11 Jul 2003 | hurley#1 said...

That poster is gorgeous; there's a certain quality in handmade prints of any kind (screens, woodblocks, etchings, lithographs, monoprints) that has always appealed to me.

Summer readings? Here are a few I've been enjoying:

The Child That Books Built: A Life in Reading, by Francis Spufford. Brilliant memoir of how reading books in childhood shaped a life and opened the doors of imagination.

"I can always tell when you're reading somewhere in the house," my mother used to say. "There's a special silence, a reading silence." I never heard it, this extra degree of hush that somehow traveled throughw halls and ceilings to announce that my seven-year-old self had become about as absent as a present person could be. The silence went both ways. As my concentration on the story in my hands took hold, all sounds faded away...

Quintet: Five Journeys Toward Musical Fulfillment by David Blum. No matter what kind of music you enjoy or play, reading these profiles of five brilliant classical musicians will give you a new appreciation of musicianship and everything it means. The profile of Yo-Yo Ma is an especially great read. I'm not a big fan of most classical music, but I loved reading these pieces and they inspired me to go out and buy some recordings by these artists.

Ultimate Fitness: The Quest for Truth About Exercise and Health by Gina Kolata. The subtitle is really what this book is about: it explores the science and the hype behind exercise and fitness and explodes some myths in the process. Think that building more muscle will cause you to burn fat even while you're resting? Think again. Do you use a heart rate monitor? You'll be surprised at how arbitrary the "target heart rate" formula really is.

After the Quake by Haruki Murakami. Actually anything by Murakami would be good summer reading. After the Quake is a nice break from his novels...these are short stories all revolving around the theme of the Kobe earthquake in 1995. Fans of Murakami will also want to read Haruki Murakami and the Music of Words by his best translator, Jay Rubin. I love Murakami, although his female characters tend to be one-dimensional and hardly change from one novel to the next.

11 Jul 2003 | Don Schenck said...

Hurley, being a buff 44-year old, I want to counter something you eluded to:

"Think that building more muscle will cause you to burn fat even while you're resting? Think again."

Resting muscle DOES burn fat, there's no disputing that. What's being disputed is the rate at which it burns. Kolata quotes Dr. Claude Bouchard that resting muscle burns 13 calories per kilogram per 24 hours.

Doesn't sound like much, but consider: Add just five pounds of muscle (I added 22 lbs., or 10 kilograms, in a year!), and you're burning over three pounds of fat a year.

Doesn't sound like much? Well, that's 30 pounds over the course of a decade ... a decade where your peers are gaining ten to 20 pounds.

Agreed; it's not up to the hype of those who sell stuff. But it's not trivial.

I'll never "give in" to any excuse that people would try to use to explain their lack of fitness. Go Play Outside!

11 Jul 2003 | Don Schenck said...

My summer reading (in addition to my usual list of periodicals) includes "10 Day MBA", "The 48 Laws Of Power" and "The Testosterone Advantage Plan".

I don't read fiction.

11 Jul 2003 | hurley #1 said...

Resting muscle DOES burn fat, there's no disputing that. What's being disputed is the rate at which it burns. Kolata quotes Dr. Claude Bouchard that resting muscle burns 13 calories per kilogram per 24 hours.

Actually, Bouchard says "weight lifting has virtually no effect on resting metabolism." Don, if you gained 10 kilograms of muscle, that increases your metabolic rate by 120 calories per day, according to the example in the book. If your appetite increased after you started lifting, which is a typical phenomenon, you might be taking in at least 120 more calories per day than you did before you started exercising which means it would all wash out.

120 calories is a handful of potato chips, or a medium-sized apple, or a 12-oz wine cooler.

Also, he doesn't say it burns 120 calories of FAT -- that 120 calories would be a combination of fat and carbohydrates.

I don't see this as an excuse to not bother with exercise, though.

11 Jul 2003 | hurley#1 said...

By the way, all the books I listed are pretty short, probably not your typical summer read. That's because I live in Canada, where summer only lasts about two weeks.

11 Jul 2003 | Steve said...

I just got done reading Devil in the White City (skip the useless flash at the beginning). Nonfiction that reads like classic summer beach fiction. Centered around the 1893 Chicago World's Fair, contrasting the efforts to get the fair going and a serial killer who was operating in it. I blew through the 400-page book in a couple days last weekend. Absolutely fascinating.

11 Jul 2003 | paul said...

battle royale by koushun takami. it's like crack-cocaine in book-format (fast-paced, violent, and total japanese-style action).

11 Jul 2003 | dave said...

paul:
I just finished it as well (the Viz translation, I assume). Compelling, speed-violence that will glue the book to your hand. Its great *summer* reading in the classic sense.. you can put it down (maybe) for 10 minutes, take a dip in the pool, and pick it right back up.

BTW, the movie is a dissapointment. While watching Japanese schoolgirls run around killing eachother in ultra-violence style is fun, they *destroy* the plotlines...

12 Jul 2003 | scottmt said...

on the top of my bookshelf are

"Acid Dreams" by Matrin A. Lee and Bruce Shlain. Riveting tale of the birth and proliferation of LSD through america, mostly due to CIA cold war espionage dreams.

"Pattern Recognition" by William Gibson. His latest and IMHO greatest since the Sprawl series. Nuff said!

"Harry Potter and the order of the Phoenix" by J.K Rowling. FictionAddciton, can't put it down ifyoureintothatkindofthing.

"DMT: The Spirit Molecule" by Dr. Rick Strassman. Modern day psychedelic drug research, implications, theories, and the tale of red tape that led to the project's termination.

finally, and I've been trying to read this one for a few years now

"The Non-Local Universe: New Physics and Matters of Mind" by Nadeua and Kafatos. Quantum physics and the death of the Cartesian divide between mind and matter. Written by a scientist and a philosopher.

13 Jul 2003 | Andrerib said...

The coudal site is great! It just proves that comunicating and opening a company towards the user does improve the overall exprerience. I like the posters but I wouldn't usually buy them. But here you watch them being hand made and just want to own such a precious thing.

Their website is such an interesting piece of work and has so many interesting stuff that you just want too stick around.

A couple weeks ago I read an article (can't remember where, sorry) in which a boat contruction company had the idea of publishing a page for each boat they sell. Since they build custom boats the cuild easily integrate the website experience with the construction process allowing the user (and client) to feel more close to the project that was being made for them.

At company level it allowed them to correct construction errors sooner (thus spending less) in the process because people would actually logon to their website and watch their boats (hi-res) pictures carefully identifying any mistake.

So congratulations coudal for the great experience!

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