Gotten into summer of the first year. Tempted to start over and try spring again now that I know a little better how things work…

My kids have been playing this on the Switch but I got the Steam MacOS version for my laptop since we have just the one Switch.

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Standalone post link: Playing Log: Stardew Valley

This is a phenomenal book.

Gave me so much to think about with writing, learning, creativity, friendship and its failings, faith and doubt, war and peace, religion and mythology, just living life, relationships, human nature. And of course insights into the lives and works of these two authors who were so important to my own imaginative life as a child and tween.

The presentation is next-level - rather than graphic novel or narrative nonfiction it feels almost like a new thing unto itself. I never felt jarred by the transitions between print text blocks and illustrated spreads, between the fantastic and the realistic. Everything just flows, fully-integrated and inevitable, Hendrix fully in command of both writing and illustration to share all of this from many different angles at the same time, the fantastic and the realistic, logos and mythos.

Extra stars for the “portals” to mythology, fairy tales, fantasy fiction, etc. Such a great way to transform “appendices” into something fun and almost magical. And again so on-point calling back to Tolkein in particular, with his rich appendices.

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Standalone post link: Reading Log: The Mythmakers

Amazing images and atmospheres throughout this book. Among other things it made me want to take photographs, gave me new ways to think about photography. I like photography but I’m a dummy about it.

Maybe I have unfair expecations, but if I’m being honest, it feels very unfinished. Fragmentary. I gues that’s actually the point, since all we have are fragments of Stesichorus' original…

This is one of the original titles added to my Goodreads “Want-to-read” shelf, apparently clear back in August of 2008.

Not entirely clear to me why I finally sought this out and read it after 17 years¹, but I did…I guess it might be because I keep looking for novels in verse and this comes up in the library catalog and different places when I browse that genre heading, decided to put it on hold and finally read the thing before returning it to the library already overdue.

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Standalone post link: Reading Log: Autobiography of Red

Continuing in re-reading the Chronicles of Narnia with my son.

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210 - 135 202-135 67/75

Standalone post link: Reading Log: The Horse and His Boy

Listening to every track by Big Thief on shuffle because I’ve wanted to see them for years but never could, and found out they are doing a Twilight Concert in Salt Lake in September for just $20 a ticket and I got a ticket and now I just need to figure out if or how I can convince anyone in my family to go to this concert with me. No worries if not, though, I will not hesitate to go by myself.

Plus, Big Thief are current-day 4AD artists so it kind of ties back to my somewhat neglected Still in a Dream extended listening project, right?

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Standalone post link: Listening Log: Big Thief Complete Discography on Shuffle

I don’t like how this is still showing as a ‘currently reading’ book on my website after all this time, so, though I am not finished with the overall shoegaze/dreampop/4AD/90s rock listening project (mission creep and distraction) I am marking this ‘completed’ as a book.

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2024-12-16

This is more listening than reading, but it is formatted as an actual book with probably 40+ pages of liner notes and essays to go along with 5 compilation discs to listen to. Since I did sit down and read it like a book, I’m listing it as reading as well. I’m not marking it as completed yet because I haven’t finished listening to all of the songs, nor my various side quest deep dives into individual albums and artists associated with this compilation and era.

I happened upon this in the Salt Lake City Public Library catalog while I was searching for something else, and I’m so glad I did get the physical copy. Having all the essays and band biographies there at hand was so helpful, and I think this is much more thorough than some random “Shoegaze and Dream Pop” playlist one could get from the streaming platforms. Also, though this comp is offered on the streaming platforms, the physical version is much more generous, with more than double the tracks of the streaming version, including many from the most notable artists. No My Bloody Valentine though. (It’s okay, I already have their stuff.)

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Standalone post link: Reading Log: Still in a Dream - A Story of Shoegaze 1988-1995

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Standalone post link: Reading Log: Poetry January/February 2025 - Young People's Poetry

I updated my now page today. This post snapshots the current version.

Now

• support, training, troubleshooting around our library management software +

  guiding the library and technology staff in my school district through several recent software updates and other technical changes to our library and resource management software (Destiny)

• curation and collection development in between all the tech support +

  filling student purchase recommendations, buying more copies of the most popular books, and making fun collections in our ebook/audiobook platform for students (Sora)

• rewilding most of my yard +

  took one of the recent mild, warm days off to plant a bunch of native wildflower seeds in pots just before the current snowstorms - may still have been a waste of time at this point as I should have done this back in the late fall, but hopefully the weather will stay cool enough for a few more weeks for them to be cold stratified and at least some of them will grow and I can put them in the ground later (I discovered last year that sowing directly into the ground during a woodchip grass/weed smother didn’t really work)

• cooking real food occasionally +

  examples: I sort of figured out stir fry finally, I recently made a homemade chocolate sauce/syrup that I really love, and I spent way too much money on a shipment of single origin spices from Burlap & Barrel that arrived last night

• spending many evenings playing euchre and rummy 500 on CardzMania.com +

  Yes, that’s ‘cardzmania’ with a ‘z’ - this isn’t really a problem except for it is what I am doing instead of other things I supposedly want to be doing like reading, writing, working on this website, or even playing other video games

• listening to every track by Big Thief on shuffle +

  because I’ve wanted to see them for years but never could, and found out they are doing a Twilight Concert in Salt Lake in September for just $20 a ticket and I got a ticket and now I just need to figure out if or how I can convince anyone in my family to go to this concert with me - no worries if not, though, I will not hesitate to go by myself

Next

• rebrand our old “Get Outside!” Sora collection as “Touch Grass,” and also get outside more myself (though probably not literally touch grass because I already smothered our grass with woodchips)
• get even more serious and official about this rewilding thing and apply for the Utah Pollinator Habitat Program
• try cooking more real things with all these new spices I just got
• make using this website and sharing things on the internet a consistent part of my life again

This reflects my ‘now’ page update of March 15, 2025. Please visit that main now page to see my dynamic log galleries, as well as an archive of prior and newer ‘now’ updates.¹

Credit for the ‘now’ page concept goes to Derek Sivers. I tend to get aspirational when I update it, so I’ve decided to embrace that by calling it ‘now and next.’

Standalone post link: Now and Next (March 15, 2025)

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Standalone post link: Reading Log: Abandon Me

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Standalone post link: Reading Log: Hell Followed With Us