2011: A Look Back at Headlines

Tomorrow, I’ll do my personal reflection of the wonderful things I’ve experienced in 2011, but today, I’m just going to offer brief comments about some of the headlines from the year.

The spring brought a couple of big news items. First, there was the Royal Wedding. Prince William, son of Prince Charles and Princess Diana (they may have stripped her title, but she’ll always be Princess Diana to me), wed Kate Middleton, a commoner. Yes, I’ll admit, I set the clock, got up early, and watched the wedding before I went to work that day. As a teenager when Diana married Charles, I was fascinated with the fairy tale that came to life. Over the years, I remained a fan of Diana’s and still think she probably got a raw deal from the Royal Family. I remember where I was when I heard the news of her death, and I cried at the news. After her death, I kept following the news about Prince William and Prince Harry. I enjoyed watching the wedding and some of the coverage of the event. Diana would be very proud of her boys.

The next big news item of the spring was the annoucement about the death of Osama bin Laden. Americans had been waiting since 9/11/01 to hear that news, and needless to say, there were many celebrations across the country to celebrate the news. As the year ends, many of our troops are now home, and the rest are supposed to be home soon. It’s sad that it took nearly ten years to locate him, but it was finally done. Other threats likely exist toward our country, and they always will, but most just seemed happy that after nearly ten years, the man responsible for the 9/11 attacks had been killed.

The country was gripped by the trial of Casey Anthony during the summer. Just as with the O.J. Simpson trial seventeen years ago, people were glued to their televisions watching the trial and awaiting the verdict. Just as with the O.J. trial, people who didn’t follow the entire trial did turn on their televisions when a time was announced that the verdict would be delivered. And just as with the O.J. trial, people were dumbfounded when the verdict came back as not guilty. Many people, including me, still believe that Casey Anthony is responsible for the death of her daughter; however, the prosecution failed to prove its case, and thus she was acquitted. Unfortunately, sometimes the bad guys get away. Don’t be surprised, however, if you see Casey Anthony in the news again in the future. Once somebody gets away with murder, they think they’re invincible. Just ask O.J.

The Penn State scandal surrounding Jerry Sandusky is just going into high gear. The revelations surrounding this scandal have already cost several Penn State employees, including Coach Joe Paterno, their jobs. The investigation is continuing and more and more young men are coming forward with claims against Sandusky. It still blows my mind that this could have been going on and that many other adults would have turned their heads just to protect Sandusky when they should have been trying to protect those children. I’ve got a feeling this story is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. I have no sympathy for any of the Penn State adults involved in this mess; some of them may have met the legal bar for what they were required to do, but none of them met the ethcial bar for what they should have done. My prayer is that all those children, who are now young adults, can put the pieces of their lives back together, and that Sandusky spends the rest of his life in jail.

Of course, there were other stories that were significant throughout the year. The candidates are getting into full swing for the 2012 elections and the economy still isn’t where it needs to be. There was no shortage of “bad news” headlines. In fact, there never is. So, here’s hoping that the 2012 headlines will be better than most of the 2011 ones.

What Makes a Reading Database?

After I wrote about my reading database, there was some interest about what is, and perhaps what isn’t, there. What do I read? I’d say most people would be surprised at the wide range of reading selections that have made the list of books I have read since 1996, the year I started keeping track of the information.

Before I get into the “what” of the list, I’ll explain the “how” of my database. I actually have two Excel documents related to this. The first is simply titled “books read” and it has columns for the book’s title, the author, the year, the number it is, and the number of pages. After getting my Kindle, I added two more columns for Kindle and number of megabytes. I thought this database was quite thorough, until Jimmy mentioned he knew someone who could tell me what movies she had watched in July 2000. It occurred to me, there is a column missing from my database, and so for 2012, between the author and year columns, I have added a column for month.

There is a logical explanation for each column. I’m sure most of you understand most of the columns. If I had to guess, the only columns you might question would be the number of pages and the number of megabytes. Those columns just give me a point of comparison. My goal is to read at least the same number of books each year, but I’d also like it to be approximately the same number of pages of reading material. It would seem like cheating if one year I read fifty books that had 20,000 pages of reading material, but the next year, I read fifty-one books but only had 5,100 pages of reading material. After getting the Kindle, I added the megabyte column for the same reason, to have a point of comparison. I’m sure my faithful friends will just roll their eyes and say something about OCD, but hey, it makes sense to me to do it this way.

My second document is called “books read stats.” Until I got the Kindle this summer, this document had only three columns: year, number of books, and number of pages. After getting the Kindle, two more columns – Kindle ed. and number of megabytes – were added. This document is much smaller, since there are only eighteen rows, one for each year 1996-2012, and one row that calculates the totals in columns B, C, and E (the numbers columns). The purpose of this document is to be able to quickly see what the totals for each year are without having to scroll the other document to find the end number for each year. It also lets me quickly see the number of pages and number of megabytes for the year. Since this information is for comparative purposes, I can easily and quickly make a comparison. The number of books column includes all books, those that I hold in my hand and read and those I read on my Kindle. Keeping a separate tally for the Kindle books will allow me to see, again easily and quickly, how much my Kindle gets used when compared to regular books.

So, that’s my system. It really is quite simple and logical. Should you decide to keep a reading database, you can use the columns I have or create your own, based on your needs. Now, though, what do I read?

I read both fiction and nonfiction. I don’t reread books often, mainly those that I assign to my classes. Since these books are often assigned every other year, I have to reread those in order to refresh my memory. I never know what kinds of questions the kids will ask during seminar, and if I don’t read it again at the same time the new class is reading it, they’ll ask me something that I don’t have a clue about because I’ve forgotten that particular detail over the course of the two years. Outside of that, though, I rarely read a book more than once. I simply don’t have the time. I have so many books I want to read that any time spent rereading takes away from the books I have yet to read.

For fiction, many of my favorite authors fill the list of books I have read. Some of these include Nicholas Sparks, John Grisham, James Patterson, Danielle Steel, Janet Evanovich, Jodi Picoult, Stephen King, Dean Koontz, Richard North Patterson, Greg Iles, Dan Brown, Catherine Coulter, Michael Connelly, Nora Roberts, Mary Higgins Clark, John Jakes, Larry McMurtry, David Baldacci, Richard Paul Evans, Steve Alten, and Michael Crichton. I’ll read whatever I can find by that group of authors. I’ve also read several noteworthy series of fiction books, including the Harry Potter books, the Twilight books, the Hunger Games books, the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo books, the Mr. Monk books, and the Left Behind books.

I’ve read many of the classics, some because I teach them in my classes, and others because I wanted to. You will find Moby Dick on the list simply because I told myself I was going to read it. I have a rule – if I start a book, I must finish it. I may not finish it immediately, and I may take a break and read several other books before I finish it, but the rule is to finish. That rule is the only reason I finished Moby Dick. I hated that book, but I finished it. I have only broken the rule a couple of times. One book I started but never finished was Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. I may have made it ten pages into the book. That book had more f-bombs on one page than an R-rated movie. I stopped reading and counted up to 20 on one page, and nearly every page of the ten I’d read was just like that, and I simply decided rule or no rule, I could not finish that book.

Other classics I enjoyed included books by Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, Robert Louis Stevenson, Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, Emily Bronte, Charlotte Bronte, Chinua Achebe, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Bram Stoker, Ray Bradbury, and George Orwell. There are some who aren’t necessarily my favorites though, like John Steinbeck and Charles Dickens. The only good thing Dickens wrote was A Christmas Carol and the opening paragraph of A Tale of Two Cities. Two other classics I enjoyed were Alex Haley’s Roots and Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind.

I also read a lot of nonfiction. I’ve read all of Dave Pelzer’s books about his struggles having been an abused child. I’ve read Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom; it’s one of my all-time favorites, and one of the few books I would reread whether or not I assigned it to my students (which I do, by the way). I also assign Lynn Truss’s Eats, Shoots & Leaves, which I think is a masterpiece, though my students don’t always agree. I’ve read several biographies about Princess Diana; I’ve been fascinated with the Royal Family since the fairy-tale wedding. I’ve ready Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood. I’ve read memoirs by Patrick Swayze, Rick Springfield, Lisa Whelchel, Barry Williams, Maureen McCormick, Robert Kennedy, Elie Wiesel, Jennings Michael Burch, Tim O’Brien, Randy Pausch, Melissa Sue Anderson, Paula Deen, and Chad Varga.

My database includes lots of others authors as well. There have been several books I thoroughly enjoyed, but it’s the only book by that particular author that I’ve read. I don’t limit myself to the authors mentioned above. If a title catches my attention, I’ll read the blurb to see what the book is about. If it sounds like something that will interest me, I’ll give it a chance. All of my favorite authors have lots of books I haven’t had a chance to read yet, and of course I’d like to make it through their other works. There are also several other memoirs out there that I want to read, from other members of the Little House on the Prairie cast or The Brady Bunch cast, just to name a couple.

Reading is wonderful. I don’t understand those who don’t enjoy reading. They really don’t know what they’re missing out on. I suggest reading every chance you get, and I suggest you don’t limit yourself. As you can see from what’s on my list, it’s all over the place. Yours should be, too. Keeping the database may not be for everybody, but I enjoy doing it; it helps me keep track of what I’ve read and when I read it. I have fallen way short of my goal for 2011 reading; however, I have set my 2012 goal at 75 books, and I’m going to work diligently to fulfill that goal.

If you have to choose between keeping a database and reading a book, by all means, go read the book. But if you do keep a database, what is on yours? Are there other columns I need to add to mine? If you ever need a suggestion for something that would be good to read, or something to avoid, just ask. I’ll be glad to share suggestions with you. For now, I need to go finish a book.