Why can't IQ and character tests be administered upon prospective dog owners and homeowners?

Every night I hear the neighbor's dog outside barking for more than twenty minutes at a stretch because it's neglected and left alone without people I pray that our local home values by 15% go down in 2009. The neighbor is already underwater on his mortgage. I feel like a dork for borrowing for half of the kitchen costs but at least I have over 50% equity...

Podcasts 2008

I am in some ways a Luddite and have most recently learned of Podcasts. At the risk of self-disclosure:

CBC Radio 3 SuperFeed
CITR Misery Hour
CITR Sweet and Hot
NPR The Color of Money
Kiplinger's Money
Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips
Nutrition Diva's Quick and Dirty Tips
Money Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips
WFMU's Antique Phonograph Music Program

Ah me, another book list

I secretly thrill to book recommendations. In my city of frosty passive-aggression, I have found books to be effective at bridging connections between people.

On my list now from the past two weeks:
The Master and Margarita -- M. Bulgakov
I Was Told There'd Be Cake -- Sloane Crosley (cautioned, may get a library copy)
The Tummy Trilogy -- Calvin Trillin
No Logo -- Naomi Klein
The Shock Doctrine -- Naomi Klein
The Lesser Evil: Politics and Ethics in an Age of Terror -- Michael Ignatieff
Dry -- Augusten Burroughs

Another book list: Black fiction for White people

I read on a local periodical's blog a post by its Books Editor noting the segregation of African-American fiction in bookstores and audiences. Most of my friends have read Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God and we have a Chester Himes book at home, but now's as good a time as any to cross segregational lines. As one panelist put it at a Book Expo: "Books are the freest media we have—it's the only media where we're not advertising drivel."

Chester Himes
Edward P. Jones
Donald Goines
Nathan C. Heard
James Baldwin
Walter Mosley
Richard Wright
Colson Whitehead

Alice Walker
Zadie Smith
Zora Neale Hurston
Octavia Butler

RIP Tanta of Calculated Risk

Doris Dungey, 47, Financial Blogger succumbs to ovarian cancer

I enjoyed her sassy and informative posts, even though I could understand maybe 40% of what she wrote (some posts were very thick with economic and financial terminology), and didn't quite understand her tendency to pick on Gretchen Morgenson of the New York Times and Catherine Austin Fitts of Solari.

A posthumous thanks, Ms. Dungey, for opening my eyes and mind to the financial world behind the front offices of mortgage lenders.

Surprising how few recreational readers there are

My son's classroom window has "what I've read" lists by several of his classmates. Two girls have at least two pages of book lists. I didn't see a list for my son and wondered about that: he does like reading but usually I catch him reading comic strip anthologies, or Astroboy or Pokemon. So I was surprised when his teacher reported his reading capability was well beyond his grade level. Right now he's reading Treasure Island.

Where I live and work books are frequently discussed, and are the most common ice-breaking topic for the otherwise reticent citizens. When they discuss their favourites they usually mention classics, which I have yet to read for pleasure. At a dinner on Tuesday a fellow guest recommended Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita to me. When I used the online library catalogue, I found it had many positive reviews and holds. I take out at least 50 books for me, and 20 books for my son through the local library branches. You'd be surprised how many people here wait in line or take the bus with Dostoyevsky, or George Eliot, or even Charles Lamb.

Harris Interactive Poll: Over One-Third of Americans Read More Than Ten Books in Typical Year.

Maybe my long bus ride to work affords me much more reading time, coupled with the fact that books are still popular where I live (a local company that is now a major online reseller started out selling books). Most of my friends have personal reading libraries whose size and breadth put mine to shame.

This is disjointed, I know. I rarely write more than a few paragraphs. Maybe if I read more offline and less online...

Breast Cancer Awareness month

My letter back from the Breast Health Center says I'm clean! Woohoo! This year my child's friend's Mom is recovering from an aggressive cancer of the breast, and my son's former classmate's mother passed away from breast cancer in late August. Considering my mom and aunt died of cancer, I'm tickled PINK to be clean.

Keep taking the cholecalciferol, Northwest women! Keep eating organic! Keep exercising! Knock back that cod liver oil!