Book, Blog and Subscription Recommendations

Judi, I agree with Gwen.. with McManus, you can just grab any of the books and you will enjoy them. I liked the earlier ones the best... tied for my favs are "They Shoot Canoes, Don't They?" and "Real Ponies Don't Go Oink". My favorite story (keep in mind that I come from a hunting family) is "My First Deer and Welcome to It". Still can't get through that one without giggling hysterically!

Kymm, We cross posted. I agree that the sharing of a good giggle is a joy all in itself!

I agree... I prefer to read vs. listen as well... which is sad for my husband because he really likes to read outloud, but it just puts me to sleep...

On long road trips we've listened to Nero Wolfe's on tape... those are fun... :)

I've been to PEI, Anne of Green Gable's house... The whole area was a little more farm-land than I imagined... Farms on the sea... Very cool, and very nice people! They love their yard sales... Almost every neighborhood had one going on the Saturday I was there... and I got the impression it was not anything unusual... Yard sales there are a communiy bonding-thing for sure... Very cute!!

I just ordered a couple of McManus books from Amazon for DH for Father's Day; I hope he likes them! He has a deerstand in our woods and got a couple of does last winter, so the subject matter looked like a good fit.

I've been looking at Solar and trying to decide whether to get it on my Kindle. One amusing thing about the difference between the Kindle and a regular book: my DH complains that it's perfectly silent and you can't hear pages turning. I guess he views that as a soothing sound when I'm reading an actual book in paper.

Kymmco, I have the same issue with being a very rapid reader; I don't like the pace of audio books, either!

This message was edited May 30, 2010 12:42 PM

Greenhouse-gal, you have a very observing husband. I used to like the sound of my kids turning pages as they read.

I thought that was an interesting thing to notice, too! He has a good background in music (he plays for fun, not professionally) and I think he's more tuned in to auditory phenomena than I am.

I didn't realize the kindle type things were slow. I'm also a very fast reader. so you can't just 'turn' a page immediately?

Oh, no, I was talking about audio books and people reading them aloud at a slower rate than I would with my eyes.

I did have to make the Kindle print smaller so more would fit on a page, since I read in sweeps and it would be too much of a hassle to keep turning the pages so much more frequently.

GreenhouseGal, I have been interested in Kindle, but find that hours spent in front of a puter monitor crosses my eyes. Are you OK to read long spurts without eyestrain? DH would absolutely love it if I wasn't turning pages during my insomniac moments.....

Have any of you read Saving CeeCee Honeycutt by Beth Hoffman?
Still in hard cover. This is her first novel. Very happy short little read. I mostly trade my books at a used book store but this one I want to keep.

I've had it on hold at the library since early April. Don't know why it's taking so long. They have 35 copies and I'm #17, so that's like a two to one ratio, I should have it by now!

Oh, definately page turning pleasure, and the smell of paper! Books for me, please. I just don't find the idea of reading on computer comfortable. But even more, I am rather partial (no, extremely partial) to a library: mine, others, public, academic, specialist - there is something about a room full of books that seems, to me, an essential part of civilization. It is something about the need to be physically in touch with generations, their ideas, their presence, their efforts. I honestly fear the loss of the physical presence of books - it somehow makes me feel as though we lose the possibility of choice. I do appreciate technological advancements, but replacing books just doesn't feel like one to me. It makes me sad.

AND - having said all of that, we had to refloor the library this winter (don't ask, just imagine) and had to move all the books up into the attic, and then back again. And put them back on their shelves - I definately thought about thinning out some of them. Maybe next year. Or maybe I'll leave it to who ever inherits.

I hope I don't live to see the day when books are no longer being made. Sad indeed.

We will just have to keep accumulating and going to libraries. Didn't they build a new fab public library in Seattle? And there is a new massive one in Alexandria (which spent so much money on the building they can't afford to stock, and one in Lausanne sponsored by Rolex!

I loaded a dictionary on my Nook and it is useless. It takes too long to get to a page. I can't get used to the darn thing. So I load a few books on and tell the kids (they gave it to me) that I use it all the time. Little white lie.

Hmmm - I was able to load a French-English dictionary on my Kindle and use it as the default. If I'm reading something in French and come to a word I don't know, I bring the cursor to that word and a translation appears in a box at the bottom. Granted there are some words it doesn't translate; what I'm reading right now is Alphonse Daudet's Lettres de mon moulin, which is fun to dip into because it's a series of short tales, but the language is a bit dated.

The one I tried was a medical dictionary. Not so good.

Not if you're trying to look things up out of context with what you're reading on the Nook. But doesn't it have a search feature? Kindle has "Search this book."

It does have a search feature but too slow - I'm impatient about these kinds of things. So I use a "real" medical dictionary or my laptop.

I'm impatient, too; I'd probably do the same thing. The Kindle awakens slowly and in general isn't as speedy as my Mac, but I think it does what it's designed to do well enough for all that!

So what about blogs? I've got a few to recommend:

Faster Than Kudzu (http://www.joshilynjackson.com/ftk/): The blog of author Joshilyn Jackson. I love her books and would recommend them heartily to anyone here - novels set in the South with a great sense of place and storie (Beyond Georgia, Gods in Alabama, The Girl Who Stopped Swimming). But I've been reading her blog for years and it's hilarious, and frequently updated.

For gardening, I read and like:
Gardening Without Skills (http://gardeningwithoutskills.blogspot.com/): Learning to garden in Florida. She cracks me up, worth a glance thru her archives.
DigginFood (http://www.digginfood.com/): Local Seattle blog by Willi Galloway (contributor to KUOW's weekly garden panel). Focuses on edibles with gorgeous pictures and recipes.
Dig in with Kym (http://blog.oregonlive.com/kympokorny/index.html): Gardening blog from The Oregonian.
Dulcy Mahar columns from the Oregonian (http://www.oregonlive.com/hg/index.ssf/dulcy_mahar_columns/index.html)
Plant Talk (http://www.valeaston.com/): Valerie Easton's blog - Seattle/Whidbey Island based
Annie's Kitchen Garden (http://annieskitchengarden.blogspot.com/): Square Foot Gardening in Eastern Washington (plus some cute dauchsands - and a bunny).

I use Google Reader to manage my blog list. You can add any blog that has an RSS feed to Google Reader. I put all my gardening blogs into a Gardening folder/topic and then I can go to that topic and see all my unread posts in one place. Very handy.

So, any more blog suggestions, gardening or otherwise?

Yay, thank you for listing these. I know digginfood and she has a list of favorite blogs on her site, too.

I have not been able to figure out google reader. I've tried. I like the blogs where you can subscribe and have new posts come straight to your inbox. the rss feed thing is just too complicated for me. I've tried so many times...

Now isn't this strange? I have no problem listening to books on MP3. I actually really love it. But I have no interest at all in getting a Kindle or anything like that. If I'm going to actually 'read' a book, I want the feel of a book the turning of the pages,etc. Maybe it's because I was read to as a child and I learned to appreciate a good story teller. It does make a difference if the reader is good, or if the voice is right. I've stopped listening to books if the narrator is poor or has bad habits. It interferes with the story. Reading aloud has always been a family activity at my house, so I guess listening to books on some kind of device (used to be tapes, then CDs, and now MP3 files) feels about the same to me.

I remember when the Harry Potter books were coming out, one about every year. My kids and I used to go to the bookstore at midnight for the 'coming out' party to get our copy, which had already been reserved and paid for. Then I spent hours reading those books to the entire family. Even my husband listened. I clearly remember reading The Goblet of Fire at a restaurant while we were waiting to be seated. No one wanted to stop reading (I had been reading to them in the car) but everyone was hungry. So we just took the book inside with us. Good times!

Laurie, I thought of you tonight. My Dh and I went sailing today and when we came back to the dock, there was a new boat docked by ours and the owner had the cutest little Norwich Terrier named Pearl. She was completely adorable and I wanted to take her home with me.

Aren't these spoon plant markers cute? http://www.digginfood.com/2010/02/vintage-spoon-plant-tags/ I wonder how she seals them. anyone got any ideas?

Those are cute, Gwen. She says it's "a moisture and UV-resistant finish", so I'll bet you could go to the hardware store and find something that would work. Maybe spar varnish or something along those lines.

Thank you Pix - Norwich are really cute - lovely shape to them. But I think I'm going to wait for another Fox Terrier. There is just something about them.

Those spoon tags are definitely cute; looks like she spent a lot of time on them, too! I use those rectangular metal tags with stiff wire legs that you write on, but my black grease pencil or whatever it was cracked after spending the winter in my greenhouse!

We have a Labradoodle that we really love. She's three, and is a great pup: smart, doesn't shed, and has a merry, eager-to-please disposition. I've never been acquainted with any fox terriers but I like our dog's curls.

Gwen, I would post a comment on DigginFood and ask her about what she uses to seal those. She seem to answer comments very quickly and really appreciate knowing that someone is reading!

And if you want to give Google Reader one more try, I've found the easiest way to use it for 90% of blogs is just to use the Add a Subscription button at the top and type in the name of the blog (like DigginFood). It will come up with a list of RSS feeds that it thinks matches and you just click the one you want to add.

There are a few that don't work this way, but if anyone wants info on how to add the other type I'm happy to help.

DigginFood isn't the one who made them. She just posted on her blog. They're made by someone who sells on Etsy, so that person probably isn't apt to tell her 'secrets.'

I will try that technique on Google Reader and see if I can't get that to work. Thanks for the tip!

SmittenKitchen blog. Great food. GlutenFreeGirl - great for people who can't eat gluten! I try to stay away from to many blogs because I end up spending too many hours with my laptop.

Maybe she uses a sort of marine varnish.

I just always think of you when I see small terriers of any kind. Pearl was the sweetest little thing and just the right size for her owner's boat. She came aboard ours and was very well behaved.

Gwen, something you could use for those spoons is fiberglass resin. You can buy a kit at Lowe's for about 20$, made by elmer's glue people. It's a two part resin, like epoxy, and you can use a brush to put it on. You'd want to glue the labels on first, then you can coat with this stuff. It's weather proof and UV resistant. Use a sponge brush as it pretty much ruins the brush once you've used it. Mixed as per directions, it begins curing in about 20 minutes. You can play with that a little by adding more or fewer drops of the hardener.

Or perhaps the ubiquitous Modge Podge? That's usually my first stab, and I typically have some hanging around for grandchild projects.

Does that stand up to weather and UV? I can't remember.

Anything by Anita Shreve.

Somerset Maughn. I just read Painted Veil, hadn't read it before and it made me think of 'Of Human Bondage' and Cakes and Ale. there is something so odd about his writing - I really enjoy reading it, but I always walk by his work with a dismissive shrug - as if it is too light. But the characters always stay with me, I often find myself just recalling them - nothing to strenuous, just recalling. He is quite remarkable.

JB Priestly and Arnold Bennett are in a similar genre - they are a good, comfortable read - and yet the characterizations are world class - just marvellous reads. VERY English.

Wow- I have a copy of The Painted Veil that belonged to my grandparents. I've never gotten around to reading it though.

I used to love dipping into Maugham's The Cosmopolitans, a group of his short stories. Not as good as Saki, but fun nonetheless. And what about Nevil Shute? Anyone read him? Not just On the Beach and A Town Like Alice, but Trustee from the Toolroom and Pied Piper and many others. Sometimes they're a bit uneven, but his faith in human nature comes through and he tells a good yarn.