bookish goal achieved!

As i am a bit of a book-nut, about 2 years ago iI created a list of all the books I own, and marked next to each one whether I had read it, started it or if it’s a reference book.

At the time there were about 600 or so books on the list, including some duplicates. As of today there are 757 in my collection (and sure to grown over birthday and Christmas season…)

I also discovered that while owning all these books, i haven’t actually read them all… at the beginning of 2009 I’d read 38% of my books (excluding teh reference ones) and i set myself a target of reaching 45% by end of 2009.

Each time I finished a book i updated the spreadsheet and the countdown was nearing 0 – which it finally reached last night

So i can happily say i’ve read 45% of all my non-reference books!

for the new year i’m going to try and change the goal a little. i kind of avoided the bigger, thicker books in order to reach my statistics goal, but i’d like to try and cover some of those interesting books as well.

but it is gratifying nonetheless to see this goal reached!

well done to me

don’t judge a book by its cover

behind a grotty looking façade in a dark street, you will find a small hall. a small hall with rich dark red walls, smooth concrete floor, a little stage with heavy red velvet curtains. low lights with bare bulbs. walls covered in big and small photos and paintings from years gone by. on the stage a piano and accordion and a string instrument – playing sublime soulful music with a gentle rhythm. opposite the stage is a long bar, with people watching the dance floor, watching the smooth moves of feet and legs.

 

this is albert hall in woodstock. this is the weekly tango night. this is, quite simply, a whole different world. i felt like i had stepped back in time to the 40s. to the dance halls during and after the war. to a time when people spent an evening with friends and strangers, dancing to music, and soaking up the soul.

 

i spent the entire time watching – how the novices and the experienced dancers mixed graciously. how most people danced with several different people and not only one partner. how some were dressed to the nines in short dress, high-heeled tango shoes and beautifully coiffed hair-do, others in t-shirt and jeans with dreads down to their waist.

 

and all the time the soulful sounds of the tango tunes from the live band on stage. albert hall has succeeded in taking me back to another era, and i’m certainly coming back sometime.

 

quite different to how the day started – with an hotel breakfast that i savoured over a period of an hour and a quarter. from yoghurt and fruit, through early grey tea and pineapple juice, followed by yoghurt, muesli and coco-pops, then an omelette and finished with danishes and a chocolate croissant. accompanied by the sunday paper, it was a decadent way to start my sunday.

 

after i checked out, i watched the rough seas in bantry bay for a while before heading home in the strong pre-cold front winds. i spent the afternoon watching a dvd (august rush – a beautiful yet fantastical movie about the power music has in emotions and communication) and reading. i read a bit more in my book about the genocide in rwanda, eventually nodding off. straight into a nightmare. i don’t normally find that movies and books enter my subconscious. i can watch a horror movie and go straight to sleep afterwards without any problems. but today, the journey and sights the book was describing, had me being followed and persecuted in my dream. this book shall have to be taken in small doses, interspersed with lighter literature.

 

and i am not the only one to read in this fashion, i am happy to discover. i met a guy at the party last night who also has a thing for books, and i was excited to find that he had a similar philosophy to owning and reading books as i do. we both will buy books that we find interesting, and know we will read at some point, but not necessarily immediately. to the consternation of some of my friends, i have bought books that have been untouched in 3 years. but then i will look at my bookshelf one day, and that book will be read within days. i also never travel with less than 5 books. usually very different books. because i never know what my mood will dictate for me to read while i am away. and i will, of course, usually read 2 or 3 books simultaneously.

 

talking of meeting people – i did meet quite a few interesting people last night. mainly guys, it being m.h.’s birthday party in a gay venue. but every time i mentioned to m.h. who i quite liked the look of, he would invariably tell me that he is straight… ho hum… but he did drop a hint in an sms this morning that i did make an impression on some people last night… we’ll have to see when he decides to let me know more.

 

and that made me wonder whether i am sometimes my own worst enemy.

 

i’m keen to meet other guys, hook up, have a few (safe) experiences – not looking for a long-term relationship just yet. but i am petrified of that initial move. that transition from “he’s a great guy i get on with” to wanting to put my hand on his thigh. i imagine it boils down to a fear of rejection, and that i think i can’t read a situation well enough to know if he is interested as well or not.

 

yet, when i get told by another friend that one of the guys i met on friday “is really taken by you” i freak a little inside. i don’t quite know what to do. i am flattered of course. but i am dead scared. how “taken” is he with me? i know that i don’t find him attractive even if we do get along well. so i guess i am afraid of being the rejector – ‘cos i’m a nice guy and i don’t like hurting people’s feelings. but i don’t want someone to expect me to go somewhere that i don’t want to go to. i don’t know if i’m making any sense. even to myself.

 

life. it’s never easy. but if it was we’d be complaining it was boring, right?

 

at least i have the memory of being in a 1940s dance hall to take me to sleep tonight…the music goes on…

 

 

what bugged me today: american visitors talking so very loudly at the next table during my entire breakfast

 

what i learnt today: just how cruel humans can be to each other – in particular in rwanda

 

what i am grateful for: my first visitor from south america to this blog J

 

of rwanda and resignations

i can’t resist a good book sale… especially if it is a 4 for r100 special… i find myself telling myself,  “andré, you shouldn’t” at the same time as, ”mmhh, this looks interesting/fun/whatever”.

i came across such a book sale today, and one of the 4 books i bought is entitled “season of blood”, with a subtitle of “a rwandan journey”. it looks like a fascinating account of a journalist’s time in rwanda covering the genocide in 1994.

so i had to find 3 more books – they won’t sell just one, and for the same price i get 3 others too. and i did find them.

i saw the movie hotel rwanda a few years back, and was so struck by it that i didn’t speak for a solid 10 minutes afterwards. it really brought to life the atrocities that occurred in the same year – hell, same month – as our historic first elections in south africa. it made me see very vividly how cruel one group of people can be to another. yes, we have had similar things in our country, but this was different.

ever since then i have had a fascination with this genocide – something that happened in my life time, that i can remember hearing about on the news, but never really, truly understood. and now through the movie and this book (and 2 or 3 others i have on my shelf) i want to get an understanding of what actually happened. and this is best done through the experiences of several people – the journalist in “season of blood” or the un officer in “shaking hands with the devil” or personal stories in “we wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families”.

i read a portion of this booking at lunch time today – not the best thing to read while attempting a turkey sandwich when you consider one of the opening quotes – a statement from radio mille collines in rwanda, “the grave is only half full. who will help us fill it?”. fascinating and terrifying all in one go. i am looking forward to spending some time in the book though.

and, in news unrelated to the above, my “awol” staff member resigned today. ‘nuff said about that. the search for a new consultant begins.

what bugged me today: having end-of-employment discussions with other human beings

what i learnt today: that another staff member is converting to islam – which involves a change of name. somehow i had not entirely understood that, not having met a convert to islam before.

what i am grateful for: home-made gnocchi for supper!

i have 699 books…

at 4pm i owned 697 books.

by 6pm i owned 699, as i bought another 2 on sale today.

the exclusive books sales are bad for me. this was my third visit.

127 of my books are “reference” type books. of the remaining 572 on my list (i loooove lists) i have read 32%. i set myself a target of reaching 38% by the end of 2008, but since i started it i have bought more than i have read.

but since i haven’t had a tv for 6 months, or even watched tv for a year now, i have been reading so much more than before. and i am loving it (almost as much as my lists).

and i have been in my “new” house for a year yesterday

when does it stop being my “new” house then…