okay sixth grade – all five of you – back to blogging:)

“theft of memory” – brilliant book by an education guy – he’s written a ton of books over the year – this one, his most personal about his father’s fight with alzheimer’s – the book made me miss my grandparents – i thought of lending it to my mother and decided it was better to not – i guess just one thought to share, we seem very okay with doctor slip-ups with older people – doctor’s can misdiagnose and we’re like “well, they had to die of something…” and be okay with that – instead of maybe pushing back harder – like we would if a healthy small child was misdiagnosed

“the fear project” – yuck – i thought the book was going to be about running – instead it was about surfing – for a while – then about eastern meditation – for a while – and then about how when you’re an old single guy in your 30s, you just give up and BOOM!!! you meet the perfect woman that let’s you take on the biggest fear of all – having a kid – whatever…

“gilead” – so after years, i finally read this book – it had received good reviews – probably in hindsight too many good reviews b/c i began to suspect the book was like a hallmark movie – and i abandoned the thought of reading it – but years later and two more books related to it later , i gave in – and it was good – it didn’t go where i thought it would – thankfully – so i did enjoy it – which is very rare for me – and i passed it along to my mom – way better for her to read than anything i’ve read in a while

maf

we’ve had midsummer night’s dream questions before – maybe a 12th night – can’t remember a much ado – so that was cool

“angel: after the fall” – ah, graphic novels – unlike my buffy experiment in the fall, i “got” this one – i followed it way better – it helped that there was a whole section at the end with director notes – i mean, when it’s explained to you, hey, you can’t help but get it – i think all authors should include such for those of us that are slow on the uptake – but yeah for angel comics!!!

“chasing perfect” by bob hurley – longtime NJ basketball coach – 27 state titles – story of his life – of his oldest son’s (went to duke, played for the sacramento kings – survived a terrible car wreck) – and of his perfect teams – the most interesting being his like ’04 team that seemed to disrespect everything he wanted – but just kept winning – i’ve had classes/years like that with kids – so the story of his teams was interesting

“one for the books” – rather snobbish – i did get some recommendations from reading it though – basically, a book about reading books – as such, it becomes a “what to read” and “what not to read” and probably only one person matches his true taste – so i would’ve preferred a kinder, gentler author – but it wasn’t terrible b/c hey, it was about books:)

“run the race” – hebrews 12 – explication on the passage – running the race before us – i had high hopes it would be very much about running and faith – instead, it was more about faith – but that was okay – the cloud of witnesses was explained way better than i’d ever heard before

reminder: you memorize shakespeare this week – you don’t have to blog

maf

muchado – Transcript – TodaysMeet the work of eighth grade from friday – in response to act 1, scene 1 of “much ado about nothing”

(please note sixth grade: all blog comments to this post need to be about the transcript – SO NOT THE PLACE FOR YOUR WEEKLY JOURNALS!!! 🙂

wow, three days w/o the blog makes one weak (pun intended)

“open your eyes” – william m let me borrow this one – inspiring read before my mobile race – good mix of first person and explanation from another POV – keeping hope can be the toughest thing to do in life

“the book of games and warm ups for group leaders” – definitely not what i expected – i expected a book on games and warm ups for group leaders:) instead, i got more of an eastern religious text about acceptance, non-competitiveness – and some strange games – i did find two that were good though – so that was good – but lots of touching in the games that we’d never do in our class:)

“below” – one book away from completing elem BOB – this one was good – really liked it – mystery – history – and just about what’s below eventually comes to the surface – good metaphor for much of life

happy blogging

maf

driving directions on the mobile marathon…

“world order” by henry kissenger – wonderful book – really great framework for understanding how the world works – why china does what it does – why the middle east is messed up – the adage, those that don’t read history are doomed to repeat it – we’d do well to listen to statesmen and their wisdom instead of making up policy as we go

“1D” – their autobiographies – the soccer references were awesome – one got to rehab at chelsea football club – jealous

“100 sideways miles” – recommended YA to me – but i can’t recommend it – not a great book – but hey, the author is well on his way in the world now so he doesn’t need my ringing endorsement (one thing that bugged me, he made a point in his “author information” to say that he doesn’t watch TV – still, he wrote the stupidest book i’ve read in a long time – so was the TV thing supposed to mean he was smart???)

“jeter: unfiltered” – photo books are awesome – i “read” 240 pages in a day – i love baseball anyway – obviously, i would’ve liked more of jeter’s story – he’s getting his feet with publications though so i may get the story eventually – class act

sorry i’m late

maf

yo,

so back to blogging for those that have been absent – hey, enjoy yourself… 🙂

“6 amendments” – by former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens – who, by the way, is like 90 years old now – but he wrote another book – this one, rather short – six amendments congress should pass to touch up the Constitution – clear things up so that judges don’t have to haphazardly interpret – i enjoyed the book – thoroughly – i’m a law geek like that – i guess the sad part was twofold – one, that congress won’t do anything with the amendments – two, that he wrote the book b/c of what happened in Newtown, Conn., two years ago – 20-plus elem kids die in a shooting and nothing much changes – that still saddens me – greatly

“factory man” – recommended from the NY Times top 100 list – story of a factory – a furniture factory – and its generations – including a current guy that’s staved offshore sending – saved jobs – practically saved the town he was operating in – just a wonderful book about the historical – and personal – effects that industry has – by the way, i don’t think i’ll ever buy from Rooms 2 Go after reading this book

happy return to school – may it be easy

maf

wow, lots and lots of rain…

“terrestria” – by some girl named reeves – i haven’t read the newly sent copy yet – tonight’s homework – i can only hope it’s better than draft one – otherwise, it would be a disappointment to read draft one and think “hey, that’s a great story b/c skylar dies” and then get draft two and be like “wow, that’s just not as good” 🙂 anyway, elves, curses, death, unicorns – really quality writing too – definitely needs to have some segments entered for the county literary competition this year – and all way better than…

“boys don’t knit” – having finished terrestria i went looking for something – and i, um, definitely got something – clever-ish book concept – boy lands in a knitting class – bit formulaic – like the bad guys went to the world championships of knitting to sabotage the kid – like why would bad guys do that – b/c they’re bad??? little off

“this book will make you sleep” – book’s basic premise is that our mental issues keep us from sleeping well – i could agree with that – fortunately, most every tip i was already doing – like sleeping 14 hours a day – ooh, nap time…

“duty” – this was my impressive read of the week – by our former secretary of defense – former president of texas a&m – robert gates – gates served under bush and obama – he was the first cabinet member to survive a change in party in like forever – really amazing story for many reasons – one, that he could enjoy working for both bush and obama – guys that lots of people like to make into total opposites – i’d love to see the department of education get $800 billion a year – and defense get what education does (nothing) – we’d have a different world

happy new year – early – maf