Dan’s Comments (group member since Mar 02, 2009)

Dan’s comments from the fiction files redux group.

This is hilarious, Mo has a candy bar with what I think is a race car driver on it! Is that an umlaut over the A in Lara's Larabar?

Kerry- The idea of this chick o stick thing is intriguing. I am torn as to whether it would taste good or not. I need to find one of these and try it.

Margaret wrote: "So it's ientirely possible that Patty is just being a rabblerouser."

Would we expect anything less? (just kidding, she is a lovely lady)

That is what I mean. I don't see that anyone that I don't know that has added a book. Though some weird guy from Pluto added a bunch but we like him.

Jcamilo wrote: "One day someone posted a Wiki entry that was saying that in Croatia a traditional form of greeting was sticking the finger in the other guy anus."

I dunno what's so funny about this. This is the traditional greeting here in Phoenix and we all know how much I like tradition.

Before we get all crazy how about we try doing some investigating? Like identifying the author/title seeing who they are and talking to them.

Audi Audi Oxen Freeeee! wrote: "mph. The lovers in Anna Karenina did this to work out a misunderstanding, declare their love and propose marriage. It annoyed me greatly. Who the f*&% actually does that? "

I didn't even think of that until you mentioned it and I actually read that book this year! some memory I have. i wasn't annoyed by that part, though I was thinking it isn't all that possible.

Neil wrote: "I'm Neil.

In '06, I lurked the files. In '07, I participated regularly. In '08, the trials of beginning a new business made me a lurker again. I made a promise to myself to pop back in more r..."

Glad you decided, after initial reservations, to join us over here Neil.

I think many of us may be TV show-challenged. I had no idea what the hell you were talking about till you spelled it out.

I guess I could have just said: ITMOUMBTVS-C.

Start with either and let me help:

http://books.google.com/books?id=67bi...

Patrick wrote: "I need to know which airport is close to whatever your house or the Dorkplooza? I plan to get plane tickets this week before they become expensive. "

Sea/tac!

I have read some of Joyce, basically the Dubliners and Portrait. I have his two big one's sitting on my shelf laying in wait. I have read parts of Ulysses before but kept getting distracted by classes and life. I plan on reading Ulysses in it's entirety sometime this year.

I can tell you that the last page of The Dead is the most amazing thing I have read. I can't even imagine trying to compete with that.

I came across a word with the -poeia suffix when reading the Infinite Jest (somewhere before page 150). I got caught up in the story and now I cannot find the word. I paged around the book looking for it and then tried googling to find it on an IJ word list to no avail.

Neil wrote: "All right . . . I'm here

I'm oddly resentful of having to join yet another networking site to keep up with folk. I know it's irrational, but what the hell in the last 6 mths I've been poked or ..."

IF you are grumpy at least use more words than the five or so he's been able to string together!

I saw that Margaret! I just like them but I don't like them in a particular order. Why isn't there an option for that (I haven't looked but maybe there already is).

Ben wrote: "i use the definitions goodreads gives me for each star (5 = "amazing," 2 = "it was okay," etc.)... i don't try to rate things relative to one another (the complete works of william shakespeare and ..."

I guess that is the same way I rate them, from an enjoyment standpoint. I imagine rating them relative to each other would be nearly impossible having just five stars in which to do so.

Damn, I guess I never noticed that. Maybe I am just too impatient to get messages from a static pointer. Thanks for pointing this out Margaret, I might need to revisit the books I have rated now!

So what does each star mean to you? Is that a stupid question? I feel that it might be.

Is it something like this:

One Star = Gouge out my ripening wheat eyes
Two stars= I allow the eyes to remain but i am not happy about it.
etc.

I think the stars rating system can be hard to go on if you don't any qualitative data to work with. thoughts, anyone?

Ok so I just read it. It was a fairly short short story and the first bit of Chekhov I have read. I read the Robert Payne translation from Chechov's Forty Stories. I have heard praise heaped upon Chekhov before but this was beyond my expectations.

Shel wrote: "Consider Gurov's opinion of women as the story begins and how (or whether) it changes through the course of the story.

Gurov's change in attitude was probably the most significant change I saw. At the beginning he was thinking, "I am gonna try to nail this broad." and Women are a lesser group.

Gurov changed from simply trying to get laid to caring about Anna and being in "love" for the first time in his life. I am not sure that his overarching "women are lesser beings" attitude changes but it does seem to go away.

It seems unclear to me just how much time elapses during the course of this story. We get the sense that it goes on for sometime but nothing really definitive.

Also what's with all the Russian Anna's always having affairs?

Thanks for posting this stuff Shel and thanks to brian for making the intro available. I may read this story tonight or tomorrow morning so I will be back and hopefully have something intelligent to say.

Adrian wrote: "I don't have much of a system nowadays. But I go through periods when I'm interested in a few writers; then, if available, I'll read their letters, journals, or essays and begin to explore those wr..."

That's interesting. I will often pick up the letters or journals but I never am able to sit down and read them through. I will page through them, read a few here and there but can never manage to keep it together long enough to consider it exploring an author. I am still selectively reading through Steinbeck: A Life In Letters which Brian sent me last year.

I wish I could manage to read in a more thematic manner.