What do anarchy, cross-Canada hikes and Mars have in common?

Nothing. Except that's what I've been reading about. :-) I guess I'm way overdue here. Just because I haven't been blogging doesn't mean I haven't been reading. In fact, I've been so enthusiastic about reading lately that I'm doing the "try-to-keep-my-eyes-open-for-just-one-more-page" thing every night (but really only managing to stay up until 9:30).

Back to Ham on Rye. If you like reading about looking up girls' skirts, fighting on the school yard, and dealing with severe cases of acne, well I have the book for you! Not much in this one that I could relate to, especially considering I've never been an adolescent boy. Nonetheless, it forced me to give a thought or two to the concept of anarchy. I've always understood the political meaning of anarchy, but I'm now starting to see anarchy everywhere. The two books by Bukowski that I've read are prime examples. The main character, Henry Chinaski, just doesn't care about anyone or anything. He's entirely disjointed from any community or group in society; he refuses to live by rules, his or otherwise. And I can't relate to that. It does nothing for me. So, I'll cross this one off my list and retire it to the shelf to collect dust.
(Confession: I still have *no* idea what the title means.)





After Ham on Rye I needed something totally different. I reached for a Pierre Berton I bought not too long ago, My Country. It's a collection of interesting stories from Canada's history. I decided to read one in between each book. The first one was about a race (on foot) across the country back in 1921. "Four men and one woman walked a distance of 3,650 miles from the Atlantic to the Pacific in a race that has never been copied or equalled." Did you know about this?? I sure didn't. And to think I used to call Canadian history boring - I take it back! It took them about 135ish days. Pretty remarkable. It was quite refreshing after struggling through pages and pages about acne treatments during the 1930s in my previous read. I'm especially looking forward to Chapter 9: The Franklin Mystery! (I can see you rolling your eyes at my inexplicable polar obsession...)

And so, after tackling something new, I decided to go back and rescue one of those poor books that only got half-read.....my first choice was easy - Packing for Mars by Mary Roach. (For those of you who have heard my gross rants about cadavers, this is the same *hilarious* author.) This time she's looking at space and space travel. I remember giving up on this one when I got to the chapter about sending dogs into space - a not-for-Cheryl (NFC) topic. In the (what I've now discovered to be) typical Mary Roach style, there's a chapter on going the bathroom and one on sex. My brain is filled with interesting space facts and other random tidbits thanks to her tangential footnotes. For example, because there really isn't any 'gravity' under water, dolphins usually need a third participant to, let's say, direct traffic and help the other two get the "job" done, if you know what I mean! Kinky.

Look forward to some of the best space facts in the next instalment. TTFN