The Next Dark Age
We're in it Now
A Different Kind of Christmas, by Alex Haley
http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=leartojugg-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=0517162695&fc1=000000&IS2=1<1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifrBook 47 of 50 Book Challenge
Book 4 of the Holiday Reading Challenge
1855. Fletcher Randall is the North Carolinian son of a plantation owning state senator, studying at Princeton. One day, he is befriended by three Quaker brothers, who take him home to Philadelphia, introduce him to a successful black businessman, and bring him to a meeting of local abolishionists supporting the Underground Railroad. And his mind is blown
He goes back to school feeling angry and imposed upon. Then he starts to do some research. Later, he goes back to Philadelphia and volunteers his services. The rest of the story is about how he sets up the escape of a group of slaves – some of whom work at his own home – over his Christmas vacation.
This book is all of 101 pages long.
I did not believe for one minute that this kid spent one weekend in Philadelphia, half a semester reading up on slavery and abolition in the library and suddenly has that kind of a change of heart. Having said that, it was a compelling tale. The glimpses of how the Railroad worked. How each person along the line might have contributed. The likely and unlikely supporters. The human consequences of doing the right thing. This could have been an epic.
The short description given of the Quakers, for example. They don’t accuse, or argue or get visibly angry. They use their calm and patience and persistence to win others over to their side. There’s a lesson for this lovely holiday season. (Although admittedly, the Quakers were awfully manipulative. And presumptuous.) I would have loved to see those characters fleshed out further.
It seems that Haley just meant to deliver a short holiday tale to remind us that once there was A Different Kind of Christmas. For that, it works.
The Big Bookstores
MSNBC had an article about the state of affairs with Borders and Barnes and Noble. I am, of course, on the side of BN. When I was younger, my friends would hang out at Borders. The video/music section was better. It didn’t take too long, however, before I figured out that Barnes and Noble had a better selection of actual books.
Then I discovered bn.com. And while I still hung out at the store a lot, I would figure out what I wanted and then go home and buy it online. Sorry, gang, but it was less expensive. At one point I believe I calculated a $100 a month BN habit.
It happened that right around the time when I got serious about my finances, I discovered used book stores. The first was a short-run store that went in to the Randhurst Shopping Mall the year before it was demolished. The Half Price Books expanded in my area. And of course, my library opened its own used book store. And every library in Cook County has been having used book sales.
Then my brother gifted me with a Kindle.
I still spend very little money on e-books. I mostly have the classics – freebies and 99 cent purchases. The last thing I downloaded was A Tale of Two Cities
Once upon a time, I did half of my holiday shopping at bn.com. Now, spending ten bucks on a book seems extravagant. So I am reading this article and it suggests that Borders is about done, And the last, best hope for BN is the Nook:
“E-books now make up about 5 percent of all book sales. The figure is expected to triple within five years. E-reader devices don’t offer great margins, but they do spur e-book sales.”
And the numbers from this holiday season are going to tell the story.
I might have to get one now.
Benjamin Franklin and a Case of Christmas Murder, by Robert Lee Hall
http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=leartojugg-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=081221790X&fc1=000000&IS2=1<1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifrBook 46 on 50 Book Challenge
Book 3 on The Holiday Reading Challenge
I don’t remember what whim made me pick up Benjamin Franklin and a Case of Christmas Murder, but it looks to have been from the Little City Book Sale last June.
It is a charming, rather Holmesian novel that has Dr. Franklin in London over Christmas in 1757, and this seems to be the second in a series of mysteries. He is there to talk with the Penns about their damnable taxes, and he also solves mysteries. His sidekick/narrator is a twelve year old boy that is a servant of sorts and also his unacknowledged son. Got that?
The premise is that Franklin and the boy, Nick, are at a party on Christmas night when the host very publicly falls dead. Franklin suspects murder and puts himself on the case.
This book does a better job than the Poirot novel of using the Christmas season to set and enhance the mystery. I find that odd since I understood historically, we didn’t start to get really crazy about Christmas until the 1800s. Oh, and that lead to the moment when I wanted to smack Franklin:
He and Nick go into a toy store. Nick has never been in a toy store and thinks it is the best thing he has ever seen. Franklin buys toys for the murder victim’s children, speak to the clerk in the store and then they leave.
Dude.
There is a shady brother and mistaken identity and a wife that is clearly hiding something – the usual. But the boy narrator is observant and clever and brave and has just enough wide-eyed wonder to make it charming.
I could read more of these.
Assorted Chocolate
Boxes of Assorted Chocolates should be required to come with a decoder ring. Or something.
http://rcm.amazon.com/e/cm?t=leartojugg-20&o=1&p=8&l=bpl&asins=B003Y871Q6&fc1=000000&IS2=1<1=_blank&m=amazon&lc1=0000FF&bc1=000000&bg1=FFFFFF&f=ifrThere are several boxes of these floating around my office this week and I find myself staring at them, trying to figure out which one has the caramel and which one has the icky creams and coconut fillings. I am told there is some way to tell from looking at the pattern on top of the chocolate piece, what type of filling is inside. But I am no such expert.
Back when we were gaming, our friend Rosalia worked at Godiva and would bring extra boxes of candy for us. Godiva always had a chart to tell you what you were getting.
At home, I use a knife, cut the thing open and don’t eat it if I don’t like what is inside. That still gives the next person a good twelve hours to eat the piece before it dries out.
Sometimes I miss living with my brother.
So today, I am just noshing on the chocolate cake.
Influence with a Capital O
Weekend Assignment # 348: Trendsetters
Musicians, writers and other artists frequently have an impact on their fans that goes beyond simple enjoyment of their work. Many rock stars have had an influence on fashion or politics or both, and fictional characters sometimes inspire real people in their opinions and career choices. [I’m not going to try to prove these assertions here; just go with them, okay?] Has an artist or artistic work ever inspired you to do or believe something that might never have occurred to you otherwise?
Extra Credit: Do you think it’s appropriate for artists to be political activists? Does such activism have a positive or negative impact on your respect for that artist?
I’ve been sitting on this question for three days, wondering if Oprah counts. I wouldn’t exactly call her an artist, but…screw it.
I live in Chicago. Besides sports, we have Malkovich and Sinise. We have Second City. And we have Oprah. For a few more minutes.
Oprah seems to have outgrown Chicago. She seems to have grown into that stratosphere of celebrity where she no longer seems to live in the same world as the rest of us. Like Michael Jackson. But if you can remember back to the days when she hosted a talk show and tried her hand at acting, she was great.
She taught us that a woman can be a great success with or without a man. She can be happy without being married and have cocker spaniels instead of children. She doesn’t have to be a size four (although she ought to try to be healthy). She can cover real stories of adversity and survival and heroism and then do the celebrity gossip with the best of them.
Even today, she reminds me that I can have my intellectual pursuits and my brain candy, too.
Say what you will about the content of her Book Club, but she gets people to read. (Anne’s Note: You do not need to spend $15 for those Dickens novels. They are in used book stores everywhere and you can probably get them on an e-reader for 99 cents. Yes, you could borrow them from your library, but it is Dickens so I suggest having your own copies.)
So let’s get to that Extra Credit, since it is probably why I thought of her: most of the time I am not really listening to celebrities and their causes. I might take note of which are supporting ASPCA and other animal adoption stuff. Who showed up when New Orleans was underwater. And I sometimes listen to Bono. But even with Oprah, I know that she was a big supporter of President Obama. And I know she built a school in Africa. That’s about it. I remember the latter because I wished she would build such a school in Chicago.
If I were a celebrity, I would absolutely use the platform to talk to people about issues that I support. So I can’t blame them. However, I would also take very seriously the responsibility of getting my facts straight. I am not sure that everyone holding a microphone could say the same.
Oprah doesn’t pretend that she is infallible. Or she didn’t. She was duly embarrassed by the James Frey thing. Although she has not, to my knowledge, apologized for launching the Dr. Phil machine. All the same, she seemed very human to me. So I hope that when she leaves town, safe in her cocoon of handlers, that she remembers why many of us liked her in the first place.
This Story Made my Heart Grow Three Sizes Today
Jon Hilkevitch at the Chicago Tribune wrote a great article about a CTA bus driver that makes people’s days. Her name is Darlene Coleman and she drives one of those routes that shuttles people from the train station to their offices in the city. She has been there for 2 1/2 years and loves her job:
“Where else can you work and get paid to tour our wonderful city and meet new people?”
I love people that love their jobs. Several passengers were quoted complimenting her attitude and extra efforts to make sure people made their scheduled trains. So while I have never met Darlene Coleman, she just made my day, too.
The interesting thing Hilkevitch did, however, was to use Ms. Coleman’s example to higlight the problems the CTA is having in other areas. Check this out:
“It’s a shame the CTA cannot clone her. Especially now, when relations between CTA management and the transit agency’s labor unions are at what may be an all-time low. Poor morale at the CTA is reflected by many employees who misdirect their anger through indifference and rudeness toward passengers.
The CTA received 1,241 complaints about rude bus operators in the first 10 months of the year. Over the same period, 826 complaints were filed about bus drivers failing to assist customers — more than the number of such complaints in all of 2009, according to records.”
See what he did there?
I live in the suburbs, so I don’t use the CTA very often at all. But I read all the time about the costs associated with commuting and how many cities have rapid transit systems in the red. And I hear about it from friends and colleagues. In fact, the last time I was in Washington DC, I was shocked to hear a colleague tell me that Metro had purchased old trains from Chicago to run in its subway system. So I was happy to see someone writing about the commuter experience. And God Bless the lady trying every day to make it better for people.
I’ll Let the Numbers Speak for Themselves
Regarding airline fees, from USA Today:
The Airline Biz blog of The Dallas Morning News reports US Airways expects to net $500 million this year in fees on items such as bag fees, change fees and on-board sales, according to comments US Airways president Scott Kirby made Wednesday at a securities conference in New York.
And US Airways expected profit for this year? Between $450 million and $475 million, according to Wall Street analysts.
BTT – Brain Candy
The question was:
Do you ever crave reading crappy books?
I presume that “crappy books” means “guilty pleasures” or “brain candy” and so the answer is:
Not for very long, because I will just go ahead and read them.
My guiltiest pleasure is Dominick Dunne
Kennedy family biographies. Luckily, I have Schlesinger’s A Thousand Days on my shelf for the next time that craving hits, so I won’t have to read crap. Which leads to several other books that I rather consider guilty pleasures, but theoretically have some redeeming value. Like Star Wars novels. And Bob Greene
I haven’t read any of these in an awfully long time. Although I did read that last Dan Brown book not too long ago. I must still be doing penance for that.
And don’t get me started, because I am on the Christmas novels now!
Ways I Torture Myself Every Season
Are you familiar with Ovation TV? Artsy-fartsy cable channel. Every year, they do a “Battle of the Nutcrackers“, where they play the performances of a bunch of different companies and viewers vote on which they like the best. I often have it on as background TV during the holiday season.
Every year, the post-modern goofy stuff wins:
This was the Americans, gang. So I’ve taken to calling it “Battle of the Goofy-Ass Nutcrackers”. This year, the U.S. isn’t represented. The French have taken up the goofy-ass mantle. And this year, Sarah Jessica is hosting.
I’m sorry to be a purist, but I don’t believe that as long as I live, I will ever see The Nutcracker done better than the one Baryshnikov did in 1977. So excuse me for posting this rather long video, because I am going to need easy access to it for a bit.
The Zookeeper’s Wife, by Diane Ackerman
The Zookeeper’s Wife, by Diane Ackerman, was a random pick, except that I it was another war history. It is the story of the family that owned and operated the Warsaw Zoo during World War II. Once the zoo was bombed to pieces, and the animals either run off, killed, or shipped to German zoos, the Zabinskis used their property to hide Jews and other fugitives with the Underground movements in Poland.
Besides the fact the it was a story of courage and survival, I also appreciated that this book reminds me that:
- The War started long before Pearl Harbor.
- The Russians were not The Good Guys.
- In fact, about the worst place on Earth you could be is between the Nazis and the Red Army.
Ackerman did some fine research, between the journals and interviews and public records. I am grateful, because this was a story that needed to be told.
The Next Dark Age 