When I was at the grocery store the other day, browsing the children’s books (as I am wont to do) I noticed Golden reissued the original Disney Cinderella under its “Little Golden Book Classic” line. I immediately snatched it up, and took it to the cash register.

The cashier was eyeing my selections: half a gallon of milk, muesli, three rolls of Bottlecaps, razor blades and the Cinderella book. Just the essentials today, ma’am. Here are some of my favorite illustrations.

The cover is similarly fantastic. Love it. I’d also like to go on record as saying how much I enjoy What Claudia Wore, more than ever now that I know Kim and I have the exact same feelings regarding Twilight’s relationship dynamics, which is to say, Edward is a total skeezbucket who will probably end up just trying to poison Bella because she dissaproves of his pornography blood addiction.

Speaking of Anne Fadiman, in Ex Libris she recounts her experiences reading Carl van Vechten’s The Tiger in the House, while researching an article on cats:

“[Vechten’s book’s] subject was cats — cats in literature, history, music, art and so on. I was writing an article on cats myself, and I’d read several recent compendia of cat lore that covered much of the same territory. The authors of those books made only one assumption about their readers: that they were interested in cats. Van Vechten, by contrast, assumed that his readers were on intimate terms with classical mythology and the Bible; that they could read music (he included part of the score from Domenico Scarlatti’s “Cat’s Fugue”): and that they were familiar with hundreds of writers, artists, and composers whom he referred by last name only, as if Sacchini and Teniers needed as little introduction as Bach and Rembrandt.”

At the moment I am in the middle of Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum and thinking that Eco and Van Vechten would have been fast friends. We always joke about reading so-and-so with a dictionary at the ready, but I am opting for Wikipedia as not only does Eco expect me to be familiar with literally dozens of historical, scientific, and metaphysical references per page, I think he’s operating on the notion that I also understand their individual significance, inner-workings, and complex interactions with… everything else in the whole world. Kabbalah, the Templars, Physics, the topographical layout of Paris, computer operating systems ca. 1988, etc.

Sometimes reading Eco is a bit like looking into the Total Perspective Vortex, but most of the time I am loving it, some of the time for the same reasons. The rest of time I feel like should be putting a list together for McSweeney’s.

Goodness, heavy entries are just that, heavy, and I don’t like the extra weight. So nevermind! Angry screed on Maher! I will just keep to my usual trite entries about books and bees and bicycles, et cetera.

Lately, I have been reading Nick Basbanes’ Editions and Impressions: My Twenty Years on the Book Beat, a collection of his essays regarding his encounters in the book world and with its most interesting tenants. I am loving it, or rather, I thought I was loving it, until I turned the page and found that his next profile was on Anne Fadiman: then I knew I was loving it.

Who knew that when I picked up Ex Libris back in 2006 at a Borders in Kahala, that it would be the beginning of such a passionate crush? When I saw Fadiman’s name at the top of that page in Editions…, it was like finding out that this book had a chapter on an old friend. It mentions a book she was reading at the time, Vilhjalmur Stefansson’s The Friendly Arctic, and mentions her “Odd Shelf,” and I thought ‘of course! She loves books on arctic exploration! And I mean, anybody who has read her essays knows about her love for these books, and about her bookshelf dedicated to tomes on the topic; but I guess that’s the magic of a book that connects with you: it feels like you own that bit of information, that it was a book written for you and no one else.

Or maybe thats just how it feels when you start to psychotically stalk someone you’ve never met. I know you’re really writing to me, Anne! I’ve gotten all your hidden messages! Yikes.

Here’s are two excerpts, a couple of my favorite parts from her second book of essays, At Large, and At Small, both from her essay “Collecting Nature.”

“The spare bedroom, on the southwest corner of the second floor of our house in Los Angeles, to which we had moved when I was eight and Kim was ten, had a sign on the door that read:

The Serendipity Museum of Nature,
No Smoking, Please.

The sign was embossed in blue with a Dymo Label-maker, than which there was no more perfect gift, circa 1963, for a pair of children who were crazy about naming things. I am not quite sure why our parents turned over this room to us, nor why they let us hammer pieces of whale baleen into the striped tan wallpaper, nor why the permitted us to fill the bathroom with dirt in order to accommodate our pet California king snake. All I can say is that I am profoundly grateful that they did.

When I read that, I was just tickled, because it really struck a chord with me. I feel like Aimee and I were indulged in just the same way, although if you asked me why I couldn’t possibly tell you. Had we kept a king snake of any variety in the bathroom, it would have been us — and not whale baleen — nailed to the wall. And, finally,

“Last week I was reminiscing about our museum with my brother. Kim said, “When you collect nature, there are two moments of discovery. The first comes when you find the thing. The second comes when you find the name.”

So true.

Look, I’ve never really read anything by F. Scott Fitzgerald. I know at one point I was supposed to, but I didn’t and I don’t really remember how I got out of it. This happened frequently in high school. Believe it or not, I managed to get through all four years of Honors English without ever reading one quarter of anything by: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Herman Melville, Charlotte Brontë, Mary Shelley, Aldous Huxley, Alexander Dumas, Victor Hugo, J.D. Salinger, Jack Kerouac, George Orwell, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Alan Patton or John Steinbeck. And that’s just the list off the top of my head. If I were to dig up some syllabi I could probably come up with a list of 50 or some-odd books that I started for class, never finished, guessed my way through the tests, and got high marks. Shamelessly.

For the most part, I have since devoured many of the authors that I’ve just listed, but still no Fitzgerald.

Which is curious, because I can almost recite from memory the opening lines to the second chapter of The Great Gatsby:

“This is a valley of ashes — a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills and grotesque gardens; where ashes take the forms of houses and chimneys and rising smoke and, finally, with a transcendent effort, of ash-gray men, who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air.”

My mouth is dry just typing it out. Just Wonderful.

I’ve just finished Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell for the third time, this time in the form of a 32 hour read-aloud performed by Simon Prebble. I love that book. Despite having read it twice, I honestly, truly, could not remember how it ended (how is this possible?). Anyway, I had also completely forgotten this little exchange, which is more surprising still, as it always (I think) makes me cry. You can listen, and read along, if you like.

“And now, Your Majesty,” said Strange, “I think it is time we returned to the Castle. You and I, Your Majesty, are a British King, and a British magician. Though Great Britain may desert us, we have no right to desert Great Britain. She may have need of us yet.”

“True, true. I swore an oath at my coronation always to serve her!

Oh, my poor country!”

And that is nobility.

Also, I had forgotten this passage which gives me chills — Clarke has written this so well, so authentically, that my hair stands on end when I think of it. I’ve uploaded the whole exchange for you to hear, below I have transcribed the prescription from Ormskirk’s Revelations of Thirty Six other Worlds:

Place the moon at my eyes and her whiteness shall
devour the false sights the deceiver has placed there.
Place a swarm of bees at my ears, bees love truth and will destroy the deceiver’s lies.
Place salt in my mouth lest the deceiver attempt to delight me with the taste of honey or disgust me with the taste of ashes.
Nail my hand with an iron nail so that I shall not raise it to do the deceiver’s bidding.

Place my heart in a secret place so that all my desires shall be my own
and the deceiver shall find no hold there.

Chills.

Just got back from a wonderful trip to Arizona — the first time I’ve been back in almost nine years! Really surprised that contrary to being crushed by the triple-digit temperatures, I actually loved it. Got to see some great old friends… it’s really cool when no matter the time or distance that has grown between people, they’re able to pick up like they just saw each other yesterday.

I’ve got some pictures that are pretty funny, but honestly, my favorite shot from the trip is this rambling, incoherent video that Caleb captured on my camera. You can’t understand a word of what’s going on, but it is so succinct in summarizing the dynamic of our family of friends. So maybe I’ll upload that and post it. Here are my favorite pics:

Allie and Aaron’s wedding was funny, and beautiful, and crazy… just what you’d expect, really, from this couple:

OK, so just a quick rant about a recent trip to Barnes and Noble.

Lately I have been hankering for some Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Specifically, I have been sort of mentally obsessing over The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. The imagery has been haunting me for a while, and I could only remember snips and bits, so I decided to go grab a copy.

So first I tried the classics section, with no luck, so I headed to the poetry section… still nothing. So I truck up to the customer service section, something that I really, really dislike doing at the bookstore. This isn’t really the place to discuss the deeply flawed ways in which both Borders and B&N really short change their booksellers by essentially preventing them from getting to know their stores, suffice it to say that most clerks I’ve dealt with are completely ignorant to their store’s content. But at least at Borders, they allow you to search their catalog yourself, whereas at the B&N in Orem they do not.

So I ask the girl at the counter where I would find Coleridge in the store, and she’s like, “Hmm, is Coleridge the first or last name.” I knew at that moment that this was a lost cause. “Oh, um it’s his last name, Samuel Taylor Coleridge.” No aha moment forthcoming, she dutifully typed in the name. “Hmm, I’m not seeing anything. Are you sure thats his name?” Um, yes, yes I was sure. “Well, do you know the title of the book?” “Yeah, it’s the Rime of the Ancient Mariner — oh, and it’s r-i-m-e.” At this point she furrows her brow and says… “Are you sure? Usually rhyme is spelled r-h-y-m-e. Nothing is coming up.” And she turns her screen to show me. And I want to say, ‘yes I am sure it it’s spelled r-i-m-e, but I’m also sure than ancient isn’t spelled acient’ but I don’t want to embarrass her, so I just slinked off saying I’d just ‘look around.’

And I mean, look, I’m not expecting everyone to remember Coleridge from the cursory readings they did in high school. But, seriously, you work at a bookstore. He’s not exactly an esoteric author. Know your stock, know your authors, especially know your foundational English writers.

Cruelly, this was literally, or rather, literarily a “water, water everywhere…” moment.

Later I went to Borders, found Coleridge’s Complete Poems in like 20 short seconds and brought it up to the counter. “Oh, man… Coleridge! I need to get a new copy of this” says the bookselller, “mine looks like its been through the wash.” So thank you, Borders, thank you for that.

Lately I have been riding the same stretch of road everyday, the same 13.14 miles over and over and over again. It’s become a sort of meditation. It’s the longest stretch of uncrowded road, and it begins two blocks from my house and ends two cities over.

This week I have started taking it at speed, and have worked up to keeping an average pace of 22mph at about 80-90 rpm. However, when asked what I was listening to, I surprised a friend (who was expecting, I guess, some sort of fast paced music, Now 88,000 or what have you) by responding “Pete Mayle’s French Lessons: Adventures with Fork, Knife, and Corkscrew.”

I’ve already been through this book a couple of times, but it never, never gets old. This is one of those instances where the concept and the content completely override the style and shortcomings of the work — a fifth grader could write about his adventures at the French country table for his “What I did this Summer” and I would still be rapt with attention. Don’t get me wrong, Mayle puts it down sharply, excelling at the art of the well turned phrase and showing exceptional candor as usual. I’m just saying I would listen to it even were it to be written and read alound by Stephen Hawkings.

The problem I am having however, is that I find myself desperately longing for a turn off on my riding route, an off-ramp of sorts, to the Provençal country side. Everything, dinner especially, seems to lose its luster after listening to Peter describe his.

An excerpt from two of my favorite customer interactions last night at the bookstore:

[Scene: I am standing at the cash register, nametag around my neck, tagging books with anti-left devices]
Customer: Do you work here?
Me: Um, (look at surroundings, down at nametag, then at books in my hand) yes, I do.
Yeah, anyway, I'm looking for Catherine Coulter's new book that just came out, I can't remember the title though...
Yeah, it's not a new one, its actually just a re-release, its The Cove, but in hardcover for the first time.
No, I've already read The Cove, this one was just released last week. I got a newsletter saying she has a new book out.
Yes I know, The Cove was just re-released last week, but this time in hard-cover, for the first time.
Are you listening to me? Ive already read The Cove. I need her newest book.
OK, Her newest book before this one was Blind Side but tha --
I'VE ALREADY READ BLIND SIDE, I NEED HER NEWEST BOOK! THE ONE THAT CAME OUT ON THE 10th
Yes, THE COVE came out on Novemeber 10th, and before that, BLIND SIDE, on July 23rd. I think you ma--
UGGGHHHH! NEVER MIND!
[Customer storms out of store; Scene.]

Or, coming in close second:

[Scene: looking up a book for an elderly, frazzled woman at the computer.]
Me: OK, and what was the title?
Customer: I can't remember the title, but its by Robert Frost, something like, "Through the, the, um, the, woods?."
Well let's see (pulling up a list of all available books by Robert Frost) ... hmm, I'm not seeing anything like that, what was--
The dark woods? Through the dark woods? The dark woods path? Through, um, throu- um, no, through, in the, through, insid- no, through? The Woods?
OK... I'm not seeing any books that begin with "Through," heres a list of all of the books by Robert Frost, why don't you see if any of those look familia--
IN - to the woods? The woods? Forest? Through, um, in, um, beneath the woods? White woods? Silver woods? Forest Paths? Um, The woods woods woods woods woods woods, path through? Yes? When in the woods? Living in the woods? Woods? No? Yes!
Um, did you mean "The Road Not Taken?," because it soun--
WOODS! yes, wait ... no ... path in woods? Woods woods? Path not in woods .... Forest dark woods no path?
Um (speechless) ....
... (empty stare)
Um... You should try Borders.
[Scene.]

Everyday is an adventure.

I'm like, five eighths of the way through The Amber Spyglass and oh, I just can't handle this! They're stuck in the world of the dead! They're bargaining with harpies! Catholic assassins! I alternately want to both read the book, and also throw it across the room.

The one thing I really like about the books as a series, is the complete lack of absolute evil and absolute good. Nothing is black and white, just shades of gray -- a brilliant device as far as the plot line goes. As the characters are forced to make tenuous alliances with people they do not like, or trust rather; you, as the reader must do so as well. You cannot ( or at least, I cannot) in any way agree with Lord Asreal's philosophy, nor can I stand Ms. Coulter -- but you have to concede that they will be bringing about a neccessary change and thus, you must comply with them for the time being -- just as Lyra and Will must. So, so effective.

I'm going to Idaho tonight, so I've got the remaining pages of TAS to carry me through, and then Dahl's The Umbrella Man, as well.

It is snowing here! In October! Too, too early -- altough I love the cold. The earth is dresing up for Halloween, as a snow globe (HO!), while I am going as a Bhuddist Monk. Happy Halloween!

The other book I'm reading at the moment, (in addition to The Artist's Way, Kokology, and The Power of Babel) is The Archivist, by Martha Cooley.I'm kind of drowning in this book.

On the first page, she remarks "I"d forgotten how heady Eliot is, how much thinking he crowds into 'Four Quatets,'" and the same applies to her completely. I'm probably about 70 pages in, but the sheer amount of passion and emotion; lust and urgency she packs into each sentence is phenominal -- these 70 pages have the same emotional content of several large tomes. The themes of the book, of conversion and attrition, of betrayal and trust are so, so compelling.

I read and wish I was as passionate about something as the characters in this book. Their lives are galvanized by T.S. Eliot's poems, they know his work initmately, they think about it always. I have no such passion. I draw incessantly, but that feels more need based than anything else. I need to draw. Sometimes it feels rote, I need to make this line and that, like I need to eat now and then. I will draw this line and then I will sleep -- its the same nourishment. But I am not always passionate about it.

I want to be passionate in all things. I want to be electric in my dealings. I need more sincerity. I want to be entralled by something, by someone. I want to need something that is not of me. Give me something. Is it too late for a good strong New Years resolution?