Never one to let a good meme die.
Myke asks
1. Estimate the total number of books you’ve owned in your life.
This is gonna have to be one hell of a rough guess. Probably at least half the books I’ve read have been traded with other travelers while on the road. Or with friends and family while [...]

I just now finished Even Cowgirls Get the Blues by Tom Robbins and it is - there is no doubt - my favorite book of the year so far.
There is a genre of literature that some over-caffeinated professor decided to one day call post-modern. Despite my general aversion to both hyphens and professors, it’s a [...]

If the bank statement has become the collective raison d’etre of Western civilization, the same could be said of officer rank in 1970’s China (when the story takes place). It just goes to show that there is something strongly human about wanting to create and improve status, whether that status be judged by money, rank, college degree(s), or even blog ranking. Wealth is the usual favorite determinant of status, but if you take class away, status will manifest itself in some other - and equally detrimental - form.