I had planned all along to go out at midnight on Friday night to get my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Unfortunately, I discovered earlier in the day that the place where I reserved my copy (Sam Goody) wasn’t going to open at midnight like they did when the last book came out. They weren’t going to open until 8AM Saturday. There explanation was that they weren’t a bookstore and Wal-Mart and Barnes and Noble were both selling it at midnight, so there wasn’t really a point for them to do so since they didn’t have many copies. I guess I shouldn’t have tried to be a loyal customer. I decided that waiting until Saturday morning would be okay. Sometime later Friday I decided since I had only put down $1 at Sam Goody, I would check out Wal-Mart sometime after midnight and get a copy there. Why wait? I went around 3AM Saturday morning to buy a copy and read a little before I went to bed.
I just finished reading it a little while ago. It was soooooo gooooood. I didn’t want to blow through it too quickly, but there were times when I couldn’t put it down. I won’t spoil anything, but I thought it was a great ending to the series. I liked the definitive conclusion that it gave. I’m sad that the series is over, but I hope that J.K. Rowling doesn’t write more Harry Potter stories.
Now I need to sleep. I’ll think more about this tomorrow.
Dreamcatchers, Stephen King
Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
Summer of the Monkeys, Wilson Rawls
The Hedge Knight, George R.R. Martin
The Sworn Sword, George R.R. Martin
The Taking, Dean Koontz
Timeline, Michael Crichton
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling
On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt
On Truth, Harry G. Frankfurt
The Long Walk, Richard Bachman (Stephen King)
His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
Throne of Jade, Naomi Novik
Black Powder War, Naomi Novik
Empire of Ivory, Naomi Novik
What Would Jefferson Do?: A Return to Democracy, Thom Hartmann
Fast Food Nation is the latest book that I’ve read. It’s a book about the impact on the fast food industry on the United States and the rest of the world. It not only discusses the impact that the fast food industry has had on our health, but also the impact it’s had our communities, our culture, and our economy. Reading it made me want to stop eating fast food so much, but I wonder if I will. After I watched Super Size Me, I did cut back on the amount of trips I made to McDonald’s for a while.
The movie Fast Food Nation is in my Netflix queue, but I’m not sure if I’ll watch it. It’s a fictional movie and it’s only loosely based on the book, but it could be worth watching.
I suppose I can hold of on starting a new book until Harry Potter comes out Friday at midnight. I can’t wait.
Dreamcatchers, Stephen King
Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
Summer of the Monkeys, Wilson Rawls
The Hedge Knight, George R.R. Martin
The Sworn Sword, George R.R. Martin
The Taking, Dean Koontz
Timeline, Michael Crichton
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling
On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt
On Truth, Harry G. Frankfurt
The Long Walk, Richard Bachman (Stephen King)
His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
Throne of Jade, Naomi Novik
Black Powder War, Naomi Novik
Empire of Ivory, Naomi Novik
What Would Jefferson Do?: A Return to Democracy, Thom Hartmann
Last night we went to see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. I had been looking forward to the movie for a while because this is my favorite book in the series so far. For me it was the one where things really started to hit the fan.
I hate that they had to leave out so much, but it had to be done. It’s been 4 years since I read the book, so my memory of events isn’t as great as it could be. One scene I was waiting for that they didn’t do was the scene where Dolores Umbrigde is trying to get rid of Hagrid and Professor McGonagall goes to help Hagrid. In the bonus features for the previous movie’s DVD, the 3 main cast members were asked what part of the 5th book they were most looking forward to doing in the movie. Rupert Grint’s (Ron) answer was the Quidditch stuff. I felt bad because he had no way of knowing at that point that the Quidditch had been taken out of the movie.
Overall it was a really good movie and it didn’t seem like it was close to 2.5 hours long. I liked Imelda Staunton as Dolores Umbridge. Helena Bonham Carter was great as Bellatrix Lestrange. I wish we had gotten to see more of her and I wish there was more Tonks. The scene at the end in the Ministry of Magic was my favorite. I can’t wait to read to final book in the series later this month.
The 4th of July was another lazy day this year, but it was still a lot of fun.
I slept late. When I got up I watched some more Jericho and read Fast Food Nation a little.
My roommate John and I finished the story mode of Rayman Raving Rabbids on the Wii. My opinion of it hasn’t changed – it’s fun, especially if you’re playing with others. We also played Super Mario Bros. 2, Justice League Heroes, and Mario Party 8.
I didn’t eat as much as I normally do on the 4th, but that could be a good thing.
I had started reading Dreamcatchers, but I decided to switch to The Long Walk by Stephen King at Rob’s urging. King wrote The Long Walk under the pseudonym Richard Bachman.
The story is about Ray Garraty, who is 1 of 100 teenage boys participating in an annual walking contest. The Walkers receive warnings for offenses such as walking too slowly or leaving the course. If they go an hour without receiving a warning, then one of their warnings gets taken away. If a Walker receives 4 warnings, then he gets his ticket and is taken out of the race. You quickly discover that the way he is taken out is by getting shot by soldiers. I really enjoyed reading the story. It’s a short novel, so it didn’t take a long time to read.
A while back I had heard about a Japanese movie called Battle Royale and it has been in my Netflix queue since then. Reading The Long Walk made me think of it and now I have moved it closer to the top of the queue. I hope I like it as much as I liked The Long Walk.
Lately it seems like every time I mark something off the list, I add more.
Dreamcatchers, Stephen King
Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
Summer of the Monkeys, Wilson Rawls
The Hedge Knight, George R.R. Martin
The Sworn Sword, George R.R. Martin
The Taking, Dean Koontz
Timeline, Michael Crichton
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling
On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt
On Truth, Harry G. Frankfurt
The Long Walk, Richard Bachman (Stephen King)
His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
Throne of Jade, Naomi Novik
Black Powder War, Naomi Novik
What Would Jefferson Do?: A Return to Democracy, Thom Hartmann
I finally finished Summer of the Monkeys Wednesday night. I took a long break from it, but got back into it recently. Because of that long break from reading, my Reading List (Early 2007) has simply become my Reading List 2007. I’ve even added a few more books to the list.
The reason I chose to read Summer of the Monkeys is that I’m pretty sure it was the first novel I ever read. I had to read it for English class, and that is how I started to like reading books. It’s been somewhere around 15 years since I last read this book, and time does make a different.
It was definitely written for a younger audience. All the innocence/ignorance of the children got on my nerves a little. Of course there was usually an adult around to say something like “I don’t think that’s gonna happen”. The story takes place in the Ozarks. I got tired of reading so many country expressions. I guess that’s why I took a break from the book and had trouble motivating myself to come back to it. Once I did get back into it, the story got moving along and I managed to deal with the annoyances.
How did I celebrate finishing the novel? I baked cookies and drew designs on them. I drew the Star Trek symbol on one, drew the Heroes symbol on another, wrote “so say we all” on another, and so forth. I’ll add that to the list of my recent random impulses. And now the new book list. It’ll probably bleed over into 2008.
Dreamcatchers, Stephen King
Ender’s Game, Orson Scott Card
Summer of the Monkeys, Wilson Rawls
The Hedge Knight, George R.R. Martin
The Sworn Sword, George R.R. Martin
The Taking, Dean Koontz
Timeline, Michael Crichton
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, J.K. Rowling
On Bullshit, Harry G. Frankfurt
On Truth, Harry G. Frankfurt
The Long Walk, Richard Bachman (Stephen King)
His Majesty’s Dragon, Naomi Novik
Throne of Jade, Naomi Novik
Black Powder War, Naomi Novik
What Would Jefferson Do?: A Return to Democracy, Thom Hartmann
Update, 6/25
I accidentally left a few off the book list.
Safari for Windows…ouch! At least they are patching it.
I got bored with Titan Quest. Too much of the same old thing and not getting much out of it. It all just kind of blurred together. No use in sticking with a game I’m not enjoying just to say I completed it.
I started back reading Summer of the Monkeys. I got bored with it too. Maybe it’ll pick up. If not, I’m going back to Stephen King.
My 10-year high school reunion is the first weekend in August. I think I’m going.
I just got a sudden, strange craving for spaghetti. Time for lunch.
I’ve been doing well lately when it comes to reading. This past week I re-read The Hedge Knight and read The Sworn Sword for the first time. Both of these are short novels by George R.R. Martin that were included in the Legends collections. They take place in the same world as Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series, only 100 years in the past. The main characters are Dunk and Egg, a knight and his squire. Combined they are about 250 pages long. I liked The Hedge Knight more than The Sworn Sword, but they are both definitely worth checking out if you like A Song of Ice and Fire. Hopefully, he’ll finish the next book in the main series soon.
I finally got around to reading the book that probably every other science fiction/fantasy fan has already read: Ender’s Game. One reason I picked this book to read next is it’s length. So many books that I read these days are newer books and are at least 600 pages, but this one is only around 300 pages. It is possible to tell a good story in 300 pages. And it is a great story with a great ending! I’m sure that I’ll read at least one more book in the series some day. I recently heard that the book is being made into a movie. Now I’m back to re-reading The Hedge Knight.
Also, I finished playing The Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-Earth. It’s been fun getting back into real-time strategy games lately. This game seems to focus more on the fighting than creating troops and gathering resources. It deviates quite a bit from the books and the movies, but it’s not a big deal. It got really good at the end and I fought some really long battles. I’m interested in playing the sequel, but for now I’m on to Neverwinter Nights.
I ended up buying this monitor as a replacement for my CRT that died. It’s fine for what I need it for and I get a rebate if I remember to fill that form out. I seem to be partial to Samsung products these days.
I watched Parenthood the other night at its still good after all this time. My mom was a member of Columbia House (when they had VHS movies) and that was one of the movies she bought. The fact that I still remembered most of it even though I hadn’t seen it in around 15 years means that I must have watched it over and over again. “When you’re slidin’ into first and you feel a sudden burst…”
I finished reading Black House by Stephen King and Peter Straub. It’s the sequel to The Talisman. It’s a much different book than The Talisman. The whole style seems different. A lot of that may be because they were written about 20 years apart. It’s still a great book, however. There’s a lot of Dark Tower goodness that people who were fans of that series will enjoy. **minor spoiler warning** It even had a warning about continuing past a certain point at the end just like book 7 of The Dark Tower. **end spoiler warning**
Speaking of The Dark Tower, I hear that it may also be made into a movie or TV series.
I went online to pay my DirecTV bill a few days ago and saw that I owed over $200. It turns out that they charged me fees that I had been told I would be charged. I paid the amount that was due on the last bill, waited a day for the payment to go through, and then called them to have all the extra charges taken care of. I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and say that they weren’t trying to cheat me. It probably happened because my call got disconnected before the guy could finalize the deal and the second lady didn’t know that I wasn’t supposed to be charged those fees.
Those Amazon.com ads on the right side of the home page seem to be different depending on whether I’m using Internet Explorer or Firefox. I wonder why that is.
I got pulled over for not wearing a seatbelt of all things. The one time I wasn’t wearing it and that happens. I discovered at the time that I didn’t have a recent insurance card on me. I had 3 expired cards, but not one that was up-to-date. I also discovered my driver’s license expired in about 2 months ago on my birthday. I had no idea. Time flies in the real world. He let me off with a warning on the seatbelt and expired driver’s license and only gave me a ticket for no insurance. Once I go show them proof that I do have insurance, I’ll be set.
Update, 2/26
Stephen King has now confirmed that The Dark Tower will be adapted by LOST co-creators J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof. How much did they pay him for the rights? $19. Somehow that’s not surprising.
I had planned all along to go out at midnight on Friday night to get my copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Unfortunately, I discovered earlier in the day that the place where I reserved my copy (Sam Goody) wasn’t going to open at midnight like they did when the last book came out. They weren’t going to open until 8AM Saturday. There explanation was that they weren’t a bookstore and Wal-Mart and Barnes and Noble were both selling it at midnight, so there wasn’t really a point for them to do so since they didn’t have many copies. I guess I shouldn’t have tried to be a loyal customer. I decided that waiting until Saturday morning would be okay. Sometime later Friday I decided since I had only put down $1 at Sam Goody, I would check out Wal-Mart sometime after midnight and get a copy there. Why wait? I went around 3AM Saturday morning to buy a copy and read a little before I went to bed.
I watched 
the other night at its still good after all this time. My mom was a member of Columbia House (when they had VHS movies) and that was one of the movies she bought. The fact that I still remembered most of it even though I hadn’t seen it in around 15 years means that I must have watched it over and over again. “When you’re slidin’ into first and you feel a sudden burst…” 
I finished reading 
by Stephen King and Peter Straub. It’s the sequel to The Talisman. It’s a much different book than The Talisman. The whole style seems different. A lot of that may be because they were written about 20 years apart. It’s still a great book, however. There’s a lot of Dark Tower goodness that people who were fans of that series will enjoy. **minor spoiler warning** It even had a warning about continuing past a certain point at the end just like book 7 of The Dark Tower. **end spoiler warning**
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