Book Talk

One blog entry a week, keeps insanity away.

Books. This week is a Book Week aside from being my Complacency Week. (I'd rather not delve into the latter aspect of the week. ;p) I read two books, and bought a record-breaking EIGHT books in three days (I bought one last Wednesday, another on Thursday, and all the rest yesterday). In case you're interested, these books are:




READ:


1) Gun, with Occasional Music by Jonathan Lethem. A futuristic spy novel (pwede ring fable, Hahaha) by the author of You Don't Love Me Yet. Babyheads, evolution therapy on kittens, apes, kangaroos, rabbits, etc, and modified drugs like Acceptol, Forgettol, Blanketrol, Believol, Regrettol, and characters such as Catherine Teleprompter, Morgenlander, Walter Surface, Orton Angwine, Danny Phoneblum, Pansy Greenleaf, Grover Testafer, Celeste Stanhunt, Conrad Metcalf. (Can you guess which are the humans and which are the animals?) A very . . . different book. (Available from Elaine. Hahaha)


2) Feminist Fairytales by Barbara G. Walker. Your (and my) favorite fairtytales given an interesting feminist twist. Panalo 'yung version ng Snow White. :D (Available at UPM CAS Lib.)




BOUGHT:


1) Plum Island by Nelson DeMille. I already had a paperback copy of the book but since the hardbound cost much less, binili ko na. I had in mind what Sir K said about paperbacks not being book-books. Gets?


2) Family Life by Russell Banks. Wala lang, I just felt like buying a book (a relatively thin novel, actually) separated by numbers, in between paragraphs, transitions in POVs, and chapters. Maraming numbers, promise. :D


3) Chasing Cezanne by Peter Mayle. I'm a frustrated painter, and have a shallow (for some people) list of qualities to look for in books. Books with interesting topics (like Jews, Arabs, West Asia, basketball, art, et al), interesting titles, a familiar author or title, and good, weird, unique cover designs easily get my attention. With this one, the topic got me looking at its synopsis. Pero, when I got home I realized Peter Mayle is actually the author of the book I wanted to read last Christmas break pero unavailable sa bookstores: A Good Year (Yes, from that movie.) I guess this is a step closer to finding a copy. Hehe.


4) Autobiography of Malcolm X. The reason behind my all-week book-hunting was for the autobiography we were required to read for our next module in Socsci 120 (Directed Readings in the Social Sciences). Any would do, except for basketball players. I searched CAS Lib, but found thick autobios of Mussolini, Nehru, Trotsky and a Western yogi (ewan ko ano 'yun, HAHA). So, why Malcolm X? This time, the name got me. Malcolm X, parang rockstar lang. Sana interesting ang buhay ni Malcolm X. :D


5) Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. Familiar title, familiar author are my reasons for buying this book. I heard that it's a World War II classic, and I've been trying to get hold of a copy, pero wala. To satisfy my then-curiosity, I bought his book, Something Happened instead. Boring and draggy. I think what really drove me to buy this book was its scarcity. (Ayoko kasi ng e-book or PDF.) I felt I had to own (actually I own a few rare books, Bridge of San Luis Rey and Brave New World) something rare. Papansin ako eh. Ha ha ha.


6) Death of an Englishman by Magdalen Naab. Mistaken identity. I bought this book thinking this was the classic, Death of a . . . It turned out na Death of a Salesman pala 'yun. Nakupo, sorry Mr. Miller.


7 and 8) Cliff Notes on Animal Farm and 100 Years of Solitude. I'm secretly attached--magnetized, actually--to literary book guides. I previously bought one on Brave New World. I don't know if I'll find the time and interest to read both these reading guides with the books.


I'm not sure if I'm going to read all these books in the coming weeks. Pero, I'm sure I'll read all of them, in due time. Ha ha ha.


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(Below is the cover of the the very first book I bought with my own money for P27 [It says so in the price tag.] when I was in Grade Five yata kasi may doodles 'yung book ng names of my grade five classmates. Fern Gully. 'Yan ang Harry Potter, Twilight, at Narnia ko. Hahaha)

Road Rage

Ren shared his "dreams" of having/buying a car, Jecy said she'll be a "reckless driver" and Janjan is, I think, a very calm (and collected, Hahah) driver.

I think, in the future, it's better for me to have a driver because I foresee myself being a temperamental driver, in the sense that, if you cut me, or nearly hit me, I will run after you, and kill you. Haha. Not physically, siguro. Pero, harm will definitely be done. (Jecy thinks she'll be the done who'd do the car-cutting.)

Just yesterday, as Ken and I were trying to buy time by going to UPD and be back at UPM for our 5:30pm class, I experienced my first ever road accident. No, I wasn't driving. And neither was she.

We were in this Guardian Angel bus, JM and Doms and Ate Josh were very fond of, when it all happened. The driver was feeling like Schumacher or Tyson Sy or maybe Gaby Dela Merced, and kept swishing through traffic (in other words, cars) and before he, and we, knew it, he struck a harmless taxi driver who was getting ready to stop because of the red light, which the GA driver was trying to beat. (Whew, long sentence.)

I don't want to recount the incident that followed because it's too stressful. :)

Not a guardian angel after all.

Today, traveling the same route but longer (I was going to Sandiganbayan), I rode an fx, to sort of erase the bad luck I seem to have with GA buses. But again, it happened.

But this time, the driver of the maroon (Go, UP!) FX I was in, was the "victim". There was this Mitsubishi Adventure who kept cutting and cutting, and cutting. I thought both drivers were going to race their way (to wherever) but cooler heads prevailed (meaning our driver) and nothing violent or stressful happened.

All this makes me wonder, do I want a car (like Ren)? Do I want to be a driver (like Janjan or Jecy)? Do I want to be part of the stressful environment I call: the Metro Manila driving "scene"? Hmm.