roundup, catchup

Well, I figure I haven’t posted here in long enough (due to an abundance of overwork) that it’s time for a little something, so here’s a roundup of things I’ve been thinking about/up to.

first of all, i got a car. woah. granted, i presume most 26 year olds in the US who have the means to own one have a car since it is near impossible to live here without one, but i have been fortunate enough to live in one of the few metropolitan areas where it is not even close to a necessity. it's been something i've been thinking of for about a year, planning out if i had the money and the initiative to drive all the time. last year i moved to a location a bit further from 'everything' and my friends have been consistently moving further from public transit (due to cost) and the cost of public transit has been going up up up, so that now it is not so much of a financial tradeoff to have a car versus using the train. which is sad.

but there you have it. to note, i got a little scion xA, which so far i like and it gets good gas mileage, as cars go.

I was among many others in my sadness to hear about the Pluto demotion.
I grew up with pluto as one of the nine, and in my heart it will always be a planet. I mean, who didn’t like plucky little pluto?

I’m on vacation this week, but not doing much besides relaxing and catching up on errands and household chores and duties. Plus hanging out with chaucer, who has been mommy deprived with all my working. We’re just about to celebrate his first birthday, and he got this as his present.

I also thought I’d start talking about what I’m reading.

Currently, I’m reading “collapse” by jared diamond. it's not as good as "guns, germs and steel", which i highly recommend, so it's taking me awhile to get through it. he basically looks as societies which have succeeded or failed in the past so as to apply those lessons to today's societies. i'm only about half way and he's covered all the polynesian islands, the 'american' southwest, and the vikings (greenland, iceland, etc). academically his reasoning seems good, but it's just not as compelling a read.

I'm also reading "reefer madness" by eric schlosser, the guy who wrote "fast food nation" (another really good one if you haven't read it). "reefer madness" is also really good but depressing. it's all about the black market and how it is a natural product of capitalism and it focuses on marijauna, strawberry harvesting (and thus "illegal" immigrant labor), and pornography. i've read the first two sections thus far which are really depressing because of how draconian our marijuana laws are and how miserable life is for people working to harvest the food that we all eat. i'm curious to read the final section because, while i am for the legalization of marijuana and against shutting people out of this country, i am also anti-porn which will be interesting.

i'm also reading "hungry planet", which is a beautiful book which profiles families all over the world focusing on what they eat. each family is presented with the food they eat for the week. it's very interesting and powerful to see how food intake varies across the world, considering food/water is probably the most important aspect of our life (closely tied with health and healthcare, imo, altho the two are obviously related in many ways).

finally, i'm reading the latest issue of bitch magazine. which is always great, and i just picked up bitchfest at my local bookstore to add to the queue. i encourage everyone to buy a copy to support this wonderful, feminist endeavor.