Books! Books! Books!

I was at Angus & Robertson today and I picked up a copy of their Top 100 as voted by YOU, the Australian Public.

Now we all know popularity doesn't automatically mean worthwhile since a lot of people are morons. But, it's a useful indicator of what is worth investigating so you can make your own decisions. Also, it's also safe to assume that people who actually read might be a little more trustworthy than average. However, I may be biased because I'm a bibliophile.

Anyway, the point I'm trying to make is that I'm going to try to read all the books on the list. I've said this before about other lists and given it a go. Fortunately the lists have a core that doesn't change so each time I try it, I get closer to my goal.

This is the list as it stands so far. Key: read | partly read | unread

1. Harry Potter Series - J.K. Rowling
2. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
3. The Lord of the Rings - J.R.R. Tolkien
4. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Power of One - Bryce Courtenay
7. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
8. My Sister's Keeper - Jodi Picoult
9. Magician - Raymond E. Feist
10. Angels and Demons - Dan Brown
11. Cloudstreet - Tim Winton
12. The Bronze Horseman - Paullina Simons
13. It - Stephen King
14. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
15. April Fool's Day - Bryce Courtenay
16. Mao's Last Dancer - Li Cunxin
17. Eragon - Christopher Paolini
18. The Hobbit - J.R.R. Tolkien
19. Gone with the Wind - Margaret Mitchell
20. Good News Bible
21. Jessica - Bryce Courtenay
22. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
23. Alchemist - Paulo Coelho
24. The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
25. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
26. Nineteen Eighty-four - George Orwell
27. Ice Station - Matthew Reilly
28. The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
29. A Fortunate Life - A. B. Facey & Robert Juniper
30. Cross Stitch - Diana Gabaldon
31. Perfume - Patrick Suskind
32. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
33. The God of Small Things - Arundhati Roy
34. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
35. The Book Thief - Markus Zusak
36. Little Women - Louisa M. Alcott
37. Tully - Paullina Simons
38. Shantaram - Roberts Gregory David
39. Wild Swans - Jung Chang
40. The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
41. Angela's Ashes - Frank McCourt
42. Tuesdays with Morrie - Mitch Albom
43. The Pillars of the Earth - Ken Follett
44. The Potato Factory - Bryce Courtenay
45. The Reef - Di Morrissey
46. The Poisonwood Bible - Barbara Kingsolver
47. A Child Called It - Dave Pelzer
48. Clan of the Cave Bear - Jean M. Auel
49. The Memory Keeper's Daughter - Kim Edwards
50. Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
51. Emma - Jane Austen
52. The Thorn Birds - Colleen McCullough
53. The Horse Whisperer - Nicholas Evans
54. Marley and Me - John Grogan
55. River God - Wilbur Smith
56. One for the Money - Janet Evanovich
57. The Pact - Jodi Picoult
58. The Five People You Meet in Heaven - Mitch Albom
59. Animal Farm - George Orwell
60. The Godfather - Mario Puzo
61. The Ancient Future - Traci Harding
62. The Great Gatsby - F.Scott Fitzgerald
63. Year of Wonders - Geraldine Brooks
64. Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
65. Dirt Music - Tim Winton
66. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
67. The Notebook - Nicholas Sparks
68. The Stand - Stephen King
69. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
70. Interview with the Vampire - Anne Rice
71. Scarecrow - Matthew Reilly
72. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
73. A Million Little Pieces - James Frey
74. Across the Nightingale Floor - Lian Hearn
75. Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
76. Assassin's Apprentice - Robin Hobb
77. Dune - Frank Herbert
78. The Bride Stripped Bare - Anonymous
79. Girl With a Pearl Earring - Tracy Chevalier
80. War and Peace - L.N. Tolstoy
81. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - Hunter S. Thompson
82. Anna Karenina - L.N. Tolstoy
83. The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde
84. The Celestine Prophecy - James Redfield
85. The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood
86. Flowers in the Attic - Virginia Andrews
87. Plain Truth - Jodi Picoult
88. Kane and Abel - Jeffrey Archer
89. The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
90. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
91. Brave New World -Aldous Huxley
92. The Other Boleyn Girl - Philippa Gregory
93. The Secret River - Kate Grenville
94. The Devil Wears Prada - Weisberger Lauren
95. Four Fires - Bryce Courtenay
96. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
97. Rich Dad, Poor Dad - Robert T. Kiyosaki
98. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
99. The Poet - Michael Connelly
100. Desert Flower - Waris Dirie

I can't believe I've only read 24 of these. I'd like to know how many books I've read.

Johari Window

Jen had a link to this on her blog, and I decided to get one of my own.

Johari Window

It's a way of comparing how you think of yourself to how others see you.

From the Ashes of the First Stars

Space is a beautiful place.

Ok, it's just an artist's impression of what a primordial quasar as it might have been, but it's still rather nice. NASA has a whole lotta photos that are really fascinating.

I want a wide angle lens!

I stumbled across a wonderful photographer today called Valerio P, whose photos are quite spectacular. Well worth a look.

Makes me want to go out and buy a wide angle lens for my camera though. Anyone wanna give me $1000?

The space time continuum

I have discovered that the later I get out of bed, the less time it takes me to get to work. Today I got up at 8:30 and was at work at 9:30. Last week I was getting up at 8 and getting to work at 9:15. I tried getting up at 7:30 and I got here at 9. So by extrapolation I could get up at 12 and be at work by 11, thereby solving the problem of time travel. With the added advantage of there never being any paradoxes since I'd still be in bed.

It's a nipple conspiracy!

Have you noticed a change in manequins recently? Ok, I started noticing a while ago, and I don't know when it started. But they all have huge, obvious nipples now. Why does a manequin need nipples? And who makes these sorts of decisions anyway?

Was the manequin design business taken over by one nipple-obsessed person? Or did a bunch of them get together at a convention and decide to make a move toward anatomically correct models? Because it's not just one brand. Manequins of all types have nipples that could take your eye out, even through a thick, wooly cardigan! Notice they've got no faces though. I'm not sure how anatomically correct that is.

Strong latte and a well-toasted banana bread with butter

I'm a regular! I have achieved that sort after status of coffee drinkers everywhere. The ability to walk into your cafe for your morning coffee and just have to nod.

I am known, possibly affectionately, as "Strong latte with a well-toasted banana bread with butter".

Delicious

I bought frozen raspberries the other day to use on pancakes. I had a bunch left over though, already thawed out so I tried putting them in a glass, mushing them up and mixing them with lemonade to make authentic raspberry lemonade. And it was great. A bit lumpy, but the texture just adds interest.

To make it even more interesting, I mixed in some vanilla vodka and now it's fantastic. The best cocktails are made with fresh fruit, not fruit liquers, if you ask me. I'm not sure if they work out cheaper or not though. Berries cost so much. Full of vitamins though, so it's a healthier way to drink booze at least.

Fantastic

Discovered a brilliant new podcast called Logically Critical. It's very clever and funny and covers a wide range of topics.

If you're not registered for Digg.com already you should. You can find great podcasts like this one, as well as lots of other websites and videos. You can also boost the popularity of podcasts like this one.

Cooper

I went to Lennox Head over easter hol and met my newphew Cooper for the first time. I took some photos of him, even though all he can really do yet is lie there.

The best way to convert a photo like this to black and white is to go into the channels pallette and select only the red channel. If you look at just the red channel, even the blotchiest skin is rendered smooth, with no need for the healing tool.

Next, you need to split the channels, which will make a seperate new file for each colour. You can delete the blue and green channels. They will probably look horrid anyway. Convert the red file back to RGB so you can work with it.

Another trick I learnt from Yervant is to then copy the main layer, and do a Diffuse Glow filter on it. That's under Filters > Distort > Diffuse Glow. The file needs to be prety big for it to work though, otherwise the filter overpowers the image. Next, drop the opacity of the glow layer til it's more subtle. Ta da. You have a lovely soft focus image.

Walking cliche

I saw a woman today who was a walking cliche. She was overly tanned, bleach blonde, tight skirt, big boobs and obvious cleavage.

I happened to be going the same way as her so I followed behind her for a couple of blocks. Out of interest, I watched the men who walked by to see their reaction to her. To their credit not one of them gave her more than a cursory glance. Being the cynic that I am, I was suprised and impressed. So grats to them for not being cliches as well.

Babies and my nephew in particular

My brother and his wife recently had a baby. He's called Cooper and he's my first nephew. Anyone who knows me at all, knows I know next to nothing about babies, and generally have little interest in them beyond that they make good subjects for photos. Which is why it was so difficult shopping for a card and present for him today.

I had planned to get this gorgeous toy dog I saw in a shop in Neutral Bay, but it's going to be difficult to get back there before Saturday when I'm supposed to fly up to see them. And why would a baby want a stuffed toy anyway? He probably doesn't at his age, and as he gets older he'll probably go for cars and stuff. Stuffed toys are far more for the people giving them and for decorating the room I reckon. And looking around in the city, I didn't find a single other toy that was any better. Anything I thought would be interesting is for far older kids and I have no idea what a baby would actually like. So no present yet.

I did get a card though. After much looking and gagging at just how twee baby cards are. Apart from the fact that they are, without fail, pink for girls and blue for boys which is just stupid, they are so revoltingly cutesy. Cards are in general - when they aren't crude birthday cards - but baby cards are probably second only to wedding cards in their sickly sweetness. It might seem the obvious thing for a baby card, but it's such a cliche it doesn't seem at all sincere.

So, I was pleased to find a cool brand of cards that used more unusual phrasing to get the feelings across. I looked at one that said "Happy Mr Aardvark, delighted at being the first in the dictionary, sends lots of affection your way" (or something like that). I was going to get it until I saw this one.

Inside I'll write "Welcome to the world. We're glad to have you here".

Scientific Literacy

I have spent a lot of time in the past weeks listening to a podcast called The Skeptics Guide to the Universe. One of the topics that came up was scientific literacy. They said literacy in the US was only at 25% which sounds ludicrously low, especially when they implied that the tests carried out were about basic science facts.

I found an article though that talks about how literacy is about concepts not facts, which makes a lot more sense. Try taking this test and seeing how literate you are.

I'm ashamed to say I failed! Only 8 wrong but still a fail. I intend to read the whole thing though (it explains all the answers) so it doesn't happen again.

Once you take the test, leave me a comment with your score so I can gauge how clever you all are.

Let's start with something I want

I destroy microphones. I've gone through at least 4 since I started using vent. The main reason is that they are tethered to the computer and I forget about that and yank on the cord constantly when I go to get up or sit on it or something. I'm also ctalk to myself when I forget to put it back on after sitting back down.

The solution? Bluetooth! My PC is already bluetooth compatible becuase it's a laptop and of course my phone is too. I wasn't sure a mobile headpiece would work on a PC but after doing a little research I found out that yes, as long as it can be paired to more than one device, I could happily use one with both a PC and my phone.

This means that

1. I can use vent without trashing another mic
2. I can use vent while I am walking around the house
3. I can use my phone without holding it to my ear which I hate doing and
4. I can listen to podcasts/music on my phone without the need for headphone cables

Even more ideal would be if I could get vent to play through the earpiece while all the other game sounds went through regular speakers.

I had planned to get this retro handset since I don't have a home phone, to make talking on the phone more pleasant. The earpiece would be much more convenient I think, but the handset would be handy to have for visitors.