Books

I'm re-reading Hitless Wonder by the bassist of Watershed. For every time I've hauled my gear an hour or two to play for 15 people, at least I didn't haul it 500 miles to play for five. And he's not only talking about his own band. It's most bands. It's a good read.

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I know a 2 friends who play in bands. One was a member of a Canadian group "Shooter" that grazed the charts with one hit in the 70s. The other goes to our church and was the drummer for "The Kings" up to an including their only "hit" "This Beat Goes On/Switching to Glide". There is no question in my mind that given their investment in gear and the lack of funds provided by most venues of that level they are in it for the love of the playing of the music and nothing else.
 
In most cities in America, the nightlife looks like this on any given night across 15 venues:

Disturbed w/ Godsmack and Halestorm: 5000 in attendance
Pat Benatar w/ Suzi Quatro: 500 in attendance
Popular local band w/ 2 openers: 75 in attendance
Band A (from Cali): 12 in attendance
Band B (from NYC): 23 in attendance
Band C (from Philly): 14 in attendance
Band D (from Seattle): 7 in attendance
Band E (from Detroit): 21 in attendance
Band F & Band G (local): 10 in attendance
Band H & Band I (local): 8 in attendance
Band J & Band K (local): 6 in attendance
Band L & Band M (local): 24 in attendance
Band N & Band O (local): 9 in attendance
Band (local cover band): 80 in attendance
Band (local cover band): 90 in attendance
 
Even sadder is that for the silly parties that I play every year or so, I know I'm not getting paid (as it should be) but I'm hauling more than $10k in equipment.
 
I've been reading a ton lately. I'm being kinda obsessive. The Kindle tracks your days read so I feel the need to not miss a day. I broke my record of 55 days and am now at 78 days. Anyway, here is what I've been reading:

The Silo trilogy. They are really good. I read them back in 2016 and it's shocking how little I remembered. When the show came out on Apple TV I decided to read them again. I've read 2 of the 3 so far.

A Court of Thorns and Roses series. This is a series of fantasy books for women. They're not really sex books but they do have a bunch of sex shit in them. They are pretty good though. I read the first one in like 2 weeks then got sick of them halfway through the second book, I'll probably go back to it soon. It's funny how all the guys who review them feel the need to say the series isn't just for women...it's clearly them just trying to justify reading them. The Silo series has a woman as the lead character but no one ever feels the need to say they're not just books for women, haha.

The Michael Crichton estate is fucking with his legacy again and putting out an outline he made before he died as a book James Patterson completed. As much as I don't love this (they've done it multiple times before) Crichton is my all time fav author so I'm going to read it on day one which is June 3rd. I've never read any Patterson before so I'm currently reading Along Came a Spider, the first in the Alex Cross series. It's a fun, easy read. I may read a couple more or I may not. I'm not some major Patterson fan all of a sudden.
 
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I just started reading Reid Mitenbuler's \Wild Minds: The Artists & Rivalries That Inspired The Golden Age Of Animation. It covers everybody from Emile Cohl, Winsor McCay, Otto Messmer, John Bray and Max Fleischer to Walt Disney, Walter Lantz, Chuck Jones, Bob Clampett and Richard Fleischer. I recommend the book to anyone who appreciates cartoons – which is probaly almost everyone.
 


I'm a nerd. There was a time when I used to be cool, that time is long gone. This morning I woke up excited for a book.


And I'm even a bigger nerd than that. I decided after finishing my first Patterson book and there being a few days before this one came out that I should read something that is actually intelligent so I went with this:

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It's by the guy who wrote Band of Brothers and so far it's really good. Lewis is only 18 where I am right now in the early chapters but it's a very interesting read. I had no idea how close his family was with Jefferson.

It actually does make me feel better about myself to sprinkle in something of redeeming value with all my silly novels.

Meanwhile, I want to stuff myself in a locker.
 
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Continuing on my trend of being an old man, I went to the library today and got a library card. Haven't had a library card in years. I know I had one in Palm Beach County at one point but that was when Hendrik was alive....Mary Ann might have still been alive. I'm not sure...a long time ago is the point and never in Broward.

I want to get hoopla the streaming service and also I've been watching videos about services you can get on Kindle and you can rent books on Kindle so that's why I did it.

Apparently they have a whole selection of library cards you can get. One of them is the Florida Panthers. I was going to go with that one until I noticed the coolest library card in the history of library cards and of course I had to go with that one instead.

Today is shaping up to be a good day. I've got this awesome library card, I'm not at work and I'm about to read the paper.

 
Continuing on my trend of being an old man, I went to the library today and got a library card. Haven't had a library card in years. I know I had one in Palm Beach County at one point but that was when Hendrik was alive....Mary Ann might have still been alive. I'm not sure...a long time ago is the point and never in Broward.

I want to get hoopla the streaming service and also I've been watching videos about services you can get on Kindle and you can rent books on Kindle so that's why I did it.

Apparently they have a whole selection of library cards you can get. One of them is the Florida Panthers. I was going to go with that one until I noticed the coolest library card in the history of library cards and of course I had to go with that one instead.

Today is shaping up to be a good day. I've got this awesome library card, I'm not at work and I'm about to read the paper.

Don't old people get library cards so they can read the newspapers there for free?
 
I am so goshdarned cultural! The book I'm reading now is Burt Kearns' highly detailed biography of the Three Stooges' Shemp Howard. It was published October 1, 2024. Eeb-eeb-eeb-eeb-eeb-eeb-eeb!

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Continuing on my trend of being an old man, I went to the library today and got a library card. Haven't had a library card in years. I know I had one in Palm Beach County at one point but that was when Hendrik was alive....Mary Ann might have still been alive. I'm not sure...a long time ago is the point and never in Broward.

I want to get hoopla the streaming service and also I've been watching videos about services you can get on Kindle and you can rent books on Kindle so that's why I did it.

Apparently they have a whole selection of library cards you can get. One of them is the Florida Panthers. I was going to go with that one until I noticed the coolest library card in the history of library cards and of course I had to go with that one instead.

Today is shaping up to be a good day. I've got this awesome library card, I'm not at work and I'm about to read the paper.

Is the other side "The Joy of Cooking?"
 
I recently got a library card after hearing about the 'Libby' app. You have it on your phone, and you can enter your library card information and rent/download books from your local library to your Kindle or phone. I still have my Kindle from the lockdown, but don't use it to buy much from Amazon anymore. Mainly sticking to Kindle unlimited and the library rentals. Since I don't watch much TV anymore, I turned my interest toward reading.

What I do like about the Kindle is it tracks your progress and uploads all your finished items to your Goodreads profile.

I'm currently seven chapters in to 'Leviathan Wakes', the first book in 'The Expanse' series. Pretty good so far.

Previously read list:

Before Elvis: The African-American Musicians Who Made The King - Preston Lauterbach - Pretty good historical text on the jazz, blues and gospel musicians who made Elvis, Elvis.

The Things we make - Bill Hammack - A History of everything from architecture to stuff we use every day.

Brothers - Alex Van Halen - Liked this one, great stories about DLR and how jealous he was of Eddie Van Halen's success as the face of the band. And you can feel the love he had for his brother. Great sense of humor throughout the book.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone - J.K. Rowling - Better late than never, that's a series I'll be continuing.

Friends, Lovers and the Big Terrible Thing - Matthew Perry - Sad reading it after the fact, but was a fan of the show, and of his character.

Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City - Matthew Desmond - An eye opener.

1776 - David McCullough - About then General George Washington's battle against the British for independence, and the turning point that helped win it.

The Martian - Andy Weir - Hilarious! Haven't seen the movie yet.

Educated - Tara Westover - A good one about a woman who grew up in a Survivalist/Mormon family in Idaho, and how it affected her life.

Sapiens: A Brief History of Human Kind - Yuval Noah Harari - VERY interesting! Good history/anthropology/paleontology read.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance - Robert M. Pirsig - First time reading this one, not bad!

The Left Hand of Darkness - Ursula Le Guin

I'm about 5 to 1 Non-Fiction to Fiction, but I hope to even that out soon enough.

And that's all just end of last year/beginning of this year. The whole list tops out about 80.
 
I'm about halfway through Leviathan Wakes (Expanse, Book 1) and this is a trip! It's like if Star Wars was directed by Quentin Tarantino. Can't wait to see how this ends!
 
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