It's that time of year.

I can't believe this was the last 'fun' book I chose to read before the semester starts. It was just 'okay'. Well at least its my last semester. Good bye world for the next 5 months.

Did I mention I have exactly a week until my life is put on hold and I hope I will finally be able to get this degree. My feelings have been back and forth with this...not necessarily what I'm learning (cause I really like what I am learning!), but the job market, competition, difficulty getting experience, and the whole high nose, lip curl librarian culture. Three years later, I still can't see myself doing anything else. Sometimes I think I will be perfectly happy at the bookstore too, but then I've been really happy at the library, especially when I get to be the more general Q&A with patrons. Librarians are probably one of the most undervalued professions.. not really monetary wise, but sometimes I get tired of hearing the lack of staying power with the profession. What, do you think the same thing too? Well read this f***ing book. Yea its a motivating read for me before the semester.

Well its not really a read.. I've been listening to it on audiobook. The library's Overdrive e-book/ audiobook service is a dream. I will really be reading...

G. K. Chesterson's The Man Who Was Thursday became a bit debatable... it felt like a secret society, mildly prophetic spy novel, but it was nonetheless good!

Joined another 'book club'. I know it's Asian American studies' curriculum, but I never had the motivation to read this until now. Things that surprised me.. how brutal it was to be brown in those days with serious animosity towards immigrants that you never hear about in American history.. its dramatic and emotional. It's also amazing how he was constantly beat down in his life, but he still dreamed, read, worked and remained faithful and supported his family. I was also really surprised about all the literary references and how deep into reading he was. In almost all of John Fante's novels/novellas, he talks about working in the canneries with Filipinos and here Bulosan talks about working in the cannery and reading Fante. A similar story that this reminded me of is You Can't Win. Yea that's a pretty strong compliment.

I don't even remember

but I haven't quit. Yea like I said, I don't really remember what books I have read lately, but I am still on it. I attempted to read John Sayles' Moment in the Sun, but I will get back to that giant thing.

Instead I picked up.. and am in official fan of Cain. This title reminded me more of a Yates story with the web of love triangles. No murders here, but a lot of heart break.


I am also reading How to read literature like a professor, which I should have read years ago, and just like Manguel's books, it has hooked me onto more reads. For the first time I thought, f*** I might not read all the books I want to by the time I croak.
Right now I'm reading the classic

.

It's a nightmare, its anarchy, it bloody sunday... its a fucking old book. But its fantastic!

I know I used to rant more about what I thought about this book and that...hey let's have coffee instead.

whooa

the art show went surprisingly well. I sold my first art pieces! yea both of them!!! Nathan did help me jazz up the 'bad seed' piece, so I pretty much owe it too him. I did kind of detest it at the end.
Nate also displayed my bday present. Folks wanted to buy that too, but I said nooo.

Our things up high.Bad Seed - sold!


My present up close.


Porch piece- sold!



Read this shorty and it wasn't as grand as I thought. A book of letters and a supposed love story from an ongoing book exchange, but I didn't get any of that. Another mild read, but I still think the snail mail is charming.


But A. Manguel is making me oh so happy.

I'm sayng "no".

I haven't been reading as much, nor biking, nor doing well in the library world. I quit my internship after one week cause on top of 3 jobs and classes- I need time to sleep, paint, be sane. Really, I need the 'me' time so I won't feel like giving up everything, changing my name, shaving my head, and then leave to Mexico City.

I tried to read some shorties, after reading the 400+page Boneshaker that left me feeling "ehh" and really mild. I always think Hesse is going to lead me through some spiritual limbo, so I read Journey to the East, and I found it okay. A little too secret society-ish for me, but it was fine.



So this Friday, I was able to contribute 2 pieces for this show. They are not final, but I think it is okay. I will probably post the final work later (most likely not). I've been thinking what I will do after library school... yea work at a library and do art/ take art classes. duh.




So after all this humm bugging, oh yea I turned 28 yay me - I am looking back to my cute book club. Crash by Ballard caused a bad turn ..it was the first book we abandoned. But I think Alberto Manguel will save us. Essays on books, reading, and the world... Hurray!

I'm sorry I neglected you FakeMeaty

Currently plowing through:

 

Edit: I got through Boneshaker and it was quite good, but not the best. It reads more like a movie. I bet you in 5 years it will be a movie.

 

Edit: This Ballard book made me feel so crazy vulgar and cheap that I had to ditch it. It's damn cold..





 

Hamster running the wheel

I have to admit I am mighty comfortable in this new, but temporary job... in an office. The environment I've dreaded and everyone is nice, intelligent, hardworking, and they treat their employees well! I have a month left of school, two months of DUI class, and then start summer school in the midst of that- work three jobs that are equivalent to working full time, but nothing more. I miss making things, riding bicycles.. - okay mostly those two things that I somehow picked up because I didn't have so much to do. I still have read to keep some sanity, but as my friend said "You have been reading a lot of violent books lately." I think when anything is referred to L'Stranger and existentialism, the only way they can express that is through violence... so I think that it just happened to be a common theme. Have I ever added that The Stranger is a favorite and really made me interested in reading again.


This book I am reading now, and he is apparently what is to Spain as Celine is to France. I still can't sense the maddening aspect of it halfway through, but we'll see. It's very good so far.. its tragic, but in a dark humorous way. I guess I'm a little desensitized after reading...

This was apparently Camus influence for the Stranger, and it has to be one of the most entertaining and intelligent things I've read. I am not a huge mystery reader, but this is fantastic..

A second part! I loved Books, but this was so so. I read halfway through the short memoir and I wasn't fancied by it. It is more about his career and his famous friends are interesting- Kesey, Sontag, blah blah.. I guess I get turned off by name droppers, even though its unintentional for the most part.. (i.e. Patti Smith).

3 lbs heavier

Yikes. Out of shape, yes.



I loved his short stories and I can see how this story is a bit of an extension of his bitterness, ramblings against nuclear families, the dirt between fingernails, and the mundane tendencies of picture perfect marriages. Frank and April Wheeler are from parents who never wanted to have kids, and the Wheelers seem to try to define their lives by their marriage, home on revolutionary road, steady income, and family - even though their minds are in denial that what they believe and how they chose to live will change and be nothing like the conservative neighbors around them. The affairs with Mareen Grube, happy hour with the Campbells, and the only strike of truth from Mrs. Givings insane son John are still refreshing and simple. Yea, but this story ended too predictably. I can see how the story in the time it was written (60's) was a kick in the head for the American Dream scheme, and it still works. I think if I still lived with my parents in suburbia and was going to school to work in a cube for a corporation, I would say "hell yea", this is what should happen to those white picket fence families, but I vowed to never fall into that lifestyle...so ho hum.


Reading this now.. and its refreshing. weeeeeee

Getting Taller

Lately, my memory has been lacking and a major part of me feels like I don't have time to do what's dear to my heart. I don't have the time to paint - I don't bike as much (although the 40 mile paradise loop kicked my behind) - I don't get to read as much, but I am trying to speed along in school and get out of this library program. In the mean time, I finally copped a temporary "boring" (yes-even the archivist I work for said it!) job at the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab and turned in my graduation candidacy form for December 2011. I WANT OUT.

On a book note, On a winter's night a traveler was one of the best books I've read everrrrrrr. Like I said, Calvino is a genius and the book is a mind f***. Well how can one book touch you the way 10 books would? yea it is literally an orgy of good literature. Yes, I said it. Next up is Revolutionary Road by R. Yates that I have been anxiously awaiting to start. In the mean time I had a nice time with


WANKY!

and


a fantastic breezy read in and out of East Bay history - bookstores galore. I can't express how proud I am to work for a library with a brand new zine collection. :)

I don't feel like writing into detail, cause its the one thing I am trying to get away from. Trying to get out of school in time won't let me.

A good morning = Coffee & Calvino

I was stuck in a whirlwind. DUI, endless school work, working 6 days during one week, and 4 birthdays (of my closest friends). I also somehow managed to make a piece for an little record art show and its hanging, but obviously needs some more work.


To maintain some sanity, I started a couple books and I will finish them. I owe it to myself.

Halfway and I will get back to it.

This one I couldn't put down!, except that I had to start on my next book in my "cute book" book club...


This is some really intense reading! A bit off and everywhere like Perec's A Life's Manual, but still engaging in its own way. Okay I have a thing for book where the author talks to his reader. I also books about books. The first couple pages are amazing!

In the shop window you have promptly identified the cover with the title you were looking for. Following this visual trail, you have forced your way through the shop past the thick barricade of Books You Haven't Read, which were frowning at you from the tables and shelves, trying to cow you. But you know you must never allow yourself to be awed, that among them there extend for acres and acres and acres The Books You Needn't Read, the Books Made For Purposes Other Than Reading, Books Read Even Before You Open Them Since They Belong To The Category Of Books Read Before Being Written. And thus you pass the out girdle of ramparts, but then you are attacked by the infantry of the Books That If You Had More Than One Life You Would Certainly Also Read But Unfortunately Your Days Are Numbered. With a rapid maneuver you bypass them and move into the phalanxes of the Books You Mean To Read But There Are Others You Must Read First, the Books Too Expensive Now And You'll Wait Till They're Remaindered, the Books ditto When They Come Out In Paperback, Books You Can Borrow From Somebody, Books That Everybody's Read So It's As If You Had Read Them, Too. Eluding these assaults, you come up beneath the towers of the fortress, where other troops are holding out:
the Books You've Been Planning To Read For Ages,
the Books You've Been Hunting For Years Without
Success,
the Books Dealing With Something You're Working On
At The Moment,
the Books You Want To Own So They'll Be Hand Just
In Case,
the Books You Could Put Aside Maybe To Read This
Summer,
the Books You Need To Go With Other Books On Your
Shelves,
the Books That Fill You With Sudden, Inexplicable
Curiosity, Not Easily Justified.
Mow that you have been able to reduce the countless embattled troops to an array that is, to be sure, very large but still calculable in a finite number; but this relative relief is then undermined by the ambush of the Books Read Long Ago Which It's Now Time To Reread and the Books You've Always Pretended To Have Read And Now It's Time To Sit Down And Really Read Them.

Perfect for the morning, like a jog or bike ride before I start the day. (except with this I can fatten up with sourdough and butter with black coffee). MMMmmmm

I'm reading two f***ing fantastic books right now!! Amongst the ho-hum of a chaotic month (or chaotic in my mind maybe), this is making me happy. So happy.



My first Nabokov book and I can see how Lolita is such a classic. Yea, this is about another fella who leaves his wife for a young mistress, but this story just swallows you whole - more than halfway through and just started the book today! Okay it helps that its about 100 words per page. I also have grown a liking to writers who fill you in on what to expect right away...

"Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he love; was not loved; and his life ended in disaster."



This book is a book for book lovers... its essentially an inside story to the rare book trade, but focuses on the book trade's most notorious thief. So I was a little uncomfortable that I am no longer one of the only who know what "deckled pages" and "pictorial boards" are, as well as how many copies of Poe's first published poem exist in the world - 14!. Whatever I love it and it all takes place in San Francisco too.

It's hard to remain optimistic these days. I've been trying to get a job in Oakland in something related, but I've missed my opportunities or they just lack in general. I applied for something new, and I honestly refuse to be hopeful.

Despite the long commute, I decided to work at the bookstore an extra day a week. With a second job, school, and soon to be other legal matters, I decided that I can't f*** around anymore. Yea I submitted to growing up for a little bit. Letting go of the fun...


I've been waiting to read this one for awhile and it's okay. I love all the wine and crazy characters... Pilon is something else. I guess I wasn't in the right mood to laugh my head off.

Things that make me happy at this very moment

More than halfway through his short stories. Holy mother. This guy is brilliant! He made me miss my stop on the bus..


Early gift exchange.

A New Year

I think it takes a few weeks to get settled in. Today I started school and am realizing how f*cked up it is not being able to drive. The cat's have fleas... I haven't been able to finish a book in days. I stormed through Norwegian Wood and Just Kids, but only made it 2/3 of the way of Monkey Wrench Gang and halfway through Ghostwritten by David Mitchell. I wasn't even able to finish 86 pages of Kerouac's Tristessa , but that's somewhat forgiving. Richard Yates short stories have been amazing, but short stories aren't satisfying me at this moment.

Ever since the clusters show and spending time with my passionate friend/coworker/art meandering creature - I have been trying to make more things. One being a life size "Geeshie Wiley" that was accepted into this blues house show in San Jose.

Title of Art: Geeshie "Geechie" Wiley Medium: Mixed Media Creation Date: 01/09/11 Size: 70"x42"x2" Weight: For Sale?: for sale Price: $400 Original?: original Comments: The only remnants that are left of Geeshie Wiley are her handful of songs, which include one of my blues favorites "Last Kind Words". Her legal name is unknown, and there are no photos of her that exist.

An incomplete version....

---

The characters of this book were fantastic... on the cusp of being outsiders and clinically insane. All living in a type of surreal world. I think I would have adored this book in college...the protagonist just turned 20. Hypersexed, conversational, and without a f***ing climax.. Did I say sexual? casual sex written all over.



I have never listed to a Patti Smith album in my life, and am afraid to. Yes this is the cafe/ hip/ beatnik thing to read...but it did win the National Book Award. It is a sweet story of the relationship of Patti Smith and Robert Mapplethorpe..full of photos and elbow rubbing with famous folks - complete with a stay at the Chelsea Hotel and hanging at the same diner with the Factory kids. The starving artists, book hounding, blurbs of noteworthy times in history, and innocent relationship early in the book is beautiful. Patti's later rants are a bit dry - you can tell she likes to name drop Ginsberg, Burroughs, Hendrix, and Joplin - just to name a few. I did feel something was missing - like she held back her true emotions, but it is after all a book devoted mostly to Robert. Yea the cool girls that walk around Oakland have some resemblance.



Geez this is good and f***ing hilarious! And its all about fighting the man and saving the canyons. Yes...the Monkey Wrench Gang is out for the kill of nature's destroyers. I really only was able to make my way through 2/3 of the book, before I got distracted with the 2 titles above. I did have to cop an anniversary copy for myself w/ Crumbs illustrations. I will get back to this.



Drug addicted - Mexico City meanderings... its an attractive book, but its god dammn Kerouac. I know I'm jaded - and I would have loved this before - but it's so stylized I can't handle it.. one day when I'm drugged.




I'm reading this book right now.. over 200 pages in - on the fifth character -and I am soooo tempted to put this sh*t down. Well I want to know what happens and how all these 9 characters in different cities around the world are interlinked. I am starting to feel like I am becoming engrossed in some cryptic, secret society situation - and I hope and pray that this is NOT the case! sigh.


I have yet to read his novels, but just five stories in and already I can tell this is going to be amazing...timeless like Dorothy Parker but in a wider range of situations and with less cynicism.
Edit: This has been one of the best collections of short stories I've read yet. I fucking love this book. I LOVE THIS BOOK.

Purely - Strictly

Why being out of school rules

I completed my 2 reading blogs! -

Popular Materials

Young Adult Materials

I am definitely more proud of my YA one. One day I will try to consolidate them all..

But now -








....to be continued.