Latest / The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast / Episode 138: No Reading Life Is Behind Schedule

Transcript

Episode 138: No Reading Life Is Behind Schedule · The Mookse and the Gripes Podcast

• 0:00
  [music]
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_01: This is the Mookse and the Gripes podcast.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Hello, everybody.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_01: This is Trevor and still walking.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: Me next to some dogs, you might be able to hear, but with Paul.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_01: Paul's out with some beautiful birds this morning.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_01: How are you doing, Paul?
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_02: I'm doing great.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, we just decided we liked it so much we'd just keep walking.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_02: We've been walking for an entire two weeks, right?
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_02: That's right.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: It's been wonderful.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: I have shrunk.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_01: My legs are a bit sore, but still going.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: No, it's been a busy couple of weeks.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_01: In fact, that's what we expected.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: We would have to do another one of these relatively quick walking episodes.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know,
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_01: this isn't going to become our regular type of content,
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_01: but I kind of like it for filling in these gaps.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, exactly.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_02: As we were saying last time, it's just kind of one of those where...
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_02: With everything going on, it's kind of the best way we can make it still happen.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, like you said, not a forever thing, but just a make it work for now thing.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: By the way, Paul,
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_01: you said that you got out of your neighborhood because there was a 5K going on.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: I am about to walk up to where I tend to go on our walks.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_01: It's by some pickleball courts.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: And today is the kickoff of Salem days.
• 1:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm from Salem, Utah.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: And the...
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_01: Kickoff is apparently a pickleball tournament.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_01: There are about a,
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know, 100, 200 people waiting to listen to our podcast live, I'll say.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I think we should.
• 1:47
  SPEAKER_02: Broadcasting live from the pickleball championships, it's The Mookse and the Gripes.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, man.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: We'll see how that goes.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: I may have to do some evasive maneuvers, but...
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_02: It's funny because when we were recording our last episode,
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: I didn't hear any of that,
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_02: but when I listened to the episode,
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_02: every once in a while you could hear some little pickleball in the background.
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_01: Yep, yep.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: Today there might be just a little bit more.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's okay, that's okay.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't,
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_01: I would love to hear,
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to have a little bit of a catch up with you
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: and hear what you've been reading.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: But I am going to link this into a question that I have about that sense of needing to catch up.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: And no, not in the same way.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_01: Of course, we need to catch up with each other.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_01: reconnect after a couple of weeks where you've been,
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_01: you know, gone, doing other things.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: And we haven't really talked or touched base offline very much.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_01: You know, that kind of catch up.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: But catching up in your reading life or that sense that you have to.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_01: So let's catch up and then let's talk about that other type of catching up.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_02: For sure.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, well, like you said, I've been busy.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_02: I think since the last time we recorded,
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_02: I have been up in the Colorado Rockies on an annual backpacking trip that I take
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_02: with my brother and a friend of ours, which was absolutely amazing.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_02: Much needed.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_02: It's been a A busy year to say the least with work and everything
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_02: so it's always amazing how nice it is just to get up and away from everything
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_02: and you know have no access to your phone.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah we did lots of fishing, talking, hiking and then of course some reading.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: I thought you know how Virginia Wolf is so adaptable and she can do pretty much anything.
• 3:39
  SPEAKER_02: I decided to test her out in the Rockies, too.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_02: Took her along with me.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_02: So I was reading the waves up there, which was absolutely wonderful.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, just a great experience up there.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_02: And then most recently here, I have been in Nashville this week for a work conference.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: But as always, I managed, you know, in the evenings to kind of slip in some fun.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_02: So I got to visit our old buddy Ann Patchett over at Parnassus Books.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_02: Which is always amazing.
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_02: I know you've been there before, Trevor.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_02: Such a cool little store.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_02: No, I haven't.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, you haven't?
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: I thought you had.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: No.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, okay.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: I would like to just virtually just every week on her videos.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_02: So I know I was chatting with the person who was at the cash register
• 4:25
  SPEAKER_02: about those videos, how much I love them.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_02: And somebody else who was standing in line was like, oh, I love those, too.
• 4:30
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, so fun.
• 4:31
  SPEAKER_02: But I picked up the new Anne Fadiman collection of essays called Frog, which I'm excited about.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_02: And then I think a while back on here, I had talked about Yeah, he and me?
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: So that was one of those where I really loved is not the right word,
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_02: but on audio was so powerful that I was like this.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_02: Let's just say this book may come up again near the end of the year.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_02: And so when I saw it there, I just like I need a physical copy of that guy.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah,
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_02: been traipsing all over the United States and reading and buying books along
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_02: the way, as you might expect.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_01: Very nice.
• 5:22
  SPEAKER_01: Very nice.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I've just been kind of busy,
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: busy working here,
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: doing things,
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_01: getting things in order for the late summer before school starts here in a couple
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: of weeks for my my kids.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a busy time.
• 5:37
  SPEAKER_02: But it really is.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_02: I remember when summer used to be like the lazy days,
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_02: you know, like it would be like a kickback.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like if anything, it's maybe as bad or worse than the holidays as far as the busyness.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it hasn't felt that way for a long time, I don't think.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_01: And it flies by.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it really does.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_02: Have you been managing to squeeze in any fun reading or any... Well,
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_02: actually, first,
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_02: before we do that, we need to catch up on something we talked about last time.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: Your birthday was right before our last episode,
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_02: and I think you had some high hopes for a couple of things that might...
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_02: You know, not be hiding under the tree.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_02: I guess that's not the right way to say it,
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_02: but a couple of gifts that you were hoping you might get.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_01: How did all that turn out?
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_01: Excellent.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_01: Excellently.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_01: My wife got me a couple of more Everyman editions of Charles Dickens books.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I can't remember specific.
• 6:35
  SPEAKER_01: I think it brings my total up to 10 of the 16, maybe 12 of the 16.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_01: I have a sense that I need four.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_01: So and there are 16.
• 6:43
  SPEAKER_01: So I must be to 12.
• 6:46
  SPEAKER_01: I could be wrong on that,
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_01: but at any rate,
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: it's lovely to see them all there,
• 6:51
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 6:53
  SPEAKER_01: think about reading them again,
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_01: the ones I've read, and think about reading the ones I haven't.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: Lots of thinking about reading, you know.
• 7:03
  SPEAKER_02: That might get into our later conversation when you can't read.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_02: What do you do?
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I'm thinking.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then she brought me a couple of Henry James Everyman editions as well.
• 7:15
  SPEAKER_01: There aren't very as many of those.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think there are six and I have I have three or four of them now.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_01: Four of them.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: So I've got I'd already had the portrait of a lady.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_01: I already had the ambassadors and
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_01: she got me the Wings of the Dove and Washington Square.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: And I know they do the Golden Bowl.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_01: And what else do they do?
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_01: That Awkward Age or The Awkward Age.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_01: And then I do have his dual collection of the,
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_01: you know, their collected short stories in Everyman.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: But I have the UK Everyman of those.
• 7:53
  SPEAKER_01: And so they're just a slightly different cover style that looks really nice.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_01: I actually prefer the covers.
• 8:02
  SPEAKER_01: They're just kind of text and I prefer them over the Everyman.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_01: In the U.S., there's kind of like this abstract art.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_01: I don't quite understand why the short stories
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_01: of Henry James would have these weird geometric shapes.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: That seems like an odd choice.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_01: Someone will look at it and be able to tell me exactly why and
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_01: that it isn't actually that weird and I'm even looking at them wrong.
• 8:33
  SPEAKER_01: They're not abstract geometric shapes there.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's upside down, Trevor.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_01: That's probably what I've done.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: But that's been a lot of fun, you know.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_01: And so I've got them all.
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_01: I did some rearranging of my bookshelves to fit everything in and kind
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_01: of move some things around.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_01: So I've got, I don't know, maybe four or five boxes of books to, you know, see who wants them.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: And then take the rest of them to the shop for other readers to have some day.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_01: A little bit of that book sifting like we talked about with Dorian last year.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yep, we did.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_02: You're always so good at it and I'm working on it.
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_01: It always clears my mind.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I kind of hate it, but also afterwards.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_01: I feel like I can move about the room a little bit easier and have
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_01: a little bit more clarity on what I actually want to read and all that kind
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: of stuff.
• 9:38
  SPEAKER_01: So I don't mind it.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_02: Well, it sounds like it was a very successful birthday.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_02: I'm glad that the family was picking up what you were putting down.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_02: Sounds like they probably knew the assignment and succeeded.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_01: Very good.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it was fun.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_01: And then a couple of friends from the Library Book Club and Pub Night took me out
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_01: to dinner last Monday.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: So about a week after my birthday,
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_01: they took me out to an Asian restaurant, a noodle place with some sushi.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: So it was just all good all around.
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_01: Still celebrating, I say.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_02: I was going to say, we've talked about all the benefits of book club.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_02: Now you can add something else to it, free food.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_01: It was unexpected, but one of those where you're like, oh, you know, that is very thoughtful.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: I very much appreciate it.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_01: That's really nice.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_02: Those friendships,
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_02: like we've talked about that forum from some of these groups are always amazing.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_02: So I love that.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: Well, good.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_01: But in terms of just actual reading,
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_01: I have gotten through The Girls of Slender Means by Muriel Spark.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_01: That was an excellent one.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: I loved it.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_01: Not sure I could tell you everything it's about,
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_01: but I think that's one of its features, you know, one of the good things about it.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_01: And then we are starting the Mandelbaum Gate.
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_01: Today's August 1st.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_01: So I've got that coming to start.
• 11:09
  SPEAKER_02: Is that the one that,
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_02: I can't remember, was that the one that when we talked about her recently was not?
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_02: I can't remember,
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like that one sticks in my brain for like maybe one that stood out
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_02: for some reason, but I don't know if that's true.
• 11:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's her longest.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: It's her longest by some ways.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: And I feel like many people think it's a little bit of a slog, you know, not that successful.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_01: I think she herself was like, okay, I gave that style of book a go.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_01: That's not really what makes me tick.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_01: But when I posted my review of the Girls of Slender Means,
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: someone on Instagram said that they love the Mandelbaum Gate, one of her favorites.
• 11:47
  SPEAKER_01: So I said, well, that's heartening.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_02: I always wonder about that.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_02: Like there are the ones that just are kind of almost unanimously viewed in a certain way.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_02: But every once in a while, those will pop out and turn out to be one of your favorites.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_02: So fingers crossed.
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I'll go into it just looking forward to it.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_01: Love it.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: And if nothing else, looking forward to it being, you know, that hurdle being over with.
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't think it'll be as bad as, you know, some have been in the past.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_01: Not of hers, but, you know, some books that you feel like you have to get through.
• 12:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: Well, nice.
• 12:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: Sounds like you've been chipping away at that one.
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_02: And then I know we're both still working on Life and Fate, of course.
• 12:33
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, that's probably going to be the case here for a little while.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_02: I think I mentioned last time I had slowed down,
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: not because of the book, but just because of life.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_02: And I will admit I did not get a chance to read it much over the last couple of weeks between.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_02: It would have been worth it, but I didn't really want to have that sucker up the mountain.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I was going to ask you.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_01: Did you have to abandon it along the pathway somewhere to free up your weight,
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_01: you know, to escape the Rockies?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_02: Or like that sacrilegious thing that some people do when they're hiking
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_02: the Pacific Coast Trail or something where they tear out every bunch of pages
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_02: that they've finished and burn them in the fire so that it lightens their pack.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think I could do that.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_02: I went conservatively and just left it at home.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: And then same with going to Nashville.
• 13:19
  SPEAKER_02: I was like, oh boy,
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_02: I always take like three or four books,
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_02: but I don't know if that can be one of them in my carry on.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_02: So that one's been languishing a bit, but I plan on jumping back into it this weekend.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: Almost done.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: I may have kind of caught up with you then.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you probably have.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_01: I think last time we spoke, you said you were on page about 400.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_01: And last night when I put it down, I've put it down after getting to page 400.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, nice.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_02: I think I'm like a little, little, little bit ahead of you.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, sounds like you're catching up.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_02: I assume you're still loving it.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_02: Or maybe that's too much of an assumption.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I do recognize that these kind of vast books that deal with a whole lot
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_01: of characters and kind of bounce around between them.
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_01: I get that they work cumulatively for a lot of people.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_01: It isn't the style that works best for me to stay emotionally connected.
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_01: It starts to feel like I'm skipping along the surface of a lake rather than diving in.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_01: And so, yes, I think it is a great book.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_01: And just so people know,
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: that's kind of how I felt with War and Peace, which has so many high highs.
• 14:37
  SPEAKER_01: But also often left me feeling a little bit,
• 14:41
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know, a little bit like I was just getting flung about.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_01: Whereas,
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 14:48
  SPEAKER_01: books that do work well for me that are long tend to be more, say,
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_01: The Brothers Karamasa,
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_01: where it's like you're going to delve deep into some of these characters.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_01: You're going to stay with them for a few hundred pages and it's going
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_01: to be mostly You know, just that kind of stuff rather than skipping around.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_01: I actually, I do like Life and Fate more than I liked War and Peace.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_01: But I am sensing that a little bit where sometimes when it comes to
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_01: yet another new character that I'm like,
• 15:23
  SPEAKER_01: I'll probably only read about this character for another,
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_01: you know, 10 pages and then leave them behind for 200 pages.
• 15:33
  SPEAKER_01: It stays a little bit harder to stay fully invested, is my sense.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I'd love to get over that.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to be able to get over that.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_01: I do recognize that that's more of a me kind of thing, and I'm okay with that.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I get that, but it is something I'm trying to deal with.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, it's legitimate for sure.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: I struggle with the same thing,
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_02: and I think I struggled with it more on Effingers,
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_02: honestly, because I feel like that one was even more bouncy.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: That one flung you right along the surface of a lake.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_01: I think I may have mentioned it.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_01: That felt like you were watching a DVD and would watch a couple seconds and then hit
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_01: the skip button.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it really did.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: And like you said, the cumulative power of books like that often pays off.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_02: By the time you're done,
• 16:27
  SPEAKER_02: you can kind of see the whole picture,
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_02: but there are times in the middle where it's a little bit of a struggle
• 16:32
  SPEAKER_02: or not necessarily a slog.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_02: The good thing about Life and Fate is they have a nice index of characters at
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: the back, which will kind of help you.
• 16:42
  SPEAKER_02: But even with that,
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_02: sometimes you leave somebody for 70 or 100 pages and come back and you're like,
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_02: I remember who this is, but I don't really remember where I left them last time.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_02: And so there's always that little bit of a challenge.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_01: And to be clear, I am enjoying it.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's fantastic.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: I think I just hoped for,
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_01: I think, you know, my brain is calibrated for some other things, I think.
• 17:07
  SPEAKER_01: And so that's what I,
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: when I imagine a great long book, it tends to fall more into that category.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: And this one's not quite like that.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_01: And that's more of a me recalibrating thing or just recognizing that,
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: hey, this is this is who I am and it's OK than anything else.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_02: I think what you need to do is just reread Lonesome Dove.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_02: That's ticking all the boxes for the long book.
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'm curious if our next one will, you know, a fortunate man.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_01: Is what we've got for our next big NYRB classic.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: And I don't know much about it.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll see.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_01: We'll see.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it's more Lonesome Dovish than War and Peace-ish.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_01: But maybe we're wrong.
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_01: Who knows?
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_02: We'll have to see.
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_02: I read his The White Bear by him a while back and really enjoyed it.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, I'll be very curious to see where that goes, too.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and there are other things I'm reading.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: But I'll save them for another episode because I do want to get into our topic
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_01: before we have to go.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: Our topic that we kind of thought is more like a guiding principle
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_01: for this episode is the sense of having to catch up on your reading life.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm distinguishing that from having to catch up with like a book
• 18:26
  SPEAKER_01: that you're reading for a book group or whatever.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_01: You know, something like that.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_01: There's kind of these external deadlines you might have to catch up in order
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_01: to finish a book by that.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_01: I'm actually talking more about your own personal reading life.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: The sense that I haven't read enough books or I haven't read enough of that kind
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_01: of book or I still haven't read that book I need to catch up.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_01: And kind of thinking about it as there is no such thing as catching up When it comes
• 18:59
  SPEAKER_01: to your reading life, but it can be a sense that can get in the way.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_01: Again,
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_01: distinguishing between a book you might be reading for some project that you're
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_01: behind on, That can be its own problem and maybe worth talking about someday.
• 19:20
  SPEAKER_01: But in this one, it's more that general sense of there's your mounting TBR.
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_01: You've got to catch up on that.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_01: Or, you know, the Booker Prize list just came out.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_01: I still haven't read last year's.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_01: I've got to really catch up.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: Or some other ways that you get this way.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: You know, you can think back on your youth.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_01: I was really looking forward to reading,
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_01: War and Peace,
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_01: which I finally did read, but for years feeling like, man, I'm behind.
• 19:52
  SPEAKER_01: I need to catch up and finally read War and Peace.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_01: And just that sense of being behind and more and more me thinking, no such thing.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_01: You're reading life as you're reading life.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: And you may want to read these things,
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_01: But the sense of being behind,
• 20:14
  SPEAKER_01: I think,
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: can actually get in the way of having the reading life that you want to have.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, what are your opening thoughts on that as we get into this brief mini-episode?
• 20:30
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 20:31
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I agree with you.
• 20:32
  SPEAKER_02: I think that pressure is real.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_02: And I think it's like we've talked about with like,
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_02: you know, social media and different things like that.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe there's some outside pressures that for some people might exist.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think I've said this before,
• 20:46
  SPEAKER_02: but I'll revert to my kind of standing of I do feel that pressure sometimes
• 20:51
  SPEAKER_02: when you feel like, you know, I should have read this or I want to read this.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_02: But I think we all have.
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but I think for the most part,
• 21:01
  SPEAKER_02: for me, it tends to be more of an excitement and a positivity.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_02: Not to say that there aren't times where you feel that,
• 21:07
  SPEAKER_02: but I do think a lot of times for me,
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_02: it's kind of what we talked about with why we like to have lots of books around,
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_02: even if we haven't read them,
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_02: is I do think usually I can kind of take that feeling and transfer it into
• 21:19
  SPEAKER_02: a positive where it's kind of like our friend on that video where,
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_02: oh great, I haven't gotten to that yet.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_02: I still have that to look forward to.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_02: I think that is that is to me a
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_01: reading life.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_01: That is the promise of what you have in the head and not a sense of the time
• 21:35
  SPEAKER_01: that you've missed in the
• 21:36
  SPEAKER_00: past, which I think can be detrimental.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: The promise of things ahead, I think, is is wonderful and encouraging and exciting.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_01: But the regret for time spent,
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_01: maybe reading other great books or maybe not, but whatever way it is or like.
• 21:54
  SPEAKER_02: I think about that sometimes too.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if I ever,
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, I've definitely felt like, oh, I read that book at the wrong time.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think I've ever felt any regret for that, though,
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_01: because the who I am right now is like,
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_01: so this book that I guess passed me would have liked it.
• 22:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I don't
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: and that's okay.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_01: I've never felt regret for that or a sense of therefore I need to read this
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: in my 40s or whatever.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_01: I have not necessarily ever thought about that.
• 22:55
  SPEAKER_01: I mean you've talked about it but I've never then gone and applied it to myself.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_02: Again,
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_02: it's not that I like obsess over that or like it keeps me up at night or anything,
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_02: but just I mentioned Jack Kerouac again,
• 23:07
  SPEAKER_02: just because like I do know that for a lot of people in their maybe late teens,
• 23:13
  SPEAKER_02: early 20s,
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_02: those kind of road trip books with like kind of the the beat lifestyle
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_02: or ethos really were impactful.
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, I read a few of them later on and I could recognize that.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_02: Some positive things about them, but it just kind of fell flat for me.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_02: But again, like you said, it's fine.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_02: It's just not the right time.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_02: But you always wonder, like,
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_02: what would it have been like if I could have hit on those at exactly the right time?
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_01: No, I think it's fair.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_01: But I think there's potential detriment to being, you know, kind of concerned about...
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: I'm walking past all the courts right now.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: But to be concerned about these books is that then they can become check boxes.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: That you're like, okay, I'm going to spend this summer catching up.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that that can lead to...
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_01: Not actually digging into the books.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, for me, I think I've learned, you know, this is me where I'm at right now.
• 24:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is not me trying to tell everyone else where they should be.
• 24:21
  SPEAKER_01: And I'll probably continue to adapt.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: But I've learned that sense of having to catch up doesn't take me to
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_01: the reading life that I want.
• 24:29
  SPEAKER_01: It takes me to having checked off a bunch of books that I may have read faster just
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_01: because I felt like I needed to have read it.
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: Versus I want to spend time with it.
• 24:44
  SPEAKER_01: Books can get in the way and make me feel pressure to finish them so I can get
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_01: to XYZ book or just finish them so I can check it off and finally say,
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_01: ha ha, I've caught up.
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_01: I've read all the books.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that to me isn't the point anymore.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_01: I do have books I still want to read.
• 25:09
  SPEAKER_01: I started the episode talking about the Everyman Charles Dickens books.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_01: I definitely have a sense that I really want to read all of these.
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: And I've read several of them already in the past, and I want to actually reread all of those.
• 25:24
  SPEAKER_01: But that's more that category we were talking about with, man, I'm so excited.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: That's a great promise.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_01: I don't feel like I wasted...
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, my 30s,
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_01: not having read them already or that I needed to get going on it
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: and have already read a few because I'm behind.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_01: Therefore, grab a short one and just burn through it so you can make that progress.
• 25:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, get a check box up there.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, a sense of progress bars and all of that.
• 26:01
  SPEAKER_01: Where are you at, Paul?
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_02: I just got to the top of a hill.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_02: It's getting a little windy up here.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_01: I'll try to take a detour here.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: I thought it might be wind,
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_01: but it also sounded like you got into a roller derby
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_00: match or something.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: While you're playing pickleball, I thought I might as well.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: I thought this was our sports episode.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_02: I'm sorry.
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_02: I must have read the instructions wrong.
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_01: One of my favorite things is my wife and I were going out to dinner and ran into
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_01: a couple that we know, they're friends, and he had sprained his ankle.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_01: And my wife said, oh, you need to come up with a really good story to tell people what happened.
• 26:44
  SPEAKER_01: What's your story?
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: What happened to your ankle?
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_01: And she goes, what is it?
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: And he goes, oh, I don't know.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_01: And she goes, oh, I know.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: You were playing roller derby, roller derby.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: And then she goes, no, wait, you were refereeing.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_01: And I thought, oh, yeah, telling people I was refereeing roller derby is a great story.
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's about as cool as it is.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:07
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I thought she nailed it on that one.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_01: She knew it.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_01: She was excited to say it.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_01: She dropped the mic right after.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_01: I hope you ran with it.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I hope so, too.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_02: All right, I'm off the roller derby, what is that, track?
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_01: Back in the real world.
• 27:28
  SPEAKER_01: Nope, sound good now.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 27:31
  SPEAKER_01: Anyway, yeah,
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_01: but like I was saying, though,
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_01: or the Henry James,
• 27:34
  SPEAKER_01: it's a sense of promise,
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: of future reading, you know, and not feeling like I have to check them all off.
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: But, oh,
• 27:42
  SPEAKER_01: I can't wait until I'm really delving into hard times and giving it the time
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_01: that it deserves to Not feeling like I've got to get through hard times so
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: that I can get to Edwin Drood, you know, or something like that.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 27:57
  SPEAKER_02: Well, and we've talked about,
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_02: I think one of the things that you've kind of put into words so nicely over
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_02: the last couple of years is the idea of just living inside of a book.
• 28:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's a big part of this.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know,
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_02: I think I'm pretty good at it,
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_02: but there are times where you definitely,
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_02: for me, it's mostly not like the external pressures.
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_02: Like you said,
• 28:15
  SPEAKER_02: it's more of the idea of like,
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_02: as you're reading a big,
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_02: long book, There's
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: all these other ones that are, you know, kind of
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_02: calling to.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_02: So for me, it's not usually like about ticking off the boxes.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_02: It's more of just like internal like,
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_02: oh, man, there are so many books right now that I would like to get to.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_02: But I think that is a more positive spin on this, like we were saying.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: So, yeah, I don't know.
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_02: It's an interesting back and forth.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_02: I think it like you said,
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_02: it adapts over time back and forth to sometimes it might feel a little bit more of
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_02: a negative thing, a little bit more of a pressure.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_01: Well, and again,
• 28:50
  SPEAKER_01: that's going back to my three or four book boxes that I have set out ready
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: to be sifted through for other people.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_01: That kind of frees up that sense of overwhelm of all these books I have to read.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: Look at how behind I am.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: Here's maybe 200 books.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_01: Most of them I have not read and have always,
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: you know, they've made it through several rounds of culling in the past.
• 29:18
  SPEAKER_01: To get to this point.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: And so they're definitely ones that I've wanted to,
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: but somehow letting go and thinking I can,
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_01: if someday it is the right time for it, then boom, I'll be able to find it again.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: You know, in this day and age, most books are not unfindable.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: Some are, but not all of them.
• 29:41
  SPEAKER_01: And...
• 29:43
  SPEAKER_01: That's just the way that it's going to go.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_01: And it does free up that sense of overwhelm of, boy, I really need to catch up on this big pile.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: If I stop and think about it,
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_01: if I read 60 of those books a year, it'd still take me like three or four years.
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 30:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you can make that your whole reading life for a couple of years at least.
• 30:05
  SPEAKER_01: So getting the sense of letting go of some things that might be giving me that sense
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_01: of, oh, I really need to catch up and get through those books.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: No, there are a lot of other books that are more pertinent to where I'm at right now
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_01: and giving me that sense of possibility and potential rather than that sense
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_01: of I got to catch up.
• 30:26
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the sense I want to cultivate, not the other.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that is the key to all this is just...
• 30:35
  SPEAKER_02: We've talked about book projects and things like that on quite a few episodes
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_02: or book clubs and I love those and I love that they kind
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_02: of do keep you somewhat rigorous on certain parts of your reading life but
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_02: to me it comes back to that idea of what we always talk about where all
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: of this should be for you and for fun and so the idea
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_02: that you would ever get trapped into any kind of thought or list I think is one of
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_02: the dangers of this and I think For me,
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_02: it's one of the things I like about having so many books around and
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_02: so many book recommendations is just allowing yourself to take those rabbit trails
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_02: and maybe that rabbit trail turns into the next three years or decade of your life
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_02: or maybe it's one book.
• 31:14
  SPEAKER_02: But I think
• 31:15
  SPEAKER_02: with all this stuff,
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_01: if we if we get too serious or
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_02: structured about it,
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's where to me it can get a little bit.
• 31:23
  SPEAKER_02: Not dangerous,
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_02: but like it can start to take some of the fun out of it or put some of the pressure
• 31:27
  SPEAKER_02: on where you you don't allow yourself just that serendipity and freedom.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_02: And that can also carry over into something as silly as like,
• 31:35
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_02: the willingness to kind of quit a book halfway through to,
• 31:38
  SPEAKER_02: you know, which we've talked about a little bit.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_02: Like it's so easy to think all this stuff is just for some purpose.
• 31:44
  SPEAKER_02: Like you said, the check a box.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_02: We have to finish this.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_02: But allowing yourself just those things.
• 31:50
  SPEAKER_02: Detours if you need them or U-turns or whatever the case may be.
• 31:54
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's one of the most important parts of all this.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I agree.
• 31:59
  SPEAKER_01: As we kind of come to the end, what are some promises that are more imminent on your future?
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_01: I know kind of what you're reading a little bit right now,
• 32:10
  SPEAKER_01: and I know you've got a bunch of others that are calling to you.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_01: Which ones are calling the loudest?
• 32:17
  SPEAKER_01: Which ones do you think you'll be getting to in the next month or two?
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: Or one or two.
• 32:21
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, I'd say we've talked about how we always like to have some classics going,
• 32:28
  SPEAKER_02: and right now I'm reading Virginia Woolf, so that's not a problem.
• 32:31
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, Life and Fate is probably technically considered a classic at this point,
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_02: but I have been getting an urge to dive back into rereading a few.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_02: Like, I always talk about Moby Dick being my The Demons are calling.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_02: The Demons are calling.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yep.
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_02: That's normal, right?
• 33:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, in my experience, yes.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_02: Totally fine.
• 33:22
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I don't know.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_02: It's just,
• 33:24
  SPEAKER_02: I think I'm getting called back to like mixing in a lot of more contemporary or,
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_02: you know,
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_02: we always have more than one book going,
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_02: but I think following your lead back into some of the true,
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_02: true classics with a capital Z.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, some of that will happen naturally because we have our Henry James episode coming up.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, I think that's kind of where my general mind is going right now.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 33:50
  SPEAKER_02: How about you?
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_01: Very cool.
• 33:53
  SPEAKER_01: Well, so my brain is taking me to a place where it's been in the past.
• 33:59
  SPEAKER_01: But I think,
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: as I go through the Muriel Sparks and they're all short books,
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_01: except for the Mandelbaum Gate, but they're all short books.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_01: I thought, you know, it's time for me to do something similar with Anita Bruckner.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_01: And I've got an arc of her new biography by Hermione Lee that comes out here in a few months.
• 34:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it's so good.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_01: So I think that's what's calling to me, is getting that going.
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_02: So she's one of your Pantheon authors, right?
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_01: Yep.
• 34:35
  SPEAKER_02: And remind me, how many of her works have you...
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:39
  SPEAKER_01: I think I've read like 10,
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_01: so I've still got several,
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_01: but I kind of thought similar to Muriel Spark,
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_01: I would just start over at the beginning and take a couple of years to read one
• 34:50
  SPEAKER_01: of her books every month.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: Super doable.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_01: All of hers are short.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I love that.
• 34:57
  SPEAKER_01: So we'll see.
• 34:58
  SPEAKER_01: I've thought about that before, but I,
• 35:00
  SPEAKER_01: you know, sometimes it just hits at the moment and it's like, okay, now's the time.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe now is.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know yet.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_01: But that's what's calling to me for this.
• 35:10
  SPEAKER_01: Trying to think that through over the next month or two.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_02: Very cool.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_02: Well, Mike, you just acknowledged that goes back to what we were saying.
• 35:17
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe you'll get partway through and decide,
• 35:20
  SPEAKER_02: it's not working for me right now,
• 35:21
  SPEAKER_02: but I'm glad I read the six that I read, but I'll pick it up later.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_02: That's kind of what I did with my Cormac project,
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_02: where I was doing the same thing, starting chronologically and reading them all.
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I consider myself to still be in the middle of that project,
• 35:35
  SPEAKER_02: but it's probably been a year since I've done it, but that doesn't mean it's over.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, I'm with you, 100%.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_01: All right, well,
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: we will be back here in a couple of weeks with another,
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_01: you know, a more normal sit-down episode.
• 35:51
  SPEAKER_01: I actually think that we are going to be doing our final episode of our trilogy series.
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_01: You know,
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_01: the parts of a book,
• 35:58
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: the beginning act,
• 35:59
  SPEAKER_01: the middle act,
• 36:00
  SPEAKER_01: and then we're going to end it with,
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_01: you know, of all things, the end, the final act.
• 36:07
  SPEAKER_01: And in contrast with just talking about like the last pages or the ending of a book,
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: but, you know, how do you get from that...
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: To that end section,
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: that ending act where you're wrapping things up and pulling the reader along.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_01: What happens in those pages?
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_01: What do we want as readers?
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_01: What are some different ways authors have done this successfully?
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_01: Things like that.
• 36:31
  SPEAKER_01: That should be a fun discussion.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_01: And that's what's coming next, I believe, unless something changes.
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_01: But that's what we've been planning on for a bit.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_02: Should we just go ahead and tell people we actually haven't been that busy?
• 36:44
  SPEAKER_02: We were just trying to drag out the excitement for that episode.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_02: We just wanted to build in, you know, it's like an encore.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_01: That's right.
• 36:53
  SPEAKER_01: We wanted to do a couple of our closing act on that.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
• 36:57
  SPEAKER_01: We're still in the middle.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: We're still in the middle.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_01: We wanted to extend it.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_02: We need a few.
• 37:03
  SPEAKER_02: We need you to stand up and cheer a little longer before we come back on for the encore.
• 37:06
  SPEAKER_02: That's all it is.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_01: Wait, but this is the ending act.
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_01: It's before the encore.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: We still need to think about that.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_01: What is our encore?
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_01: That's true.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_01: I've done this all wrong.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 37:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 37:17
  SPEAKER_01: Don't worry.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: I'll edit this out.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_01: No one will know how ill-prepared we are for
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: all this.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_01: Good.
• 37:23
  SPEAKER_01: That's what you always do.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_01: Well, have a good one, Paul.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_01: Listeners, thanks for joining in on another walk, and we'll talk to you all soon.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_01: Bye, everybody.
• 37:34
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to the Mooks and the Gripes podcast.
• 37:38
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• 37:45
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• 37:50
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• 37:56
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• 37:59
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• 38:04
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• 38:06
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• 38:15
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• 38:24
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• 38:26
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• 38:32
  SPEAKER_00: May you keep exploring great books until next time.