David S. Atkinson's Blog, page 281

Was The Copy I Downloaded of “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman” Complete Or Not?

I am so confused right now. I downloaded a pdf copy of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman to work on for that book blog I run with Kimberly Moore, Eleven and a Half Years of Books. However, I suddenly became unsure as to whether or not it was complete.

I saw mentions that The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman had nine volumes. However, the copy I had downloaded from project Gutenberg only had four volumes. It made no mention of being incomplete. However, it had to be, right?

(By the way, I hate ebooks. However, I have a Kindle to use for the free ebooks I get sent and I’ve started trying to save SOME space and money by getting ebook versions of the books for Eleven and a Half Years of Books that are public domain.)

It’s so confusing. I went out and found a different pdf that had all nine volumes. Then I compared my place. The old one listed me on a certain chapter of volume four. The new one listed me on a different chapter of volume 2 (volume 1 not even having as many chapters as the old one told me I was on). However, the text was identical.

To complicate matters, the old one told me I was 20% finished whereas the new one said I was 15% finished. No amount of math makes this add up.

What was going on? Was the old one somehow complete but had somehow mushed nine volumes down into 4? I couldn’t be sure. I just went with the one that definitely had nine volumes. I just switched over and I’ll keep reading from there. The new one isn’t formatted as nicely as the old one, but I want to be sure to read the complete text.

I’m just so confused right now. Believe me, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman is confusing enough so far. I didn’t need any further confusion.

I’m A Literary Groupie And I’m Fine With That

I’ve admitted to myself that I am, in fact, a literary groupie. However, this realization doesn’t really bother me. Really, I’m pretty good with that. I may get a bit fan boy at times, but I’m good with that too.

The event that kicked this off this morning was a note from Goodreads mentioning that someone liked a review I’d posted. I noticed the name and realized it was the author. You have no idea how much that made my morning. Is that geeky? Probably, but I really don’t give a crap.

I mean, I write at least a short Goodreads review of every book I read. In my record year, that was as much as 318. I’m not always completely fond of everything I read, but there always seems to be at least something good in most things I choose to pick up. I’m honest in what I say, so I never know what authors are going to think.

Frankly, some are just too big to notice. Sometimes my review is the 4000th entry and no one could possibly notice. Heck, I read a lot of books by dead people. I’d be damned surprised if they noticed.

Still, it’s cool to get a little quip like that from Goodreads when an author noticed my thoughts and actually liked them. I just say what I think, but when I enjoyed the book it just seems cooler when the author likes what I had to say about it. Is that fan boy? Does that make me a groupie? Probably, but I’m just not going to worry about it until I’m hiding in the bushes in the rain stalking some author outside their living room window. I’m enjoying this so it’s all good.

Updates On The Goodreads Giveaway For “Bones Buried in the Dirt”

Well, the Goodreads giveaway for Bones Buried in the Dirt is going strong. We have 109 people competing so far for the five copies up for grabs (the giveaway running until February 11, 2013). Take a look:

Goodreads Book Giveaway


Bones Buried in the Dirt
by David S. Atkinson

Giveaway ends February 11, 2013.

See the giveaway details

at Goodreads.

Enter to win

Of course, things aren’t over yet. You have until February 11 to roll on over to the giveaway and enter. Again, if you win, reviews on Goodreads and/or Amazon are appreciated if you feel so inclined.

Also again, I won’t be offended if you don’t want to enter because you prefer to buy a copy on Amazon. I won’t mind at all.

Senate Opens Confirmation Hearings On John Kerry…But The Good Fairy Is The Bigger Consideration

I just saw this article about the Senate opening confirmation hearings for John Kerry as Secretary of State. I haven’t really thought about Kerry in this role, whether he’d be good for it or not, and don’t really want to advance an opinion on that anyway. Regardless, I think that the Good Fairy is a bigger consideration here.

After all, we all know that if John Kerry does a really good job as Secretary of State, then the Good Fairy might make him a real boy. I’m sure that’s his biggest goal in all of this. I’m sure he’s always dreamed of becoming a real boy.

Of course, he’ll have to avoid telling any lies during the confirmation hearings or his nose will grow. I don’t think this will be a real problem for him, but again I haven’t looked into the ‘for’ or ‘against’ camp on this so I don’t know whether or not lies might be an issue. I know for sure that he’ll need to obey Geppetto if he expects things to go well…and well as staying away from Pleasure Island and the insides of whales.

I’ll just have to hope for the best on this. I can’t really speak to whether or not he’d be a good Secretary of State, but I have enough human compassion to hope he can realize his dream to become a real boy. Can’t we all get behind that?

A Nintendo Confession

I’ve attempted to claim a bit of gaming street cred on here before for my dedication to the old 8-bit NES (particularly related to the original Final Fantasy). It wasn’t much, but I did claim it. As such, I have a confession: I never mastered the turtle trick in Super Mario Brothers.

Admittedly, I was addicted to Super Mario Brothers all the way back to when I first got my first Nintendo back in the mid eighties. I played all the time, and eventually did beat the game (though not until 89, after I beat Super Mario Brothers 3). I found the warp zones, figures out the fireworks trick, and all sorts of things like that. However, I have to admit, I never managed the turtle trick.

Unfortunately for me, the turtle trick seemed to be the biggest thing about the game. Certainly back then. For the people who don’t know, if you hopped on a turtle shell enough times, you got extra guys. You could get a lot. However, it wasn’t an easy trick to master.

Turtle shells tended to fly away from you when you hopped on them. You had to do the trick as certain spots where the turtle shell would fly away before ricocheting off of something back to you so you could hop on it again (thus freezing the shell and requiring you to hop again to send it flying again). It was a difficult timing to master. The hops when the shell was flying away had to be long and timed just right that you’d land on the shell when it came back. The hops when the shell was frozen needed to be quick so you wouldn’t run out of time too fast (and screwed with your head because you were interacting with a still object all of a sudden instead of one moving at lightning speeds).

In short, I never mastered this. I might have gotten one life or so this way, managing it a few times, but I never got it down. I never got the hundred plus lives that the true masters of the trick could get. Believe me, there were a lot of masters.

Really, this is an embarrassing thing for an 8-bit NES aficionado to admit. The turtle trick was fundamental…and I never got it. I just thought I should come clean about that.

Cloud Cakes Are A Good Enough Substitute For Twinkies For Me

With Hostess closing its doors forever and no deal in sight for anyone to pick up the various brands, my concern has mainly been with the twinky. I didn’t eat them often, but I did from time to time. As I mentioned before, Little Debbie Cloud Cakes appear to be a substitute for twinkies. However, how close a substitute are they?

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Well, I picked up a box this weekend and gave one a shot. After all, I don’t think I’ve ever tried a Cloud Cake before. I wasn’t even used to seeing them in the stores before the Hostess debacle hit. Maybe they just didn’t sell while real twinkies were available.

The conclusion? I couldn’t tell the difference. Some Little Debbie treats mimic Hostess imperfectly (like Swiss Cake Rolls for Ho-Hos, though not in a way that matters), but Cloud Cakes were pretty good substitutes. I had my wife try a bite and she said she wouldn’t have known it wasn’t a twinkie if I hadn’t told her.

So, we can rest easy as far as twinkies go. Some purists might not see Cloud Cakes as an adequate substitute, but they’re good enough for me. I’m betting that most people will be able to live with these.

Taking A Minute To Remind People About Kimberly Moore and I’s Book Blog

I just wanted to take today to remind people about Kimberly Moore and I’s book blog, Eleven and a Half Years of Books. I’ve mentioned it on here before, but I thought it wouldn’t hurt to remind people so they remember to stop over and take a look. I think we’re doing some good work over there.

As a reminder, Eleven and a Half Years of Books is a book blog based on The Top Ten: Writers Pick Their Favorite Books edited by J. Peder Zane. Big authors were asked their top ten books and Zane compiled them all into a book of lists. We’re going through the book one list at a time.

So far we’ve covered The Master and Margarita, Wuthering Heights, Molloy, Malone Dies, The Unnamable, Fahrenheit 451, Pale Fire, Grimm’s Fairy Tales, Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Love in the Time of Cholera, The Red and The Black, The Screwtape Letters, Rule of the Bone, Madame Bovary, Right Ho, Jeeves, One Hundred Years of Solitude, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, The Remains of the Day, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Bell Jar, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Tin Drum, The Bible (Genesis), Midnight’s Children, Revolutionary Road, Ship of Fools, Sheila Levine is Dead and Living in New York, Lord of the Rings, The Street of Crocodiles, and The Lorax.  On Thursday we’ll be looking at Tell me a Riddle.

Anyway, just wanted to make sure everyone knew about Eleven and a Half Years of Books and what Kim and I were up to over there. Take a look. We’re having fun and you might as well join in.

Last Minute Attempt To Start A Conspiracy: Everyone Buy A Copy Of Jon Konrath’s “The Earworm Inception” To Celebrate His Birthday

I know this is a bit late in the day to do this, but we should start a conspiracy to get everyone to buy a copy of Jon Konrath’s The Earworm Inception to celebrate his birthday today. Here is the link to the paperback on Amazon and here is the link to the kindle version. Consider hopping on board this last-minute conspiracy.

You see, I saw someone had posted on Konrath’s page that they’d just bought a copy of The Earworm Inception to celebrate Jon’s birthday today. This struck me as amusing, because I’d just done the same thing.

Then I got an idea. I thought people might be using Jon’s birthday as an excuse to pick up some of his books that they didn’t have yet…but what if everyone bought a copy of The Earworm Inception? Sure, Jon might attribute a sudden uptick of sales to his birthday…but what would he think if all the uptick was on The Earworm Inception?

Seems like it might make him wonder a bit. Had someone with a big following suddenly plugged the book? What was behind it all? It seemed like it might puzzle him a bit and that seemed like a lot of fun.

So, I know there is only so much time left on Jon’s birthday, but I thought I’d give this a try. Consider hoping on board and buying a copy of the The Earworm Inception (again, here is the link to the paperback on Amazon and here is the link to the kindle version). Together we can try to mess with Jon’s mind (and boost sales).

Will I Enjoy Van Gogh As Much At 3AM?

Van Gogh has almost always been one of my favorite painters. I love his work, particularly when I get to see it in person. However, will I enjoy his work in person as much at three in the morning? We’ll see.

The Denver Art Museum is doing a special exhibit: Becoming Van Gogh. As I understand it, this isn’t traveling. It is pulling in Van Gogh works from museums and such all over the world and Denver is going to be the only place to see it. However, the exhibit have proved immensely popular and it has been extremely difficult to get to. The last few days, they are keeping it open 24 hours or so in order to get in more people. My wife happened to get tickets from a friend…for 3am Sunday.

Of course, I’m going. It may be an art museum at 3am, but this is Van Gogh we’re talking about. I always see his stuff in person when I get a chance. Not only do I love his work, but there is something about his work that doesn’t work as well in pictures (I have books with tons). There is something about that energy in his pictures from the juxtaposition of colors, the brush strokes, paint thickness, whatever, I just don’t get as much of the motion, the vibration, from looking at a picture of one of his paintings as I do looking at an actual painting. And, this promises to be one of the largest groups of his work I’ll ever be able to see at one time.

But, will I enjoy it as much as normal? Will I be able to appreciate that unstable, even though the paintings are static, trembling? I’m going to be pretty tired. Maybe fatigue will make everything look that way anyway and I won’t appreciate the paintings as much. Maybe I’ll just be too tired to care, or keep my eyes open.

Regardless, my wife got free tickets and I’m not passing up a chance to see this much of Van Gogh’s work in person. I’ll be there. Everything else we’ll just have to play by ear and see.

I’m Just Not Sure How I Feel About The Aurora Theater Reopening

I was a bit stunned when I saw on the news last night that the theater in Aurora is reopening. I’m sure you know which theater I’m talking about. I really don’t want to glorify the guy behind the whole thing by spreading his name around, so I’ll just assume that you already know the details (heck, it happened while I was in Paris and even tourists from other countries were mentioning it to me). I’m just surprised that the thing is reopening.

I mean, it sounded at first like they were just going to close forever. Too much bad press and too many bad things there. I guess that didn’t stick.

Of course, I can understand. A movie theater that size is an expensive thing, and if you just scrap something when something horrible happens there then you might not have anyplace left. Horrible things happen, though this was certainly worse than most. Besides, the only way to beat something like this is to carry on, right? Von Maur in Omaha is still open.

I go back and forth. Really, I don’t know how to feel. How does this make the victims feel? I really don’t know. First I think they shouldn’t reopen, then I think they should. Then I switch again.

It just surprises me and leaves me uncertain how to feel. I probably won’t go there, but I never went to that theater anyway even though I live in a town nearby. Regardless, they are reopening it. I guess that’s that.