Quote of the Moment
"If you ever yell at me again, Paul, know that I will fucking kill you, and bury your body where no-one will ever find it."
-One of our neighbors, to our landlord

[Random] Word
Overheard in Trader Joe's on Masonic:
T.J. Sample Guy: Hey! I didn't know you shopped, man.
Too Hip 33-ish White Male: In the bubble I had delivery, but now I have to actually leave the house and get my own...

Q's Musings
Touching The Void
There's nothing like a death in the family to put things into perspective for you. My grandmother was a Cuban farm girl. She swore someday she would rise above her upbringing, and become part of the class that made things happen on the island. I was never able to get the full story of how she met my grandfather, but I know that early on they were very much in love.
[word: read]

Yo Jay, Check This Out
I was 11 years old, roller skating in a park in Miami, and I happened upon a kid about the same age as as me captivating two of his friends. He was regaling them with a tale of prowess, bad dinners, and stealing SuperMan's girlfriend, and he was doing so with a lyrical style I'd never heard before. I, too was captivated, and tried as hard as I could to listen in without looking like I cared.
[word: read]

Me and Coolio up in the Nosebleeds
As I walked into the lobby of the St. Francis I could tell that I was quite suddenly immersed in an "event." Security guards hustled to and fro. There were checkpoints waiting around every corner. There was nothing but beautiful people, every direction I looked in. As I rounded the corner towards the elevators I spotted a group of young boys with pens and basketballs, waiting for their opportunity to capture a small piece of their heroes. The atmosphere was loud, busy, and hurried. Everyone was on their way to the game. So was I. For once in my life, I was in.
[word: read]

Book Worm
I like to read, and thoroughly enjoy sharing what I read with other people. At one point I moved from California to Miami, and opted to leave a good chunk of my library behind. I gifted my books to my friends with two caveats: They had to read them, and they had to share them with other people when they are done.

Lately, I started reading a lot, again. It comes in cycles, and ever since I managed to finish off Gravity's Rainbow I've been on a tear. When I'm on a reading binge I tend to devour everything I can get my mind on for a while, often chasing down the entire collection by a particular author.

I always find myself making recommendations, and constantly following up on recommendations made by others. Lately I've received some fantastic recommendations, and it was in that spirit that I decided to begin chronicling the books I read, as a way of passive recommendation, and thanks to those who recommend. Below is a list of the books I'm currently reading, click here to see the list of books I've read recently, or highly recommend.

Currently Reading:
Quicksilver: The Baroque Cycle, Volume I
Neal Stephenson
William Morrow, 2003

Neal Stephenson has the amazing ability to bring whole eras to life with stunning granular detail, and utter comprehension of the larger picture of the time. Stephenson has a tendancy to build his stories slowly, creating the entire picture before making any of it actually move. In his 2000 work, Cryptonomicon, Stephenson managed to completely rewrite World War II, tying it in to a few modern-day plot lines.

Quicksilver is set in the 1600's, at a time when our perception of the world, and our place in it was radically changing. Stephenson focuses his tale on the lives of the people whose discoveries and actions at this time would fundamentally alter history. He manages to make 1640 London come to life, down to the attitudes people had about their clothes, their god, and their commitments to their country.

Stephenson makes it possible to understand what a radical concept Revolution actually is, and shows one how the word came to mean political and social upheaval, and not just the turning of a wheel. He also introduces a cadre of characters, some fictitious, some real, that are a wonder to behold: Isaac Newton, Daniel Waterhouse, Half-Cocked Jack Shaftoe, and Daniel Leibniz, to name but a few. The scope is grand, the detail granular, and the story-telling compelling. I'm actually thankful that this 944 page work is just the first third of the tale, and look forward to savoring the next 2,000 pages.