Slye
Posts: 1923
Joined: 8/3/2013 Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: PinotPhile Deep Work by Cal Newport. Part of my adventures in reducing and limiting online time. More reading of books in the evening, less Web surfing, minimal text messaging. It seems to have made a positive impact so far. A very nice plan. I too have started to get back to reading more. Catching up on the last year or so of New York Review of Books. And reading a few books on Zimbabwe (work-related), and not directly work related, Erik Larson's In the Garden of Beasts, that covers the life of the US Ambassador to Berlin in 1933 and 1934, just as Hitler was coming to power. Like all of Larson's work, it is pretty easy to read; seems well researched, but is not burdened with footnotes. I find the latter sometimes liberating, and other times a bit annoying (at least the academic in me!). Very enjoyable reading though. Some of the reviews try to tie it to our current political situation. I am no fan of the current administration, but I do think one needs to be careful of such comparisons. I do think Larson illustrates how easy it is to be complacent or less principled when faced with clearly wrongful activity. For that it is applicable to the current situation, but also I would argue more broadly to any time and place given the large amount of injustice still in the world. As I go on, I realize this should also be cross posted to one bottle consumed alone -- though I have only had about two glasses (of an excellent Hermitage given to me by my Secret Santa this year!). Back to cooking dinner, that Hermitage, and eventually more of Erik Larson......
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