Weekly Geeks time everyone! This one is a holiday themed one (being as it’s Memorial Day). So, I guess, first things first:
HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY!!!
Now for the Weekly Geeks topic:
Again with Memorial Day Weekend here in the U.S. starting traditionally on Friday evening, it also is unofficially the start of summer. You’ve probably been asked this in other meme groups in which you participate, but do your reading habits change over the summer? Do you choose lighter fare? What do you enjoy to take to the beach, for example? What is the ultimate summer book? OR what are your favorite travel guides — official or unofficial guides? Again, an example, I think of Holidays In Hell by P.J. O’Rourke, of places I’d rather not vacation. Along those lines, where do you vacation? Any places you recommend or even don’t recommend?
My reading habits do not, in fact, change during the summer. The only times my reading habits change is during Halloween and Christmas, when I tend to read appropriately traditional books for the specific holiday. But Summer is just a continuation of my regular reading habits.
However, if I had to pick, what more “summery” reads I would recommend?
Jimmy Buffett wrote two great books that would work well for sitting on the beach, listening to the surf and reading. The first is a collection of stories called Tales From Margaritaville.
It’s a surprisingly fun and clever collection from a first time writer (Jimmy’s written several books since this one). I honestly did not expect to like it as much as I did. Which led me to read his second book, and his first attempt at a full length novel story, Where is Joe Merchant?
This is another, very casual, but very fun story I enjoyed from start to finish. It follows a group of people in search of rock star, Joe Merchant, who supposedly committed suicide many years ago but keeps popping up in tabloid headlines. Definitely a rollicking summer read.
Okay, how about travel guides? There is one in particular that my wife and I found extremely helpful on our trip to Paris in 2007. It had tons of information and several great suggestions of sites to see that we never would have found on our own. It was Rick Steves’ Paris.
If you ever plan on traveling anywhere in Europe, take a gander at all of the Rick Steves books. They are fantastic. I know if Steph and I ever make the trip to London or Rome, Rick Steves is the travel guide we will pick up.
So, I hope everyone has a great Memorial Day and enjoys the day off. We’ll be grilling burgers and brats for dinner. See you later this week.
Forrest Gump by Winston Groom – Granted, I’m not a HUGE fan of this movie, but it was sweet and entertaining enough that I don’t hate it. The book, however, receives the full brunt of my white hot hatred. It contains a lot of the story in the movie, plus so much other utterly insane crap that several times I had to look at the front of the book to make sure I was still reading Forrest Gump. Part of the book takes place in the African Jungles where Forrest is lost for years (he even marries a tribal woman from an African tribe he lives with). There’s also an entire section of Forrest going to live with Jenny at college and them doing nothing but having sex everyday. Seriously. EVERYDAY. Jenny even mentions it. And don’t worry, I checked, I was not, in fact, reading the novelization of Forrest Hump, it was Forrest Gump. That wasn’t the only thing. He also becomes an astronaut and blah blah blah. It’s endless monotonous marches through history that we got plenty of in the movie. But it was more. And more obnoxiously over-the-top. Needless to say, I really didn’t like the book.
Cavalcade of Awesome 