a stream

Here are some of the things I’m working on and thinking about now…

• I’ll be attending the AASL21 conference here in Salt Lake City later this week. (AASL = American Association of School Librarians)

• I’m deleting my Facebook. Might be deleting Instagram and some other platforms, too, but I’m starting with just Facebook.

• I’m posting random notes on this site every day now, or nearly every day. (I think it’s kind of like nicorrette for social media.) The notes show some of the things I’m reading, listening to, taking pictures of, etc.

This page was last updated on October 18, 2021. See my prior ‘now’ updates here.

Credit for the ‘now’ page concept goes to Derek Sivers. I had envisioned a page of this sort for my new website, but my concept was vague and I didn’t have a clear way forward until I happened upon someone with a ‘now’ page and followed the trail back to the source. I think you should make one too.

Standalone post link: Now (October 18, 2021)

I’ve been slowly making my way through Thoreau’s A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers. By “slowly” I mean I still consider it as a book I am currently reading, though I hadn’t read a word of it in several weeks until this morning.


So it is taking me months to get through Thoreau’s week- it started on “Saturday” and I’m in “Sunday” still. But to be fair to myself, I think it took Thoreau years to write through his week.

This all started from reading Desert Solitaire earlier this year, and realizing I loved nature writing but hadn’t read much of it. So, I borrowed this Library of America anthology American Earth from the library, and read the Thoreau selections, and then got sidetracked with the idea that I wanted to read more Thoreau before proceeding with the rest of that anthology. So Walden was the first obvious choice, but as I started investigating Thoreau’s bibliography I found that he had this other book he had published before Walden, the project he finished at Walden, filled with a mix of poetry and prose, about a river journey with his brother. The process and style of this appealed to me, and the narrative idea reminded me of Abbey’s account of his river journey through Glen Canyon, which was one of my favorite parts of Desert Solitaire. So, in my ever expanding reading goals, I decided I needed to read A Week before reading Walden, and then after Walden move on to the essays or directly to selections from Thoreau’s journals, because I am fascinated by journals.

Likewise I’ve made the selection of my reading text convoluted - I started by sourcing via archive.org what I think is a 1st Edition scan from the Boston Public Library, and I was reading that directly on my phone as a PDF. (Sometimes I just really like to read these scans of old editions of books - it makes me feel like I am in a rare book room of a library or have tons of money to own vintage editions myself, but I’m just on my phone.)

Then, wanting references and footnotes, I found that the city library had a Library of America edition and so borrowed that and read a bit from that, so as to figure out who he is quoting, or when he has inserted his own verse into the narrative. But I tend to read more readily on my phone these days, and so this tome fell by the wayside and I need to take it back soon.

Finally, yesterday while looking for something else[^1] I rediscovered Standard Ebooks, and found that they had an edition of A Week, and so I am giving that a go, though it has no footnotes. (They also have what looks to be a nice and, dare I say, thorough collection of Thoreau’s essays; and, of course, Walden.)

I might start contributing to Standard Ebooks at some point, if they will have me and if my desires sync up well enough with their priorities for next texts and their style guidelines. If not, I may just learn and steal their methods to make my own ebooks according to my preferences.

[^1]: De Quincey, via the term “dream fugue” that came into my mind as a possible description for the finale of Summer in the City of Roses, which I finished reading yesterday. But more on that in another post I need to write soon once I have fully processed that book.

Standalone post link: A week, but so far a month

I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0004

Art Credit: Woman Reading a Letter
Gabriël Metsu (Dutch, 1629-1667)
Oil on wood panel
52.5 cm × 40.2 cm (20.7 in × 15.8 in)

Standalone post link: I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0004

I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0003

Art Credit: Man Writing a Letter
Gabriël Metsu (Dutch, 1629-1667)
Oil on wood panel
52.5 cm × 40.2 cm (20.7 in × 15.8 in)

Standalone post link: I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0003

I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0002

Art Credit: A boy writing a letter by candlelight
Follower of Henry Robert Morland (British, lived circa 1716–1797)
oil on canvas, 73.3 x 60.5 cm. (28.9 x 23.8 in.)

Standalone post link: I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0002

I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0001

Art Credit: Young woman writing a letter
Federico Zandomeneghi
Painting, 1874, 45.7×38.1 cm

Standalone post link: I AM ASYNCHRONOUS LIFESTYLE 0001

This is how slimy they are.

I have to stay clean for 30 days to actually make this happen.

Standalone post link: ''slimyfacebook''

So it looks like I finally have the syndication of short posts set up how I wanted (from my personal Hugo static site to Micro.blog, then to my more obscure Twitter account) at just the time I don’t think I care about doing such things anymore. Oh well.

Standalone post link: ''syndication''

You could daydream about what a collab between Kevin Shields and Frank Ocean might sound like, if they ever got around to it in ten years or something.

Or, you could just listen to boylife’s song “goldeyes” right now.

It’s the final track off his new album gelato.

Or you could even do both.

(Think I’ll be creating a ‘Favorite Music of 2021’ page soon, and I’ll probably add this album to it when I do.)

Standalone post link: ''boylife-goldeyes''

Explored an undisclosed moffitish place with Luna in July.

Standalone post link: ''moffitish''