QUOTE | Books we can't make sense of

"The books we can't make sense of, that knock us off-kilter, that we don't accept readily, will often be the books that matter most to the next generation. In fact, that's generally the sign of a really important book: it doesn't fit into our received expectations, it bothers us, it 'doesn't work.' Sometimes an ambitious failure is more worth having than a successful little novel that is perfectly well done."

~ Michael Dirda

Reading Distracted

I was reading Find Your Focus Zone earlier. It's a non-fiction title on attention. These days I find myself too easily distracted and I needed some good advice on now to regain focus on the tasks around me. But I was at the library earlier and naturally, I picked up some new books and I am now distracted by Kate Christensen's The Epicure's Lament.

Some habits are hard to crack. :\

YOGA | Finding Balance with John Friend

Excerpted from the Anusara Yoga Grand Gathering DVD, John Friend will guide you through playful arm balances. Before you begin, make sure to warm up with Sun Salutations, gentle backbends, and a few hip opening poses.

YOGA | Seane Corn Demonstrates "Body Prayer"

The only way to come back, is to start from Square 1.

Pixie Lott - 'Use Somebody' ( Kings Of Leon Acoustic Cover)

Dear God - Sarah McLachlan version

I was messaging a new Facebook friend earlier. We started talking about irony, and being bemused by humans a lot. I told her: irony is the reason I believe there is a god; there has to be somebody out there laughing at us.

Irony of course, is that my new friend posted a Yotube video of "Dear God" before she read my message. I'm posting the Sarah McLachlan version instead - because I super puffy heart Sarah McLachlan. (I can be very single-minded when I want to be)

One wonders though, why a god would makes us humans - gifted with intelligence, resourcefulness, yet so crippled by base instincts. That's a whole theological debate there. Most of us ordinary human beings can only wonder, and maybe joke about it a little. Still, no small surprise that my new friend is also a big Terry Pratchett fan. I guess us bemused sort find a familiar chord in Pratchett's stories.

Dear God
Hope you got the letter and...
I pray you can make it better down here
I don't mean a big reduction in the price of beer
But all the people that you made in your image
See them starving on their feet
Cause they don't get enough to eat
From God
I can't believe in you
Dear God
Sorry to disturb you but...
I feel that I should be hear loud and clear
We all need a big reduction
In the amount of tears
And all the people that you made in your image
See them fighting in the street
Cause they can't make opinions meet about God
I can't believe in you
Did you make disease
and the diamond blue?
Did you make mankind
after we made you?
And the devil too?
Dear God,
Don't know if you noticed but...
Your name is on a lot of quotes in this book
And as crazy humans wrote it
you should take a look
And all the people that you made in your image
Still believeing that junk is true
Well I know it ain't and so do you, dear God
I can't believe in
I don't believe in
I won't believe in heaven and hell
no saints no sinners no devil as well
no pearly gate no thorny crown
you're always letting us humans down
the wars you bring
the babes you drown
those lost at sea and never found
and it's all the same the whole world round
the hurt I see helps to compound
That Father, Son, and Holy Ghost
is just somebody's unholy hoax
And if you're up there you'd perceive
That my heart's here upon my sleeve
If there's one thing I don't believe in...
It's you, dear God.

BOOKS | Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk

[02/03/2010 ~ 09/03/2010]

Just had an urge to re-read Fight Club recently. I first read Fight Club many years ago - before the film with Brad Pitt, Helena Bonham Carter and Edward Norton was even mentioned. I enjoyed its anarchic energy. It was the kind of book that appealed to the anarchist within me, someone who is more than a little embittered by a consumerism culture, yet so trapped within it that we appreciate anyone who imagines a way out.

I guess I am now back to that stage of my life where I find my existence has become stagnant and demanding change. To destroy everything around me so that I can make it into something better.

Our reading lists are rarely as innocent as we think they are.

PS: As you can probably tell - I am desperately trying to get back to reading and blogging about books. Trying.