August '08 brought us to the Standard Hotel, hosted by Summer. A perfect location as apparently a lot of Spook Country by William Gibson was set there, but unfortunately no-one got through the whole thing. It was okay though because it was a lovely night and we drank lots of sangria and had good eats by the pool. All was well until the end when we were sitting in the lobby and I got scolded for taking pictures of the chick who sits in a glass case behind reception. Assholes.
September's meeting was hosted by Dana and the book was In Defense Of Food by Michael Pollan. I was in Vegas for work and missed this one which is too bad since I bought the book. I don't know what they ate, but I hope no-one spoiled the party and brought Ding Dongs. I still plan to read this book and not just because I have since learned that this book was written by Michael J. Fox's brother in law.
October was hosted Lien and once again, I managed to slide under the radar for my poor form of not reading. There was a huge turnout for this one as I imagine the promise of screening a Bruce Lee movie to accompany his book Artist of Life is a good motivator. I was terribly late which was lame since I lived across the street at the time, and as I drank wine on an empty stomach I don't remember much after the first 30 minutes or so.
November, again I missed. Not sure why this time. This month's book came about by nominations from those of us with high attendance (though not necessarily great reading records). Lisa, myself, Mike, Summer, Chris and Tom each nominated a book and that list was put out and ultimately Tom's choice of Steppenwolf by Hermann Hesse won. This meeting was held at the Red Lion and hit some chaos as the planned destination turned out to be riddled with a weekly trivia night. I can't recall why I didn't go, but something must have been up to miss the 2-year anniversary of book club. Clearly this blog tells you little to nothing about the books we read, but hopefully you are enjoying learning how one thrives in a book club without the aid of books. The week after this, once we knew about the trivia night, Summer, Chris, Sohrab and I went back for trivia.
December's book was Deer Hunting with Jesus by Joe Bageant. I did not attend again as I was in England and was busy dancing on stage with Supergrass during their Christmas show. Never have I been so glad to miss book club. Having said that, I am proud to announce that I went ahead and read this book in January, quelling rumours that had begun to surface that I was a complete boob. I had heard of this book before book club, hence my enthusiasm for it, but I was a little disappointed by it, if memory serves. His tone was a little annoying and I didn't see him really presenting any worthwhile solutions to the problem of red state folks being more or less duped into voting against their own interests. It made things seem kinda bleak, but I guess if they are, they are.
Sohrab hosted his first meeting in January with Bowl of Cherries by Millard Kauffman and again I missed it. I was on my way there, but got tied up catching up with a friend I hadn't seen in a while. Kaufman passed away just two months after this meeting, aged 92.
February was skipped for lack of a host, which brings us to March which was hosted by me. It was a delight to host in my lovely new apartment and I was able to comfortably accommodate the crowd of twelve or so. The book was Naked by David Sedaris which, due to it's ease of reading and existing popularity, may have won the award for the book most read at a meeting. Most had read all of it and the remainders had at least read some or listened to the audio recording. The book was great and reinforced my love of David Sedaris which began last year after someone nominated When You Are Engulfed In Flames. I read it even though it didn't win (see, I'm not so bad)
Mike hosted in March at his condo and sadly there was no rec room use nor end of meeting hot tubbing like the last time. We did close watching some gems on YouTube on the big screen, but before that, we did talk about the book, The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell.
I liked this book a lot, but it seemed the general consensus was that a lot of what he said was obvious and that in the years after the book's first printing, some of Gladwell's fact were debunked. This made me feel like a bit of a dolt, but I still think there is a lot to be drawn from it. I will say that upon searching for an image for this blog, I stumbled upon Gladwell's picture. May I just say that if had seen his picture before I read the book, I'd surely have doubted his credibility about pretty much anything.
Malcolm Gladwell
So that brings us up to date! I shall now resume regular blog entries...at least that's the plan.
