light work in that bathroom, removing bits of paper we’d missed. Put some pictures back on the walls, and restored some other things in the family room. But I didn’t undertake anything major.

During the week we had the air conditioner man out to look and see if he could see what is causing the staining on the ceiling in our computer room and in the guest bedroom next to it. He said he couldn’t see anything with the limited view he had, and that we would need to tear out some of the fixed ceiling to tell anything. The restoration people said their meters detected wetness in the ceiling. Insurance wouldn’t cover what caused the problem, but after we fixed the problem they would restore everything, including ceiling that we had to tear out to find the problem.

So yesterday, after washing windows, screens, and window sills in the computer room, I began tearing out ceiling. The first piece comes out with the most difficulty, of course, as you pierce that nice finish and use the hole to begin the tear out. I started where the stain looked worst, and the first piece felt a little wet to me. But it was cold, being right near an AC duct, so maybe I was feeling the cold and thought it was wet.

I kept at it, removing enough so I could see what was up there. It’s a spaghetti mix of water pipe, AC duct, drain lines, and electric and telephone. All the ceiling board seemed dry, though staining on the back side sort of mimicked the stains visible below, except more extensive. Looking through the joists, into the ceiling above the bedroom, I could see that the hot and cold to the washing machine was right above the stains. But nothing looked wet.

So maybe the water came from two problems. A year (or maybe more) ago we had to replace the garbage disposal, a hole having been worn into the side of it. We figured this was the cause of the staining, as the kitchen if right above that part of the computer room (The Dungeon, as I fondly call it). But the staining in the bedroom showed up much later. Maybe it’s a leak associated with the washer. Or, the main house drainage line for the upstairs is right in that area too. Maybe it’s something to do with that.

It appears that we will have to run some appliances and watch and see if the area above the stains looks wet. That means everything will be torn up for a while, since we won’t have the new carpet put down (as a result of the hot water heater leaking) until we have the ceiling fixed, which won’t be till we find the leak.

In the meanwhile, I’ve got lots of reading done, not in a book, but in accumulated magazines. I finished the latest edition of Poets and Writers today, finished an old (2008) National Geographic yesterday, and got some good information about a sci fi subject I was thinking of. Have about finished reading the latest Quadangles, the URI alumni mag. And it seems that I read something else earlier in the week. Oh, I’ve read some in an investment/trading book, and have brainstormed a series of articles for Suite101.com on the subject. I hope to write one tonight.

So all in all a productive time. I’m fairly well caught up on mags, so will go back to my reading pile and see what book is next.

Logs Loosened, Logs Added, the Jam is Still

Well, the reference book about labyrinth weirs I’ve been waiting for arrived today, just a half-hour before the third conference call in four days about the problem. A quick review of the most critical chapter in the book confirms that our weir is under-designed, and won’t pass the flow intended. At the conference call, everyone seemed pleased with the progress. But tomorrow I will have to tackle the book in earnest, and work on some solutions.

The big negative for the day was my Centerton Little Osage Creek flood study. As I reported Monday I figured out the mistake in the printing and got the reports printed correctly. That was good. Unfortunately, when I checked the spread of the flood in the model it did not match what we show on the mapping. That’s bad. That means I’ve got to figure out if the model is wrong, or if the mapping is wrong. But I’m supposed to have the exact same topography in the model as is on the maps. So how the heck can the spread of the flood be 50 percent different? More logs added to the pile.

The church parking lot continues to progress nicely. Of course, I’m getting queries about it from all quarters, along with some advice. Still, it’s not bad. I’ll have to go to the site early tomorrow (more time away from my job) and make a couple of decisions. But either tomorrow or Friday we should have asphalt down, if the rain is not too bad.

Writing goes well. I continue to read in Poets and Writers, finally getting past the features into the regular columns, several of which include advice for writers. I’ll get through at least one of those tonight. My actual writing has been confined to passage notes for the Harmony of the gospels. I’ve written seven sets of passage notes since Sunday. I’ll get two more done tonight, then may pull off for a while and work on my next Life Group lesson series.

I’m back in a routine, getting stuff done. I’m not writing creatively, nor reading for pleasure, but it’s still a routine, still a good groove.

Book Addiction

Last night we moved books. First we took them out of the bookcases. Then we moved the bookcases. Then we moved other bookcases into the spots where the first bookcases were. Then we put the books back on the shelves.

Well, the whole process is not yet done. We did get all the bookcases in their new places. One short one was replaced with a tall one next to another tall one, except those two didn’t match, and one of them (the one already in place) matched two or three on the other side of the room, and another bookcase in a semi-used state in a spare bedroom matched the tall one replacing the short one. Are you with me so far?

First, the short one went on a wall where there was no bookcase, under the high school graduation pictures of the kids. The same books went back in that one in the new location. Then I took the encyclopedias off their shelf and set that bookshelf to the side, for two other shelves had to be moved four inches first to increase some space for the encyclopedias. The tall one being moved to its two (or three) matching brothers, where the encyclopedias had been, went next, but those books were not necessarily going back on to it, so they had to stay in piles for a while. That all happened Monday evening, along with vacuuming vacated places and spraying for bugs.

Then yesterday evening I moved the unused one from the garage to where the short one had been, went to writers guild, came back from writers guild when no one else showed, moved (with Lynda’s help) the other matching tall one. We then unloaded two other tall ones and moved them four inches. Except that proved to be a little too much and so we moved them back one inch. Then the encyclopedia case went in its new home, right by the door into the Dungeon (as we fondly call our walk-out basement where all this was taking place).

Then the slow process of moving books began in earnest. Christian fiction, alphabetical by other first, then Biblical fiction also alpha by author, then secular fiction alpha by author and collating two groups, then non-fiction (Christian and secular mixed), except how to organize the non-fiction? Alpha by author wouldn’t work. It has to be topical. I worked on that some, until it was after 10:00 PM and time to wind down for the evening. The few remaining piles on the floor, and whatever the final look of the non-fiction will be, can wait for tomorrow.

All of which says: I have an addiction to books. It’s very difficult to pass any up at a sale. At least, to pass up any I’m truly interested in. The list of books I blogged about a couple of days ago had all come from used book sales over a month’s time. That’s too many books to be adding to an already over-stuffed collection. So as of now I am swearing off used book stores, thrift stores, garage sales, and even new book stores. The library? I’ll still go there, but only at times when that little used book store in the entryway is closed.

Now I have to read them, all 4,000 of them (my best estimate). It might take a while, especially with finding a couple of articles in every book. More on that tomorrow–if I’m not too busy shelving books.

New Book Accumulations

I almost wrote book “acquisitions” in the title, but that would be misleading. The term acquisition regarding books in the publishing industry normally refers to a publisher acquiring a new book from an author, i.e. making an offer for publishing a book and having that author accepted.

Nothing like that going on in this writers life. But I continue to accumulate books to go on already filled bookshelves in our house. I quite buying used books for a while, or bought them at a very slow pace. For a while I didn’t even go to places where used books were being sold, as my powers of resistance are fairly low were book buying is concerned.

Over the last month I picked up the following books.

  • The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, Vol. 1
  • A Manual For Writers
  • Jews, God, and History
  • Handbook of the Pentateuch
  • The Adams Chronicles
  • the search for JFK
  • War Letters (from American wars)
  • Complete Short Stories of Mark Twain
  • Mart Twain: Letters From The Earth
  • Foxe’s Book of Martyrs
  • Great Voices of the Reformation
  • Assumed Identity, by David Morrell
  • The Haldeman Diaries

I’m not quite sure yet how I will work these into my reading pile. I’m not quite half-way through the reading pile I established last August, and will probably go a book or two into the second half before I make any changes. I bought the two Mark Twain books because I enjoyed his Letters from Hawaii so much, and in truth I’ve read little by Twain except his major books for children (Tom, and Huck). I have enjoyed the two David Morrell novels I’ve read, so couldn’t resist buying a third.

A Manual For Writers is more of a reference book, sort of a poor man’s Chicago Manual of Style. I’ve already used it for reference a couple of times. The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha book is probably nothing more than an academic affectation for me. I read about 25 pages in it over the weekend and found it enjoyable, but I’m not sure I got much out of it. I’m not going to read any more at this time. Well, maybe I’ll just finish the introductory material of 1 Enoch. But then I’d have to read at least five or ten chapters of 1 Enoch. But I can’t do that and write articles for Suite101.com and track freelance queries and research and send out more and start reading Steinbeck.

What’s a writer to do?

Book Review: Team of Rivals

On Monday I finished reading Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, 2005 Simon & Schuster, ISBN 0-684-82490-6, a non-fiction book by Doris Kearns Goodwin. The book totals 754 pages, not including extensive notes, bibliography, and index. As I mentioned in a previous post, I expected this to be a two month read, or seven weeks if I could find more time to read on weekends. Well, I completed it in five weeks and two days.

The reason for my better progress? The combination of a well-organized book, easy reading that was at the same time scholarly, and an interesting subject. I found I could ready twenty pages a day without any trouble. On weekend days I did thirty to forty. I wouldn’t say the book was a page turner; few history books are. But it treated the subject matter in such a way that it was perfect for me.

The book begins on a day in May 1860 when the Republican convention in Chicago was to select their candidate for the presidency. The four main candidates–Seward, Chase, Bates, and Lincoln–were in their respective home towns, waiting on the outcome. In those days candidates never attended or even addressed their convention. The opening chapter tells something of how the four men pursued the nomination. Then chapters 2 and 3 go into their lives leading up to that point, and chapters 4, 5, 6, and 7 cover the last decade or so leading up to the convention. It isn’t until chapter 8 that we return to Chicago and see how Lincoln’s team bested his rivals. Thus the book is in a D-A-B-C-E order.

Beginning with chapter 8 the book runs in chronological order, covering the Lincoln presidency in considerable detail. As could be expected from the title, the primary subject of the book is how Lincoln put his chief political rivals on his cabinet, and then how it was his personality and leadership style that molded them into a team that carried out what he wanted to do with the nation. Lincoln’s style was one of quiet perseverance and charm. When faced with a disagreement with any of his cabinet, he resolutely forbore the arguments in favor of the opposing position, then with charm and quiet persuasion was able to bring the colleague around, or on occasion slightly alter his own position based on the logic of the other guy’s.

This was no Harry Truman, who would tell his cabinet, “Here’s what I’m going to do. Talk me out of it if you can.” They never could. Nor was this a Teddy Roosevelt, speaking softly but carrying a big stick. Lincoln carried no stick at all, according to Kearns. He entered the presidency as a relative unknown, painted by the Democrats as a rail-splitter. In fact, a few months into his first term someone in power said, “We have voted for a rail-splitter, and that’s what we got.”

As the opening battles in the Civil War went against the Union, everyone questioned Lincoln’s forbearance with non-performing generals. The radical side of his cabinet questioned his toleration of the conservatives, and the conservatives did the same concerning the liberals/radicals. The abolitionists declared Lincoln a friend of slavery, and Southern sympathizers declared him an abolitionist. Somehow, through his incredible forbearance and his refusal to become flustered or angry, Lincoln prevailed and the Union was saved.

Kearns does a masterful job at weaving this story. She tells how Lincoln used diversions to reduce his stress level and allow him to keep focused, diversions such as the theatre, the opera, carriage rides, weekends away from the White House, and simple evenings spent with friends where he could spin his yarns. He became good friends with his chief rival, William Seward (Secretary of State), and the two spent much time together not necessarily discussing government business.

It was not so with Salmon Chase (Secretary of the Treasury). Kearns describes how Chase constantly baited Lincoln, either purposely or just as a consequence of planning to unseat Lincoln in 1864. Lincoln stood for much abuse from Chase, refusing three times to accept his resignation. When he finally did accept it (to Chase’s surprise), the timing was perfect and the rest of the cabinet, the Congress, and the nation understood it was for the best.

Tomorrow I’ll cover a few more items, and summarize the review. For now I’ll say this read is well worth the cost of the book and the hours you will dedicate to it. Don’t take a chance to pass this up.

Progress as Promised: a shameless commercial plug

I had intended tonight to post the first part of a two-part review of Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin. Yes, I finished it last night, well ahead of the schedule I thought I could achieve. The book is long, and deserves a thorough review. On my noon hour, after walking 1.33 miles, I did an outline of my review. Of course, I left the outline on my desk when I left the office.

So tonight I’ll post something else. I’m making progress on a number of fronts.

  • Health: After a few weeks of barely watching what I ate (while continuing a good level of exercise), this is shaping up to be a good week. For the last two days I’ve barely snacked, and have upped my exercise level slightly. Despite 90+ temperatures at noon, I walked 12 laps each day (a mile and a third).
  • Flood study: At the end of the workday, I had pretty much completed the last analysis of the flood study that has been a sword dangling over my head for two years. I still have to get the tech going on the mapping (promised for tomorrow), and must write a technical report (already started) and fill out the FEMA forms (one day’s work). The end is in sight.
  • Reading: As stated, I got more reading done than anticipated over the last month. Perhaps I’m reading more efficiently, because I had great comprehension as I read; I didn’t skim any of it.
  • Freelancing: Last night I spent time preparing a query for another article in Internet Genealogy. No word on it yet.
  • Suite 101.com: Here’s the shameless plug: I have three articles up on Suite 101: two on flood plain issues, and one an overview of Robert Frost’s “Into My Own”, one of his early poems. These three articles don’t have many page views yet and no revenue earned, but that will come in time. What business, you ask, does a civil engineer have reviewing a Frost poem? You’ll have to go to my profile page at Suite 101 and click on the article.

Tomorrow hopefully I’ll begin the book review. Right now, I’m exiting the Dungeon for the upper levels, from the coolness of the basement to the heat of the street level, and will spend a little time reading. The next two books on my reading pile are A Harmony of the Gospels (I forget the author) and East of Eden by John Steinbeck. I’ve never read that, but it’s rather long and I’m not sure I want to read a long book right now. So, for the few minutes of reading tonight, I’ll get back into my son’s philosophy paper “The New Problem of Akratic Action”. This forms a chapter in his dissertation, and is not really a difficult read. At least I think I understood the first five pages.

Trying to Concentrate

This weekend has not been good as far as writing is concerned. Yesterday morning I did my usual Saturday work outside the house routine. I cut down a 30 foot dead tree on the adjacent lot, where we are trying to create a small, park-like area (we don’t own this lot; it’s vacant and forested; I suppose we can use it until the owners retire and build a house on it). I only had a few other things do to outside, so came back into the house.

Before I could write, I decided I’d better read a chapter in Team of Rivals. I’m making good progress in that and am ahead of even my most optimistic schedule. Still, as of this afternoon, have 160 pages to go, but the reading is easy and I should finish by next weekend, if not before.

Then I came downstairs to the Dungeon, intent on writing something, either work on a chapter in my novel in progress, or a Bible study in progress, or begin to flesh out some freelance ideas I had, but as I sat at the computer I found my mind had no powers of concentration. I couldn’t even read e-mails. I played some mindless computer games, tried to read e-mails again and got through them, played some more games, then left the computer to file various household papers. That worked fairly well, because I got through some papers that did not have a place prepared. That meant I had to concentrate enough to determine what the place should be and prepare it and file the paper. That included a number of items related to my completed, in-the-drawer novel.

That done, I came back to the computer, but still couldn’t write. A writing related task I had on my mental to-do list was to set up a spreadsheet for freelance writing accounting. This isn’t on a critical path, since I have no income as yet (at least none paid; I have some accrued), but still just having the system set up will make it much easier to keep track of things. Still, that wasn’t writing.

I never could get much done. I did some hand-writing on an idea for a magazine article, and I read some writing blogs, but nothing that could be described as progress. Lynda returned home from OKC about 8:30 PM. I had supper prepared (though she ate on the road). I just turned to reading for the evening. Having read a chapter in ToR, I decided to pull out Tolkien’s letters and read them. I’m at the point where he was finishing the proofs and then seeing published The Lord of the Ring. That was interesting and satisfying, until one long letter to a bookstore owner/operator who had questioned some theological items on the book. Tolkien painstakingly explained how he had no theological agenda, that the book wasn’t allegorical, and how this and that item had been misunderstood, etc. I got through that letter, but was left with no mind for anything else. So I went to bed, earlier than normal for a Saturday night.

So here I am in the Dungeon, at the computer, about to begin writing. It seemed a blog post would be a good place to start. Even with that, I have interrupted my writing several times to play a game. Cursed games! I have four or five writing projects I could work on, and will turn to them now. Perhaps I can get in two or three good hours from this point on, and face the new week really feeling like a writer.