winners of the Bible Jeopardy challenge today – don’t get me started on all the mistakes we made – starting with the team name…

“Running with Phidippides” – amazing story of the 1946 boston marathon winner – he was from greece – survived the nazi occupation for five years – five years of starvation for his people – after seven years off running – he decided december ’45 to run and win boston – in four months time – and he went out and did just that – which is truly remarkable – very inspiring story

“eight keys” – okay, lil bri – help an old man out – this was elem BOB, right??? it was better than anything at the middle school – and ironically about middle school – 6th grade – but it wasn’t great – at all

“the last season” – awesome book about a political strategist who at 60, took a fall off and took his 95-year old father – and 86 year old mother – around for ole miss’s 2013 football season – included flashbacks of going to the games in the 1960s – just a heart-warming amazing read – all my guys that love football and have watched it with their dads would love this book

“swimming upstream” – i’ve got a ton of ideas from this book for teaching next year – just for starters… i want to teach everyone to be a Detective – rather than get a bad grade on a quiz and say “I’m a failure/loser/never going to get this” – treat it like evidence – and you’re a detective – would the evidence really confirm that you’re a failure/loser – or would it just say that you didn’t do well on one quiz? for my kids that overtrust their emotions, i think the detective thing is a good way to pull back from that – thoughts???

maf

it was all i could do to read with comprehension since i have pre-parade anxiety…

“calvin” – calvin and hobbes – i think billy is a fan – honestly, you all should be – anyway, this book envisioned a boy, 17, who imagines a pet tiger – and tries to hunt down the cartoonist to help solve his mental illness – the book was very atypical YA – as such, i really, really enjoyed it – would be a great high school BOB

“the lost art of reading nature’s signs” – cool book – i learned several ways to spot north – outside of a smartphone:) i also learned a bit about nature – birds and deer – and about weather – ooh, and i don’t feel as special now – i thought i was the only one that saw shooting stars – or space dust – but turns out, they occur a lot at parts of the year – and at a rate of like every six minutes – so i should seem them when i run early on the weekends

“missoula” – saved the best for last – although, not a young adult book at all – that said, it should be read by every high school senior going off to college – as a law junkie, i found the court coverage awesome – just like the book – but awesome in a way that the book is incredibly sad – unfortunately, i will probably be the only person that will read it at the public library – because people have this notion that if you ignore sad things, then sad things never come – which is completely absurd – but the book was really good about reminding me how important it is to take every elected office seriously – the county prosecuting attorney in missoula was a former defense lawyer – and the book reminded me of the somewhat tragic existence of freshman college girls

mafeld

oh, those long summer days…

“every day i fight” – espn anchor stuart scott – this one is at the county public library – so great for my sportscenter guys – but very sad – b/c it was a goodbye book to his daughters – scott passed away of cancer early this year – the book talked about the hardest thing to do in life – keep hope when hope isn’t there – really good – and prayers for his daughters who will grow up w/o a wonderful father

“the art of character” – great book – the basic premise that we’ve lost humility in today’s world – we don’t admit to sin, personal sin – we inflate ourselves to be the center of the universe – now, those ideas aren’t new, they’re a large part of the conservative view, but the author made the ideas new in his argument – so it wasn’t just left/right political deal – and i’ve taken more to considering my faults daily – which i think is good and healthy

“saban” – great book coming out in august about everyone’s favorite football coach:)

“losers take all” – YA – i know, i finally got around to reading another one of those – of course, it was a disappointment – they all are:) in the book, a school forces all seniors to play a sport – one group decides on purpose to be bad – really bad – so it’s their story

i need Coach Tone to write an inspirational book in the middle of Binder Girl II…

maf

i’m amazed that my choices for “podcast of the week” in cspan are a huge list of presidential announcements – yawn…

“john walker: champion” – once upon a time, there was a miler who ran really fast for a really long time – from essentially 1972-1984 – often, biographies can be more like a subject – so rather than telling a story, it’s just giving advice on running – this book was good – even autographed straight from connecticut to the local library – it was a personal story – so i enjoyed the book more than i thought i would

“in defense of a liberal education” – the book that answers the question “why do i need to study _____ b/c i’ll never need it in life” – if you haven’t realized it yet, there’s probably a lot in life that you’ll learn that you technically may never need – so why learn it? because the process of learning is fun – and should be celebrated – tragically, we live in an age where everyone’s supposed to know what they want to do by 8th grade (become a detective) and then focus all on that – this book rejects a narrow/technical focus early in celebration of learning for the joy of knowing things – it was a good point

“2 hours” – book coming out in the fall on the marathon’s quest to break the two hour barrier – very awesome book

back to watching women’s world cup

mafeld

so the internet mice chewed out wires way back on friday – so i have dropped off the web for the time being

i’m so lost as a result… 🙂

it was good to hear from the bunny killer – everyone else, meh…

“long shot” – by piazza – 63rd round pick made it to the big leagues – and will more than likely be a HOFer some day (hall of fame for everyone NOT billy) – it was a whiny book though – lots of “everyone misunderstood how awesome i am” type stuff – giving the guy credit, he was sensitive – and most athletes don’t do that in a biography – but that said, he was really sensitive

“boston” – by higdon – book on the marathon in 1996 – good – some old stories – fit well with the demar book from the week before

“boston by the mile” – this one was the awesome book of the week – like great trivia – the second city we run through, ashland, was named after kentucky’s trees – there are no ash trees in Massachusetts – so that was a cool fact i hope to remember early in next year’s race

“natural born heroes” – another good one – the guy that wrote “born to run” has one that incorporates a crazy WWII plot to kidnap a german general with greek gods and goddesses – i was fired up to refind my edith hamilton’s mythology book afterward

sorry again about this being so late – i understand if billy is too swamped with VBS to respond – everyone else, great first week:)

mafeld