Bookpile: October 2009

How to Train Your Dragon and How to Be a Pirate - First two books about the heroic misadventures of Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III, a viking in training of the Hooligan tribe. Picked them up because there's an animated movie coming out next year and I wanted to catch the story. (And make a lens on it, yes.) Really enjoyed them. The art looks like something a kid (or me!) would draw and the stories are just plain fun. There's humor that might go over the head of a kid but gave me quite a few chuckles.

Change the Way You See Yourself - Partner to previous book on asset-based thinking. Basically just applied it to three more areas. Maybe when I conquer the other three, I'll come back to this one. :-)




The Alternative Hero by Tim Thornton - First novel from this guy and made me feel like I really missed a lot of music in the 80s-90s. Decent book, not raving about it. Fascinated by the trip back into a world before the internet and even wide distribution of PCs and printers. Hard to remember the days when you couldn't just ask all your Twitter friends for a recommendation.

The Draco Tavern - OK, I love short stories. I love Larry Niven. But this collection wasn't working for me. Not that I didn't love the stories, but ... . Collecting all the ones about the same place just left me wishing for a novel rather than vignettes. You get tired of reading the description of the specific alien types every single time and the tavern just seemed ripe for more depth. Great setting and some interesting things raised for discussion, but possibly shouldn't be taken in one sitting.

The Spiderwick Chronicles - We watched the movie recently and left it thinking that the book was likely better. And maybe if the book(s) were more than the movie, that would be the case. Finished the first book in an hour, got nothing more than was in the movie so am not proceeding to the rest of them. Maybe if I had read the books first, I would have been more impressed with them. (NOTE: this is one time when being an adult reviewing a kids book isn't a good thing. These would be fabulous for the right kid.)

Lateral Thinking - had to abandon this one. Just wasn't in the mood for what turned out to be a textbook. Could never focus enough to make it very far.

(All links above go to Amazon. Yes, I make money if you buy them, probably enough to stay in gum. The people annoyed by my gum popping do not thank you.)

No cheering for infidelity

Not going to do it.

Don’t care how bad you make their situation. Don’t care about soulmates. Don’t care how much romantic music you swell up in the background.

I’m not cheering for infidelity.

It’s a common theme in movies and books. People trapped in a loveless/abusive/neglectful (pick one) marriage discover love with someone not their spouse. And now we’re supposed root for them to abandon their vows, seek happiness without regard for consequences and run off into the sunset with each other.

Get real.

There is nothing romantic about infidelity. And there is little permanent about selfish happiness.

So stop it already, OK? I hearby declare a moratorium in my household on movies that involve such plotlines. If you’ve never lived through the pain infidelity can cause a family, you might think I’m going a little off the deep end; you probably don’t feel quite so sensitively toward that subject. But any married person should be ticked at the casual way infidelity gets bandied about.

(Yes, I just watched a movie this weekend with such a story line. They didn’t end up together, but you were definitely supposed to root for them to do so. Am I the only person who just thinks this is wrong?)

Paisley's review of PlanetDog disc

So, our friend Anthony over at k9cuisine sent Paisley a new frisbee* recently. Chasing frisbees is her main source of exercise since she hates walks (weird dog) and she had finally broken her last one. This is a blue and orange disc from PlanetDog with the orange part a hard plastic like a regular frisbee and the blue part a softer rubber-like material.

She loves it. She will choose it every time over the regular frisbee. (Although, if they're both out there, she'll try to pick them up together. Hilarity ensues. :-) The humans - we'd rather use the regular frisbee. Guess who wins?

The PlanetDog disc is much heavier than a standard frisbee, which takes a little getting used to. You have to really fling to get it to go the length of the yard. And I have yet to actually get Paisley to catch it, although Kevin reports that she's caught it for him. So I'm not sure if it's harder for her to catch because it's heavier or if she just likes chasing/attacking it on the ground. She does tend to pounce on it a lot once it dies.

So far, it's holding up really well. Paisley has little teeny teeth that don't exactly cause a lot of damage to anything and despite her fondness for chewing on the PlanetDog disc, you don't really tell that much. The tag on the disc promised a minty taste (I licked it and didn't taste anything), so maybe that explains her desire to chew it.

So this is the frisbee of choice here now as it's the one Paisley wants to play with. Sometimes without me. :-)

(*Note: the frisbee was a gift with no requirement for review. But Paisley insisted on sharing.)

Recapping TEDxSMU 2009

I'm not going to tell you every little detail of the event. Although maybe I should. I was one of the few people I saw taking any kind of notes, much less copious ones.

All in all, TEDxSMU was a well-run event, very consistent in tone and style with the main event held in Long Beach and all the more impressive for having been pulled off so quickly. (Six months from idea to execution!) Well spent day, although I'm not entirely sure just how the people at the big deal manage to make it through four days of this!!

Here's my non-randomized experience with TEDxSMU:

Cool moments:

• Podium JFK used when he did his man on the moon speech was there to illustrate the power of the individual to change things
• Jill Soubule – singer with an incredibly wry sense of humor. (One selection? You Better Not Kill in Texas.)
• Seeing what the new Wyly theater is going to be like (The group I sing with - The Women's Chorus of Dallas - is doing its spring concert there with Lesley Gore as our special guest.)
• Rives visual poem – Trespassing in New York City
• Great food options and snacks (Hansen and Blue Sky drinks! Not a Coke, Pepsi or Dr. Pepper in sight. Wow!)
• Polyphonic Spree – awesome!

Semi-quotable moments

Some people were just full of it. Completely. Talking about stuff that they really had no expertise in or providing very anecdotal evidence and guilt piles. And saying things they obviously thought were profound. Some were.

• Bobby Haas - The price you pay for your inheiritance is the responsibility that goes with it.
• Joshua Prince-Ramus - Lost art of productively losing control
• Amory Lovins - Carbon fiber for ultralighting cars
• William Abraham - Make an illuminating mistake
• Aaron Reedy - Teacher should be more than just a conduit of information, need to bring passion
• William Kamkwamba - We don’t need to wait for the government to do it for us (standing O from people who probably support the public option for health care)
• Tanya Pinto - You can make a small change, don’t be scared by the statistics.
• Turk Pipkin - If you are looking for a big opportunity, look for a big problem

Bitches

• The theme for the day should have been "all wet". There were a large percentage of presentations around water issues or that brought up water as a segment.
• To that same thing, in general, the mix of presentations could have been a little better. We didn't see much from the soft sciences - marketing, psychology, sociology - and not really even biology. The event was organized by the engineering school at SMU and I wonder how much their interests slanted that. Arts were pretty much covered by performance, not by presentation. (OK - this is a real bitchy thing, I know. Having seen TED via satellite - so semi-live - you get a good sense of the way TED mixes things. I guess I would have liked more of that mix.)
• Improv dance/music group. Let me just say it for everyone I talked to about it - huh? (Perfect opportunity for a short talk after to explain what was going on up there.)

Wrap-up

The theme for the day was "What Would Change Everything?" My answer is always "nothing". When we spend a lot of time looking for The Big Change, we miss all the small opportunities to make change along the way. Small change that adds up to THE REALLY BIG CHANGE. I wonder how many of the people at TEDxSMU will actually leave and change in any way based on what they heard.

We shall see.

Photo Gallery:

Question for the audience: How'd you get that scar? Come to the front, take the mike for a strict 30 seconds and tell us. Some good stories, some weirdness. Yes, bum us all out by telling us about your tumor.

Benefit of knowing the building. I found some peace on the couches at the bottom of the stairs. Headed there to eat my lunch (yes, being anti-social) and got to spend the time with speakers hanging out. David Gallo from Woodhole is quite the character.

I am the world's worst phone camera photographer. But this is the stage for TEDxSMU. Great set-up and lighting. It's tough to do much on the stage at Caruth because it's so shallow, so kudos!

There were around 500 people expected, although I did see some empty seats. Sorry I couldn't bring you to help fill them. (This is far over my normal limit of 8. :-)

My first shot. Just wanted something to show where I was. The amount of technology they had going was pretty impressive. Major kudos to Sharon Lyle for pulling this all together in great fashion!

New glasses have arrived

Video post!! I really should do more of these. Showing off my new glasses from Zenni Optical, which arrived Monday. (That was one fast boat from China!) I got four pair, including a pair of sunglasses for the whopping price of $167 - about $50 less than what I paid for my last pair of glasses from the doctor.

I screwed up with one pair - ordered too narrow a frame, although I'm adapting - and the brilliant green pair that I've been talking about on Twitter turned out to not be quite so brilliant a green in person. Adore my sunglasses and my red every day pair are perfect.

This is at least the third time I've ordered from Zenni and my husband has gotten glasses from there as well, so if you're thinking about ordering glasses online, I can vouch for them. Great source for learning more about the different places you can get glasses online as well as information about ordering is GlassyEyes.

My extra tips on ordering:

• Customer service isn't the same as regular stores. Some of the online optical stores only do customer service via email, so stop trying to call, already! Understand that this is one of the things you yield in order to get a great price.
• Know what works for your face. That means style, color and size. You'll be using all that to make an educated guess when you order online. (Although, there are a couple of sellers that allow you to upload a picture in order to "try" on styles before you order.)

Happy to answer any questions I can if you're thinking about ordering your next pair of glasses online.

(See those boxes off to the right of the screen? Those are wheels. For a car. That I want out of my house. If you'd like some nice wheels, let me know and I'll send you details. I think they're the race wheels from hubby's M3, which we don't have anymore.)