Well, our friends over at NPR, (who are like the BBC in [...]]]> You know that silly Facebook meme, the one that lists 100 books that the BBC has allegedly selected as the best evAH, and then goes on to claim that the average reader has only read like 6 of them.  It’s fun, but completely bunk.

Well, our friends over at NPR, (who are like the BBC in a non-British way, I guess), recently put out a call for the best SciFi and Fantasy books.  Over 5000 people nominated books and series in the comments.  (I might have. I thought about it, but then I don’t know if I actually did or not).   Then they slimmed the list to the top 237 nominations, specifically excluding books that didn’t make their strict criteria (basically, they excluded horror, paranormal romance, and YA  from the list), and asked for votes.

50,000 votes later, and mine was for sure one of them, and they came up with a list of the top 100 SciFi/Fantasy novels (excluding YA. They are running a YA poll next summer.  Sorry Harry.)

I don’t propose a meme, although go ahead and play along if you want.  I’m just curious to know how many of them I have read.  I’ve got the top 13 down, except I have never finished 1984. 

Here’s the list.  I bolded the ones I’ve read at least one of the series, although in most cases, I’ve read the whole she-bang. 

1. The Lord Of The Rings Trilogy, by J.R.R. Tolkien
2. The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
3. Ender’s Game, by Orson Scott Card
4. The Dune Chronicles, by Frank Herbert
5. A Song Of Ice And Fire Series, by George R. R. Martin
6. 1984, by George Orwell
7. Fahrenheit 451, by Ray Bradbury
8. The Foundation Trilogy, by Isaac Asimov
9. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman
11. The Princess Bride, by William Goldman
12. The Wheel Of Time Series, by Robert Jordan
13. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
14. Neuromancer, by William Gibson
15. Watchmen, by Alan Moore
16. I, Robot, by Isaac Asimov
17. Stranger In A Strange Land, by Robert Heinlein
18. The Kingkiller Chronicles, by Patrick Rothfuss
19. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
20. Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley
21. Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep?, by Philip K. Dick
22. The Handmaid’s Tale, by Margaret Atwood
23. The Dark Tower Series, by Stephen King
24. 2001: A Space Odyssey, by Arthur C. Clarke
25. The Stand, by Stephen King
26. Snow Crash, by Neal Stephenson
27. The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury
28. Cat’s Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
29. The Sandman Series, by Neil Gaiman
30. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
31. Starship Troopers, by Robert Heinlein
32. Watership Down, by Richard Adams
33. Dragonflight, by Anne McCaffrey
34. The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, by Robert Heinlein
35. A Canticle For Leibowitz, by Walter M. Miller
36. The Time Machine, by H.G. Wells
37. 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea, by Jules Verne
38. Flowers For Algernon, by Daniel Keys
39. The War Of The Worlds, by H.G. Wells
40. The Chronicles Of Amber, by Roger Zelazny
41. The Belgariad, by David Eddings
42. The Mists Of Avalon, by Marion Zimmer Bradley
43. The Mistborn Series, by Brandon Sanderson
44. Ringworld, by Larry Niven
45. The Left Hand Of Darkness, by Ursula K. LeGuin
46. The Silmarillion, by J.R.R. Tolkien
47. The Once And Future King, by T.H. White
48. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman
49. Childhood’s End, by Arthur C. Clarke
50. Contact, by Carl Sagan
51. The Hyperion Cantos, by Dan Simmons
52. Stardust, by Neil Gaiman
53. Cryptonomicon, by Neal Stephenson
54. World War Z, by Max Brooks
55. The Last Unicorn, by Peter S. Beagle
56. The Forever War, by Joe Haldeman
57. Small Gods, by Terry Pratchett
58. The Chronicles Of Thomas Covenant, The Unbeliever, by Stephen R. Donaldson
59. The Vorkosigan Saga, by Lois McMaster Bujold
60. Going Postal, by Terry Pratchett
61. The Mote In God’s Eye, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
62. The Sword Of Truth, by Terry Goodkind
63. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy
64. Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, by Susanna Clarke
65. I Am Legend, by Richard Matheson
66. The Riftwar Saga, by Raymond E. Feist
67. The Shannara Trilogy, by Terry Brooks
68. The Conan The Barbarian Series, by R.E. Howard
69. The Farseer Trilogy, by Robin Hobb
70. The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger
71. The Way Of Kings, by Brandon Sanderson
72. A Journey To The Center Of The Earth, by Jules Verne
73. The Legend Of Drizzt Series, by R.A. Salvatore
74. Old Man’s War, by John Scalzi
75. The Diamond Age, by Neil Stephenson
76. Rendezvous With Rama, by Arthur C. Clarke
77. The Kushiel’s Legacy Series, by Jacqueline Carey
78. The Dispossessed, by Ursula K. LeGuin
79. Something Wicked This Way Comes, by Ray Bradbury
80. Wicked, by Gregory Maguire
81. The Malazan Book Of The Fallen Series, by Steven Erikson
82. The Eyre Affair, by Jasper Fforde
83. The Culture Series, by Iain M. Banks
84. The Crystal Cave, by Mary Stewart
85. Anathem, by Neal Stephenson
86. The Codex Alera Series, by Jim Butcher
87. The Book Of The New Sun, by Gene Wolfe
88. The Thrawn Trilogy, by Timothy Zahn
89. The Outlander Series, by Diana Gabaldan
90. The Elric Saga, by Michael Moorcock
91. The Illustrated Man, by Ray Bradbury
92. Sunshine, by Robin McKinley
93. A Fire Upon The Deep, by Vernor Vinge
94. The Caves Of Steel, by Isaac Asimov
95. The Mars Trilogy, by Kim Stanley Robinson
96. Lucifer’s Hammer, by Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle
97. Doomsday Book, by Connie Willis
98. Perdido Street Station, by China Mieville
99. The Xanth Series, by Piers Anthony
100. The Space Trilogy, by C.S. Lewis

So there it is. I count 37 of them. That leaves me with a whole lot of reading to do.  I recently added #14 Neuromancer to my to-read list, and several of the Neal Stephenson books are there.  Looks like we’ve got a lot to draw on for our SpecFic book club too.  So far, we have read #32 – Watership Down and #35 – A Canticle for Leibowitz.  Some of our other books will likely be on next summer’s YA list. 

Good times.  How many have you read?

The rules are simple. No Facebook games.

I’ve only been playing three anyway, but they are all three of the click and hope variety. They are significantly less click happy than, say, Mafia Wars, and they do involve some sorts of decision making, but [...]]]> I’m on my third day of a Facebook game related detox.

The rules are simple. No Facebook games.

I’ve only been playing three anyway, but they are all three of the click and hope variety. They are significantly less click happy than, say, Mafia Wars, and they do involve some sorts of decision making, but really, it’s just clicking and hoping.

What kind of game play is that anyway?

I got to a point in all three where I had accomplished what I wanted. (As if it can really be called an accomplishment… It’s just an accumulation of clicks over time.) And so I felt like I could let go.

The first day was a breeze, the second a little challenging, but today is not going so great. I apparently need those little dopamine squirts that come when I click my little rat brain buttons. I’ve also never had Facebook game-related nightmares until last night (although I think that might have been significantly influenced by a pair of Doctor Who episodes that I watched earlier in the evening with a similar character.)

In other news, I found a downloadable version of Race for the Galaxy, a board game I have recently been playing in real life. I’m using it to try to improve my understanding of how the game works, and it involves very complex decision making, so that’s good, right? I don’t get as much dopamine but I am improving actual skills (for example, evaluating trade offs, developing and deploying strategy, attempting to learn what

Also, my kitchen is approaching a clean state.

Amazing what a little less MouseHunt can do for you.

Anyone else have any experience with electronic detox? Do you know how long I have until the shakes start in?

Last week, I did the final workout of week 6. I repeated several weeks. I haven’t tried the final test yet. I don’t think I’m really ready for 100 pushups, I think I could use one more week. So [...]]]> I thought I should probably post a really quick update on my 100 pushups challenge status.

Last week, I did the final workout of week 6. I repeated several weeks. I haven’t tried the final test yet. I don’t think I’m really ready for 100 pushups, I think I could use one more week. So far this week hasn’t been a pushups kind of week for me. This daylight savings time change is supposed to be the easy one, but I’ve been struggling all week to adjust.

So there you have it. I didn’t quite make my goal, timing wise. But that’s ok, because I consistently put the effort into the goal, I just didn’t gain strength as fast as the program suggested I might. Perfectly acceptable, because I can now do 45+ pushups at the end of a workout that includes more than 140 pushups. I couldn’t have said that 8 weeks ago.

I’ll keep you posted as to when I actually get to 100 pushups.

It turns out it’s only been around since 1996, but still, that’s 13 whole years when I could have been celebrating an obscure and arbitrary holiday, and I wasn’t.

It’s time to change that.

Here’s how I propose to do it:

Write Poetry.

Pretty [...]]]>
April is National Poetry Month. I didn’t know. No idea!

It turns out it’s only been around since 1996, but still, that’s 13 whole years when I could have been celebrating an obscure and arbitrary holiday, and I wasn’t.

It’s time to change that.

Here’s how I propose to do it:

Write Poetry.

Pretty simple actually, but here’s what that means. I will write poetry during NPM, but I also want you to write poetry this month. After all, it’s not really a celebration if I’m the only one that shows up to the party. Know what I mean?

It’s April 13th already, so there’s still plenty of time, but remember, April is one of those tricky months with only 30 days in them. I invite you (if you are reading this, that means you’re invited) to write a poem, short or long, rhyming or not, iambic pentameter or free verse, and post it in the comments or post it on your blog. I’m also carrying around my fake Moleskine a lot lately, and if you want, you can write your poem in that, which I will scan and put up on my writing blog as bonus material. I’ll try to sum everything up here at the end of the month.

I’ve been writing and reading poetry for most of my life. Here are some things that I’ve learned about writing poetry:
1) Writing poetry is manly.
2) Writing poetry is fun.
3) Poetry doesn’t have to mean anything.
4) Poetry means so much more than just what you wrote down.
5) Poetry doesn’t have to be about serious subjects.
6) Poetry heals the soul.
7) Poetry doesn’t have to rhyme.
Poetry doesn’t have to be hard to write.
9) Poetry doesn’t have to be good.

There are exactly zero excuses for you not to write a poem this month. Zero! So do it. Invite others to do it. To get you started, here are all of the poems that I’ve written so far this year. I’m sure that I I’ll be adding a few more. Added bonus: I just dug up an old account I had on allpoetry.com. Here are some vintage 2006 poems.

So go! Write Poetry! Breathe air! Live!