Neanderpundit

I have a huge reading habit. I spend a LOT of time at libraries when I can’t afford to buy books, and I read at a rate of about a book a day.

This week I’ve been reading True North by Jim Harrison.

I have only ever read one other book by Jim Harrison, and that was “the Road Home”.

I have spent the week reading this book, and I’m not exactly sure why.
The whole book is written in first person by a relentlessly self absorbed fool of a boy/man who never stops wondering how to not fuck up his own life to LIVE his own life.

Harrison has a way of telling you the story that’s a bit infuriating and at the same time, sucks you in, hard. He tells you the end of the story, and then backs up to tell you the meat of the story, and after a while, you don’t mind so much.

I’m not exactly sure what makes True North resonate so well with me, if it’s the setting, (the narrator spends most of his time in the wilderness fishing or reading) if it’s the slow descent into madness of the narrator, or if it’s the description of the landscape, which, if you have any personal experience with the UP you can practically sit on every stump he describes. I read so much, such a large volume of work, that I often don’t take the time to enjoy it; this book was different, I kept putting it down when I was not tired nor tired of reading, I had to stop and absorb the things I’d read.

I don’t know if I’d personally reccomend this book, because I think it might not be to most people’s taste. Me, I liked it enough that I’ll try to find a first edition.
I will re-read it again and again. I will go back and read all of Harrison’s work, just to see if this was a fluke or if he’s always like this, and I will be pleased if he is.

Today, in Condi Rice’s confirmation hearings:(Bloomberg)

Boxer questioned Rice’s credibility, citing past statements on Iraq that appeared to contradict subsequent findings, including her prewar warnings that Iraq was stockpiling banned weapons, assisted the al-Qaeda terrorist network, and tried to buy thousands of high-strength aluminum tubes only suitable for nuclear weapons programs.

Rice said she “never ever lost respect for the truth in the service of anything.” She then told Boxer: “ I really hope that you will refrain from impugning my integrity.”
Or, in Ogspeak:

“Shut the fuck up before I slap you down like the insignificant moron you are, you tree hugging liberal fuckface. You wouldn’t know truth if it jumped up and bit your saggy ass”

I am still learning things about Ms Rice, and I haven’t formed a lot of opinions yet about what kind of a public servant she is; but I like her more as a person, with every breath she takes, with everything she says.

No, it doesn’t hurt that she’s cute. And she’s 50!!! As Ms Ochieng says, Black don’t crack.

A good looking, brilliant woman as Secretary of State. We live in wondrous times, my friends.

Update: Confirmed

It may be that I am beyond the abnormal; I don’t do sports. I have never had even the slightest inclination to either watch, or play, any kind of sports, thought i had the opportunity and was drafted into doing so on a painfully regular basis through my youth.

I played soccer, basketball, some baseball. I got coralled into playing golf. I played football with neighbor kids.

I wasn’t the best at any of these sports, but neither did I completely suck.I probably could have gone on to be, well, something more than mediocre, anyway.

Fact was, it all annoyed me. I didn’t see the point in any of it, didn’t see the point in competing like that, didn’t see the point in winning or losing a battle where nobody died.

I grew up on flyfishing, and quail hunting, and dog running, and rabbit hunting. I loved being in the woods, on the water, loved being involved in the process of life and death and eating or being eaten. I resolved that I would stay on top of the food chain as long as I could. I also loved working, and getting paid for work. I examined sports from either of two directions: A hunt which didn’t end up feeding me anything, or a job which didn’t pay me at all. I abstained.

Watching someone else play a game that I wouldn’t play myself, well, that was just asinine beyond words.

So, to the confession. No, the above wasn’t it, I am not ashamed of my mindset and would never apologise for it.

the confession is, last saturday, between one automobile repair and another, I did something I never expected to do.

I watched part of a football game.

No, i didn’t watch it all, and i didn’t even notice who was playing. One team had red shirts and white pants, and the other team were, oh, I don’t know, gold? Anyway, it was as boring as I could imagine anything being.

So I thought up some things that could make those games a WHOLE lot better.
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