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In other news...
A curious thing happened on the way back from the kids' place tonight.
As we drove up the hill toward the entrance to our driveway, Galina slowed down because she saw something on the road, off to the right side. It looked like, perhaps, an animal that had been hit by a car.
As we got closer, it became apparent to me that it was a bobcat - a feline almost twice the size of your typical house cat. It was unharmed, and in fact, it seemed to be in pretty good condition. It was sitting on its haunches, its body perpendicular to the axis of the road, and it was motionless. Galina stopped the car, and I reached for my camera as I hit the button to lower the window.
For several seconds, the cat remained just on the edge of our car's headlights, coiled as tight as a spring and concentrating with everything it's got, eyes locked on something off to the right in the darkness, about to pounce on something. I am trying to figure out how it is that some part of the cat's brain isn't screaming "Hey, did you just see what just drove up, shining bright lights all over the place? Didn't you hear it? Run-n-n-n!!!"
Anyway, I point my camera out the window, say "Ks-s-s-s-sss!" and wait until the cat turns its head before depressing the shutter.
Remind me not to wait next time. The cat turned its head and took off like the proverbial bat, getting probably halfway to Mineral County before the flash went off. I was left with a nice shot of the road next to the car.
* * * I've just finished reading a fascinating book titled How Proust Can Change Your Life, by Alain de Botton. I really enjoyed it, but unfortunately, I read it without underlining anything or taking any notes, which is frustrating, because although this tome is far from being some kind of How to Win Friends and Influence People, it nonetheless does try to draw some conclusions about life that might be of use from time to time.
One thing is for sure: reading this book has awakened a desire to read Proust. I only despair of finding the time to do so (perhaps during the launch campaign?), because it took an act of will to find the time to read this book.
After making my previous observation, about how I tend to "dip" into books these days instead of reading them the way I used to when I had (or seemed to have) all the time in the world - in one or two long sittings, for it is easy to hold my attention with a story - I have started to pay attention and look around and it seems almost every book I see is a "dipper," which is to say it's not exactly the kind of book that's amenable to a front-to-back reading (case in point: UNIX Power Tools).
Time to go to bed and get some shuteye.
Cheers...
As we drove up the hill toward the entrance to our driveway, Galina slowed down because she saw something on the road, off to the right side. It looked like, perhaps, an animal that had been hit by a car.
As we got closer, it became apparent to me that it was a bobcat - a feline almost twice the size of your typical house cat. It was unharmed, and in fact, it seemed to be in pretty good condition. It was sitting on its haunches, its body perpendicular to the axis of the road, and it was motionless. Galina stopped the car, and I reached for my camera as I hit the button to lower the window.
For several seconds, the cat remained just on the edge of our car's headlights, coiled as tight as a spring and concentrating with everything it's got, eyes locked on something off to the right in the darkness, about to pounce on something. I am trying to figure out how it is that some part of the cat's brain isn't screaming "Hey, did you just see what just drove up, shining bright lights all over the place? Didn't you hear it? Run-n-n-n!!!"
Anyway, I point my camera out the window, say "Ks-s-s-s-sss!" and wait until the cat turns its head before depressing the shutter.
Remind me not to wait next time. The cat turned its head and took off like the proverbial bat, getting probably halfway to Mineral County before the flash went off. I was left with a nice shot of the road next to the car.
One thing is for sure: reading this book has awakened a desire to read Proust. I only despair of finding the time to do so (perhaps during the launch campaign?), because it took an act of will to find the time to read this book.
After making my previous observation, about how I tend to "dip" into books these days instead of reading them the way I used to when I had (or seemed to have) all the time in the world - in one or two long sittings, for it is easy to hold my attention with a story - I have started to pay attention and look around and it seems almost every book I see is a "dipper," which is to say it's not exactly the kind of book that's amenable to a front-to-back reading (case in point: UNIX Power Tools).
Time to go to bed and get some shuteye.
Cheers...
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I'm the same way. I used to be a prodigious reader, but like you I prefer to immerse myself, read 500 pages in 2 days. Which is a luxury my life doesn't afford right now. So I hardly read at all.