So I just finished my first ultramarathon yesterday

I know I've been rather silent the past couple of years here, but I really haven't had much time for reading anything at all due to balancing a very demanding career with running on weekends.  Lately, I've been moving up in running weight class, progressing to running 18 half marathons, my first 3 road marathons and yesterday, my first ultramarathon of 50K (31.1 miles).  Running for hours at a time, especially when your body, even after losing over 120 lbs. in the past four years, takes a huge mental and physical toll and it certainly changes you as a person.

The readings I've done this year have largely been by ultramarathoners.  While I hope to talk more about them at length around the end of the year (after all, four are 2018 releases), I have to say that I've learned a lot about perseverance and realizing just how strong I can be in my weaknesses from reading those books and then enduring some of the same obstacles myself.

Yesterday's ultra, the Bellringer 50K, was not run in what most people would consider ideal conditions:  It had begun snowing about an hour or so before race time and while the road temps were just above freezing, it certainly made the trails at Montgomery Bell State Park rather slushy and treacherous at times.  I had 9.5 hours to finish and it took 9:25:25 to do so, thanks in large part to the support of several volunteers, including one who came out and ran/walked the final 4 miles with me, even if technically I had missed the time for the last cutoff by a few minutes.  I grew up going to the park several times and I knew the backstretch well (I train by running up the course's final descent to begin my 10 mile training sessions), so I was able to just make it.

However, the weather did take its toll.  I found myself suddenly confused the final km and I staggered to the end.  When I removed my thermal gloves, I saw that nearly the entirety of each finger was bone white due to the wetness and cold.  My speech was slurred and while I was able to ring the personal record bell (after all, it was my first 50K), I barely made it around the corner to my car and get a thermal blanket out of my trunk in order to warm up before driving the 10 miles home (idiot me forgot to bring a change of clothes since I live nearby).  Took me nearly 3 hours to get the shaking in my hands under control enough to at least approach normal body temperature (my feet were also numb but not anywhere near in as bad shape since I had more layers on there), so yeah, I probably had mild hypothermia.

Would I do it all over again, knowing the conditions?  Most certainly yes.  I'm already planning out at least four ultramarathons and 2-3 marathons to run in 2019 because there is something to be said about all but the most essential being stripped away until you are just left with the urge to fight on or to give up; nothing else really matters (except port-a-potties, electrolyte drinks, and M&Ms at aid stations) and that sense of having your true core exposed is an extremely powerful one.

So yeah, I plan on running road in Miami in late January, a nearby trail marathon in mid-February, my first 60K in early March, my second 50K in early April, another local road marathon in late April, and my first 50 miler on May 4, 2019.  I need to experience this stripping away of anxieties and self-doubts on the trails, as they assist with dealing with those quivering moments away from running.

And for those who like pictures, here's one of my ringing the titular bell after I crossed (I was 54/54 out of those who finished, but I think 2-3 dozen dropped beforehand or didn't show up, so I'm far from a last-place person):

14 years

It's hard to believe that I started this blog back on August 25, 2004.  Back then, I saw it as an extension of the old wotmania Other Fantasy section and little did I know that I would cover a wide range of literary genres until I began to transition away from heavy reading/reviewing when I took my current job in December 2016.

Although I'm nowhere near as active (I really do need to buckle down and write a review sometime, right?), I'll probably keep this blog active for a long while, even if my postings might be reduced to a handful a year instead of hundreds.  For those who do see this and have followed me through all the twists and turns, thank you.  It's been a wild ride (especially considering I was in a bad car accident two days ago and was lucky to walk away from it - I got sideswiped at 45-50 mph and if the angle of the other car and been just a few inches over to the right, it could have been deadly) and perhaps there will be a day when I return to reviewing more often (if my eyesight will permit me - I'm becoming both near- and far-sighted, with astigmatism in my left eye compounding matters).  We shall see.  But until then, I shall continue to enjoy the good things (and people) who've come into my life over the past 20 months.  I am fortunate.  Hope all is well with you also.

I finished a book today!

Actually, I finished two!  While that might have sounded blasé back 4 years ago, when I read over 400 or any of the previous decade before that, I really haven't been able to read much the past nine months or so.  While I'm extremely busy at work (the two books I read are a re-read and a first time read of Lois Lowery's The Giver and Gathering Blue, the former being used in classroom assignments the past two weeks) still, the main culprit for my lack of reading has been a physical inability to stay focused on anything for long before headaches and dizzy spells would strike.  After months of tests ruled out the more obvious possible causes (vertigo, stroke, cancer), it turns out that my body was strangely (I say strangely because I'm outside in the sun more than the average professional in the US would be) deficient of vitamins B12 and D.  Ever since I started taking supplements almost a month ago, the symptoms have mostly faded, with maybe 1-2 minor spells the past three weeks.

But it's high past time that I reintegrate reading into my busy professional and social life.  So in addition to the two books I mentioned above (I'll finish Lowery's other two books in the Giver setting, The Messenger and Son, at work over the next week or so), I've begun reading the recently-released Library of America anthology, Reconstruction:  Voices from America's First Great Struggle for Racial Equality, and hopefully if I just read a few minutes at a time 3-4 times/week, I may just be able to finish reading more than the 15 or so books that I read all of last year.

We'll see.  But it sure is good to be able to read near my old reading speed without feeling nauseous, dizzy, or mentally confused afterward.

So I went silent for nearly four months...

No, I haven't forgotten about this blog.  Nor do I plan on shuttering it permanently, even if it seems that I've done so over the past year or two.  But the truth is that I really haven't had much at all to say about books or writing or anything of that sort this year because I just haven't had a desire to read novels.

Yes, I've only finished about 15 books so far this year and 2/3 of them were read while I had to proctor state exams this May.  There are a few reasons behind this:  teaching job taking up more and more of my concentration energy; trying to train when I can for distance events; personal life developments; and etc.  But for much of the past four months, I've dealt with something far more insidious and debilitating:  a reoccurrence of clinical depression, which I haven't had in nearly 15 years. 

It's hard to pinpoint what triggers any individual's depressive spells.  It could be a change in serotonin levels due to not being able to exercise as much during the hot summer nights.  Or two deaths weeks apart.  Or maybe it's due to me starting to get progressively worse vertigo-like spells, which are now combining with migraines (which I rarely had before the past year or so).  Or possibly just another bout of dealing with self-doubt, something that seems to creep up when I'm doing well in life, oddly enough.

Regardless of the cause(s), I've been dealing aggressively with it.  Discovered that medications are not a cure-all; I got sicker on some and symptoms were alleviated when I was removed from them.  Laughter seems to work best, that and getting closer to some awesome people, some that I somewhat lost touch with over the past quarter-century or so.  Religious faith is another cornerstone for me.  So far, based on the past two weeks, it seems the worst has passed.  Much more energy and focus has made me a better worker and human being.

But the effort required to enter recovery (and I consider mental health, like chemical addictions, to be where an afflicted individual will live in a perpetual state of recovery, perhaps pockmarked with occasional relapses; we are human, after all) still has left me with little time to read novels or prose (although I am finally starting to feel an urge to read some prose work).  However, my long-held love for poetry has remained strong and I have occasionally introduced some of my favorite poems as writing prompt/discussion pieces in my classroom.  Yeats, Angelou, Henley, and Hughes are recent ones.  I have quoted Beckett and the beginning to Ginsberg's "Howl," although even where I work, that would be considered off-limits for middle school students.  Hearing boys who suffer from various traumas and behavioral issues discussing how they relate to "I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings" and "The Second Coming" has been invigorating; their insights, informed by their situations, sometimes have surprising depth.

Perhaps I should just, for a time at least, write a few reflections on those poems that I've begun to re-read in my nascent recovery and share them here.  Perhaps.  In the meantime, here's proof at least that I have not yet sailed alone into the seas of madness.

Next week will have been 13 years since I started this blog

I am writing this post in a bit of a daze after suffering through an attack of vertigo this week that left me leaving work early twice and missing today.  My thoughts are somewhat in a haze, but as I was just catching up on online stuff, something I really don't do that much these days, I realized it had been around four months since I last posted here, so I thought I would write a brief post to prove that I haven't yet totally abandoned this site.

2017 has been a different sort of year for me.  I'm working full-time during the day for the first time since 2011.  My job demands a lot out of me and for the most part, it has been the sort of "good" challenge that keeps me occupied and (mostly) content.  I don't read all that much anymore; only 14 finished books so far this year.  Frankly, I do not miss reading all that much right now, as I have found new stimuli in running, training for distance running, and developing personal connections with people in my life.  As much as I enjoyed reading, I always sensed there were things that I was missing out on because of my odd work schedules and hang-ups about the person I had seemingly become.  Thankfully, these negative thoughts seem to be fading away and I get to do more these days.

That being said, I do not plan on abandoning this blog anytime soon.  Yes, I might not really write many (or any) reviews for a while still, but eventually I will write some more.  I know online book discussions have evolved over the years and that this platform is a dinosaur of sorts compared to social media.  Yet it is still a valuable place where I can record my thoughts on matters, perhaps with a few readers discovering something new. 

There will be some cosmetic changes here, of course.  I have already removed a few squirrel-related images because I think it was past time to change the look.  I still find the animals amusing and the in-joke as to why they were here in the first place is still a treasured memory, but times do change and with that, probably a few things will, by necessity, need to fade away into fond memory.  If I do decide to post more frequently, it might be more as a personal blog than as a review one.  Or maybe this will become a list of literary-related thoughts more than anything else.  I myself do not know for sure what the future holds.  What I do know is that in some ways it is a small comfort that I do have records of my thoughts on books, even if there are a vanishingly few readers still left to read these thoughts.  But I am now 43 and I am increasingly convinced that the social media arguments are best left to those younger than me, those who perhaps have more fight left in them than a middle-aged man whose pleasures and interests have been simpler with the years.

Perhaps I am wrong, though, and what interests me may interest others.  We shall see.  All I know is that the greatest task left to me now is to simply tend my own garden and hope others shall do the same in peace and comfort.  See you around, in some form or fashion.

Reading Slump

I had every intention of posting here more this year, but it seems that I've developed a rare reading slump in that from Christmas until today I hadn't read more than maybe 10 pages in any book.  Yes, I have not finished a single book this year (and only properly began one today, with a little over 100 pages read in A. Scott Berg's just-published World War I and America:  Told by the Americans Who Lived It).  Just haven't had the time (lots of 11-12 hour workdays lately, often working 6 days/week between my new residential teaching job and my PRN status at my old one) nor the energy, plus it seems that my prized Serbian reading squirrels have been more busy with their mating season than with attempting to read books.

Hopefully, the springtime will bring some time for reading once the quarterly audits are done and my paperwork is caught up.  I'd like to read more volumes in my Library of America collection (I should own 200 volumes by May) and maybe some fantasy/fantastika as well, since I haven't really read much speculative fiction over the past couple of years due to burnout.  Doubt I'll resume a daily social media presence (reading Twitter 2-3 years ago was like listening to interminable arguments; even if I agreed, it was still tedious and all joy was sucked from me if I paid attention too long), but that's OK.

But for those few who still read my blog via whatever nefarious means that still exist, what are the speculative/fantasy books du jour that I'm missing out on due to not really paying attention this past year or two?

It's been a bit quiet here lately, I suppose...

It's been almost two months since my last post here, so I suppose I should provide a little update for those who might be wondering if I have abandoned this blog for good.  No, I still plan on blogging here whenever I get the chance, but the past few months haven't been all that conducive for writing reviews.  Not that all of the reasons for that are bad, per se, but they do hamper my ability/desire to type a thousand words or so on whatever comes to mind.

Foremost, I have been recovering from what is likely a torn ligament in my right ring finger that I suffered during a fall in a creek during a six mile trail race back on my birthday in mid-July.  I reaggravated that injury back in late August when I had to block a teen with autism from attacking me.  Lately, I have very little pain in it, only when I have to have a prolonged grip on heavy items, but I did have to avoid using it whenever possible, since my hand would cramp up faster than usual due to avoiding putting any weight-bearing pressure on it.  I am optimistic that I'll be able to resume heavier weight-lifting in the next few weeks, but first it seems I'll have to re-teach myself how to type with all ten digits, as I seem to be missing typing a few letters that I used to type with that finger.

I'm still very busy with run training.  I have 3-5 more races to run this year, including a possible 12K (7.4 mile) race in early December, before I begin training in earnest for running 2-3 half-marathons in 2017 (and a hopeful marathon and 50K in 2018).  This takes a lot of my free time, especially on weekends, so it's difficult to maintain the required focus necessary for me to read and write reviews and columns (trust me, if I had the time, I would have written a lengthy piece on my thoughts on Bob Dylan winning the Nobel Prize in Literature, but I just didn't have it in me this weekend), but at least I'm happy with training so far, even if it means a reduction in the pace of weight loss compared to last year or earlier this year (I have to eat more in order to fuel my body properly for these sessions; I've also had to add more muscle mass for greater endurance).

But there's another reason behind my recent semi-silence:  the current moods I see on social media exhaust me.  I've largely abandoned Twitter this year (reading it maybe 1-2 times a week for 5-10 minutes without responding for 1-3 months at a time) because the "book" conversations were so little about the books themselves and much more about the controversies du jour that I just found myself struggling to find a reason for even reading anything at all.  Might explain in part why for the past year I've read little but histories and other primary source material (largely drawn from my nearly 200 volumes of Library of America books), because there isn't the "noise" associated with those works that are associated with certain recent releases.  I hope to read more recent releases by year's end or early 2017, but I first need to achieve a greater, more proper distance between the work and whatever other people might be saying around, behind, and under the books themselves.

I must admit that it might be a blessing to have shed 90% of my former readership over the past six years.  There is that sense of greater freedom in being able to write about whatever might please me without having to worry or becoming annoyed at others who want to interject tangential opinions.  So if I don't feel like weighing in on whatever supposedly asinine and/or hurtful thing an author or "fan" wrote, I don't have to, since there should be no expectation of me "taking sides" if I consistently remain silent on such matters.  Instead, I might just write about the American Revolution, the War of 1812, and the writings of three American Presidents (and Franklin and Hamilton).  That is what interests me now. 

But until I do, I think I'll just maintain mostly radio silence until I have the time, energy, and desire to write on those matters that interest me first and foremost.

So it seems the sky has been falling since I last wrote a blog entry

In nearly two months, it would seem for some people, a lot of important things have happened.  Something about some puppies trying to get people mad while ultimately getting pounded in the butt by a butt, I think.  Something else about sites closing after a dozen years or more, leaving some to fret about "independent" book reviewing and the decline and fall of a generation of literary/genre online reviewers.

Yes, things are changing, perhaps not to the liking of many people.  Writing out thoughts takes a lot of time and energy (so says the guy writing at 3 AM on 4.5 hours sleep, 28 hours away from running his third 5K).  So easy to want a steady euphony of thoughts on certain books, so easy to confuse conformity with clarity of insight into literary works.  Does it really matter if I were to write 150 reviews in a year (which I have done before) or if I (using myself only as one minuscule example) were to write none here?  Do people really want to hear my thoughts on matters or is it more a hope or desire that I express something in conformity with their own inclinations?

Before I began training for distance walking (and after January, running) last year, my mind was often a chaotic mix of thoughts on fictions read and opinions inflicted upon me whenever I checked social media.  Sure, there is an excitement involved in coming in contact with new people and unfamiliar ideas, but after a while, it becomes tedious to encounter the same tired opinions expressed in trite fashion.  Running became an escape for me from all of this, or rather it allowed me to clear my thoughts in order to experience things in a different light.

A week ago, I ran a 14km/8.7 mile mountain bike/running trail before going to work.  Hot, humid day (it rained an hour after I finished).  Runs (later, mostly walks as my legs grew tired) along a creek bank, the only human there for a square mile or more.  Hearing a woodpecker hammering at an oak off to my right as I struggled to run up a steep, rock-strewn stretch.  Smelling blooming plants, including the heavy perfume of a honeysuckle out of my sight.  There was a sense of being enveloped here, being a panting, sweaty part of something much greater than me.

And yet words will fail to describe the totality of this.  Sure, I can use the 128 colors in my Crayola box of literary expressions to create a simulacrum, but ultimately experiencing the Sublime defeats all attempts to describe it.  Yet as I slowed down as I encountered 6.5% climbs in rapid succession, as I saw squirrels scurrying around me as I plodded on (my personal exercise trainers?), my mind became increasingly clear and focused.  One more running step forward.  One more sprint up a twisting hilly path before slowing down to brace for the steep descents.  Then it didn't matter how much or how little I had read, what I might encounter at work shortly, what I needed to do in the future.  Right then, right there, I was living within a moment that was more than the sum of myself.

Realizations like that make it hard to sit down at night to jot them down as though they were just impersonal opinions to be shared frequently.  I haven't blogged much recently not so much due to having little to say but rather in feeling that it is almost impossible to share these sorts of experiences without coming across as insincere and garrulous.  But maybe I've been looking at it from a weaker position.  Perhaps through clearing my thoughts via exercise reading itself might become something more enjoyable, as it can be another part of experiential growth.  Later this weekend or early next week, I am going to write a review of Elizabeth McKenzie's The Portable Veblen.  It is an outstanding work of mediation on relationships, between humans and between the animals who live among us.  I took over a month to read it, not because I didn't have time to read it over the course of a night, but rather because I wanted to reflect in piecemeal fashion on some of the things it had to say about how wantonly we live our lives, often at a detriment to other living creatures.  Reflecting on this while running through neighborhoods where the scent of southern pines is strong, while hearing chirps and barks and the occasional hiss, made these scenes come to life for me.

All of this is just a long-winded way of saying that it doesn't matter so much what others are saying about works or whether or not you should be following trends or taking recommendations.  As Saint-Exupéry said in The Little Prince:

"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." 

This holds true when it comes to writing commentaries on blogs such as this.  What I have to say may matter little to you, but I try to show that something mattered enough for me to write down thoughts for it, even if none of these pertain at all to you.  Writers and critics come and go, but the earth still abides and we abide within it, creatures mucking our ways around, possibly toward something greater than anything we can fathom. 

Personal news and an upcoming book review you never knew you wanted me to review

I've been busy the past couple of weeks training for my first 5K race, which was this morning.  Although I didn't break my personal best due to the cooler temps and being unaccustomed to running uphill (I usually run on a relatively flat track, since it's been too damp for me to run on trails), I did finish 23rd overall and 3rd for men 40-49 (I think there were slightly over 100 runners) at 33:17 (I walked about 1.5K out of the 5 due to the somewhat steep hills).  Won a free meal at Arby's for placing third, plus I won a door prize.  Somehow, I don't see myself using the free 30 minute massage session, but oh well.

My next scheduled race is in two weeks and is a much bigger race, so if I finish in the top third again, I'll be ecstatic.  It has been a fun journey to this point.  A year ago at this point, I could barely walk 3.1 miles/5K within an hour due to being grossly out-of-shape and with a very overweight body made much worse by my August 2014 back injury that led me to gaining almost 50 pounds (or slightly over 20 kg).  A few days ago, I stepped on the scales and saw that I had lost 101 pounds since January 12, 2015.  I am now the lightest I have been since 2008 and hopefully by the end of the year, I'll be weighing less than what I did when I was in college.

However, all of this training and weight loss has taken a toll on my reading time.  I have only finished four books this year (granted, three of them are massive Library of America volumes that contain 3-4 novels' worth of writing inside), but I am hopeful that I'll have a new review ready by Easter weekend.  Even better, this is the sort of title that long-time readers (if such exist still!) of this blog will want me to review.  After all, look at this cover:

If that gorgeous cover (squirrel!) of Elizabeth McKenzie's The Portable Veblen doesn't mesmerize you enough into buying/reading it, then maybe Jeff VanderMeer's review of it, appearing in the Los Angeles Times, will convince you.  This is the book that my reading squirrels have been clamoring for me to have finished already, so hopefully I'll have the energy/time this weekend to finish reading it.  Such a good book so far.

Hopefully I'll be more regular in my blogging after my April 2nd race, but until then, you have a squirrel-centric novel review to look forward to.

So it's been a long time since I've blogged anywhere

I had fully intended to resume regular blogging this autumn after taking a hiatus of sorts to recharge my mental batteries.  But instead, a few things conspired to occupy my time:  having to study for two Praxis exams so I could add a special education certification to my quartet of certifications; working longer at work a few nights the past two months; being exhausted more than I expected after adding longer, more intense fast jog/running elements to my daily cardio (that and trying to do trail jogging for 2-3x/week, weather permitting, in addition to 5x/week track walking/jogging); and a sudden death in my family this week.

So when I was finally upgrading my ancient Macbook to El Capitan tonight, I noticed that two months had gone by without a post of any sort; the first time in nearly ten years that there was a month without a single post.  Amazing how out of practice I became at this.  So yeah, I'll be making a greater effort to not just blog, but to read/re-read books/stories/poems so I can have things to discuss here that perhaps cannot be found in any other singular location.  Might be a bit sporadic until the 30th (my second Praxis text is then; my first was this afternoon), but I'll really make an effort this time.

In the meantime, what all have I missed in recent months?  Some on Twitter were mentioning the aftermath of the World Fantasy Convention's decision to change the appearance of the WFA trophy from H.P. Lovecraft's stylized sculpture to something, anything else.  But what else is out there?  A brief glance at my blogroll seems to reveal that either more online reviewers are shuttering their sites completely or they are continuing to join large conglomerates.  Is this a mistaken impression or just the way things are trending these days when it comes to online discussions of books?

So if there are other things that I've missed since the summertime, feel free to fill me in.  Oh, and one final thing:  the reading squirrels are beginning to become rabid.  You've been warned.

A little personal update before resuming reviews

As I've said before on a few occasions, 2015 to date has been devoted much more to improving my health (2014's kidney stone and back injuries wreaked havoc on my body shape and health) than reading or translation work.  Back in January, my work held a company-wide weight loss challenge, where groups of 4-5 employees were paired up and the winning group (selected by average percentage of weight lost per team) would divide the pot.  The competition ended on May 5th and my team won.  During that span, I lost 42 lbs., so it was nice to have monetary motivation to lose the necessary weight.

Also in January, I had blood tests done to see if progress was being made in lowering my cholesterol and triglyceride levels, both of which were around the 300 level (>150 is considered normal/good for both) back in October (I was placed on simistatin then).  Although both had dropped some due to the medication, they were still elevated.  So I made a goal then that by the time that I had my next round of tests (today), that I would have lost 50 lbs.

In order to do this, I gave up drinking anything other than water; ate leaner cuts of meat and only occasionally fry/saute them; ate more nuts and dried fruits; only had two meals with any sort of meat a day, if possible; lifted weights (only up to 65% of my known maxes) at least once a week and usually 2-3 times; and tried to walk at least 20 miles a week.  It was at times grueling, having to relearn muscle movements while my stomach felt hollow, but it was interesting to see the changes.  Within a week of giving up sodas, I had a lot more energy and I only needed 5.5-6.5 hours of sleep a night on average to feel rested the next morning.  I started to feel less hungry due to drinking 3-4 liters of water a day and my chronic dehydration went away.

In March, I purchased a fitness band, the Garmin Vivofit, and began using My Fitness Pal to track what I ate.  On the latter, I was able to set goals (namely a 2 lbs./week loss) and by inputting what I ate and seeing roughly what their caloric contents were, I found myself eating less in order to meet those daily goals.  With the Garmin watch/band, I started trying to walk more and more each day, especially during the late hours at work after the residents were asleep.  This combination of tracking items and conscious effort on my part to meet the goals set out led to a very rapid weight loss in late March/April, when I lost nearly half of my weight before the competition's end.

So it was with some confidence that I went to get my blood tested today.  Turns out that my cholesterol and triglyceride levels are now in the 130s and that my HDL and LDL levels have improved greatly.  No imminent threat of Type II diabetes setting in and the anemia that showed up on the January tests had disappeared (maybe due to the further healing of my left kidney after my October procedure, or maybe also due to taking vitamin supplements regularly).  If things are much the same in four months, I get to come off of my medications, so I still have motivation to work even harder to get my body healthy and toned.

And yes, there have been days where the squirrels have pushed me to the brink...

But at least now I can rest a little bit.  No, wait, I'm going for an evening walk in a few minutes.  Maybe later this weekend I'll write my first review in a few months.

One of my reviews has been translated and printed in a newspaper's literary supplement section.

Last week, I wrote a review of Serbian writer Zoran Živković's 1998 novella, The Writer.  Živković liked it so much that he asked if I wouldn't mind if it were translated and submitted to the literary supplement section of the Belgrade newspaper Politika.  I said sure, that would be great.  Late last night, Živković sent me this:

Although I have had other essays of mine translated into Portuguese, this is the first time that I have ever had one republished in a newspaper, much less a leading daily.  Just thought I'd share this very cool news with everyone.  And yes, I can understand bits and pieces of the translation. 

2015 Goals

Unlike previous years, I aim to make 2015 a simpler year for me in terms of goals.  No wait, actually, I'm going to have fewer goals, but these might prove to be very difficult to accomplish.

I did fairly well with my goals in 2014.  I aimed to read at least 50 books each in Spanish, French, Italian, and Portuguese.  I finished with 60 read in Spanish, and 52 each in French, Italian, and Portuguese.  Combined with around a half-dozen in other languages (mostly read via parallel comparisons with English translations), over 54% of my total reads in 2014 were in languages other than English.

I also read 144 books (co-)written or (co-)edited by women this year, or 35.38% of the total books read.  I had set my modest goal at 35% (knowing it would be relatively more difficult to read a larger percentage in non-English books, due to limitations on how I could acquire those books), so it was nice to achieve this.

I almost achieved my goal of reviewing the remaining Premio Alfaguara winners that I hadn't reviewed by year's beginning.  I finished re-reading the last book yesterday morning, but I didn't have enough time before bed to write a coherent review and I barely had enough time to finish writing my last two Best of 2014 posts before leaving for work.  I will, however, write that review sometime this weekend.  I did read/re-read all 25 winners, in both incarnations of the award, and certainly plan on reviewing the 2015 winner soon after it is available.

But that is 2014.  This now is 2015, and with the new year, comes different goals.  I think I have spent too much time writing as a reviewer and not enough time working on honing my skills as a freelance translator.  Therefore, I have two translation-related goals for 2015:

1)  Post a rough draft prose translation of the rest of Book II of Vergil's Æneid.

I posted my 1994 Intermediate Latin translation notes last year, along with the first 30 lines of Book II that I did from scratch then.  I think another 800 lines or so can be accomplished over the course of the year.

2)  Finish translating an Argentine story collection and see if I could get it published.

Uncertain if copyright stills applies here in the US (author died in the early 1940s and this particular book was never published in the US in any language; it is in public domain in Argentina and elsewhere), but just in case, I'd like to see if I can finish a book-length project and then let the pros read it and weigh in, if they so choose.  More fun than reading nearly 200 reviews from me this year, right?

There are other goals that will take away from reading/reviewing time, things that are much more important to me than reading another page from any book.  Here they are:

3)  Exercise for at least 45 minutes on 185 days minimum this year.

I've had my fair share of injuries and pain, but I think regular exercise will alleviate some of that, including my chronic bronchitis, which I truly worry will be the death of me.

4)  Walk at least 500 miles as measured on my Nike phone app.

I walked nearly 400 miles in four months in 2012, but fell off the wagon since then due to weird work schedules and leg/back nerve pain.  I'm conditioning myself these next three months to resume walking 5-8 miles/day for 4-5 times/week.

5)  Average at least 1 lb/week weight loss for the year.

Gained nearly 30 lbs. after my back injury, due in part to the steroids I had to take.  I want to lose that and some more.  This is a multi-year goal, as I would eventually like to weigh within 15 lbs. of my high school playing weight by the end of 2016.

But for those who want some reading/reviewing goals, here goes:

6)  Review works by the 2015 Man Booker Prize, National Book Award for Fiction, Premio Alfaguara, Baileys Prize for Women's Fiction, Premio Strega, Prix Médicis, and Prix Goncourt.

Pretty straightforward, no?

7)  Read the entire Les Rougon-Macquart cycle by Emile Zola.

Only twenty books.  Oh, I plan on reading them in French.  No decision yet if I'll review them all, however.

8)  Improve my German reading comprehension.

At some point in the next few years, I hope to be able to visit Central Europe, including one of my cousins in Bavaria, so it'd be nice to work on a language that I used to be able to read a bit back when I was in school in the 1990s.  Might try to work my way through 20 books originally written in German.  Kafka perhaps?

9)  Average writing at least a post a week on my WWI blog.

I neglected it in 2014 in order to complete my ambitious 2014 reading/reviewing goals.  It'll receive much more priority this year.

10)  Review at least five more books by Zoran Živković. 

He was kind enough a few years ago to send me Serbian editions of his works and I'd like to finish reviewing those in the next couple of years.  This also means I plan on working on my reading comprehension of that beautiful language as well.

11)  Teach other reviewers how to effectively utilize rabid Serbian reading squirrels in order to improve the quantity and quality of their writing.

Still working on teaching them how to compose better prose, however.  Maybe by 2016, they will be able to translate and compose fiction as well.

Feasible goals, no?

Warning: Graphic photo of surgical stent

If anyone, most especially myself, ever needed motivation to stop drinking sodas and drink copious amounts of water (and reduce salt intake), then this picture of the urethral stent that I removed this morning following my outpatient surgery three days ago should be motivation enough.  I'll put in a jump break for RSS readers who might not want such a warning (sorry for others who might be squeamish, but this is to give readers an idea of just what I suffered on Friday):

Well, the stone is gone now...

I had an ureteroscopy done this morning for a left kidney stone (8 mm) that had caused some swelling in that kidney.  Turns out that if I had paid attention when I woke up a little before 5 AM, I would have seen the crush remnants of it in the toilet, as I somehow passed it without realizing it (my dad noticed the particles remaining even after I flushed).  So yeah, I had to endure having a stent left in me for the weekend.  Not a fun feeling, that sense of pissing fire and seeing blood come out with the urine.  At least I have some really nice painkillers for the weekend.

But I also have things to write.  As I said in my last post, I've managed to do a lot of reading lately and I do plan on attempting to write 2 reviews/day for the rest of the month, starting either later this weekend or Monday at the latest.  I do have about two dozen books already read that need some sort of commentary written for them.  One of the latest, read today before the procedure, is Phil Klay's National Book Award-nominated Redeployment.  It is a fantastic read and might just be my personal favorite of the five Fiction finalists.  I'll write more about it tomorrow or Sunday.

Also started reading Steven Erikson's Willful Child this morning and finished the first 200 pages or so before leaving for the surgery.  It actually made me chortle a bit, something that rarely happens when I'm reading.  Finally, I hope to review Julia Elliott's excellent debut collection, The Wilds.  This year has been an excellent one for collections and this is one of the best of that fine crop.

Now to sit back and enjoy the haze...

Exercise and Reading

It's interesting how (re)starting one thing can affect something seemingly unrelated.  I haven't read as much this year as in previous years (only at 319 books read so far this year, my lowest number for this date since 2008), but until recently, I was even below the average of a book a day that I had maintained since 2008's 385 books read.  I had little motivation for reading, since I had little energy for doing much of anything outside of maintaining my daily post here due to my recent back and kidney stone issues.

Then I was able to resume gym workouts this past weekend for the first time in months.  Although I'm going very easy right now (lower resistance on the exercise bike, short reps/sets on weights, fewer stations than usual), I've found myself finishing over a dozen books since Sunday.  Weird how things like that happen, although some of it no doubt is due to reading substantial portions of several e-books during the 20-25 minutes I've been on the exercise bike these past five days.  Curious to see how things will be after my (finally!) surgical procedure tomorrow (I mistakenly thought it was scheduled for last Friday).  I think there will be some pleasant surprises in store for the rest of the year.

Now to see about reducing that backlog of unwritten reviews after the procedure...

Weekend plans

Not much time to post today, so here's a tentative plan for the weekend.  Much of this depends on how I feel after my ureteroscopy Friday morning to remove an 8 mm kidney stone, but I do hope to have several more reviews online by Monday morning.  Here's what I'm planning to review:

Late night/early morning Friday:  Robert Darnton, Censors at Work:  How States Shaped Literature

Saturday:  David Cronenberg, Consumed; Frankétienne, Ready to Burst

Sunday:  Marilynne Robinson, Lila; Ismail Kadare, Twilight of the Eastern Gods

Monday:  Paul Theroux, Mr. Bones


But again, a lot of this will depend on how I feel after tomorrow's surgical procedure.

Back "procedures" suck, in case you never knew that

Well, after enduring six weeks of often excruciating back pain after initially injuring myself at work trying to keep a 6'5, 230 lb. young adult resident from running out of the room, I finally had a procedure done this morning to alleviate the pain.  It took nearly five weeks for the muscle spasms and strained muscles in my lower lumbar region of my spine (or about two inches above my waist/tailbone) to ease enough for there to be clear signs that I also had some nerve irritation.  Had an MRI done on Monday and it revealed some damage to one of my vertebral discs. 

It wasn't so serious that I needed back surgery, but it was bad enough that I was recommended to get an epidural steroid injection directly into that region of my spine.  So I had that done today.  One of the effects of the injection is that the numbing agent gets into your system, making your lower body number, making it unsafe to drive for any long length of time (not to mention it feels like you have your drunk legs all day).  This, however, does not stop the actual pressure pain from the injection site, which I was told can take up to four days before it is alleviated.  Thankfully, I did have some prescribed painkillers to help me endure this, even though this led to nearly a full night's night this afternoon.

On the bright side, before I was knocked out (much of this was done during the 45 minute drives to and from the clinic, along with the 30 minute wait at the clinic), I did manage to finish reading four recent releases that I hope to review in the next 3-4 days.  I read three National Book Award-longlisted books (John Darnielle's Wolf in White Van; Elizabeth McCracken's Thunderstruck & Other Stories; and Gail Giles's Girls Like Us (YPL nominee) as well as Kelly Barnhill's The Witch's Boy.  Each of these were distinct in their prose and thematic approach and each will be receiving positive reviews whenever I have the time/mental focus to write them.

But for now, it's time to clear up this mental fog and see if the pain will subside some when I begin walking more next week (not to mention returning to work on Monday after a month's absence).  I'm past tired of sitting around the house not being able to do much else other than read and write reviews.

40

It's finally happened.  The calendar turned enough leaves that it's now 40 years since I was born.  It's a number I've been waiting to reach and trying to avoid for a number of years.  I can remember starting out as a teacher 15 years ago, tired of always looking 5-10 years younger than my actual age, hoping for my hair to turn silver so that I wouldn't be confused for a student.  I can also remember sighing about things that I wanted to have accomplished by this age that I later realized would have to wait a bit longer, if they would even occur at all now.

However, there is so much to happen about which I have no foresight.  Ten years ago, I didn't see myself still living in my native Tennessee after moving back from southern Florida for a respite from job burnout.  I also didn't see myself having two short story translations published, one of which in a World Fantasy Award-winning anthology.  Squirrels were just another animal back then, before an in-joke between me and someone dear to me made them much more special.  Back in July 2004, I was contemplating whether or not I wanted to try this relatively new thing called a blog; in 2014 I've been on Facebook for 6 years and Twitter for 4.

My hair is slowly turning silver, but thankfully it is as thick as it was when I was 30.  Perhaps by the time I'm 50, I'll have found a place and career that is more rewarding to me.  Maybe I'll translate a book and see if I can get it published.  Maybe I'll establish a squirrel sanctuary.  So many maybes.  Perhaps the one constant will be that I will likely, as long as I have eyes to see and hands to move the pages, reading a story in some form or fashion.  Hopefully, there will be people along for the ride.

A few things happening this week

Might have time later this week to post my review of Gabriel García Márquez's Cien años de soledad/One Hundred Years of Solitude.  I had begun re-reading it a couple of weeks ago, before Gabo's death, and I really would like to have a formal review/appreciation posted sooner rather than later.

Since there are many masochists who like to vote on my occasional blog polls, they will be pleased to know that I did order a copy of Brandon Sanderson's Words of Radiance Saturday and it'll be here on Monday.  I'll re-read the first book first, so it'll be a while, maybe 1-2 weeks, before I sit down to write the review.  Some people just want to see if I'll write something scathing, don't they?  But who knows, I might enjoy it like I did (for the most part) his Mistborn books, so there is that, I suppose.

I'm going to be super busy for the next two weeks because starting in the morning, I am teaching full-time at my teaching position and working weekends (for 14 hours each day) at my second job.  Just in time for state exams, which begin next week.  So yeah, there is that to take care of first, but since I'll be home awake for a few evening hours, I still might manage to squeeze in a variety of posts.

That's about it.  The squirrels are going to be mad at me if I don't try to get six hours of rest now.