Podcast Challenge 12

Woohoo! Cross Podcast Challenge off the list! For my last book, I picked Man vs. Markets by Paddy Hirsch, who is the Senior Producer of Marketplace for American Public Media. For those of you who are not nerds, it's a segment on NPR.

I'd say the book is a finance primer, with a bit of economics thrown in. It starts off very basic with what it means to hold a stock, and continues on to more complicated things like credit default swaps and quantitative easing. It looks at Wall Street, the Fed, and the Treasury and their roles in the economy. The last chapter basically explains what happened to lead up to everything with Bear Sterns, Lehman Brothers, and the whole mid-September 2008 debacle. It was really easy to understand and is clearly meant for people who know nothing about finance and economics, however, if you know a little but want to know more, this is the book for you. I found the last chapter to be much easier to understand than  Too Big to Fail (which I also recommend because it offers a more in depth description of EVERYTHING that happened, but you will need to devote at least a week or two, if not more, to that one, and constantly look up financial terms if you really want to understand).

Podcast Challenge 11

How does one consider a cookbook read? I decided once I skimmed most of it, made a couple of recipes, and it was due back at the library qualified as "read".

I had seen Sandor Katz speak a few months ago about fermentation (promoting his book, The Art of Fermentation) and immediately wanted to give it a try. He made everything seem so simple. I had canned a few things before, but this went beyond vegetables, to cheeses, drinks, and meats. I currently have sauerkraut and mead fermenting in my apartment. The mead is almost done, and the sauerkraut can be eaten whenever. I cannot wait to try the mead. I'm definitely buying the book later.

Podcast Challenge 10

Moonwalking with Einstein was not quite what i was expecting. Instead of being a self-help book, it's about Foer's year-long journey from covering the world memory championships as a journalist to competing in the US memory championship just a year later. He was in awe at how much information people could retain and recall in a short period of time. But the competitors he talked to were quick to tell him that everyone could do it, it's all parlor tricks. So he sets out to build his memory to that and along the way talks to experts and savants about their memories and their tricks of the trade. Savants generally can't explain how they remember, but people who have trained share a lot of the same tricks.

The tricks Foer gets into are interesting, and work. Early on, a mentor helps him learn how to memorize a list of things. As he walks through what he did to remember each item, it got stuck in my head. I still remember everything until I stopped focusing on that segment. And I couldn't recall anything past that point immediately after I read it.

While it's "easy" (it does require a daily training), it seems pretty pointless in today's world for day-to-day info. Foer himself notes it would've been great in high school and college to know these techniques, but, as an adult, it's just so much easier to write a list and put a number in your phone.

Podcast Challenge 9

In the Garden of the Beasts by Erik Larson was about the American ambassador to Germany from 1933-1937, William Dodd, and his family's time in Germany at the rise of Hitler. Hitler was chancellor when they got there, and things were already pretty bad for Jews, but Americans were pretty disinclined to believe it. Dodd got a sense that it was worse than most Americans believed pretty quickly, but his children experienced a different side of Germany and it took them a while to come around.

I found In the Garden of the Beasts to be an interesting look at pre-war Germany. Granted, I probably would've found any viewpoint interesting. I wasn't really familiar with the events in Germany leading up to invading Poland. To see it from an American ambassador's viewpoint, as well as his adult children, made for a good read. America had many issues with Germany, but primarily wanted Germany to repay debts and wanted to avoid another war. Dodd, however, realized early on that Hitler wasn't just going to go away (as many believed), and thought that he needed to show American values, which meant skipping diplomatic events when attendance would imply approval of Hitler's regime. He was a controversial figure in the state department for his lifestyle (having not been independently wealthy when appointed ambassador, Dodd was very frugal, and felt, during the depression, people representing American overseas should show some austerity) and his all-but-completely-transparent attacks on the Nazi regime when many Americans favored isolationism and keeping Germany happy to promote peace.

His daughter, Martha, was a quite different character. Having been newly divorced when arriving in Germany, she immediately took advantage of the chance to meet new people and start new relationships. She was romantically in linked to German officials, Soviet diplomats, and a whole assortment of intellectuals in Berlin at the time. She entered a particularly charged relationship with a member of the Soviet delegation and, after finally seeing that Nazi brutalities weren't just isolated incidents, started having communist leanings herself.

Podcast Challenge 8

I finished reading Me the People: One Man's Selfless Quest to Rewrite the Constitution of the United States of America by Kevin Bleyer. It was as informative as it was funny. My husband was about ready to tape my mouth shut because I kept reading what I thought were particularly funny passages aloud. He was all like "I'm trying to sleep!" And I was all like "But wait! He's at the Constitution Center! He's comparing it to a 3D Ken Burns documentary!" Needless to say, I'm a nerd. In that I find things about Ken Burns and the Constitution Center so funny I need to share them with my (I thought just as nerdy as me) husband. Even when he's clearly trying to sleep.

Throughout the course of the book, Bleyer examines each article of the Constitution, how it got to be that way, and what it means for us today. At the end, he gets to the Bill of Rights, and then touches on some of the other amendments. Again, very funny and informative. I recommend it to anyone who has a basic knowledge of the Constitution and possibly wants to learn more, but mostly wants to laugh. Learning is fun(ny)!

Podcast Challenge 8

I just finished The Uninvited Guests by Sadie Jones. I'm not really sure what to think of it. For some reason, I thought it was going to be a mystery, but I'm not sure why I thought that. The whole book is all over the place. Part love story, part ghost story, part ruining someone's life story? It was fine, but not really good.

Podcast Challenge 7

I just finished reading Space Chronicles: Facing the Ultimate Frontier by Neil deGrasse Tyson. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Tyson, he is an astrophysicist and director of the Hayden Planetarium in NYC. He's the astrophysicist you always see on Colbert or Stewart. He also hosts NOVAScienceNow and is pretty well known for demoting Pluto in his planetarium exhibit before the International Astronomical Union did. All in all, he's basically my hero. So when I heard he had a new book, I had to read it.

The book is a collection of essays that explain the science of getting to space, the history of space travel, and the future of it. It's really informative. Since it's not a novel, nor is it written in novel form, I don't feel I need to summarize anything. I definitely recommend it to people who are at all interested in space, or science in general. The science in it is really accessible, even to someone who has taken exactly two science courses since high school. Granted, I do get a lot of science education via PBS.

Podcast Challenge 6

In theory, I should've loved Death Comes to Pemberly. I'm currently obsessed with Downton Abbey, and while early 19th century Britain was different from early 20th century, I think the flavor should've been good. I also love a good mystery, and this mystery was quite interesting. Despite this, I couldn't get into Death Comes to Pemberly. My first problem was the way it was written. The tone was so forced to sound like it was written in 1805. Throughout the whole story, too, not just in dialogue. The story jumped around a lot to give background, but this was after it spent the beginning giving background, so I didn't understand why all of the background wasn't given upfront. Then, once the true story behind the murder came out, the details were given several times by several people, with a lot of the facts being repeated in each retelling. I found this rather ironic, since the judge the case was in front of was known for disliking hearing the same evidence more than once.

Podcast Challenge 5

The End of Illness by David B. Agus, MD (I don't think I've ever read a book before when someone used a suffix in their author name) is not about stopping viruses or bacteria per se, but more about preventing chronic illness that are within the system rather than outside invaders. It's also about living a healthy lifestyle through things like diet and exercise.

Throughout the book, Agus shows steps he takes and steps he recommends to his patients. The biggest takeaway for me is to have a set schedule for just about everything in your life. Bedtime, wake-up time, meal time, work-out time. They should be the same every day of your life, if possible. The body relies on regularity to, well, regulate itself. Our systems are remarkably good at keeping us healthy and fighting diseases if we let it. And the body craves regularity to know when to release certain hormones that let us sleep, digest our food, boost our metabolism. I'm pretty good with my sleep regularity (as most people who know me already know, I'm pretty much in bed before 10 every night and up between 6 and 7, no matter what day of the week it is). However, I do need to work on regularity for eating (including snacking at the same time every day) and working out, both of which I tend to do when I feel like it and when I have time. And skipping lunch isn't a rare occurrence for me if I'm too lazy to pack something, or just don't feel like eating.

I'm vaguely inspired to go to the doctor for a physical, too. I haven't been since I started my current job (and then I only went because you have to have a physical if you're going to work at a school in Pennsylvania) and I've never had blood work done. One of Agus's suggestions is to learn as much about your body and your system as you can, and a good way to start is to get some blood work done. He's also a proponent of genetic testing so that you can start to alter your lifestyle to prevent diseases rather than wait for them to hit you and then have to treat them.

I do hope I take some of this book to heart so I can be healthy until I die. I recommend this book to people who want a good, middle of the road approach to healthcare, using technology, common sense, and hopefully minimizing (though not necessarily omitting) pharmaceuticals.

Podcast Challenge 4

In case my post about counting puzzle pieces didn't convince you that I'm a nerd, I stopped at the library after counting puzzle pieces (for charity) and got a book about people who love maps. No, not a book about maps, a book about people who love maps. Maphead by Ken Jennings was hilarious and eye opening. I didn't know there were so many people who loved maps and who loved what maps can do. There are people who have been to over 100 countries, who have climbed to the highest elevation point in each state, who travel to integer degree confluence points* (if you know what that is without me telling you, you are awesome), and (my personal favorite) who make Earth sandwiches**. And, of course, what book about people who love maps would be complete without GPS and Google Earth.

Jennings takes you to meet so many people, from 6 year olds who can find point to any country on a map (even without borders drawn) to tweens and teens competing in the National Geography Bee (special appearance by Alex Trebek); from everyday people who travel as wide as possible on as little money as possible to the inventors of geocaching. I found them to be simultaneously strange and inspiring. I couldn't imagine doing what these people do, but at the same time, I had to look into different groups and games just to entertain the possibility that I may tray. And, who knows, maybe someday, I will travel to 100 countries or make Earth sandwiches.

All in all, I highly recommend this book to anyone who has a passing interest in maps. Jennings is really funny and the book contains plenty of anecdotes from his life (like how his wife turns maps around so the top of the map is the direction she's looking and how he changed his GPS to say "You turned the wrong way, dumb-ass. Just do what I say" instead of "Recalculating").

*places where integer lines of latitude and longitude (no minutes, no seconds, exact lines) meet

**when people on exact opposite sides of the Earth lay a piece of bread down at the same time so the Earth is like the meat in between those slices of bread

Podcast Challenge 3

I just finished reading Is That a Fish in Your Ear? Translation and the Meaning of Everything by David Bellos. I was really excited to read a book about translation. Having studied (to varying levels of competency) three different languages, translation interests me. I like having better words and phrases to express myself, which I do use from time to time. (My favorite is "hygge", a Danish word that loosely translates into "cozy", but it's really a noun and a verb, not an adjective.¹)

I'd always thought of translation as being difficult (I was never anywhere near fluent in the three languages I studied), but hadn't thought it through beyond "Poetry must be really hard, because it has to rhyme and have the same rhythm." Is That a Fish in Your Ear? discussed the difficulties in translating for subtitles (limited by the number of characters we can read per minute, plus the speaker must be on screen while the subtitles are up), instruction manuals (depending on what they're for, a mistranslation could kill someone), and comics (the words need to fit in the speech bubbles), just to name a few.

The book did have some interesting historical points. The Nuremberg trials had a necessity for simultaneous translating between four different languages. We still use a similar system in the UN. The skill of these translators astound me. They have to listen to a speaker while saying what that speaker is saying in another language. That just seems impossible.

Bellos spends quite a bit of time explaining different ways to translate, and demonstrating how different translators can come up with different words that express the same thing. It really drives home the point that what is important is the meaning, and not the words.

If you have an interest in how communication works (not just language), I do recommend this book. If nothing else, you'll leave with a greater appreciation for anything you read that is translated.

¹ Check out this website for more information on hygge

Podcast Challenge 2

Today, I finally finished Blood Work: A Tale of Medicine and Murder in the Scientific Revoluntion by Holly Tucker. Ever since I heard about this book on the Stuff You Missed in History Class podcast, one of my favorite questions has been "When do you think the first blood transfusions took place?" The answer is 1666 for animals and 1667 for people. This book walks us through the history of blood transfusions, including the scientific rivalry between England and France and the political aspects of medicine in France, as well as a history of science at that time. The main thrust of the book relates to one of the early human transfusions in France. The murder comes in when one of the first human subjects mysteriously dies within months of receiving  the transfusion. With so many people anti-transfusion at the time, the death of the subject creates a reason to ban transfusions all together, while allowing the transfusionist the believe that there is a conspiracy against him, one he hopes to overcome to continue his experiments.

Podcast Challenge

I should probably start off by explaining the Podcast Reading Challenge. A friend and I listen to similar podcasts and NPR, and have heard of quite a few books from it. We also like to read, so we decided to try to read some of the books we've learned about through podcasts and NPR. (We include NPR because it's basically one giant podcast anymore.) Our goal is 12 books, but right now the list only has 9 books on it.

I finished before the new year (which is OK according the challenge I made up, because I didn't want to wait a month or so until I could read these books), but I wanted to add it here. I read 11/22/63 by Stephen King. It's about a man who travels back in time to stop the Kennedy assassination. You should probably stop reading now if you don't want spoilers.

All-in-all, I like reading Stephen King. I haven't read much of his stuff, but I've enjoyed everything I have read. This book was no exception, but I found it to be a little long for me. I think I found it to be too long because it was probably 300 pages longer than anything else I've read in the past year and because you know what the major climax will be, and I reached a point (around page 650) where I no longer cared about the events leading up to the assassination and I just wanted to know what happened. I've heard some people think it could've been 300 pages shorter, and I didn't think it was that bad, I think I was just getting antsy.

A brief background of the book: Al found a portal into the past. When you travel through it, you always go to the same date in September 1958. When you come back, it's 2 minutes after you left. Al wanted to see if he could change history in a huge way, and decides on the JFK assassination. He does a quick butterfly effect test by preventing a hunting accident that left a teenage girl paralyzed for the rest of her life. When he gets back, he finds that life is mostly the same, looks her up, and sees her life is different, but since everything is generally the same, he thinks preventing JFK from being killed will change the future, but it will be better (the Vietnam War will end earlier, Martin Luther King, Jr. will not be assassinated, no race riots, RFK will not be killed). While Al is waiting out the 5 years, he develops lung cancer and returns to the future for better treatment and to get someone else to go back and take care of it. His cancer is so bad, he may not make it to the assassination. He recruits Jake, gives him a new identity as George, and George starts his travels.

George does a test, too. He thinks Al's, while doing good, didn't save a life, and he wants to see that difference. He know about a father who killed nearly his entire family in 1958, so he headed there to prevent that. The world was mostly the same when he got back. He goes back again, this time for JFK.

It's at this point in the book where I think there is a disregard for the butterfly effect. While George doesn't (as far as we can tell) save lives, he does start to touch a lot of people's lives. He becomes a high school English teacher (his profession in 2011), falls in love with a divorcee, and becomes a fixture in a small town. He catches, but doesn't punish kids drinking at a dance (one of whom would've lost his scholarship to play football). He convinces a football player (in 1960s small town Texas) to start acting. I'm just saying this activity could cause some major changes in the future.

A theme throughout the book is that the past is obdurate. The bigger the change, the harder it is to change it. When Al saved the girl, he got a flat tire and a bridge was out. When Jake/George saved the family, he got sick and nearly got killed by someone else. So, the past worked against George again when trying to save JFK. (And I often wonder what little obstacles came up with the smaller changes). He got beat up and lost his memory. He spent weeks trying to remember Lee Harvey Oswald's name. In the end, he figured enough out. Then he lost a tire, a bus he was on crashed, his girlfriend almost got mugged, they stole 2 cars, but they were able to get to the book depository and prevent Oswald from shooting JFK. George initially has some trouble, but he's able to return to 2011. Before he does, he speaks to a man who lives near the portal and that man tries to convince him to go the 2011, then immediately return to 1958 to reset and go back to 2011 and leave the past alone. The butterfly effect isn't the only problem. The past does not like being change and bite back. When George returns to 2011, he immediately sees that at least his corner of Maine has not changed for the better. He gets a brief history lesson and learns that while we cut back on Vietnam, MLK was still shot, the race riots were worse, and now there are frequent massive earthquakes across the world. Undoubtedly, this world is worse for the average person than the one where JFK died.

George goes back to 1958, but, due to his love for the woman in Texas, he doesn't head immediately back for 2011. He has no plans to save any lives, but will clearly be changing the past just by staying. When people become so wrapped up with the idea that they're supposed to be with someone that they will do so with complete disregard for everyone else really bothers me. I think authors try to pass it off as romantic, but I just see it as selfish. Especially in this case where George has been told and has seen what changing the past can do. Thankfully, he returns to 2011, and life is normal.