Read more fiction, it’s good for you. More importantly, it’s good for society (which benefits you).
The Books Of The Future
This blog posting, A 1962 Vision of the Twenty-First Century Book Trade, made me unexpectedly nostalgic.
First off, let me acknowledge some of the prescience of those prognosticators of fifty years past. The prediction about microfilm could easily be seen as prefiguring the e-reader. And they predict modern audio books and reading on computers and one person was right on in predicting the rise of the Borders and Barnes & Noble style bookstores (though he did not predict their struggles).
But it was Mrs. Ross’ comment about books being sold in groceries, drugstores, and filling stations.
Of course, one of the big stories of the book business has been how warehouse stores like Wal-Mart have cannibalized a decent percentage of the business of bookstores by stocking a small collection of best sellers.
But I remember the circular, spinning wire racks in drugstores filled with thin paperbacks. Mostly of the Harlequin and Zane Grey type, but sometimes with some kids novels or science fiction or fantasy. You can still find a few thick romance tomes in drugstores, but I haven’t seen one of those wire racks filled with pulps in a drugstore since visiting Arkansas for my aunt’s wedding. We stopped in a drugstore (with a soda fountain counter) and there it was. The last I can remember in such a place.
I know I must have bought a few books from such racks. Though as a kid, mostly I just looked at the cover art and read the back of the book in awe.
Mrs. Ross was right, but the books in drugstores didn’t really make it to the twenty-first century.
Thursday Morning Staff Meeting – DC’s ‘Secondary Sights’
Howard Carter
Of course, I only know this because of a google doodle, but today is the birthday of the egyptologist who discovered Tutankhamen’s tomb, Howard Carter.
While he was known for the discovery and for the introduction of (more) modern theories and methods of practicing archaeology, isn’t it more fun to think of him as an occasionally swashbuckling, proto-Indiana Jones? Even if it’s not exactly true?
Little Tokyo Is (Was?) Awesome
I loved visiting Little Tokyo when I lived in Los Angeles, so I hope it keeps something of its character. Though what does it mean when a caucasian of mostly English descent wants to save the character of an ethnic neighborhood? There’s a stench of paternalism about it.
This article, Save Little Tokyo, is a reminder that Los Angeles is a great big Jackson Pollock painting, with each streak and drip being a unique little neighborhood (though some more desirable to live in than others).
There was a restaurant in Little Tokyo called Haru Ulala that opened at five pm and catered to the after work crowd with tall bottles of beer poured into little glasses and servings of grilled and fried seafood and vegetables.
A little store, with the sort of random goods you’d expect from a Dollar Tree, but which always had these strange little notebooks – composition books for tests, actually, with poorly translated phrases on the front (‘THIS NOTEBOOK IS THE BEST QUALITY FOR WRITING SENTENCES’).
And, of course, the toy store with classic Godzilla movies and toys, Great Mazer action figures. Everything a man-child could want.
Midweek Staff Meeting – Why Is Charles Murray Still Speaking?
Farewell, Sendak
Yes, Maurice Sendak passed away.
Where the Wild Things Are was a beloved book for me when I was a child, but it was not a life changing experience and I had little desire to see how a story of a very young child experimenting with a little independence before returning to the safety of a patient mother’s arms could be turned into a two hour movie.
But yes, it is a beautiful book.
Tuesday Morning Staff Meeting – Kindle Not On Target
Political Colors
I was reading some soccer scores while taking my lunch (hummus and crackers) and noticed a Romney add at the bottom of the page.
But just a glancing look would not have told me that, because the color design of the add was overwhelmingly blue – and the particular shade of blue most often see associated with graphic designs for Democrats.
There was just a tiny bit of red (the sort of token touch used to suggest a little bipartisanship), but was otherwise exactly what you’d expect from a banner ad for a Democrat.
So this is how Romney is distancing himself from the GOP for the general election – he is subtly shifting his strategy to appear more, well, Obama-like. Or perhaps ‘Obama-lite.’
the coffee philosopher 