Nancy > Recent Status Updates

Read 10/33 essays: Today is a look at Mary Meeker (1959) "The Girl in the Bubble". Who? In 1990s She was celebrated for her stock-picking acumen. Now, Mary Meeker digests vast amounts of data to highlight the unprecedented pace of AI adoption and innovation and how businesses can create an explosion of wealth. Mary just keeps on ticking...like the Duracell bunny!

#tolstoyreadalong "...It appeared he had forgotten nothing except what he wanted to forget -- his wife." (ch 3) @chapteraday365

Haven't even started my 50 pg a day target...and I'm frustrated! Why does Balzac refuse to create chapters ...for a flowing narrative? It does NOT enhance the storytelling...but drives me crazy!

Read 9/33 essays: "Kids in the Conference Room" (1999) looks at management consulting jobs that were once a top aspiration for college graduates, prestige, high pay, fast-track career growth. By reading about the past I wondered if AI could replace these young people? AI reinvents consulting as higher-value..but does not make it obsolete. Nothing can replace empathy.

Part 4: The poems were 70% optimistic 30% reflections on how culture and morality can quickly collapse in the face of war, historical upheaval (WWII). Poem "Heraclitus" was my favourite as I learned what a Heraclitian Challenge is: nothing is permanent, it is an illusion of stability. Heraclitus said: "No one ever steps in the same river twice." So...embrace the present as it inevitably slips away.

Read 7/33 essays - Reading Malcolm Gladwell "Clicks and Morters" is like reading ancient history. MG delights in the benefits of e-commerce (barcodes, internet web stores, tracking packages) but still wants to highlight that 'people' are still necessary for business. Poor MG he did not see AI chat customer service, robotics in warehouses and...drones ...coming! Fun to look back to 1999, ancient history!

2 essays "The Gilder Effect" (about George Gilder, who?) and Hard Core Bill Gates Microsoft vs the Government trial.. Interesting at the time (1998)...but pales in comparison to the tech-bros of our times. The only thing that kept me awake were the " Pre New Years " fireworks that are currently exploding in my neighbourhood! 2025......If ever there were a year whose end could not come soon enough, this was it.

Finished part 3 (read 30 poems so far....) - these poems are post WWII, more reflective with less surreal images.
"Child of Europe" ...child being the survivors of WW II.
Milosz has a sharp eye and traces justified betrayals during war he witnessed: "Having the choice of our own death or that of a friend, / We chose his". (...many turned a blind eye to the horrors of the concentration camps.

Read 4/33 essays:

The post enjoyable so far is Mark Singer's essay 1997 "Trump Solo". I had to laugh at one quote from Trump:
"Whatever complicates the world more, I do,”
Aint' that the truth!

Series of poems while Milosz was in his 20s-30s (1934-1944): (The Poor Poet) "I am a poor poet, I have no words." Yet Milosz demanded that we be a moral witness (WWII) ...must see and remember. Milosz warns us of indifference and forgetfulness.

Read: 2/33 essays and am impressed by Larissa Macfarqyhar! Staff writer at the New Yorker since 1998 and is known for her sharp, insightful profiles. She interviewed Jason Calcanis (Internet entrepreneur. I'd like to find her essays on Hilary Mantel and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in the magazine's archive. NETFLIX docs (2025) New Yorker 100 years is excellent!

Poem: "And the City Stood in its Brightness"
It is impossible to recapture the past.. for example visiting your home town again.
The "CITY" preserves, stands "BRIGHT"
...BUT also obliterates b/c human lives
...run their course and fade away.

Poem "Mittelbergheim"
Places carry the weight of the past...visible (buildings) and invisible (suffering).
The church is empty....but the light (faith, hope) is still there.

Excellent essay writings from this Nobel Prize winner!

What have I put off reading this novel for years...no decades? All of the characters want something intensely—love, money, revenge, or social recognition...and now we see who is successful and who ends up in the gutter!

Everyone wants good reviews: actresses submit to journalists....journalists submit to publishers and the public never reads the truth just comments paid for by interested parties who will make money!
Lucien feels poetry is being dragged through the mire his friend says: "...you still have your illusions." (part 2, pg 286) - No time to read the book? Watch the movie (2021) on streaming.

Book starts with a detailed look at fashions, furnishings, finances, and class hierarchies in French provincial society.
Lucien is headed for a shock in
part 2: Paris is ready to crush this wannabe poet!

The Christmas Carol was a wonderful read
....but The Chimes was not as enchanting!
The writing is confusing b/c Dickens repeats
phrases over and over again. You can listen to the audio book
on Spotify...that was much better!

Powerful prologue....

MB = MAÇON, OUVRIER
RD = ÉMPLOYÉ, CHAUFFEUR
HC = JOURNALISTE, POÈTE

ALL IN A IMAGINARY CELL (ROOM) CREATED BY THE AUTHOR….AS PAYBACK, REVENGE

…BUT FOR WHAT?

Pg 140/250 (finished 56 %)

Part 2 was like watching moving pieces of a chessboard. Triple Alliance, Entente Cordiale with the tension that countries felt wondering if a "friend" would remain a friend in case of a Balken Conflict! What was the Linman Affair 1913? Well, I know now! Pushing hard to finish this book b/c it will not be easy to pick it up if I stop for a while.

Eyes are closing, I can't process any more Serbs, Bulgaria, Russia, Ottoman (Turkey) shenanigans in 1912.

Chapter 3-4 (pg 122-240) explained polarisation in Europe and I wanted to move on to the Balkan Wars in ch 5. There were fun facts a/b monarchs Tsar Nicolas II, Edward VII, George V and Wilhelm II). Kaiser W II completely unable function as his high office demanded. Staff went out of their way to keep him FAR AWAY from government policy making. "...he spoke not like a monarch, but like an over-excited teenager..."

Part 1, ch 2-3-4 This is explains the groundwork for the 1st (1912-1913) and 2nd (1913, last just 6 weeks) Balkan Wars. WW I was actually the 3rd Balken war until it officially became the First World War. I watched on You Tube "TheTerrorByte" channel It has clear mini videos explaining what was happening in all the battlefields. Very helpful...if not essential to watch!

Part 1 , chapter 1:
I finally learned what exactly started WW I...it was not just a bullet shot on 28 June 1914. The Balkans was already in a situation that was highly volatile and could erupt into conflict or chaos at any moment: a powder keg ready to blow! Excellent text by C. Clark that is easily digested!

IReading a biography about Hesse now by Gunnar Decker. It is a miracle he survived such childhood smothered in his parent’s religious rigidity! Faith and religion,,,finding one’s soul…were topics Hesse often wrote about.

Slow, slow going with very long look at Hesse's family life, the religious rigidity of his parents and his schooling....often being expelled b/c he was uncontrollable!

What a coincidence...reading in Ferrer's book how US tried to take over Cuba at the end of Spanish-American war 1898...now this headline:
US's real aim is to overthrow Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s government and then, by cutting off the flow of Venezuelan oil to Cuba, fulfill the Republican right’s decades-long dream of collapsing the Cuban government. #Déja vu

I'm glad I did not give up ... In chapter 9-10-11-12 I finally understand what Hesse is trying to say. He wrote it in neutral Switzerland in the 1930s...and was concerned with the rise of fascisim all around him. Hesse's plea to leaders was NOT to isolate yourselves in thoughts and theories (...as did the scholars in Castilia) ...but go out into the world of reality and confront the evils at your border!