The Case for Re-Reading

It's always been a bone of contention between Dara and me that I don't like to see movies or read books more than once. Life seems too short to me. That's not to say I'm not a creature of habit, eating the same thing for breakfast and enjoying going back to the same favorite haunts. Still, about the only book I can ever remember re-reading is Isaac Asimov's Foundation Trilogy. Perhaps a strange choice given my eclectic reading habits, but I was curious how a book that I found so insightful and exciting as a teenager would age. (Short answer: not very well, in my opinion.) Lately, I was amused to see Paul Krugman's reference to the Foundation Trilogy in his comment on Sonia Sotomayor's being inspired by Nancy Drew and Perry Mason.

I got into economics because I wanted to be Hari Seldon. Sonia Sotomayor went into the law because she wanted to be Perry Mason.

Which is all a long bit of introspection to point to a NYTimes opinion piece extolling the virtues of and motivations for re-reading books. I bet Dara can find something to relate to in it. Re-reading favorite books is like comfort food for her. Re-readers out there: check it out.

Empathy I Can Believe In

In the midst of the noise about the Sotomayor nomination and the danger that empathy poses to the rule of law, I thought I'd just point out that she has had Type 1 diabetes since she was 7. There's a source of some hard won empathy I'm hoping might be brought to bear in future rulings, say on the rights of blastocysts vs. people.

Teen Text Obsession

Can it be true? From the NYTimes:

American teenagers sent and received an average of 2,272 text messages per month in the fourth quarter of 2008, according to the Nielsen Company — almost 80 messages a day

That really can't leave a lot of time for the usual teenage vices, can it?

Disney Engineering Expose

It was a bit shocking to Garrett to find out we had watched Disney's High School Musical the other night. But, now we know the secret to their success: the characters have been genetically engineered by Disney. As far as High School Musical and star Zac Efron goes, the Disney engineer laments:

Actually, I think we could have done a better job with Zac. He could show more human tendencies. If you look close, you'll see that there is a certain deadness around the eyes. It's hard for me to watch because all I see is my mistakes.

Hardcore Star Trek fans will also find the Onion's take on the new movie amusing, while the non-hardcore will wonder what the joke is about.

Slime 'em Slugs!

Mom will remember that when we parked at Pt. Lobos in the early morning that we took the last parking place in the lot. Pretty much all the other places were occupied by the cars of scuba divers. A guy from work dives there, and when I had lunch with him the other day, he told me that he and his wife had discovered a new species of sea slug while diving! Turns out that they dive between 100 and 200 feet, which is not all that well traveled. They spotted this little sea slug and took some pictures.
They did not recognize what kind it was, so they consulted with a local expert in Santa Cruz. He didn't recognize it either. They kept their eyes open for it in later dives, and managed to find quite a few. They took a couple of specimens, and when the local expert examined the reproductive system under a scanning electron microscope (apparently the definitive way to identify it), it was found to be new. How cool is that! Scientific paper in the works. By the way, the other picture is Dara scouting for otters, not slugs.

Spring Reading List

It's been a while.

Little Face, by Sophie Hannah. A mystery about a missing baby who is seemingly replaced by another. The mother claims a different child has been substituted for her "little face", but the husband and evil mother-in-law claim otherwise. A pretty good story that manages to work out the inherent contradictions fairly rationally.

Bridge of Sighs, by Richard Russo. As predicted when I blogged about The Risk Pool, I didn't like this Russo as much as either The Risk Pool or Empire Falls. I am kinda Russo'd out now. There are only so many stories you can come up with that have at their heart the experience of living in upstate NY (or some small New England town). Or at least only so many I can read. In this episode, a threesome of buds, two guys and a girl, live through a troublesome childhood on various sides of the proverbial railroad tracks. One guy marries the girl, and the other goes off to become a famous artist (living in Venice near the Bridge of Sighs). The girl has great affection for the other guy but plays it safe and stays home. Angst and soul-searching ensue.

Rabbit Run, by John Updike. When Updike died, and I read so many glowing reviews of his work and pithy writing style, I thought it must be time for me to step up to reading something by him. Certainly this was a good read, but I have a hard time with books where I hate pretty much all of the characters. Rabbit finds himself trapped in a going-nowhere life, his wife pregnant and more unattractive to him by the day. He decides to walk out, shacks up with a prostitute with a heart of gold, is hovered-over by a well-meaning parish priest, and finally returns to his wife for the birth of their baby. Things don't get better from there. Personally, if you're looking for a good read about the conflicts of meaningless suburban life in the 50's, I would go for Revolutionary Road. Now that it's been made into a movie, you won't be able to impress your neighbors quite as much by it, though.

Mudbound, by Hillary Jordan. Excellent story about a woman whose husband sells everything and buys a farm in Mississippi, around the end of WWII. It wasn't her idea, and she's none too happy. Her name for the place is Mudbound. They struggle to make it work, while the husband's brother comes back from the war with a set of his own issues. The brother strikes up a controversial friendship of sorts with the black sharecropper's son who is also returning from the war. It turns out to be tough for both of them to adjust to the old ways of Mississippi black-white attitudes. Really a very good story, not just the old race relations and injustice grind, and highly recommended.

Regeneration, by Pat Barker. Mom bought this for me at a used bookstore while she was out here. This book is part of a trilogy, but Mom's advice is to stick with this one. I really enjoyed it. The story of a decorated war hero who decides to protest the continuing bloody, stalled trench warfare of WWI by refusing to serve any further, and publishing a declaration against it. Although he's quite sane, he is remanded to a mental institution used to treat soldiers with various types of what we would call PTSD. The main character is the doctor who works with him, but he's surrounded by various cohorts, and their lives and stories intermingle in ways that keep you turning pages. Makes me want to go back and read All Quiet on the Western Front.

Tree of Smoke, by Dennis Johnson. There are about four intertwined stories surrounding a single common character, Skip Sands, who works for the CIA during the Vietnam war. His uncle is a famously independent war hero and now CIA agent, who is working on a grand scheme in the Psychological Operations area. You get the story from the Vietnamese angle, in addition to the religious humanitarian volunteer. Of all the story lines, the one I liked the least surrounded the uncle. Unfortunately, that is the central one, so I found myself trying to skim past it to find out what happened in the other ones. Not a very satisfying way to journey through a very thick book. Sort of a cross between The Quiet American and A Bright Shining Lie, but not as good as either.

The Appeal, by John Grisham. I haven't read a Grisham book for years. The story line on this one seemed up my alley, and it was a pretty good read. The story follows the appeal after the conviction of a chemical company accused of causing many cancer deaths in a small Mississippi town. There's not any question of their culpability. The company battles the appeal by working to replace a sitting Mississippi supreme court justice with a firebrand conservative who is clueless about how he's managing to run such an effective well-financed campaign. Can't let those damned lawyers wreck the business climate! Good, entertaining story. I remember Grisham books being laced with valiant lawyers battling death-defying violence and plots, but this one is more my style with pure politics and dirty business. Of course, who needs fiction for that.

So Brave, Young, and Handsome, by Leif Enger. Terrific western-style story. We follow a one-trick-pony writer who tags along with a semi-reformed train robber on a cross-country adventure. The robber wants to trace down his former fiance whom he deserted as the law was breathing down his neck. Along the way they run into a famous Pinkerton detective, Charlie Siringo, and spend the rest of the book trying to elude him. Although the book takes place around the turn of the century, as cowboys get relegated to theme shows like Wild Bill's, it has the feel of a more traditional western.

American Pastoral, by Philip Roth. It won a Pulitzer, so it must be great, right? Need I answer? This book was very hard for me to get into, as the first third or half of it is dedicated to details about growing up Jewish in northern NJ, and the relationships of the main character, which are rooted in his experience being the sports star in high school. A lot of this is accomplished through the literary vehicle of a high school reunion of people in their mid-sixties, which made it even harder for me to enjoy. Once past that barrier, the rest of the story was interesting. It follows the model family's ordeal of dealing with the fallout from their only daughter joining a sixties underground organization, bombing the local post office, and living on the run. They are left with the guilt and uncertainty as their lives have to carry on in her absence and the surrounding atmosphere.

The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher, By Kate Summerscale. Ever play Clue? This is the true story that inspired the classic Clue-like Victorian murder mystery, such as The Moonstone. I thought it was fascinating. Even the profession of detective was new then, as Scotland Yard was only recently formed. Detective Whicher is dispatched to the scene of a child killing, and the entire house is under suspicion. Ultimately, the case ruins Whicher's career, as he stubbornly works to sort things out regardless of how many sordid Victorian household dramas he uncovers along the way. The real-life ending is just as entertaining as the detective work. Highly recommended.

The Good Parents, by Joan London. I really loved Joan London's Gilgamesh, and this is her second novel. It was a good story, but it didn't have the same appeal for me as her earlier novel. The "good parents" of the story go to visit their small town daughter who is living in the city, only to find she's missing. She's been having an affair with her boss, whose wife was suffering from cancer and just died. They spend a lot of time hanging out, thinking she will show up, but soon start to work tirelessly to find her. Along the way, we find out all about her upbringing, but more interestingly about the parents background. Very enjoyable, but I think I had my hopes up too high based on Gilgamesh.

Fieldwork, by Mischa Berlinski. Another of Mom's recommendations. Great book! Although it's fiction, the main character is... Mischa Berlinski. His girlfriend finds out you can get a job teaching English almost anywhere in the world with minimal credentials, so off they go to Thailand. He scratches a living writing odds and ends, but gets turned on to the story of an American anthropologist who did her fieldwork in Thailand studying a remote tribe. She killed a missionary and ended up in prison. He becomes obsessed with uncovering her story, and I have to admit I was pretty obsessed with it myself. Read it and learn about the tribes of Thailand; what it's like to get your PhD in anthropology from Berkeley; and the ins-and-outs of being a missionary in China and Thailand. With a murder mixed in, how can you beat it.

Mother-of-my-Children Day

The old saw of "You're not my mother" was wearing a little thin, so I thought I'd try something new and make Saturday Mother-of-my-Children Day. This year's celebration included my attempt at a gourmet meal. I keep reading the excellent food section in the SFChronicle and thinking, "I could do that!" So I put it to the test with an appetizer of olives, cheese, and baguette; a main course of Pork Chops with Ginger, Sauternes & Coarse Mustard; followed up with Griddled Meyer Lemon-Ricotta Pound Cake with Seasonal Compote for dessert. The ingredients were gathered with a trip to only two stores, and an emergency trip to the local market. I am sure Alice Waters would not have had this much trouble. As it turned out, the pork chops were terrific, but the pound cake was a little strange. I discovered what was strange about it when I went to make the whipped cream with mascarpone, only to find the ricotta sitting in the refrigerator. A little garbage can forensics established that I had made a Meyer Lemon-Mascarpone pound cake. I (wisely, I think) decided not to compound the confusion by folding the ricotta in with the whipping cream.

All in all a success. Maybe a new tradition has been born.

Cop-Out Politics

Many bytes have been wasted recently lamenting the sad state of California's budget and the politics that led up to it. In spite of its kooky reputation, California is pretty diverse. In fact, I'd say that the California Republican party has for some time resembled what the national Republican party is starting to look like. They hate Ahnold as much as the Democrats, if not more.

One of the more annoying aspect of California politics is our referendum system. Issues that our legislature is incapable of dealing with, or matters that well-funded interest groups can muster a pathetically small number of signatures for, get tossed directly to the voters. My general practice is just to vote NO on all such propositions, granting a miserly amount of exceptions. I keep thinking this may eventually result in a legislature that actually does its job. Hope springs eternal. This year, since the legislature requires a 2/3 vote to pass a budget and is just shy of 2/3 Democrats, there was a giant cop-out foisted on the voters. Thus, California voters get to decide on Props 1A-1F, a confusing array of budgetary crap that you would think you pay your state legislator to deal with.

Just like the unorthodox alignment of pro- and anti-Bush sentiment that served to defeat naming a SF sewage treatment plant after him, we seem to be lining up for a left-right alliance to defeat of 1A-1F. The left feels the defeat will force right wing Republicans to come back to the table and negotiate (or risk losing their seats eventually), while the right feels the defeat will force the left wing Democrats to come back to table and negotiate (or risk losing their seats eventually). It's always a bad sign when George Will, in his toney Georgetown digs, or Rush Limbaugh in his toney Manhattan digs, take an interest in California politics. But here we are.

And speaking of where we are, the thing that inspired me to write this long blog post was an article outlining the position of aspiring California gubernatorial nominees on Props 1A-1F.

Candidate	1A	1B	1C	1D	1E	1F
Jerry Brown (D)	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Tom Campbell (R)	Y	N	N	Y	Y	N
Gavin Newsom (D)	Y	Y	N	N	N	N
Steve Poizner (R)	N	N	N	N	N	N
Antonio Villaraigosa (D)	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y	Y
Meg Whitman (R)	N	N	N	Y	Y	Y

Clear as mud, eh. This of course makes it difficult for me to determine my voting position by voting the opposite of the person I most distrust. Oh well, maybe George Will made that easier.