Don's Diary

Books read in December. Favorites with astericks.

Friendship: An Expose by Joseph Epstein*
All Rivers Run to the Sea: Memoirs by Elie Wiesel
Second Drafts of History: Essays by Lance Morrow
Ambition: The Secret Passion by Joseph Epstein
Mad World: Evelyn Waugh and the Secrets of Brideshead Revisited by Paula Byrne
Roctogenarians: Late in life debuts, comebacks, and triumpths by Mo Rocca
One Man’s America: The pleasures and provocations of our singular nation by George F. Will
Death Need Not Be Fatal by Malachy McCourt
A Passion For Books: A Book Lover’s Treasury edited by H. Rabinowitz and Rob Kaplan
The Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell
Edward Hopper by Lloyd Goodrich*
Going Solo by Roald Dahl*
Over To You by Roald Dahl
More About Boy: Roald Dahl’s Takes from Childhood
Mind And Matter: A Life in Math and Football by John Urschel and Louisa Thomas
Players: How Sports Became a Business by Matthew Futterman
The Legend of Bear Bryant by Mickey Herskowitz
The Boys of Riverside: A Deaf Football Team and a Quest for Glory by Thomas Fuller

The contents of someone’s bookcase are part or his history, like an ancestral bookcase. -Anatole Broyard

Jingle Bells 5K at Maurie Jacobs Park. 29:23.1. 1st in age group. Oldest competitor of the 216 participants over the two races that day.

More.

Video game developers are starting to grapple with the real-life, planet-warming consequences of immersing gamers in fantasy worlds.

More than 3 billion people — a third of humanity — play video games. Their consoles, computers, tablets and smartphones use more electricity than midsize countries. Video games in the United States alone create more greenhouse pollution than 5 million cars. And the legion of gamers and power-hungry devices is only expected to grow.

Read

Books read in November. Favorites with astericks.

God Grew Tired Of Us by John Bul Dau*
Choosing Courage by Peter Collier
Beyond Winning: The Timeless Wisdom of Great Philosoopher Coaches by Gary M. Walton
The Strenuous Life: Theodore Roosevelt and the Making of the American Athlete by Ryan Swanson*
Portraits from a Life: Lee Miller by Richard Calvocoressi
The Devil’s Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce
The Precious Days by Ann Patchett
Anthem (graphic version) by Ayn Rand
Fates Worse Than Death by Kurt Vonnegut
Sex, Art, and American Culture by Camille Paglia
Extraordinary Popular Delusions & the Madness of Crowds by
Charles Mackay (1852)*
The Demon of Unrest: A Saga…of the Civil War by Erik Larson
Survive & Advance by Tianna Bartoletta
Spartan Up! by Joe DeSena
Ninety-Nine Glimpses of Princess Margaret by Craig Brown*



Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you. -Anne Lamott

It’s one of the ironies of American history that when the Pilgrims first arrived at Plymouth rock they promptly set about creating a communist society. Of course, they were soon starving to death.

Read

3.5 mile race at Spencer Butte. 451 feet net elevation gain. Enitirely on wood chip or rockly mountain trail. As usual, the oldest runner in the race (and the three other races that morning).
Fun. Pleased with results.

Details.

Books read in October. Favorites with astericks.

For The Love of Books: 115 Celebrated Writers on the Books The Love Most by Ronald B. Shwartz
First Person Singular: Stories by Haruki Murakami
The Year of Living Constitutionally: One Man’s Humble Quest to Follow the Constituion’s Original Meaning by A. J. Jacobs*

No Finish Line: My Life As I See It by Marla Runyon with Sally Jenkins*
Lost on Planet China by J. Maarten Troost
Ask Not: The Kennedys and the Women They Destroyed by Maureen Callahan*
I Am The Central Park Jogger: A Story of Hope and Personality by Trisha Meili*
Clete by James Lee Burke
Read On: Life Stories by Rosalind Reisner
The Big Book of Senior Moments by Bennett E. Melville
Where There’s A Will: Thoughts on the Good Life by John Mortimer
Murderers And Other Friends: Another Part of Life by John Mortimer
Clinging to the Wreckage by John Mortimer
Forever Rumpole by John Mortimer
The Pentagon: A History by Steve Vogel
Beyond Winning: The Timeless Wisdom of Great Philospher Coaches by Gary Walton

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library. -Jorge Luis Borges

Beware Dr. Evil

Tonight was a 5K at Alton Baker Park. My time was 28:34.4. That’s 3.3 seconds faster than my July 4th Butte to Butte, an easier ordeal on a tougher course.

Here

National Debt of the United States