books!

only the best way to read Calvin & Hobbes...

Old Book

a child with a book

We recently took a side trip to Southern California (a side trip from our house-hunting trip in the bay area) and visited with my brother and sister-in-law, many Adams relatives, my grandma, uncle, and our godson Thomas and his parents - all of this in three days :-D ...not to mention assorted friends - yay!...

Anyhow, we had a blast, although the visit was far too short. Thomas is now one year old - this picture was taken about a week before his first birthday. He had wedged himself partially under the front of the rocking chair, and he was happily "reading" to himself... He has a small pile of board/tub books in front of his dresser, so he'll occasionally make his way over there to "read". It's positively adorable!

We had a great time with everyone on our visit, and it was fun to see Thomas - he's a total people person...

...there's a shocker.

Look out for another post coming soon - baby Collin will make his debut here next time!!

Random tidbits

- Sunshine - I highly recommend this book by Robin McKinley. I'm in the middle of reading it and it's wonderfully woven story placed in a futuristic United States-type place that is a little bit of an alternate view of our world. The protagonist is a woman who bakes "cinnamon rolls as big as your head" at the coffee shop owned by her mother and stepfather (Charlie). It's a great story of self-discovery, magic, and others (vampires, etc...).

- I've been visiting in CA for a few days and J & L introduced me to a new computer game called Portal, which is a neat kind of puzzle game which increases in difficulty every time you get to a new level. It's kind of a logic/think-outside-the-box type of skill game - I like it :-)

- Canter's deli in Hollywood is sooo tasty - I highly recommend their Reuben, Potato pancakes, pickles and Rugelach.

In memory of a writer with spirit

Madeleine L'Engle died yesterday in Connecticut at age 88 (I think).

She remains one of my all time favorite authors. Many of her stories affected me quite deeply, and perhaps even changed or enhanced my view of life and humanity. Her stories contained powerful messages about good and evil and human flaws and the grey areas of life.

There is a really nice article in the New York Times today about her - to read it, go here.

If you haven't read any of her books, then, by all means, do so.

to Madeleine L'Engle - all the best.

goodreads

So, I've decided to join Goodreads and see what all the excitement is about (several people I know, who are, of course, voracious readers, have recently joined as well.) It's a fairly interesting site where you can keep track of the books that you have read in the past, books you are currently reading, as well as books you would like to read at some point.

First you sign up, and then you can start adding books. Many readers on the site post reviews of books that they've read, so you can search for a book and read any number of random reviews of that book. It's also a nice way to see what other friends are reading that you might also like to read :-) So far, I'm really enjoying the site, because I typically have many books that I want to read, and I have an incredibly hard time keeping track of them, because there are always new books being published (i.e. the list just keeps getting longer...).

Anyhow, it's a fun network for readers (you can add friends and recommend books to them as well, and receive updates when they review books that they've read), and it seems that you can even trade/give books away through the site as well.

In any case, I like being able to keep track of what I've read/am reading - so it's great for that :-)