Jake Leech > Recent Status Updates

FYI, your Goodreads year in review for the current year is always available by going to last year's and changing the year in the url.

I was going to skip the eight appendices but find that, to my horror, I am somehow compelled to start crawling through them

"Table 3-2. Selected Bases for Parking Requirements
Amusement devices
Bassinettes
Clergymen
Driving tees
Examination beds
Fuel nozzles
Grease racks
Homeless children
Interments in one hour
Largest number of visitors
Mechanics
Nuns
Operator stations
Persons lawfully permitted in pool
Reposing rooms
Service bays
Tie-downs
Users
Vehicles maintained
Washing machines"

I hate that it's so hard to see (and impossible to like?) anyone's reading challenges any more. Or am I missing something?

Today I learned that n2 equals the sum of the first n odd numbers (with a very easy graphical demonstration). I didn't expect to learn this in a book that opens by arguing that epistemological pessimism is the root of totalitarianism. I also feel kinda dumb for not already knowing this.

Year in Books is out! Once upon a time, I used to read 52 books a year, mostly to impress girls. But I was skimming books just to hit that target. When I started the annual Reading Challenges in 2014 I set the bar to 25 to avoid that. Since then it seems like my natural cadence is around 40 books a year, so I guess I'll set that as my new target for 2025.

https://www.goodreads.com/user/year_i...

"I don't think you'll have much difficulty in recognizing him."
"Why's that?" said Bond.
"His left hand," said M, sitting down again, and staring Bond squarely in the eye. "It's a monkey's paw."

Almost indistinguishable from actual Fleming garbage!

This is a train wreck.

I've felt stymied this last week. The nonfiction I'm reading now can only be read in little chunks; it's either too technical or too prone to blur otherwise. I also don't want to add a third nonfiction book to my reading pile. But I've recently read so much...literary genre fiction (?), mostly sci-fi or fantasy, that I'm glutted and can't stand to read another novel. Only one chapter left in Rice Noodle Fish, though!

I have no idea where I put this library book.

It's been a weird year and I'm not reading as much as I would like.

I hate that there is only a finite amount of M.F.K. Fisher writing in the world, and one day I will have read it all and there will be no new M.F.K. Fisher for me to read. :(

Just finished the chapter "Lust". I'm feeling very fortunate about my own life (watching the surf crash on the beach outside my window). I'm feeling very relaxed, on the Sunday of a holiday weekend, and having had a beer at 11:00 AM. I'm feeling very bittersweet about Hong Kong, which I'll probably never visit again. I'm home alone for the first time in two years. We're under a tornado watch. I've got The Feels!

Wait, are they all vampires?

I remain hopelessly baffled by enthalpy, but will persevere.

I've read this ten times. How is this not already on my "Read" list? Ah well, an excuse to read more Fisher!

"Here is a recipe, a combination really of Escoffier's Soupe a la Bonne Femme and one I found in a calendar published by the gas company in the Canton of Vaud in Switzerland."

"A vivid demonstration of such regulation comes from a cute experiment with chick embryos. When posterior spinal tissue that controls the legs was replaced by anterior spinal tissue that controls the wings, the chicks that hatched moved their legs in unison as if they were trying to flap them in a vain attempt to fly."

This is one of the most horrifying things I've ever read.

Gorgeous so far. Tough decision--do I gobble this up as fast as I can or draw it out to savor it for as long as possible?

How can so many pages have so little plot? How is this even legal?

Well, that's Marxism taken care of!

How come it's always children and teenagers who are feeling discouraged and ordinary right before they find out that they have amazing powers or are "the one"? How come you never read about a mysterious mentor swooping down and proclaiming, "Ah yes, your forty-second HUMAN birthday, traditionally one's first day as a WIZARD! What's that? Today is your FORTY-FIRST birthday? Why then you must be THE NEW WIZARD KING!"?

I am reading this with a book club and we are reading around 40 pages a week, out of 900. In 2020 it should be a crime to take so long to read a book. We might all be dead next week.

I've read a couple of Vollmann novels before and been baffled, so I was daunted when I started this. Ten pages in, I'm amazed. I guess I'll see how the next 614 pages go, but I'm excited right now.

I have a few very long flights coming up.

I really want to hate this but I just can't stop reading.