Sometime back in early 2008, about the time that I started my goal for reading a book a week, a coworker gave me a book and told me that it was a hand-me-down to her and that I should feel free to keep it or pass it along to someone else. That book? Patricia Cornwell’s Postmortem.

I didn’t dive right into the book and I let it sit for a few weeks before I actually ended up picking it up. Honestly, I don’t even remember exactly when I read it but I believe it was sometime after I started my current job in April. Looking for something to pass the time on the bus and lacking any new books on my shelf to read, I grabbed Postmortem and began reading.

I was immediately sucked in and burned through the book faster than usual. It was a great crime/murder novel about a fictional Chief Medical Examiner for Virginia named Dr. Kay Scarpetta. While I don’t even really remember the exact plot, it stuck in my head as a CSI-ish type novel that was pretty damn good. I didn’t think much more about it until Black Friday while perusing Half Price Books I noticed several of Cornwell’s Scarpetta novels on the $1 rack in the back. I picked up a few of them and took them home. I dove into them and burned through several over the course of the next few weeks and enjoyed them immensely.

I have recommended Cornwell’s novels to friends and one of my buddies who got me hooked on CSI, has also been going through them methodically ever since I passed along Postmortem to him. Unfortunately I haven’t been quite as methodical, being that I’ve been picking them up for $1 instead of doing the smart thing and getting them from the library (BTW, the last I looked, the most recent Scarpetta novel had a waiting list over 400 people deep the last time I looked in Dakota County’s library system) and have suffered the consequences but found that while some details are given up in later books, the stories don’t necessarily need to be read in order.

This past weekend I picked up two more from the $1 rack and have them tucked away for safe keeping until I get a chance to read through them. While I’m currently reading another Cornwell novel, it’s not from the Scarpetta series and I must say that while it’s all right, I just don’t find it nearly as interesting or exciting — although I have far less bad dreams heh. That said, I’m trying to push through it so I can get to what I really enjoy ;-)

So, are you a Cornwell fan? What do you think of the Scarpetta series? Any favorites in there? Perhaps you have read Cornwell’s stuff and have some suggestions on similar material that I could move on to once I exhaust the Scarpetta series offerings. Whatever it is, feel free to comment on!

It’s been a while since my last update on what I’m currently watching, reading, and listening to so I figured I’d give everyone a quick glimpse of what I am doing with my free time, most of which is spent riding the 477 to Minneapolis and back.

Yesterday I watched the worst movie I have seen in quite some time, M. Night Shyamalan’s The Happening. I’m not quite sure why anyone would have agreed to be in this movie, let alone produce it and then distribute it but someone was convinced it would be a good idea. Unfortunately it wasn’t. The movie is fucking terrible. It’s not suspenseful, it’s not interesting and there’s really no reason for it to exist at all except for the name behind the screenplay. The movie is about plants causing people to kill themselves. The movie should have been about bad movies making people want to kill themselves. That would have been a lot closer to reality.

I’ve been reading Robert A. Heinlein’s Stranger in a Strange Land. I picked it up at Half Price Books from the $1 rack because I recognized the title (and the word “grok” on the front cover) from many of the pieces of media I have read and/or heard from the 1960s. I figured I’d dig this groovy (heh) book but so far it’s been really slow going. I’ve never been much one for sci-fi and while Wikipedia tells me that many people, even those that were not sci-fi fans, appreciated this book, I can’t say that it has done much for me. I’m going to continue to power through it but I am fairly certain I’m not going to enjoy it much.

Because we have no TV I have been watching some of my more regular shows via Hulu (which spawned this poll) but aside from that I’ve been watching Arrested Development with Kim and her cousin Laura. Laura had never seen AD and was interested in it. I have S1 and S3 on DVD and have S2 coming soon so we have been going through the episodes when Laura is over. I fucking love that show. While I understand why it went off the air (too many inside jokes that require you to have seen every single episode which is not conducive to normal TV viewers) it still saddens me deeply. Most TV viewers are dumb, can we keep at least one show on TV that isn’t marketed for retards?

In addition to Arrested Development, I have been catching up on Lost. I never watched this show on TV but I have recently come to acquire it on my iPhone and I have been watching an episode (or so) every day on the bus plus whenever I am working out. I just finished S1 yesterday and have started going through S2. I definitely see the draw to the show and have been completely sucked in. I continually curse the coworker who suggested that I watch the show — I have to force myself not to watch the show while at work or at home on the couch.

Because of the iPhone I have rediscovered a lot of my old favorites. I went through the CDs I could find in the house and ripped and synched them all up. While I have a ton of shit on there now (well, a ton for me) I am still addicted to just a handful of albums. The one I’m listening to most often is Beck’s Sea Change which was introduced to me by my brother-in-law when we were in Ohio back in September. The album is completely chill and one that I have used to soothe my jagged nerves many a time. Even if you’re not a Beck fan, I have a feeling that you’d enjoy this one.

In addition to Beck, I have been listening to Alice in Chains Unplugged which has been a top 5 favorite of mine since 1999 or so. This album got me through rough spots, stressful swim meets, and many long commutes from Apple Valley to White Bear Lake. If you haven’t had a chance to hear this one, I highly suggest at least listening to “No Excuses” which YouTube has so kindly offered to host:

I have a ton of other books I need to go through before the end of the year but I’m kinda burned out. I have read over 80 books this year so far, far exceeding my original goal for the year (which was created before I realized that I would be riding the bus every day and not having TV!). I made a promise to myself that I would not buy anymore books until I finish (or at least attempt to finish) what I already have on my bookshelves. That just gives me more cash to spend on used CDs at Half Price Books, right? ;)

What are you reading, watching or listening to that you’d like to share? Anything good? If so, comment on, we’d love to hear your suggestions!

On our way back from Zach and Krista’s wedding, Kim wanted to pickup a book for the flight home. I didn’t feel like reading The Executioner books I had with me so I picked up Bringing Down the House which is what the recent Kevin Spacey movie 21 is very loosely based on.

The book itself was ok but nothing terribly great. I mentioned that it was a quick read but not worth the $15 price tag. It seemed like a bunch of horseshit and based on what I’ve read about the MIT Blackjack Team across various other sources, it definitely was. Still, it was something to kill a flight from DAY to ORD to MSP and two trips on the bus.

At the wedding, someone told me that 21 was an awesome movie and that they were surprised I hadn’t seen it. I’m a big Kevin Spacey fan with The Usual Suspects being my #1 favorite movie ever but from what I had heard, it was a pile of shit. I was in the mood for a movie yesterday and with a limited selection laid out before me I picked up 21.

Kim and I watched a little bit of it yesterday and finished it tonight. Unfortunately, the guy at the wedding was wrong and the movie did suck. If you were thinking about it, don’t bother, it’s not even worth a $1.00 rental at your local Redbox.

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On Friday I had received an SMS from Chuck which said something like, “if you liked Fargo, RUN to see Burn After Reading.” I liked Fargo just fine and nearly wore out the VHS copy of it that I had from when I was a kid. At the time I didn’t know who wrote the movie, just that I liked it. I didn’t even pay much attention to the accents or even care that it was in Minnesota/North Dakota. It was just a quirky movie for me. Anyway, knowing that I liked that one, I figured I would take Chuck’s advice and check out the movie that weekend.

Kim was going to hang out with her cousin in Eden Prairie, with the car, so I braved the drizzle and walked over to the theater and sat down at the 1:00 showing for the movie. I was surprised that not only wasn’t I the only person there, I wasn’t the only person alone there. Going to movies alone usually creeps me out pretty good but I felt a bit better knowing that there were other losers just like me :)

Without spoiling anything, the movie was just all right. Some of it was funny, some of it was fucked up, and some of it was just downright stupid. After the movie I sent Chuck a reply SMS that said something similar to this message posted to Twitter.

So, if you’re in the mood to see Burn After Reading, wait for DVD, it’s just not worth the $7+ ticket price and if you want to see 21, poke yourself in the eyes, you’ll get the same effect and save yourself the rental fee.