1. At 14, working at Popeye's Chicken
2. Mrs. Montgomery, my AP government teacher. She introduced me to great books I'd never have read on my own, like the tagged one.
3. My 27th. My Father-in-law called me about 9am, I thought to wish me happy birthday (he'd never called me before or since), but it was to tell me to turn on CNN. We sat on the phone together and watched the Twin Towers fall. My birthday is September 11.
@eggs
#wondrouswednesday
pickThis was the bestselling book in the US in 1960. It's long, and feels long -- especially when read in the context of real-life shenanigans that make these fictional scandals and strategies feel naive. But it's also quite good: the characters have depth, and the mix of ambition, idealism, retribution, and compromise is engrossing. I understand there are sequels, and I might get to them sometime.
#24B4Monday
@andrew65 @jb72 @SumisBooks
1. Advise and Consent / Allen Drury
The Iron Hand of Mars / Lindsey Davis
Stormhaven / Jordan Hawk
2. Bible
Elements of Style / Strunk & White
Programming Perl ("The Camel Book") / Larry Wall
3. "Tomorrow may be a busy day."
#WeekendReads @rachelsbrittain
Forty pages from the end of this 762-page book, and I finally see why this 1972 edition I have calls itself "prophetic", because it got the moon landing entirely wrong and nothing else in it is particularly prophetic of anything else.
Because today is literally a bonus day, I'm using it to finish books I put aside last year. You may remember I put down this book because, to borrow a phrase from Marge Simpson, "a book character was having difficulties".
But there's also a neat bit of #BlackHistoryMonth trivia attached to this book! When it was made into a movie, MLK Jr. was approached to play one of the Senators (and there were no black Senators IRL at the time)!
What's really bothering me about the second half of this book is why is every single Leffingwell supporter in such a rush? It's been a while since there were Cabinet appointments that I was in support of, but I think I don't even remember the hearings etc. because I figured, "It'll happen in due course." It's the Cabinet appointments you don't support that you have to stay on top of.
Oh snap, I'm going to have to finish this book and watch the movie ASAP!
I know someone in this book is gay, and it's taking a lot of willpower for me not to just look up on Wikipedia who it is. (I'm pretty sure it's the Mormon guy though. Those longing gazes at the paperboy and references to wartime camaraderie must have been REAL subtle for 1959.) #SeptemberTBR #Pulitzer (Fiction, 1960)
BOOK: Advise and Consent
AUTHOR: Jane Austen
MOVIE: The American President (and Adventures in Babysitting - the original)
FOOD: Avocado
#ManicMonday @joscho
Advise and Consent | 
