Banned Book Week

I tend to read a lot of banned books.  They're usually worth reading, and nothing like Banned Book Week gets me motivated to actually read the ones that have been sitting on my To-Read list for ages.  While these other posts aren't necessarily of the Banned Book Week variety, I thought they might be an enjoyable look back at some older posts and maybe make you aware of some titles you didn't realize were banned or challenged.  I might not catch all of them since people will ban some pretty tame stuff, but I'll peg the obvious ones for you.  In alphabetical order by title, for your convenience.

Enjoy your freedom to read!

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley (by guest blogger, Dan Walker.)
Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger (by guest blogger, Dan Walker.)
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson (posts by myself and guest blogger, Dan Walker.)
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (by guest blogger, Dan Walker.)

On another note, I've decided to take a bit of a break from writing blog posts, so if you see a slew of guest posts in the next couple of days that's why.  If you're interested in being a guest blogger, please contact me at acampb8@kent.edu or check my contact page.

Day 137: a general update

For those of you who are kind of newish or haven't physically visited my blog in awhile, there's some more information about the project available here.  For those of you who are looking for book reviews, they are not a typical feature of my blog.  There are review elements in my post and I do occasionally review books I read (I always review ARCs).  If you're interested in following my reviews you can do so via my RSS on Goodreads or you can just friend me there.  I do also have a separate page for my book reviews here on my blog, but I don't update that automatically and there's no guarantee on how frequently I will update it. 

I also have some information on the contact page, I prefer contact through e-mail, but I've also set up a Meebo window if you want to leave a quick message.  I tend to log on daily, but remember to give me your contact information if you want to get back to me on anything.  You do not have to download a program to contact me via Meebo widget.

In other news, I celebrated my two year anniversary with Dan Walker on the 8th and recently returned from a trip to visit him.  He gave me a signed copy of Octavia E. Butler's Parable of the Sower.  It happens to be a first edition, although sadly a second printing.  However, since I love this book beyond belief and there is no way I'm going to be able to obtain Butler's signature any other way, this is the best present he could have ever given me.  I'm not really much of a book collector, but having the first printing would have been extra cool.

Some of you may be saying, hey, you can't write a general update yet, you haven't read all of the books on your previous list.  Well, I haven't because they haven't all come in from the library yet.  Most of this is because my library decided to go on furlough from August 1-8 and I had trouble getting my grubby, broke hands on what I was supposed to read.  So yes, The Ask and My Empire of Dirt are going back on the list for this update.  Unfortunately I'm unsure about how soon the second one will be available because there are only 2 circulating copies and I'm still number 6 on the waiting list.  Drat.  Otherwise, here's what I have planned.

Speak by Laurie Anderson.
This was actually on my to-read list before Dan Walker wrote a post on it, but his high praise resulted in me needing to read it.  It's highly praised enough that I'm at least hoping to enjoy it.

Bozo Sapiens: Why to Err is Human by Michael Kaplan and Ellen Kaplan.
This is another Dan Walker recommendation.  If you want to send one my way, by all means e-mail me at acampb8@kent.edu.  I actually recommended that he try to get his hands on this via First Reads giveaways on Goodreads.com.  He won and devoured the book in a matter of three or four days (between lavishing attention on me).  I too will soon be digesting this saliva covered delicacy, much like monkey brains or head cheese.

The Facebook Effect by David Kirkpatrick.
Like pretty much everyone else in the entire world (except for China), I have a Facebook account.  I know how it's affected my life, but I was interested about what it meant for my generation and future generations to all be pulled into one giant social networking site (in a way that Friendster and other sites have not).  I have my own suspicions about it and I'm curious as to whether or not they will be confirmed.

Frostbitten by Kelley Armstrong.
I grabbed this before my library closed for furlough.  Little did I realize this was the 10th novel in a series.  No way will I be reading all 9 previous novels.  It also seems like it's one of those series that I don't actually have to read previous books for.  I need a little trashy paranormal romance, since it is adult I am expecting it to not be on the level of Evermore.  I will go all ranty on its ass if it is.

Lavinia by Ursula K. LeGuin.
I enjoyed Left Hand of Darkness so much that I decided to see what her current work is like.  I'm sure her writing style has changed over the years, and I've always loved the idea of writing minor characters into major characters, particularly in the case of ancient literature where the women usually get no back story.  I'm not familiar with the Aeneid on which this is based, so I may be doing some background reading on...Wikipedia of course.

The Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold.
This was recommended to me by fellow Antioch Alumna and non-book blogger, Traveler@larger.  I'd been considering Bujold previously, but didn't want to get sucked into another author that mostly writes series.  But I can't resist a recommendation so I went ahead and slapped this on my reading list.

Post 300: Myself (interview)

I know you don't really care about learning more about me, but I thought I would share this interview between my editor (Dan Walker) and myself.  This took place over AIM on January 6, 2010.  If you're not interested in learning more about me, feel free to skip it, regular posting resumes tomorrow.  If there are additional questions you wish to ask, I will be happy to answer them in the comment section.  Interview edited for spelling errors, flow, and clarity.

Dan Walker: I just want to start off by asking you to introduce yourself to us. We already know a lot about you from reading your blog, but this needs some kind of a beginning. Maybe this post is someone's first
time here or something, who knows.
LibsLIB: My name is Amy Campbell, I've lived all over the country between my mother being in the Air Force and then attending Antioch College where I participated in the co-op program.  My family was and continues to be fairly dysfunctional whenever we're in the same room together, but we seem to function pretty well separately.  I have a background in history and received my Masters degree in Library Science in August
2009 from Kent State University, where I met my fiance who is a constant pain in my ass and the light of my life.

DW: Why did you decide to start blogging, and to start this blog in particular?
LibsLIB: I started the blog up in March 2010. By that time I had already been unemployed for about seven months and I felt this might be a good distraction for me.  At the very least it would get me more involved
in professional development in the form of reader's advisory, which among other things is a librarian or other informed person making reading recommendations.  The idea for this particular blog had actually been floating around in my head for several years.  I've always related reading to my personal life and how it can enrich it or trigger memories or deepen my thinking about certain topics.  I was curious to see if other people did this as well, or if it would improve their reading experiences if they started to do this.

So I began by sharing my personal reading experiences and thoughts with reading and seeing if anyone was interested in sharing their own, or at least listening to mine.

DW: Is there anything in particular in your background, personal or professional, that you think gives you unique insight into the subject of books and reading?
LibsLIB: Well, everyone brings their own particular insight to reading, from what they choose to read in the first place to what it makes them feel or think about, and that can change from moment to moment based on when and where they read the book.  I think given my lifelong experiences as a reader, a historian, and a librarian I may be able to put literature into a more involved context than someone who has less experience in these backgrounds, but then their insights may be more thoughtful just because it's the first time they've been exposed to a certain reading experience or concept.  It's really a matter of personal taste and opinion, which is why I like having guest bloggers to give a different view point every now and then.

DW: Tell me about your guest bloggers: Who are they? Where did you find them? How important are their posts to you, and to your project?
LibsLIB: At the moment my guest bloggers mostly consist of family and friends. There's Dan Walker who is my future husband and also my editor, although he sometimes lets things slip.  You get what you pay for I guess.  He and I almost never agree on literature, so it's interesting to see some of his reflections.  He prefers to write under a pseudonym, while some of my other guest bloggers just use initials.

That gets us to Kyle B.  Kyle is actually a mutual friend, with a background in journalism, which I thought would work well with the personal essay nature of the blog.

Then there's Dayna Ingram, who I met at Antioch College during my undergraduate program.  She's actually gone on to become a writer and so it's great to get that perspective.  She mostly works in fiction and has a couple of self-published novels.  I love her posts because they are usually off the wall and we have a similar sense of humor.

Marybeth Cieplinski is also a writer and mutual friend of my fiance's.  Although Marybeth's background is mostly in fan-fiction (X-Files), she also has some really unique insights, being a person who has gained much wisdom in her years of child rearing.  I like that I'm able to get her perspective as a mother, writer, and as
a non-traditional student.  It's hard to express how proud and happy I am for her for receiving her Bachelor's degree just this year.

DW: Sounds like a great bunch of people! So let's talk blog content.  You read a lot of children's and YA fiction, it seems. Tell us about that.  Do you find it odd at all?
LibsLIB: I wouldn't say I read a lot of it.  I think if you look back over my blog I read a pretty eclectic bunch of books.  I certainly don't find it at all odd.  I think a lot of people still enjoy stories from their childhood and are trying to capture the feel of it, not to mention there are just some great stories being written for children and YA.  I know when I was growing up we didn't have nearly as many choices in
literature as we do now.  If adults are benefiting from this as well I see absolutely nothing wrong with it, but then I think everyone should read anything and everything they can get their hands on.

DW: You certainly do read a broad variety of books. Would you think of yourself as young at heart, or fun loving? I only ask because of the occasional toilet humor, and here I am referring specifically to Pooping on Mars.
LibsLIB: Probably more fun loving than young at heart.  I like to think of myself as a curmudgeonly old lady in training.  You have to understand I was raised on Looney Toons and Mel Brooks, that's going to make for
a strange sense of humor.

DW: Sorry, that picture just made an impression on me. "Fun loving" fits, I think. You also talk a lot about the darker side of things, I notice. I recall a mention or two about your soul being black, for instance.
LibsLIB: That goes more with my twisted sense of humor.  I can't remember that particular reference, but whenever people ask me how I take my coffee, my response is usually, "Black like my soul."  I just think it's funny and it usually takes people back a bit before they realize I'm having them on.  In the meantime, watching their faces as they figure out what to do gives me an inner sense of glee.

DW: Haha! So what about zombies and vampires? You apparently like both, and you've griped about vampires a lot, especially in regards to Twilight. Do the supernatural monster genres hold a special place in your life?
LibsLIB: Not so much the monsters themselves as the recognizable bits of humanity within the monsters.  It's not what's different that makes them so scary, it's what makes them like us, because if they can be monsters and feel things like lust (Dracula), loneliness (Frankenstein), etc. then what kind of monsterlike behavior are we capable of?  With zombies it's a bit more direct because we have a deeply embedded distaste for the dead because...well, they're just not sanitary to be around.  The idea of a dead corpse walking around and mucking up the air alone ought to scare the bejesus out of a sane person.  Having them bite you on top of that?  I wouldn't even want a living person biting me.

DW: And when they start sparkling, you get angry.
LibsLIB: I'm actually not so angry about the sparkling.  It's stupid and it's silly and it's a bastardization of the genre, but when it comes down to it, I have a problem with the romanticizing of dangerous relationships.  These are not the kinds of relationships we want young people to idealize and set as their standards for romantic love, because they will either never be achieved or if they are it will be with someone who is controlling, moody, and "mysterious."  To me mysterious is just another word for not knowing anything about the person you plan to spend forever with.  I don't see how that can possibly be a positive thing to teach our young people.  Besides, Count Chocula is more intimidating than the sparkly freaks Meyer
created.

DW: He is also more delicious. If I may extrapolate, you're concerned about the effects of media on young people.
LibsLIB: I am, especially since this used to be a genre in which we have some really strong female role models.  Buffy the Vampire slayer is the obvious front runner here, but then you also have fantasy and
sci-fi writers who were making real progress in producing headstrong females who were also allowed to have love lives and be good role models, and I feel [Twilight] just threw us back into the dark ages.
It's like the revival of the "get back in the kitchen" joke, except it's not really much of a joke is it?

DW: Just for reference, can you give another example of good female role models in fantasy or sci-fi?
LibsLIB: More recently I'd say Katniss from the Hunger Games Trilogy.  Despite all the bull-hockey about Team Peeta/Team Gale, which was all fan-frenzy anyway, Katniss all along said, "No, not with the world the way it is now.  Marriage means children and I won't have my children subjected to the Hunger Games." For this reason I very much wanted everyone who was excited about who Katniss would end up with in the third book to omg shut the hell up. But even Mina Harker was a stronger character than Bella Swan, Harker at least had her own personality and started to explore her sexuality in relation to her strange attraction to Dracula.  Another example is Lauren Olamina from my favorite book Parable of the Sower.  Her world is falling apart around her and she seems to be the only one to recognize it.  Her parents tell her not to go around scaring people, so instead she begins to prepare for the inevitable.  Although she can't save everyone because they have their heads in the sand, she is able to save herself and some others, and rebuilds a community based on the principle that everyone has a special skill set or knowledge to
contribute.

DW: It's just a shame that these characters aren't in the million-selling, movie-making series.
LibsLIB: I wouldn't be surprised to see the Hunger Games turned into movies, but honestly I'm okay with keeping them in literature where they can tell us their story directly rather than having it focused through the
lens of what would likely be a male director.

DW: Let's switch gears. Rupert the Magical Pony. Tell us about him.
LibsLIB: Rupert is a magical pony and he lives in a magical pony field and he goes on magical pony adventures and it usually ends poorly for him.

DW: How'd you come up with him, and I mean him specifically? Why a magical pony, why such a tendency to die at the end of the stories?
LibsLIB: Ponies are kind of naturally ridiculous: they have all the looks of a horse, which is a majestic and useful animal, but somehow when it got translated to a pony it's just kinda like, "Yeah...what are we gonna
do about you?"  As far as his actual creation it took a lot of watching of bad movies and 80's cartoons.  And I like to think his tendency to die is kind of mocking writers who "drop bombs" as the ending of their stories.  Also, killing magical ponies is hilarious.

DW: I can't argue with the results. What, aside from death, is Rupert's future?
LibsLIB: I have no idea.  I've gotten really good responses to it.  I'd like to see Rupert stories published or maybe turned into a season long TV show.  The stories I worked on during NaNoWriMo still have a lot of
work that need to be done before I'd even consider sending them to an agent.  I'm not even sure I could find someone willing to publish them, which is a shame because I think Rupert has a lot to teach us.

DW: We can all learn a lot from a cheerfully oblivious talking pony. I wanted to wind down with a big question: Where, in your opinion, does your blog fit in with the rest of the literary blogosphere?
LibsLIB: It doesn't really.  It's kind of the ugly baby.  But I don't think there's anything wrong with having a blog dedicated to self-reflection in reading and I think it will makes us all more thoughtful and
intelligent and open to new ideas.

DW: If you weren't blogging, what would you be doing?
LibsLIB: I'd still probably be reading a lot.  As it is I watch a lot of movies on Netflix, so I'd probably do more of that.  Mostly I'd be doing much of the same things I'm doing now; I would just be more miserable
because I would feel less productive about it.  I mean, it's great having an audience and I love getting feedback, but to be honest I keep the blog because I like doing it.

DW: I think that's what's most important. Where do you see yourself and your blog in the next few years?
LibsLIB: I will probably drop the daily format at some point.  I can't reasonably keep up with that.  I imagine it will depend on what kind of job I have and how much time I have to read.  I'm trying not to look too far into the future because right now it's like a big empty blank space and I have no idea how to fill it.  There are really just too many uncertainties for me to answer that question.

DW: Well, I think we all wish you the best. Any last words you'd like to say to your readers?
LibsLIB: That is a terrible closer, and I'm sorry my fiance/editor/interviewer is such a tool.  But otherwise, keep reading.

[Editor's note: I am not a tool.]

Post 471: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

The Book of Tomorrow, by Cecilia Ahern. ISBN: 9780061706301.

Our narrator almost redeems herself right off the bat by telling us that she realizes now, cast out of her previous, glamorous life into relative squalor in the countryside, that when she was living in a huge mansion with all the stuff she could ever want, she was pretty much an insufferable, spoiled brat. That redemption didn't pan out for me in reading the book, but at least it gives me a jumping-off point to talk about the one thing that gets me angrier than anything else: economic inequality.

The tl;dr is: I hate rich people. I kind of can't help it. Racism, sexism, oppression, environmental destruction; they don't get under my collar nearly as much as someone suggesting that anyone at all can solve their problems with money. I encountered this a lot in college, and the worst part is, I don't think that these people do this to be mean. They're thoughtless, yes, selfish perhaps, but they simply are ignorant of the problems that people without a lot of money have to face. Things like, "I can't get that book for my class because I have to feed myself this week." And that lack of malevolence is the hardest part, because you can't hate someone for not knowing. For not trying, yes, but first you have to educate.

Unfortunately, no one's doing the education. Rich kids get brought up in gated communities and private schools with other rich kids. They never have to go anywhere outside their little spheres of money because everything is provided for them. When they grow up, they expect everything to be provided for them because that's just how they were brought up. It takes a serious wake-up call to break someone out of that mindset.

This is what I say to people when they suggest things like, "We shouldn't overtax the rich because they made that money and they deserve it." Well, when mommy and daddy buy them everything all their life and they just inherit the money, do they really deserve it? Someone on a message board cheesed me off big time once by suggesting that, yes, they do, because they "carry on the family name." Ignoring the fact that only sons would be worthy of such an inheritance, I found that statement unspeakably ridiculous. Carry on a family name? So they get rewarded for simply being born? No one cares what your name is if you lose everything and wind up on the street. The American dream is not to be born into a wealthy family, but to build an empire and become rich through hard work and dedication.

Of course, the American dream is dead. It's a myth at this point, and its perpetuation just leads people to set their dreams high and suffer disappointment as they crumble. We may all be created equal(ly), but that doesn't mean we all have equal opportunities. The circumstances you grow up in are the ones you're most likely to stay in. We like focusing on the success stories, the people who rise from nothing to become these famous stars or lead multimillion dollar corporations, but they stand out because they're the exceptions. For every one of those people are hundreds of thousands more who are in the ghetto, who will have kids who stay in the ghetto, and the cycle will continue.

And that's what's always made me so angry, I think. My family was working-class, not so poor that we couldn't afford to have nice things every once in a while, but often living above our means and too poor to do things like save money or buy really nice things, like say, extra cars. And now here I am, stuck in a crap, dead-end job that just barely pays enough for me to make payments on my student loans, with no real out in sight, while some bimbo who can't be arsed to remember her teacher's name is going to go through college -- paid for by mommy and daddy -- go into business and make a ton of money while never having to lift a finger. Yeah, I think that would make anyone a little mad.

Unfortunately, there seems to be no way around this except to make these people go from ignoring the poor to hating them. I'm a big proponent of wealth distribution, but honestly, I don't think that goes far enough. I want to see salary caps. No one really needs to make more than $100k, as far as I'm concerned, maybe $200k if I'm feeling generous. Because, yeah, I'm sure running an entire company is hard work, assuming you're actually doing some kind of work, but you sure as hell don't deserve hundreds of millions of dollars a year (plus multimillion bonuses!) for working your slaves to death and exploiting everyone you can lay your hands on just so a room full of rich stockholders can get richer.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He is currently the editor of Lib's LIB

LibsNote: This post was originally written January 30, 2011 to give the regular blogger a break. 
Dan Walker received a review copy from the FirstReads program at Goodreads.
This was posted late because I totally planned to get something written, but SHIT HAS HAPPENED that needed taking care of. Should be back next week.

Post 489: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Soulles by Gail Carriger. ISBN: 9780316056632.

I found this novel refreshing in its portrayal of vampires and werewolves.  It was something akin to what I 'grew up on' regarding those two genres.  The idea at the bottom is that these supernatural beings are people first, monsters second.  Sure, werewolves completely lose control of their higher brain functions during the full moon and would just as soon tear you apart as look at you, and sure vampires still need blood to survive, but these, shall we say, defects do not prevent them from fitting in with civilized society.

When I say I 'grew up on' vampires and werewolves, I'm talking about two years at the end of high school, so I wasn't exactly a little kid.  One October, my friend James said, "Dan, you're coming to Game with us," and there was simply no saying otherwise.  I was introduced to White Wolf's World of Darkness live-action roleplaying games, specifically Vampire: The Masquerade and Werewolf: The Apocalypse.  Friday nights, I would gather on campus with about thirty other people and we would run around with character sheets in our back pockets, playing make-believe that we were bloodthirsty, if angsty, creatures of the night.

I have no delusions that this was a terribly fulfilling way to spend my Friday nights, of course, but it was a lot of fun at the time, and perhaps more importantly, White Wolf's take on supernatural horror has colored my perceptions of them ever since.  When it comes to werewolves, I'm simply a werewolf fan.  I go to movies to get a good transformation scene and cheer on the puppies, whether they're ripping people apart or trying to save the world.

Portrayals of vampires tend to irritate me more.  Mindless, killable leeches are not interesting, and mopey uber-goths are annoying.  There seems to be little deviation in mainstream media from these two tropes, Twilight aside.  Those who hide out in the shadows tend to moan about how the world hates them, and they're monsters who must feed on others, and they never wanted this curse, blah blah blah.  Me?  I always thought there would be at least something enjoyable about being bitten by one of these guys.  I mean, it can't be all doom and gloom and what have I become, right?

Vampire and Werewolf, the games, were always about being people first, who had cool powers.  Sure, we didn't want any normal people to find out what we really were, but that was because they all feared us.  Werewolves and vampires were misunderstood, and the fearful, destructive humans would just try to kill us all, like they did in the Dark Ages!  Was this marketed towards outcast teenagers who got off on feeling like special snowflakes who could rip the heads off their tormentors?  Absolutely.  But that doesn't change the fact that World of Darkness really did focus on the humanity of the supernatural monster, even if it was quickly slipping away in the night. 

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He is currently the editor of Lib's LIB.

LibsNote: Dan was reading a personal copy of the book.
*This post was originally written March 15, 2011 to give the regular blogger a break.  She finally got around to using it after being sleep deprived for 3 days in a row. Yeah.

Day 90: Dan Walker (guest blogger, with commentary)

To Kill an Armchair Husband: A Dark Comedy by Teri Weeding. ISBN: 9781451525830.

So this is a pretty average book about a woman trying to kill her husband because he's no longer the man she married. Lucky guy. My fiancee has wanted to kill me since before we got engaged.*

"I'm gonna kill you in your sleep" has been a long-running joke between us. She told me, very early on, that after we're married, she'll take out an insurance policy on me and then, one day, maybe a after a few decades** of marital bliss, she'll kill me and collect the money. And she keeps talking about it. I'm not sure how much of a joke it is anymore.

Like the aforementioned armchair husband, I've got a heart condition. Mine keeps me away from caffeine; if I get even a drop of a caffeinated beverage nowadays, I get killer headaches and heart palpitations. So of course she keeps telling me that she's going to slip me caffeine. She thinks that will let her get off easily. Funnily enough, the woman in the book tried the slipped mickey approach as well; didn't work out so well for her.

But isn't it odd how we never think about this? We trust our significant others not to kill us or do anything crazy. We share with them our beds, our homes, our lives, and I don't think "Honey, you're not gonna kill me tonight, are ya?" ever comes up as a legitimate question. Sleeping with someone, with or without the sexual
connotation, is an incredible act of trust. We place our well being in each other's hands when we're at our most vulnerable. And yet, spousal homicide is such an everyday occurrence. It might be shocking to read
that a husband or wife killed one another, but only insofar as a person took someone's life. We never think about the dangers we place ourselves in; we never ask ourselves, "How well do I really know this person?"

Trust is an amazing thing. Also, this blog post can totally be used as evidence against her now.***

(Note: It was actually at Amy's suggestion that I write this article. She's not actually going to kill me. I don't think...)

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful armchair husband someday.

*Before we started dating, actually.
**Decades?!  Someone is a little optimistic.
***Evidence has a funny way of disappearing and all that.  [insert evil laugh.]

This blog post was originally written May 23, 2010 because the author is currently busy plotting her future husband's demise...most likely with the aid of her mother-in-law.  PS: if you actually believe any of this, you have no sense of humor, Dan.

Post 318: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Nemesis by Philip Roth.  ISBN: 9780547318356.

One of Bucky's initial points of self-loathing is that his eyesight is too poor for him to be able to fight in World War II.  So his friends ship off to Europe while he's stuck at home, a 4-F minding a playground.  I want to make it clear, this really gets him down.

Me, I don't get that.  I've always believed that going into the military was a death sentence.  That's a bit harsh, of course; it's more like playing Russian roulette, there's just a chance that you'll die.  Personally, I've never wanted to take that chance and I don't understand why people do.

I'm not a big patriot, and I'm certainly no nationalist.  I try to support our troops and all that, but deep down, I think they're all crazy.  As far I can tell, everyone in the military is in some way suicidal.  I cannot find any other way to explain why they would want to go to war, because I'm one of those people who doesn't believe that there is anything worth dying for.

See, when you die, you stop.  Anything that you were fighting for, you can't fight for anymore.  You're useless.  Your potential as anything but fertilizer is zero.  So that's one less person trying to hold off the invaders, one less person who could one day cure cancer or invent the warp drive, one less person to love and care about others.  What's the point in dying for something?  Isn't it better to keep fighting, to keep working toward whatever ideal you stand for?  You certainly can't trust others to do it once you're gone.  We may put a lot of emphasis on last requests, but it's not like there's any kind of binding contract for others to carry out your wishes.

I'm sure I'll get a lot of flak for this, but I don't care.  I guarantee that as much as I don't understand the military viewpoint, those who do won't understand mine.  Call me a coward if you want, that's fine.  I just think this is something that needs to be said, because no one ever seems willing to say it. 

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

LibsNote: This post was originally written October 11, 2010 to give the regular blogger a break. 

Dan borrowed an ARC of Nemesis from me. I received it from a publisher's booth at ALA 2010.

Day 191: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Bozo Sapiens by Ellen and Michael Kaplan.  ISBN: 9781608190911.

In exploring the human equation, finding out why we make the mistakes we do, the authors of this book draw on a huge swath of information, from biology, anthropology, neurology, psychology, pop culture, common wisdom, philosophy and even religion.  A broad view of a topic like this really appeals to me, because I've always enjoyed knowing even just a little about a lot: the core of a liberal education.

It's sad though, that we don't appreciate this kind of breadth of wisdom anymore.  In school, it's "is this going to be on the test?"  English composition classes are split up into technical and business writing, and lessons are geared to give everyone a chance to use writing in the context of their field.  If it's not going to get me hired, I'll forget it once the semester is over.  Knowing a lot about one subject is what gets us jobs; no one loves the Renaissance men.

And the consequence of this is not only that people don't know a whole lot about their world -- and the resultant fear that comes from that ignorance -- but also that we value knowledge less.  Know-it-alls are the subject of ridicule.  I can't count the number of times I've heard some oranged valley girl, her face contorted in disgust, screech, "Why would anyone know THAT?"  We treat our minds as if they were finite sponges.  Knowing too much about a subject unrelated to our dream job would cause the excess knowledge that we DO require to squish out the other end, rendering us helpless.  But brains don't work like that. Learning keeps us sane, keeps us whole, and it certainly doesn't replace the things we already know.  Unless, of course, those things were wrong.

If I had my way, I'd first get a Master's and then a PhD in linguistics. After that, I'd study math, geology, geography, economics, political science, as many bloody language as I could get my hands on, and maybe art. I'd try and get degrees in all of them, at least Bachelors.  It would take a long time and a lot of money, but it would enrich my life so much.  No one is going to let me do this, though, because living for your field is valuable.  Being a trivia buff is not.

PS: This was a fantastic read, and everyone should pick it up.*

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday.

*This is not a paid endorsement, nor is it necessarily the belief of the regular blog writer.
**Post originally written August 9, 2010 so the regular author could take a much deserved break.

Day 276: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Watchmen by Alan Moore.  ISBN: 9780930289232.

I picked up on a subtext while reading this through.  In Alan Moore's vision of 1985, World War Three is a specter hanging over everyone's shoulder, and once Russia invades Afghanistan, the shadow of impending armageddon looms heavily over the secondary characters.

It made me wonder how I would handle the end of the world.  Living where I do, it's very unlikely that I'd be hit by an atomic bomb, unless they were being dropped willy-nilly: Cleveland is too far away and Akron really doesn't need to be bombed.  I mean, just look at it.  But fallout, nuclear winds, or nuclear winter would eventually rear their ugly heads and I'd be up shit creek.

So how to take it?  I've always thought that if I knew it was coming, I'd just try and get out and do everything I could before the final curtain call: have sex, eat stuff, go places, see things.  Heck, travelling like that could potentially take me outside a blast radius, to somewhere relatively unaffected by whatever force is currently destroying civilization.

On the other hand, I'd like to think that I'd be one of those people who would knuckle down and prepare for a long haul underground.  By the time the bombs dropped, it would no doubt be too late, but hey, I used to belong to an apocalypse cult, kind of.  But that's a story for another time.

...Or maybe right now.

My friends and I, during my senior year of high school, were obsessed with World of Darkness roleplaying games, the kind that make you run around outside with your arms crossed over your chest shouting words like "Obfuscation!" and "Celerity!" at people desperately clutching their wrists.  Anyway, when other teens were fussing over social status and whether their zits were coming back for prom, we were forming a werewolf pack, which gave a structure to our Big Plan.  One of my friends had had a vision of impending doom that would "change the world as we know it" (we later thought it pertained to 9/11, but hindsight always validates augury), and his plan was to squirrel away books about farming and other knowledge that would be useful in rebuilding a society.  We were going to get in shape and learn all kinds of skills and... whatever, it never worked out and the apocalypse didn't happen until we were out of school anyway.

The point is, that kind of thinking, plus a mile-deep concrete bunker and some seeds and canned food, is all you really need.  That's resourcefulness.  It's also the kind of thing that you pretty much have to be a paranoid conspiracy nut to prepare in time for Ragnarok.  But it's not like the world is gonna end any time soon, right? 

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

LibsNote: Post originally written on October 7, 2010 so the regular author could slog through Bill Bryson's At Home.

Post 361: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

You Don't Look Like Anyone I Know by Heather Sellers. ISBN: 9781594487736.

One of my ex-girlfriend's friends has prosopagnosia, and meeting her was when I first became aware of the illness. Of course, being me, I immediately began to wonder if I had it. I've come to the conclusion that I don't, but I do feel like I have a hard time remembering people's faces.

In high school, I used to be able to recognize anyone by looking at their back. I don't know how I did it, but hair, clothing, height and weight were much easier traits to use in noticing someone in the halls. Maybe it didn't help that I grew to be six-foot-four, and most faces were below my field of vision. I don't think I do this to quite the same extreme anymore, and I have to wonder how I kept such a running catalog of everyone's back.

Lately, I have had opportunities to reflect on my problems with faces. At my workplace, I've been tasked with keeping track of the parking lot, which means I see a lot of the same people every day. I apparently have an amazing talent for recognizing license plates (we keep track of the people who don't pay us by the end of the day), but when it comes to people, it seems to take forever for me to be able to recognize them.

One girl in particular comes in all the time and tends to stay later than she's supposed to, so we make arrangements for her with the towing company. The only way I ever recognize her is by her license plate, which is a vanity plate and thus easy to remember. It's easier to tell who she is when she's wearing sunglasses, because that's how she looked when I first met her, but even then it takes a while for me to figure out who I'm talking to. The fact is, she looks too much like every other white, preppy, lightly tanned girl with perfect skin that I've ever seen.

There's a second side to this issue, though. I'm measuring my ability to recognize other people versus their ability to recognize me before I recognize them. The fact is, my face is pretty unique, and it could just be that I'm far more memorable than most, because ain't nobody else looks like me.

I got to thinking about this due to the part of the book where the author starts telling people about her prosopagnosia. A lot of people didn't believe her, and her psychiatrist told her that was because they wanted to believe that they were unique enough to be memorable. I find this funny, because, brother, you don't want to be unique, take it from me. I can't ever get away with anything, because if anyone sees my face, they'll remember it. Not to mention I'm pretty creepy looking (as Amy will tell you), so I can't do things like offer candy to my customers the way another of the parking lot attendants does. She's a kindly, grandmotherly type, but I'm more of the "Would you like some candy little girl? It's in the back of my black-windowed van" type. At least, that's what my face is.

So, yeah, having someone not recognize you can kind of be a blow to the old ego. But be careful what you wish for; sometimes anonymity is a thing to be revelled in.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday.


LibsNote: Copy won from Goodreads Giveaway program.
*This post was originally written October 30, 2010 to give the regular blogger a break.Yeah, it's taking me awhile to read The Ground Beneath Her Feet.

Day 91: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

To Kill an Armchair Husband: A Dark Comedy by Teri Weeding. ISBN: 9781451525830.

Despite the fact that I gave this book a two-star rating on Goodreads and I was really pushing myself to get through it, it sure has given me a lot to talk about. One of the driving plot elements in this book is a distinct lack of communication between any of the characters.

Communication, I have learned, is really key to a solid relationship. Amy's taught me a lot about being completely open with someone, and while it's not something I'm good at, I think I'm definitely improving. It's tough being so honest, and it helps that I'm a terrible liar.

The problem that I think a lot of couples have is, even when they try to communicate with one another, they don't really go far enough. What's holding them back? An easy scapegoat is movies. Think about the last movie you saw, dramatic or comedic, where a couple was having some kind of issue. How long would that movie have been if they had just been open with honest each other? Didn't hold back the truth? Didn't make assumptions? I'm willing to bet that a lot of our examples of how to act in a relationship come from movies and television, and those people are dysfunctional as hell, because that's what brings in the viewers. So we think that we're supposed to hold things back, keep emotions and thoughts to ourselves, and we go right on making ourselves miserable because of it.

The fact is, we shouldn't be acting like this. We don't have to. But I've even got trouble shaking that hangup; there are just some things that I assume people don't talk about, because I've never really heard anyone talk about them. And perhaps more so than lying or holding back the truth, making assumptions is the worst mistake that we can make. Almost all the misunderstandings and arguments that my fiancee and I
have had, big or small, have been because one of us made an assumption (and yes, it's usually me). Assumptions just plain don't work; making an ass out of you and umption and all that. It's difficult to get out
of that habit when you've spent your life making assumptions about things.

Can we really blame Hollywood for all of this? I don't know. Like I said, they're an easy scapegoat. They sure aren't doing anything to show people how to communicate, that's for sure. Regardless, we can't all have awesome partners like my snoogie booboo sugar dumpling, who know how to communicate and who are willing to be patient and teach us their ways. :)

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday.

This blog post was originally written May 23, 2010 in order to give the regular author time to do anything, but blog.

Post 337: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Lord of the Flies by William Golding.  ISBN: 9780140283334.

This post is going to be equally about the novel and an article that I read recently.  If you read it, make sure you click the two follow-up articles the guy wrote.

What got me thinking about this article in conjunction with the novel was the way the boys treated Piggy.  He's the fat, awkward kid, a serious mama's boy, always speaking his mind to try and get things to work the way he thinks is proper, and so he gets picked on and shunned a lot.  There's a scene where a very tense moment is diffused by someone poking fun at Piggy; it comes off as business as usual, and everyone relaxes.

So, yeah, I was bullied in school, and I won't even begin to guess why.  I remember being laughed at and called names, spit on, and occasionally beaten up on my way to or from school.  That last one was the worst; it didn't happen often, but it did cause me to alter my route to school.  I do hold it accountable for my cynicism, however.

The silly thing is, I never told anyone about anything that happened.  I actually went to great lengths to keep people from finding out what had happened to me.  I can't even begin to understand why I didn't tell anyone.  The best I can guess is that maybe I thought there was something wrong with me and that's why I got picked on all the time.  It's that internalization that keeps bullying something tolerated.  Like the guy in Single Dad Laughing says, the bullied have voices and need to use them.

Still, the treatment I received could have been a lot worse in some ways.  I knew a girl in middle school who was picked on far more publicly, and far more often than I was.  I actually tended to avoid her because she was lower on the social ladder than even me.  Also, the physical abuse I underwent never really did any lasting damage, although I did experience something Single Dad Laughing described, where hot girls would ask me out and then laugh in my face.  That left scars, that have only just recently begun to heal.

It also could have been much worse, because I at least had people to turn to, and I think that's really the most important thing for someone who's being tormented in school.  In high school, I made friends with a bunch of other social outcasts, and we banded together, and we turned our collective ostracized status into something that allowed us to feel better about ourselves.  We didn't need anyone but ourselves, we were better than the 'normals' because we made an effort to be different.  That kind of mindset has sort of warped me for later life, but at the time, it was a most necessary survival mechanism.  My friends gave me a way to be myself, and they gave me something to live for.

I think anything else I could say on the subject is said much better by the article, so I'll just say, if you were holding off on reading it until you finished reading this post, go back and read it now.  It's worth it.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

*This post was originally written October 16, 2010 to give the regular blogger a break.

Day 236: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Summerland by Michael Chabon.  ISBN: 9780786808779.

I guess I should talk about baseball.

Being a nerd and all, I'm not all up on my sports.  I always got C's in gym due to being out of shape and thoroughly unconcerned with the whole winning and losing bit.  I'm not terribly coordinated, and I sure don't give a damn about team spirit.  I'm one of those people who watches the Super Bowl for the commercials (because, damn, they funny).

But yeah, baseball.  It's never appealed to me, what with the running and the sliding in the dirt and the having to hit/catch a hard little ball with a hard little stick of wood/thin leather glove.  It's kind of like golf, only more sadistic.  I'd much rather play kickball, which at least has you aiming for a much larger target.

Which is funny, because one of the few sports I like playing is tennis (the other one is soccer).  At least the rackets have much larger surface area than a baseball bat, and you don't have to worry about having more than one other person on your team, if that.  I was very surprised when I first took tennis in gym class, how much I enjoyed it, and I can't really say for certain what about the game appeals to me.  I do know that I took it again during the requisite second year of gym class (we got to pick about four different activities per semester).

Baseball, football, hockey, basketball: it probably is the team aspect which turns me away.  I never liked working in groups as a student, so why should playing on a team be any different?  And yet, reading this book, a game of baseball seemed so nice.  Who knows, if I hadn't been so awkward and uncoordinated, maybe I could have come to appreciate a leisurely game of baseball between friends.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday.

Day 39: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.  ISBN: 9780060850524.

A few months ago, I kick-started my current rush through my ages-old book list with back-to-back readings of 1984 and Brave New World.  And while I liked the former for its alternate history and linguistic efforts, Brave New World was the novel that really got me thinking.

In some hidden corner in the interwebs, I while away the hours reviewing music albums.  Music is really my "thing"; I spend a lot of time keeping up with who's doing what, and I listen to everything I can, from all over the world.  I have lots of opinions on music in general, and of course I have some pet peeves, one of the biggest being "indie music".

What started as a general movement away from large record companies (independent music) has metamorphosed into what I consider to be a free-for-all of total expression with no direction (indie music).  Indie music today is a mishmash of offkey singing and cacophonous orchestras, of screechy guitar solos and highly pretentious, poetic lyrics that make little sense.  And this bothers me.  I don't understand it, and for the most part, I don't like it.  I detest the jarring music, I mock singers who seem unable to sing, and I resent the pretention with a passion bordering on a blood feud.

But whether I like indie music or not, after reading Brave New World, I have to admit that the experimental and the artistic have their place in the world.  I could almost say that they're the most important art forms we have right now.  Pop music is catchy and accessible, and therein lies the problem.  Placating simple tastes with jangly hooks buries intellectualism and mutes experience.  People need to be made to think about what it is they encounter.  They can't be allowed to wallow in the mentally unstimulating surface pleasantries, or we risk developing a Brave New World, where art is produced by machine for easy consumption and no one is expected to think about anything.

This novel really made me question my opinions on music.  I mean, I love fiction that goes beyond standard boundaries, and the same can be said about my thoughts on visual art, but why put music on a pedestal?  So rather than railing against indie music and all of its shrieky, offkey, pretentious badness, I've had to step back, look at what's really important, and say, "Thank you, indie music, for keeping us from the Brave New World."

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday.

Day 92: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  ISBN: 9780446310789.

Someone I knew once told me about a Monty Python sketch he'd seen live.  One man came on stage, sat in a chair, and began a rambling monologue about how he "coulda been a judge" but ended up instead as a coal miner.  My friend said it was hilarious.  I've had the phrase "I coulda been a judge" rattling around in my head ever since.

Although in my case, it's more "I want to be a judge".  I've always had an appreciation for the law, and for judges in particular.  I love courtroom dramas, like the one that plays out in this book.  Secretly, I have always wanted to be a judge, a Supreme Court justice especially, although my reasons for wanting that position are definitely less than stellar.

I watch shows like Judge Judy for that one moment where the plaintiff is being a jerk, his prattling driving home the pointless nature of his claim, the defendant standing there stifling laughter as he lets his opponent make an idiot out of himself.  Then, the moment comes: Judge Judy or Judge Joe Brown or whoever is presiding says, "That's enough, get out of my courtroom."  The schadenfreude!  It's delicious to fantasize about having that kind of power over people, not just to decide who was in the right and help people along in their disputes, but to be able to say, "You're both idiots and I have nothing but contempt for you," and getting away with it.

It's childish, I'll admit. The Supreme Court even gets control over who comes into their courtroom in the first place, which has always appealed to me.  But it isn't like I don't have any appreciation for the law; on the contrary, I consider myself very law-abiding, moreso than I think other people who think of themselves as law-abiding do.  I watch Atticus Finch weaving a logic thread, or Tom Cruise in A Few Good Men using courtroom procedures to his advantage, and I wonder if I might not have had a future as a lawyer.  I'm not very good at thinking on my feet, but I think I could have done pretty well in law school, had I given it a shot.  I honestly never even considered lawyering, but... well, Atticus is pretty awesome, I have to admit.  It goes double for the fact that, despite being fictional and all, he's inspired a lot of people to become lawyers, and he even has a monument dedicated to him in Alabama (source).

I guess I was inspired, too.


Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday.

*Post was originally written June 6, 2010 and was saved so the original author could watch some Judge Judy.

Post 336: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Lord of the Flies by William Golding.  ISBN: 9780140283334.

I first read this book in tenth grade, and I remember really, really liking it until we started to discuss the symbolism (and I know I'm not the only one who felt this way).  What really appealed to me at the time was the surface story: about a bunch of kids having to fend for themselves, living off the land, and forming a society outside the influence of adults, even if it fell apart.

I was really into books like My Side of the Mountain when I was a kid.  I'm not sure what it is about survival stories that's so compelling.  I mean, if I had to go through a situation like that, I'd most likely wind up like Piggy: fat, whiny, ineffectual, striving to maintain decorum, and ultimately, dead.  I'm certainly in no shape for taking care of myself in the wild.  I don't know a whole heck of a lot about cold weather survival, what things to eat, how to hunt...  Like most people, I'm simply not prepared for roughing it.

To be honest, as much as I like visiting parks and forests, I kind of hate being outside.  There are two reasons for this.  The first is the sun.  The sun hates my eyes.  The sun hates my skin.  I don't know that I've ever suntanned, because I usually just turn red and start peeling.  It's unfortunate that we kind of need the sun for living and stuff, because it's really inconvenient.

The second reason is bugs.  Spiders aside, I'm not what you'd call bug-phobic, but I really, really, really hate it when bugs think they can just walk all over me.  There's something about having a bug land on me that makes me react as if I have seen a spider.  I will do anything to avoid coming into contact with most bugs, and I will do anything to get them off of me once they've landed.  I blame mosquitoes for this.

That all said, there is at least one thing that I like about being outside: eating stuff.  I get a serious thrill out of being able to pick fruit outside, whether it's from the blackberry bushes in my backyard, the apple trees at the other end of campus, or that plum tree outside where I work that doesn't produce plums anymore because it's got some kind of disease (when it did produce, they were great).  Even if we're talking something that I've grown, like a carrot, I just find something supremely satisfying about being able to pull something out of the ground, or off a branch, and consume it.

Of course, you have to be careful.  I once tried eating a puffball that was growing in the backyard and boy was that nasty.  I still gag a little when I think about it. 

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

*This post was originally written October 16, 2010 to give the regular blogger a break.

Banned Book Week: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

The Giver by Lois Lowry.  ISBN: 9780440237686.

After he's been named the new Receiver of Memory, Jonas is given a (distinctly brief) pamphlet like the others receiving their Assignments, with instructions for his first day of training.  It tells him, among other things, not to discuss his training with anyone, and gives him leave to break a number of societal norms, including being able to tell lies and be rude.

I sure wish I had access to that last one.  I'm constantly afraid that someone is going to take some little thing I do or say as being rude.  This is especially true when I'm at work, I'm always finishing with customers and wondering, "Was I somehow rude...?"  I'm constantly concerned that I might have said something wrong, or said it a certain way.  Maybe I didn't wait long enough for something to happen.  Maybe my body language was improper.  There's nothing in my actions that stands out as having been rude, but I wonder if it might have been taken that way.  I just wouldn't know if it happened.

Of course, people are free to take offense at pretty much anything, for pretty much any reason.  Being offended is a choice, after all, but most people don't realize that.  (Think about it: if it wasn't a choice, then how could there individuals who are not easily offended by things like taboo words? racist jokes? dead baby jokes?  ...Are you?)  If it's easier to get your way by being offended all the time, why wouldn't you let that thong ride up your ass*?  After all, if people didn't choose to take offense, we wouldn't be 'celebrating' Banned Book Week now, would we?

That said, a license to be rude would be awesome for a different reason.  So many people in this world need to be set straight about their behaviors.  They need to be told that they're being obnoxious, selfish assholes.  They need to be told that it is not acceptable to be so demanding, especially when those demands infringe on the rights of others.  They need to be told when they're being rude, even though that is, paradoxically, rude in itself.  So a lot of the self-absorbed, self-entitled, customer-is-always-righties in the world get to go on about their merry way without anyone checking their behavior.  Forget a license to kill, I just want a license to say "STFU and GTFO".

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

*Phrasing generously loaned by Amy L. Campbell.

for description of drug use by children, lethal injections of babies and the elderly, suicide, and other reasons.

Day 237: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

Summerland by Michael Chabon.  ISBN: 9780786808779.

At one point in the story, our heroes have been captured by not-so-nice faeries.  Two of them break loose and search throughout the faeries' compound for a magic thingy that will heal their wounded friend.  As luck would have it, they eventually make their way into the fearies' treasure chamber.

Chabon points out that rather than being full of gold and jewels, the room is jam-packed with junk: broken odds and ends, discarded bits of stuff, and a whole lot of unmatched socks.  In other words, one human's trash is a faerie's treasure.  And while the fae seem to value most the things which they can steal undetected, I can still sort of sympathize with them.

All my life, I've always walked with my eyes pointed groundward and because of this choice in vantage points, I've brought many a piece of useless crap home.  I'm a compulsive junk collector, you might say.  Anything which I see on the sidewalk, in the grass, in the dirt, in the snow, or tarred to the road surface has a chance of winding up in my pockets, and from there, onto one of my shelves or one of the many heavy, plastic containers I have full of useless crap.  I've kept them around for years.  Did I mention I'm compulsive?

What I'm likely to pick up is hard to quantify.  Shiny things attract my attention.  The bulk of my collection is made up of rocks, but I've lately stopped really noticing those.  I tend to pick up things which are whole unto themselves, but otherwise broken.  Stuff with moving parts is great.  I've found toys, screws and bolts, jewelry (probably my favorite), wooden things, dice, rubber stampers, bottlecaps, cell phone batteries, pieces of plastic...  I could really go on and on.  I once found an entire car headlight, sans bulb.

Of course, it isn't all useless.  One of my most prized possessions is a metal hoop, a little over a foot in diameter, with a kink on one edge.  I think it used to be a TV antenna of some kind.  I hope to turn it into a microphone windscreen one day.  Not to mention, I find money constantly.  I once found over two dollars in random coins scattered over a ten-foot section of sidewalk.

I really think that what makes this 'hobby', if you will, so compelling is the sense of finding value where someone else sees none.  They discard it, I pick it up and treasure it.  And money is the best example, because you can actually use it for something.  One man's trash and all that.  Yes, dear, the junk is coming with me when we move in together.*  Some of it, anyway.

*That's what you think.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

**This post was originally written September 26, 2010 to allow the regular author a break and/or a chance to catch up on her own reading. 

Post 360: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

You Don't Look Like Anyone I Know by Heather Sellers. ISBN: 9781594487736.

About 30 pages into this book, I said to myself, "Goddamn everyone in this woman's life has mental illness of some kind!" Her mother is the best example; she suffers from paranoid schizophrenia. I couldn't help but compare the woman to my ex-girlfriend's mother, who I had the "pleasure" of meeting one weekend around Thanksgiving.

I wouldn't go so far as to say she's paranoid schizophrenic, but she definitely has some problems. She drove us to her house up north, a trip that took twice as long as it should have because she refused to use highways. Everything was backroads, 5 MPH under the speed limit. She just seemed to be scared of everything (including me, which was kind of amusing), and it really made me pity her. What must life be like, when you're constantly holding back because of fear?

Well, it's actually really hypocritical of me to be asking that, because I've always held back because of fear, mostly fear of failure. I will tend not to do things if I don't think I can get them right the first time, or if I don't think I'll thoroughly enjoy myself. When I saw my ex's mother's driving habits, I told myself I wasn't going to be like her, but unfortunately, I am. Amy's been helping me take more chances, but when you've had a lifetime of acting a certain way, it's hard to break the habit.

And that's all a set of fear-based behaviors like that is: a habit. When your rituals keep you safe -- you haven't come to any harm in doing them, after all -- the need for doing them is reinforced. When I was a kid, I used to spend a lot of time worrying myself sick, because I thought that, magically, it would affect things that I really had no control over, like the weather. I have even battled bouts of my own paranoia. Most recently, I would spend hours lying awake at night, absolutely certain that every creak I could hear in the house meant that someone had broken in. I would get up and grab the sword I keep under my bed (it's never been sharpened) and stalk down the stairs very slowly, only to find that nothing had changed since I'd gone to bed. This is actually apparently something I get from my mother, who will have periods where she has to get up in the middle of the night and check to make sure the doors and windows are locked. I finally put an end to it by sleeping with a fan running, even in winter, so that I can't hear anything.

Fear is a great motivator, but like all things, it's best in moderation. It's one thing to lock your windows at night, but you cross the line when you start nailing them shut.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed temporarily working at a bookstore. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

LibsNote: Copy won from Goodreads Giveaway program.
*This post was originally written October 30, 2010 to give the regular blogger a break.Yeah, it's taking me awhile to read The Ground Beneath Her Feet.

Banned Book Week: Dan Walker (guest blogger)

The Giver by Lois Lowry.  ISBN: 9780440237686.

So the main plot involves Jonas approaching the beginning of his Twelfth year, and the accompanying ceremony, in which he'll be given his Assignment, a post that he'll train in for a few years before working in the job the rest of his life.  The Assignments are made by the Elders who've watched the children, carefully recording what their strengths are.

Boy do I wish someone would do this for me.  Yes, choice in Jonas' society has been removed, to keep people from making mistakes, and that's part of the point: making decisions, even bad ones, is part of what makes us human.  Amy can sure tell you that I am severely hung up about needing to do things correctly, to the point of not trying if I don't think something can be done right.  But it has always seemed to me that everyone else in the world has always known what they want to do with their life, except for me.

See, I've got all these talents -- little things, mostly, like my penchant for making voices -- and I have no idea what can be done with them.  Something tells me I could be making a living doing something, but I don't know what that something could possibly be.  I may be missing my calling, for crying out loud, and not even know it.

For instance, I didn't discover my talent with languages until I took German in college, and that was after four years of high school Spanish.  I've bounced around from language to language, picking up bits and pieces of Swahili, Chinese, Russian, and French, to name a few.  And while I feel like each experience is helping me move toward some greater fundamental understanding of language as a whole, I can't exactly do anything with what I've already learned.  Unless there were, say, someone out there who just needs a little knowledge of a lot of languages.

Speaking of which, I didn't discover linguistics, now my passion, until my third or fourth year of college.  I could have been working toward a degree in that from a much earlier time if I'd known it even existed as a field.  Instead, I feel like I've wasted the last eleven or so years, and in some ways, I have.  A lack of direction in my early life plagues me now.  Maybe if someone had been there to say, "Hey, you're good at doing this, maybe you should try this," I would have at least been able to work towards a real life goal.

Dan Walker (pseudonym) is a writer from Northeast Ohio, who would be teaching ESL if he wasn't unemployed. He received a BA in Creative Writing from Wright State University in 2004 and a Masters in Teaching English as a Second Language from Kent State University in 2009. He will make some lucky librarian a wonderful husband someday. 

for description of drug use by children, lethal injections of babies and the elderly, suicide, and other reasons.