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Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon May 09, 2016 12:45 pm
by pinkynose
I know what you mean Ann. I can only read a few pages at a time.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon May 09, 2016 2:15 pm
by Rustsmith
Pinkynose, I enjoyed a "Brief History of Time". I even got to hear him give a lecture a couple of hears ago, which was a great experience. What I have struggled with is his book "God Created the Integers", which is quite long and is a history of all the great mathematicians from Euclid up to Alan Turing. It is definitely not a light read nor is it something that would be of interest to anyone who isn't very interested in the science of mathematics.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon May 09, 2016 5:43 pm
by pinkynose
Wow Steve, that was a great experience! I've only seen him on documentaries. I use to love diving into a challenging book (dictionary in hand) on most any subject. I belonged to a book club and we had the most wonderful discussions. I find I have a harder time concentrating now since RLS. However, for whatever reason, the past few weeks my brain seems improved so maybe I'll seize the moment and try "God Created the Integers." I just looked it up and it intrigued me.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon May 09, 2016 7:42 pm
by Rustsmith
Pinkynose, I will warn you that a lot of what I have read so far had to do with Euclid's "Propositions" of geometry that he used that lead up to the Pythagorean Theorum. For example, Proposition 1 is "If there be any number of magnitudes whatever which are, respectively, equimultiples of any magnitudes equal in magnitude, then, whatever multiple one of the magnitudes is of one, that multiple also will all be of all". Fortunately, Hawking's illustrations and text help clarify what that means, but it really helps if you understood geometry class really well. BTW, the Pythagorean Theorum is Proposition #47.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon May 09, 2016 9:13 pm
by pinkynose
:D Thanks for the warning! I did well in Geometry class but it was over 40 years ago! I'm definitely not current in the subject. I think I'll skip this one!! 8)

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon May 09, 2016 11:12 pm
by Rustsmith
You never know where you will find bits of interesting trivia. Ever since I first went to college I have heard the term "ivory tower" to specify some place that is purely academic with no other useful purpose. In the chapter on Alan Turing, it talks about his time at Princeton while in grad school. It seems that at Princeton there is a tower that overlooks Proctor Hall, the site of the main graduate student meeting area. Proctor Hall was named after the Proctor as in Proctor and Gamble. I had always assumed ivory tower had something to do with something like elephant ivory, but no. The tower was given the name based upon the Proctor and Gamble product named Ivory Soap.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Fri Oct 28, 2016 11:16 am
by Madmom02
It's one of my stay awake all night nights so I've been looking at old posts. I read on my Kindle because I have a hard time holding books (Dupuytrens). I read everything except women in jeopardy books. Just finished Dead Wake: the Lost Crossing of the Lusitania (Erik Larson), which was interesting but maybe a little heavy on torpedo and U-boat science. I also just read Not the End of the World by Kate Atkinson, who is wonderfully weird; Black Widow by Gabriel Allon for a little espionage action; and The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace, which was really damning about race and higher education in the U.S..

My local library offers a great selection of ebooks. You can put anything they have on a wish list, put up to 10 books on hold at a time, and recommend new ebooks for them to acquire. I usually have 6-7 books downloaded to read so I can dip in and out of things as the night moves me (ha!). And the holds come available remarkably quickly - even new best-sellers. Not all of the books (mostly older ones) are available for the Kindle but they have Overdrive which you can just read in your browser.

I'm always looking for recommendations!

Off to read!

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Sat Oct 29, 2016 2:12 am
by Yankiwi
I usually read mysteries and detective novels, fun while they last but not inspiring. Recently I read The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
From Wikipedia: " It tells the story of two sisters, just coming of age in France on the eve of World War II, and their struggle to survive and resist the German occupation of France. It was inspired by the story of a Belgian woman, Andrée de Jongh, who helped downed Allied pilots to escape Nazi territory."
A really good book, probably available in audio and e-books.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Sun Oct 30, 2016 11:19 pm
by debbluebird
I've been reading Edgar Rice Burroughs books. Right now, Tarzan books, there are over 25 I think. I like old stuff.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 4:26 am
by jul2873
A fun thread. I am so in love with ebooks. I have an iPad, an iPhone, and a kindle, and read all kinds of things--old favorites, self-published authors, all kinds of non-fiction. It's so amazing to be able to have a library of hundreds of books in your purse, that you can choose a book from whenever you have a few minutes. I also love audio books, and fall asleep every night listening to some of my favorite authors, such as Jennifer Crusie, Georgette Heyer, Donald Westlake . . . All on a tiny iPod. Podcasts are great too, and I often listen to one when I find I need to walk for a few minutes in the middle of the night. As I'm 72, I remember vividly worrying about packing enough books for a vacation, or packing a large case of audio cassettes. So easy now.

Netflix is also great for the middle of the night. I like to binge on series, like Hawaii 5-0, Drop Dead Diva, Doc Martin, Blue Bloods, Royal Pains. . . Yeah, RLS sucks, but if I have to be up at strange times, I am so grateful for such easy access to such fun entertainment.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Mon Oct 31, 2016 7:10 am
by ViewsAskew
On a business trip, about 15 years ago, I took two books. Flight from Chicago to Pittsburgh, an hour delay, then a puddle jumper to a remote, small airport in the mountains. Because of extreme delays, I'd already ready both books before I left Pittsburgh and had to go to the bookstore at the airport and buy more - at those outrageous prices, lol.

After that, I started stuffing books in every crevice of my luggage. As you mentioned, now I don't have to do that! I still have books, but I also have ebooks.

I also love Netflix :-). I rarely watch TV when shows are on, so rely on services such as Amazon Prime and Netflix to entertain me when I'm awake at 5 AM. Just finished bingeing on 3 episodes of Suits :-).

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Tue Nov 01, 2016 9:33 am
by Polar Bear
Jul2873 - I so love Doc Martin.....

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 8:41 pm
by ViewsAskew
I loved Doc Martin, too. Wish it weren't over! The opening shot of the water and village makes me want to get on a plane to go visit, lol.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 9:39 pm
by legsbestill
I love my audio books - don't know what I would do without audible. They play on my ipod all night helping to deflect those awful despairing thoughts that can assail in the early hours. I particularly enjoy Terry Pratchett but anything that can be relied on not to throw up dark unhappy scenes is good.

Does anyone know the poem Things by Fleur Adcock?

There are worse things than having behaved foolishly in public.
There are worse things than these miniature betrayals,
committed or endured or suspected; there are worse things
than not being able to sleep for thinking about them.
It is 5 a.m. All the worse things come stalking in
and stand icily about the bed looking worse and worse and worse.

Re: Whacha readin?

Posted: Wed Nov 02, 2016 9:56 pm
by legsbestill
I think it's a cool poem but I would hazard that she is untroubled with rls or the 'worse things' she refers to would manifest themselves twitchily inside her body rather than standing around the bed!