August 23, 2009
Just as a novelist creates a narrative, a person creates a sense of being. The self is simply our work of art, a fiction created by the brain in order to makes sense of its own destiny. In a world made of fragments, the self is our sole “theme, recurring, half remembered, half foreseen.” If it didn’t exist, then nothing would exist. We would be a brain full of characters, hopelessly searching for an author.

Jonah Lehrer, Proust Was a Neuroscientist

Just finished reading this, and I highly recommend it.

October 21, 2008
I’m lost in a city whose name you can’t pronounce; I think it is my own. Your country’s maps spell this name differently. Will you recognize the postmark? Will you recognize my hand? Who’ll translate the maps for us? Do you know this means I love you? Do you know this means I love you?

Rebecca Brown, The Terrible Girls

Going through my bookshelf tonight, I found this book and remembered this quote.

September 3, 2008 • 2 notes

Book Funk

pinkhotel:

I’m in a serious book funk.

Over the past 3 weeks I have bought and read the following:

  • The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolano;
  • Marching Powder by Rusty Young/Thomas McFadden; and
  • The Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud.

I stopped reading all three at a certain point because I was truly and utterly bored.

The great thing about New York is the time I have to read each day on the train but the bad thing is, it’s significantly less enjoyable when all the recent reading material I have been carrying lately bores me to tears.

If anyone has any good book recommendations, please let me know.

My Recently Read Book Recommendations:

Fiction -  Elizabeth McCracken, The Giant’s House

Marisha Pessl, Special Topics in Calamity Physics

Non-Fiction - Daniel Gilbert, Stumbling on Happiness

Mary Roach, Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex

Memoir - (and one of my all time favorite books)

Ann Patchett, Truth and Beauty

August 5, 2008
Perhaps we don’t fully recover from our first loves. Perhaps, in the extravagance of youth, we give away our devotions easily and all but arbitrarily, on the mistaken assumption that we’ll always have more to give.
michael cunningham, a home at the end of the world
August 1, 2008
Megan Lea and I are waiting outside barnes and noble for breaking dawn. Typical

Megan Lea and I are waiting outside barnes and noble for breaking dawn. Typical

July 25, 2008 • 1 note

Twilight.

katysaidso:

“You really shouldnt do that to people, its hardly fair.”
“Do what?”
“Dazzle them like that— She’s probably hyperventilating in the kitchen right now.”
He seemed confused, “Oh come on, you have to know the effect you have on people.”
His head was tilted to the side and his eyes were curious. “I dazzle people?”
“You havent noticed? Do you think everybody gets their way so easily?”
“Do I dazzle you?”
“…Frequently.”

- Twilight by Stephenie Meyer.
I am SO looking forward to the movie coming out about this book. I read the first chapter and couldnt put it down.

i can’t even explain why it’s so good except that it is. none of my friends believed me until i forced them to read the first book and they couldn’t put it down. i’m reading the third one, but doing that thing where i postpone finishing the book. (i’ve got maybe fifty pages to the end.)

July 18, 2008 • 1 note
around this time my precious work ethic began to atrophy in earnest and - truth be told - it has never returned. a basic affinity for office work may appear expendable to most. but i was a good girl from the suburbs, where self-worth was color-coded and bound and crazy-glued into a diorama. yet when the phone in ursula’s office would ring, i would run to the bathroom to avoid picking it up.

sloane crosley

in an essay in which she describes how working as an assistant for a crazy boss killed her work ethic. i know how she feels. actually i think she summed up my life. i wish i could tape the phone conversations i have with my boss. they are far crazier than any of the e-mails. harder to capture though.

July 14, 2008
Team Jacob is comprised of bitter whiners who hate love, and would probably have wanted Juliet to end up with Paris, and Mr. Darcy to take up with his sickly cousin.

Let’s have a ‘Twilight’ debate: Team Edward or Team Jacob? | PopWatch Blog | EW.com

Team Edward. There is no other option.

July 13, 2008 • 1 note
52books: #33: Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire Wicked was just about everything I hoped it would be. It was epic, funny, dark, and thoughtful. I knew nothing of the story beforehand and was surprised by the weaving tale of the land of Oz. When I was reading, I had to think back to the movie to try to put together the pieces of the puzzle before me. Maguire is able to create a fictional world that seems as real as the one before us and at the same time as magical as anything we could dream up. This is an excellent read for anyone looking for a little bit of imagination this summer! Oh, and if anyone knows how to get a cheap ticket to see the musical on Broadway please let me know. get a bunch of friends to help you lotto. (2 and a half hours before every show) tickets if you win are $25 for front row. the only way to boost your chances of winning is to bring ‘ringers’ who will give you the tickets if their name is called. alternatively, they sell side orchestra partial view tickets for $55. the view isn’t that partial and you can buy in advance. enjoy!

52books:

#33: Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire

Wicked was just about everything I hoped it would be. It was epic, funny, dark, and thoughtful. I knew nothing of the story beforehand and was surprised by the weaving tale of the land of Oz. When I was reading, I had to think back to the movie to try to put together the pieces of the puzzle before me. Maguire is able to create a fictional world that seems as real as the one before us and at the same time as magical as anything we could dream up. This is an excellent read for anyone looking for a little bit of imagination this summer!

Oh, and if anyone knows how to get a cheap ticket to see the musical on Broadway please let me know.

get a bunch of friends to help you lotto. (2 and a half hours before every show) tickets if you win are $25 for front row. the only way to boost your chances of winning is to bring ‘ringers’ who will give you the tickets if their name is called.

alternatively, they sell side orchestra partial view tickets for $55. the view isn’t that partial and you can buy in advance. enjoy!

June 29, 2008
if you do not generally live a tidy life - putting things back in place when you’re done with them, implementing an underwear organizational system, stocking up on supplies long before they run out - then in all likelihood you won’t have a deeply tidy room, and there is only so much you can do about it in the short term…it takes consistent and persistent behavior to have a deeply tidy room. but a hurried hour, or even a day or two of tidying can produce at best, only a tidied room. no matter how hard we try, many parts of our personalities are simply irrepressible.
sam gosling, snoop: what your stuff says about you