Bluestalking

New, Improved and AD FREE!

You may notice I've banished all for profit ads from my blog sidebar. All that's left are those which are nonprofit, advertising a cause I consider to be important. Not a single one of them pays me a dime for sidebar space.

A couple of the purveyors of the for profit ads made me feel a bit used. That's why, for now, I've banished them all. I reserve the right to add a reputable ad or two sometime in the future, but I don't have any plans to do so right now.

So, more book content, less flash. It's the simple life for me.

I'm FREE! I'm FREE! I'm FREEEEEEEEEEEE!

And a bit odd.

And the winner is ...

Word Lily, from the blog of the same name!

Just send me your mailing address to:

lisaguidarini AT yahoo DOT com

and I'll get the book out to you!

Congrats, Word Lily!

Religion from the other side, biased by faith

 

Fingerprints of God: The Search for the Science of Spirituality

by Barbara Bradley Hagerty

My first clue was learning Hagerty's the religion correspondent for NPR. Intelligent and talented though she may be, she's also very biased toward the existence of God. It's impossible to present a logical and objective argument when you are as unashamedly firm in your beliefs as Hagerty.

The simple truth is anything can be bent to fit anyone's agenda, even, apparently "science." The book tells story after story featuring great "epiphanies" people have had, turning the unbeliever into the believer instantaneously. Anything that sudden can be reversed just as suddenly. It's human nature.

There's much more behind this subject than science can be expected to prove or disprove. Science doesn't deal in emotion, nor in anything as ephemeral as "faith." It can track the absence or presence of certain chemicals in the brain, but the release of these chemicals and the subsequent euphoria experienced by these converts cannot be assumed as a product of concrete evidence of a God.

The book is faulty and frustrating. The reader doesn't need to be a scientist to see her assertions are built on shaky ground. Just as books violently assaulting religion, and the faithful, are irksome and annoying, books with the opposite bias are just as useless to anyone seeking well-written and objective arguments on that which is in essence unprovable.

Anyone looking for objective books investigating the potential existence or non-existence of a God  are far better off reading about the philosophy of belief. Belief, or faith, are the core issues, clearly not measurable by science, nor by those already converted. The religious are too biased one way, and science often too biased the other. It's only in philosophy where we can even begin to honestly debate the issue, but even then it can never be resolved.

For those established in their faith, it's all well and good they find this a consolation and a base of support. But for the rest of us interested in unbiased thinking, the debate is fascinating. Feelings, suppositions and the nature of faith have no place in the argument. Neither do many of the hard facts of science necessarily negate the existence of an ephemeral being.

And I don't expect an answer. I just enjoy asking the questions, and thinking about both sides of the issue. As with the secrets the Universe holds, I will most likely never know the truth regarding how life was created, and what lies beyond. People say once you die you'll know, but even that's no proven fact. Who says so?

I'll continue to question and investigate. The questions I love most are open-ended and unanswerable. The fun, for me, is in the open debate. And there is no debating without bias, without pre-conceived opinion. The search continues.

Today, today. The winner will be announced ....

The process is secret, as with fraternity hazing, the voting system in Iran and how governors confuse Argentina with the Appalachian Trail (to be fair, they do both start with "A"). We don't question; we simply accept.

The world is nutty. It is rampantly insane. And also inane, which I typed first then changed.

But today, today. The winner from my Girl With a Dragon Tattoo book GIVEAWAY contest will be announced.

Later.

Hang on.

You'll know today.

I promise you ...

Now I'm going, to compose a grocery list. Or go to Guam. One of the two. I can't be bothered with specifics.

  

But this is a dancing cat. Of that I'm fairly certain.

Vacation ...

Just a bit of a setback on the vacation front. Schedules for work, reservations, etc., have not been going according to plan. So, at some point this summer we're hoping to get out of here and head west. We just don't know when. It's just not working out right now.

Sigh.

Don't be surprised if we flee suddenly, because I'm packing the camper with essentials anyway, so we're ready to hit that asphalt just as soon as life allows. Then look out, Pacific Northwest! When the opportunity comes we'll bolt, and we may not know that much in advance. Seems like the same thing happened last time we tried to go on vacation, if I recall correctly. We were all set then BAM! Thor whipped a lightning bolt our way, stopping us in our tracks.

Not that I'll be terribly missed in summer. Hopefully the rest of you are out enjoying vacations and such, and your outdoor thermometers aren't stuck at 200 F, with 5,000 % humidity, like ours. Just walking from my house to the mailbox I sweat like a veritable pig. It's awful. Just awful.

Ah, well. Nothing ever goes simply, does it? Especially when you have a big target on your back marked, "Pick me! I'm expendable!" 

In the meantime, I'll be pretty busy catching up with reading and such over the next few weeks. Don't be surprised if there's a blog drought during July, as I work feverishly to get caught up before school begins again in the fall. But I shall check in when I can, just probably not as often.

I'll look at it positively, as having more time to catch up on what on earth I'm supposed to be reading, whom I'm supposed to interview, and when the blog tours are to which I've committed myself. I've told myself the time I spend blogging should be spent taking care of previous commitments, and I really need to heed that this time. And, I need to revise a story I'm working on for the first edition of the library writers' group's first publication, to which I am contributing.

Oh, and speaking of reading and writing and such, I will be back very shortly to report on a book that's jumped my reading queue. It's a nonfiction book called The Peep Diaries: How We're Learning to Love Watching Ourselves and Our Neighborsby Hal Niedzviecki, and it's about the open world in which we live, and how blogs and other networking sites (Twitter, etc.) are turning us all into reality shows. Fascinating stuff, and it really makes you think about the ways in which what you put out there in the ether can come back on you. Much caution is given as to what can happen should you temporarily lose your mind and post incredibly personal details. People have been fired for talking about co-workers, complaining about the environment in which they work, or openly dishing gossip, true opinions about supervisors, etc. Even when a person blogs anonymously, it's supposedly not unknown for him/her to be caught out.

Who knew? Kind of makes me look back and wonder what I've said that could hang me. I'm sure there's something. In fact, I can think of a couple things off-hand that could boomerang on me, though I'm honestly not overly concerned about it. Yet. One thing I know, I've never criticized work or a co-worker. A husband, a family, and the administration of my country, perhaps. But work is off limits. I have my standards, low though they may be. As far as I can figure, what I've said can't be legally used against me. Now, if I commit a heinous crime I may have to eat those words. But so far, the bulk of my posts have been about my lust for books and long, painful whines about things I'm not yet mature enough to get over. The worst crime I've committed is being annoying.

Dang it, I didn't mean to talk about this yet! Saving rest for next post ...

The great adventure that is a camping vacation

I hate vacation prep. Does that sound irrationally negative? In the interest of full disclosure, I would much rather curl up in bed, under piles of blankets, than pack for a trip. There just must be a better approach, because my anxiety level is through the roof.

Not only is planning frustrating, but when you come home you need a vacation from your vacation. This year I'm being smart. I'm taking off the day after we're planning to return, so I can start on some laundry and SLEEP BLISSFULLY. We'll see how that works.

This year I'm making use of online websites, as well as books, suggesting ways to make the process simpler. What I could really use is a cookbook for camping, which doesn't exist at my library, or even within our system. Perhaps Borders has something. There have to be easy recipes not requiring lots of clean up. Surely?

Another challenge is the problem of what - and how much - clothing to bring. While we're going through the Pacific Northwest, where it's freezing at night (45 F) and moderately warm during the day (60s - 70s F), the three day trips there and back pass through stinking hot western states. Basically, we need every form of clothing from shorts to jeans, tank tops to jackets and heavy sweaters. And I was hoping to be as minimal as possible. As for doing laundry? The goal is to do it just once, halfway through. HA HA! I know.

I've learned camping requires bringing a mini-version of your entire house, cramming it into less than 1/20th the space. The pop-up camper fills up quickly, and just when you think you have everything in a convenient place, everything shifts. Then no one can find anything. 

What's not to love about that?

Washing dishes in a sink the size of a paperback book is fun, too. Since there's no separate sink for rinsing, it's impossible to wash dishes without also taking a shower in the process. Then again, maybe I should look at that as multi-tasking. Laundry, personal hygiene and washing dishes, all at the same time!

Perhaps the worst part is how quickly quarters become cramped, and cluttered, in a camper jammed with five people - four of them adults or as big as adults - all trying to occupy the same space at the same time. It gets old really quickly.

Bears and other wildlife ... They scare the living hell out of me, especially the bears. I'm afraid one of them will come sniffing around our camper because we forgot to put something scented into the van. So of course I don't sleep nights. If I'm going to become a grizzly bear's midnight snack I want to be awake to see it, dammit.

I've covered storage, cramped quarters and bears. Offensive odors are fun, too. As is trying to find your clothing and/or toiletries in the maelstrom. Oh, and showering in a public bathroom, where someone with a life-threatening fungus may have rinsed off just before you. And, dressing in a room so tiny you bump elbows on either side, while standing on a tile floor streaked with dirt. Which your clothes drag through, on their journey to your body.

And the fun part is ...?

This week will be full to the brim with vacation prep, so don't be too surprised if posts are sporadic. Think of me kindly, and for God's sake, if you have any tips on how to survive camping without committing hari kari, feel free to drop me a line. I'd appreciate any advice.

Back to the list making for me. Goodie!

A view from the other side

What dads are reading--it's not what you think

June 21, 4:08 PM · Marilyn Crain - Non-Fiction Books Examiner

 

Ask a dad what he's reading. The answer may surprise you. After conducting the first annual, informal, not so carefully monitored, survey of the smallest pool of reading fathers ever, this is what we discovered this morning. Dads are extremely unpredictable readers.

Are they reading one of the recent Pulitzer Prize winners? No.

The latest manly man-fiction? Not a chance.

Maybe something mind-stimulating, like What's Next: Dispatches on the Future of Science by Max Brockman. Not a chance.

To a man, all of the dads who took part in this Father's Day survey were re-reading an old favorite. Perhaps, this means when times are a little uncertain, men reach for the comfort of the books they love. Old friends they can count on?

Whatever the reasons, here are the books these dads are reading:

• The Pleasure of Finding Things Out by Richard Feynman—A collection of Feynman's writings about the joys of life and learning.
• Education of a Wandering Man by Louis L'Amour—A memoir from the master of the western cowboy, about a life of globe-trotting and reading.
• First Light: The Search for the Edge of the Universe by Richard Preston—Nonfiction that this dad says reads like fiction, about astronomers at Palomar Observatory and their adventures with the Hale Telescope.

Even though it's Father's Day, one mother wanted to participate in this survey, so risking the integrity of such a tightly controlled endeavor, in the interest of fairness she was allowed to add her voice.

So, what new and exciting best-seller is she reading? You guessed it. Her choice is even older than the guys' picks. She is reading (maybe for the tenth time) A Thousand Miles up the Nile by Amelia B. Edwards. She found a copy of this classic for $9.95 several years ago and she calls it her best find ever.

Well, that's it for this year's survey. It might be interesting to conduct a Father's Day inquiry of your own.
 

Copyright 2009 Examiner.com. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

Author

Marilyn Crain is an Examiner from Chicago. You can see Marilyn's articles at: "http://www.Examiner.com/x-7711-NonFiction-Books-Examiner"

The Challenge of challenges, along with other disassociated thoughts

I'm amazed by the literary blogs I tour. I blog hop far more frequently than I should, but it's just so doggone fun.  Dismaying sometimes, but fun. Those of you who read so much! Who participate in all those tasty reading challenges! I want to be you. There's the Pulitzer Challenge, the Nobel Challenge, and so many more it boggles my fuzzy, little brain. If you can name a prize or a genre, there's a challenge for it. And more, there are people doing it.

I mean reading, you naughty, naughty thing.

I'm looking for a Challenge for those with Limited Time and No End of Distractability. Anyone seen that around the blogosphere? Maybe I should start it myself, fashioning a graphic button featuring a woman with wild hair, rubbing her hands like Lady Macbeth, looking one part excited, three parts completely insane. Next time I pass a mirror I'll take a self portrait and get going on that.

That I had world enough and time!

I used to be one of the bloggers with seemingly infinite reading capability. And it sometimes feels so sad sitting on the sidelines, like the last puppy left to languish in the window (about which no one even asks the price! sniffle!), while others manage to juggle everything and still read the equivalent of the contents of the Library of Congress every year. I'm torn. Should I love you, or hate you, giving in to that most wicked of sins - JEALOUSY. I said that out loud, didn't I? Is this thing on? (tap, tap)

Meanwhile, I scramble to do whatever it is I do, reading much less than I'd like. It's heartache inducing, even if this summer has allowed me something resembling the volume of reading I used to do, as an at-home mom. With a very messy house. Now I'm a part-time working, part-time grad schooling reader/writer/dogsbody who fits in reading where she can. And still has a messy house.

 Even if I found a way to read 24 hours a day I'd still say it wasn't enough, because all you dratted good writers keep writing dratted good books. Would it kill you to stop long enough for me to get caught up? Well, would it? I'm looking at you, Joyce Carol Oates. Yes, you, at least until you turn sideways. Then you're too thin to see. I bet she has fun with that at parties:

Famous Literary Celebrity: So, Joyce, how's that new novel coming along? Isn't it the second you've written this week? Ummm, where'd she go?

Other FLC: See that disembodied martini glass over there, the one hovering in mid-air? That's her.

FLC: Are you sure? It looks like the stem of a champagne flute glass to me. Oh, I see. She just turned back around.

And for that there's a special category of jealousy. It's called pass the chocolate ice cream and I'll cry in existential angst, curled up in fetal position, trying to simultaneously suck my thumb and fit the spoon into my mouth, as the credits go past in Swedish.

I should wobble off now and see if there's any Oreo ice cream left in the freezer. My kids have been on summer break for two whole days, but I'm sure they left me some. Sure. That's probably the most unbalanced statement in this entire post. And that's no small feat.

I'm off, people. Off to do what it is I must do today. Now you go, and do what you must. I'll meet you back here later.

[Cut to scene of clown crying, as rosebuds gently drift by in the breeze.]

Le Fin

Tom Lehrer's Ode to "Smut"

Toto, I don't think we're in Kansas anymore

Wow, what a morning. Two reported tornado sightings, both very close to where we live. As far as I know, there were no touch downs, and no damage, but that's too close for comfort. Now the streets are flooding, with another very big storm cell barreling down on us within the next few hours.

Where did I leave that gopher wood? And my tools? Exactly what is a cubit? We already have the two dogs (both female, and both spayed - whoops), and far more than two fish (genders undetermined, species a definite issue). I expect the other animals should turn up shortly, though the house smells as though they already have.

Because I was monitoring the tornado warning this morning, when the kids were still in bed, I delayed going into work. Sure enough, the tornado siren went off, proof of my mother's intuition. And modern radar. I ran upstairs like a blue streak (well, not quite, but as quickly as I'm able) and herded the sheep to the basement. There we waited out the tornado warning.

When that all seemed safely past I drove to work, dodging the streams forming on the roads, and was duly drenched when I came in through the employee door. Of course, the rain slowed significantly shortly thereafter.

Ah, but anyway!

A busy weekend ahead for the denizens of Chez Guidarini, assuming we don't float away beforehand. My father in law turned 70 not long ago (she said, vaguely gesturing toward her calendar), and there's a gala planned on Saturday. Huzzah! On Sunday, a barbecue at the house of some friends. Good news is Saturday's showing much better weather is forecast, though the ground will be one, big mud pit. Great time to pull out those weeds in the gardens, though, when the ground's soaked. I'll have to let Paul know.

I'm behind, in so many ways,with things bloggish. With things everythingish, but let's forget that for now. I'm sitting on a couple of interviews, as I've been unable to polish them up and post them. So if it's YOU I'm speaking of, know I haven't forgotten! And other author interviews in progress ... Yes, there are those. It's very not cricket asking for an interview then not sending along one's questions, so I will carve out that time this weekend, God help me.

Reading... Also behind.  Laundry ... Don't mention that. Cleaning ... Why, is company coming?*

Alas and alack.

In other news, hopefully more cheery, last evening Paul worked on mapping out our tentative vacation itinerary. To say it's a whirlwind tour of the West/Northwest is an understatement. Funny how we always seem to do things like that. With five in the family, there's nothing that ever suits all of us, so in order to keep everyone shut up we have to run like everliving hell to get in something for everyone. That means entire national parks get done in one day. Mountains? A few hours. But the coastline... Ah! Three entire days. Finally, the sequoias (for me!). That's shut up times five, or as close as it ever gets. Which is why mummy bought pink ear plugs. An entire pack.

I really don't see how we can manage leaving the house without having the in-laws come live here while we're away. The saltwater fish tank is the great unknown. It could so easily overflow (it nearly has before), and we could come home to an aquarium in the basement instead of on the first floor. Then, there are the dogs. Here, the yard's equipped with an invisible fence even Jack Russells respect. And they respect precious little. The fish, the mail, any unexpected emergencies... I expect that's the best idea. Time to convince them of that.

Late yesterday evening I'd composed half a post on current reading, not anticipating the weather usurping it. It's still not over, but don't start worrying until you haven't heard from me by the end of Monday. Then you may safely assume either all computers within the vicinity have suddenly and simultaneously exploded, or that the five of us are floating down the Mississippi River, singing hits from "Showboat." God willing, I'll have remembered to bring my camera on the roof with me.

Must run. So little to do, so much time. Strike that. Reverse it.

Land ho!

* Last weekend my brother called from his cell phone. "We're about an hour away, and thought we'd drop by!" The children were still asleep, and Paul and I were in pajamas. The house looked like ground zero for a previous tornado. Though he claimed he'd told me they were in the area for a wedding this weekend, between you and me -- HE DIDN'T.