dollar dollar books, yo

So booksales abounded (abound? abint? abinded?) this past week at UVic. First there was the United Way booskale -- some people might choose to invert the "s" and "k" in that, but I wouldn't want to bore you, Gentle Reader -- where I found the following at $2 apiece:

x The Holy Bible (this edition pudlished in 1930 -- bought it for a directed reading)
x Trapp's translation of the Tao Teh Ching
x Man Against Myth, Barrows Dunham
x The Daily Planet Book of Cool Ideas: Global Warming and What People Are Doing About It, Jay Ingram
x The Big Over Easy, Jasper Fforde

The "Hurt Penguins" sale at the UVic bookstore was also fruitful. For a combined total of $25.00, I walked away with such riveting titles as

x The Genome War: How Craig Venter Tried to Capture the Code of Life and Save the World, James Shreeve
x The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God, Carl Sagan ed. by Ann Druyan
x Breaking Trail: A Climbing Life, Arlene Blum
x The Survival Imperative: Using Space to Protect Earth, William Burrows
x Branding Only Works on Cattle: The New Way to Get Known (and Drive Your Competitors Crazy), Johnathan Salem Baskin
x Why the Dalai Lama Matters: His Act of Truth as the Solution for China, Tibet, and the World, Robert Thurman

Phew! Now, if the majority of these are read by next spring, I will be utterly (I'd say "udderly," but you can't see all of the covers so the caustic wit would be lost to the universe) shocked. Lots of dystopia, there, but also models for change; hopefully a leasta few of the posited solutions are workable ones! I'll let you know if anything especially remarkable comes to fruition.

Also, as a side, but possibly more exciting, note, I met Laurie Ricou yesterday evening, completely by chance of peer pressure and filled chairs. His Salal is one of my favourite works of criticism I've newly read in ages.

what's the rush?

Perhaps a better question would be, "Where's the rush? Who's the rush? When? Why?" The title of this particular webcomic is particularly enlightening: "Orgasms are great, but why skip the sex?" Why are we so concerned with endings and beginnings? What about everything in between, the actual living, the life? What's the point of music you ignore? Just where are you trying to get? Let it be, kid. Let it be.