What are you currently reading?

Started by facehugger, April 07, 2007, 12:36:10 AM

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Haffner

Quote from: MN Dave on March 25, 2008, 08:29:39 AM
Being entertained is all I ask when I read something like this. It's a lot of fun so far.


Alot of times that's plenty enough for anything, right?

MN Dave


Haffner

I am a certified "Zombie Movie" fanatic. People-eating zombies scare the daylights out of me, and it's fun to be scared sometimes. For me, movies like that are just entertainment (Stephen King is a good example for literature). It's great to do as that beloved Seinfeld character encouraged others to do "to not think too much", at least part of the time.

MN Dave

Quote from: Haffner on March 27, 2008, 11:17:08 AM
I am a certified "Zombie Movie" fanatic. People-eating zombies scare the daylights out of me, and it's fun to be scared sometimes. For me, movies like that are just entertainment (Stephen King is a good example for literature). It's great to do as that beloved Seinfeld character encouraged others to do "to not think too much", at least part of the time.

Oh, I'm a horror fan too, though the stuff out there lately doesn't really impress. Maybe the genre is finally dead. (I'm talking about literature, not movies, though those are fun too.)

Haffner

Quote from: MN Dave on March 27, 2008, 11:19:59 AM
Oh, I'm a horror fan too, though the stuff out there lately doesn't really impress. Maybe the genre is finally dead. (I'm talking about literature, not movies, though those are fun too.)




Yeah, I remember when I first read "The Shining","Salem's Lot", "The Stand","The Black Cat", "Call of Cthulu"...terrific stories, great reading!

MN Dave

Quote from: Haffner on March 27, 2008, 11:35:07 AM



Yeah, I remember when I first read "The Shining","Salem's Lot", "The Stand","The Black Cat", "Call of Cthulu"...terrific stories, great reading!

Hell, you listen to metal. It's almost mandatory to read horror. :)

Haffner

Quote from: MN Dave on March 27, 2008, 11:39:32 AM
Hell, you listen to metal. It's almost mandatory to read horror. :)



You are a prophet! With a really killer avatar.

Danny

Truth and Tolerance: Christian Belief and World Religions by Pope Benedict XVI:


Benedict is always a deeply insightful and stimulating read. His theology is profound and reflects that fact he's one of the most well-read and theological of popes. The first essay, from 1964, contrasting the Asian "mysticism of identity" from what he calls "monotheism revolution" and how the attitudes and approaches of the two essentialy differ and create a vastly different construct of religion that is developed over a millenia is a masterpiece of its kind, IMHO.

pjme

Ian McEwan's "On Chesil beach" - love it very much! I visited that beach last year - the sound of the pebbles, roling in the surf, is still in my ears.

Bogey

There will never be another era like the Golden Age of Hollywood.  We didn't know how to blow up buildings then so we had no choice but to tell great stories with great characters.-Ben Mankiewicz

Anne

Quote from: MN Dave on March 25, 2008, 08:12:22 AM
An entertaining science fantasy.



Would these two books appeal to a 13-yr-old boy who loved Lord of the Ring and Harry Potter books?  It's birthday time!

MN Dave

#1111
Quote from: Anne on March 31, 2008, 09:14:10 PM
Would these two books appeal to a 13-yr-old boy who loved Lord of the Ring and Harry Potter books?  It's birthday time!

I figure if he can get through Lord of the Rings, this should be no problem. So, yes, probably.

[Edit: Wait, there are some slight sexual references, so I'll say it's PG-13. And please note I haven't read the second book, so I can't tell you much about that one.]

SonicMan46

Windows Vista Annoyances (2008) by David Karp

Bought a new laptop last year that came w/ VISTA - been using these 'annoyances' books from O'Reilly for many years, so had to pick up this one which was released recently - if you are STUCK w/ this OS, then a highly recommended reference - CLICK on the image for reviews, if interested - also, excellent price at Bookpool.com:D



Anne

Quote from: MN Dave on April 01, 2008, 04:28:52 AM
I figure if he can get through Lord of the Rings, this should be no problem. So, yes, probably.

[Edit: Wait, there are some slight sexual references, so I'll say it's PG-13. And please note I haven't read the second book, so I can't tell you much about that one.]


Thanks, Dave!  Much appreciated.

rockerreds


DavidW

Dave (Sonic)-- thanks for talking about it and the links, that looks very interesting to me since I've been dealing with Vista.  I got it down to look and behave roughly like XP, but there are some strange annoyances that still float around.  I've bookmarked it now and I might order it.

SonicMan46

Quote from: DavidW on April 01, 2008, 09:54:00 AM
Dave (Sonic)-- thanks for talking about it and the links, that looks very interesting to me since I've been dealing with Vista.  I got it down to look and behave roughly like XP, but there are some strange annoyances that still float around.  I've bookmarked it now and I might order it.

Hi, David - just getting started w/ the book, but expect a 'useful' read (from my past experiences w/ these Annoyances works) - I'm pretty comfortable w/ VISTA on this new Dell laptop, but there remain some 'irritations & quirks' that I hope this book will explain.  There is also an excellent website Annoyances.org that might be of interest, if not visited before - think I've been getting these books since @ least my W2K days!  :D

BTW, had to get the new Dell because my 'beloved' IBM ThinkPad's HD DIED on me - replaced the HD & upped the RAM to 512 MB - installed Ubuntu 7.10, so I kind of alternate being my 'wireless' laptops @ home - really enjoying the LINUX experience - been taking that one on the road w/ me - just feel safer w/ it on these 'open' hotel networks!

Let us know what you think of the book, if purchased -  :)  Dave

DavidW

That's cool for you Dave, because I love Linux but since I got this new laptop none of them detect and configure my wireless card right, and I simply do not have the time to learn to do it manually.

Lilas Pastia

Being a sloooow reader, I've been reading a book titled " La Pensée antique - des présocratiques à saint Augustin" for at least three weeks, and probably won't be finished with it before next Summer. It is very well laid out, with short chapters devoted to all the philosophical currents that were emerging in ancient Greece before Socrates. I had heard the names Heraclitus and Democritus before, without knowing if they were authors, athletes or philosophers (Greece was busy breeding them like rabbits between 600-400 BC). Now I know !

According to Whitehead, "Modern philosophy is but a footnote on a page from Plato". There are indeed the germs (and stems, leaves and fruits) of just about every philosophical current when one reads about Anaxagore, Parmenides, Empedocles, Thales and Pythagoras.

Nietzsche and Marx, Sartre and Heidegger merely developed what had long been exposed before them (if sometimes imperfectly). The most interesting discovery I made while reading this is that the main difference between now and what had been said 2500 years ago lies more in the evolution of language than of thought.  Therefore, as one of the writers(*)  comments, philosophy has progressively detached itself from the common sense and capacity of understanding of the mass to evolve in a science, bundle of concepts and language that only fellow philosophers can understand.

This has long been my own contention but I'm happy to see that my intuition is abetted by the Faculty :D

(*) Sorbonne professor, ancient Greek specialist, Académie française Member and eminent hellenist Jacqueline de Romilly.