Stuff we're reading / watching / listening to

[Digit]

Ha ha. I just heard Diane Sawyer talk about this on the evening news. The rest of the people on the plane look so normal at the beginning of the video, especially that old guy on the left. The FAA is investigating

[Whistler]

Some of you are Sci-Fi fans right? I'm trying to find the name of a book my husband liked. It followed the history of an alien planet that was drifting towards the Orion nebula. The first part of the book was about an astronomer named Jing who discovered that in a few centuries their planet was doomed and ended up dying to a plague. The book went on to describe a period some centuries later of global warming and frantic space-exploration, and ended with the aliens on a spaceship. The aliens had unique appendages/expressions which my husband remembers being a pretty good depiction of a non-human race. Does that ring a bell for anyone? He said he read it maybe as late as 1997 from the Provo library so it's an older book (and probably isn't in that library anymore).

[Katya]

Is it The Crucible of Time by John Brunner? It was published in 1983 and it has a character named Ayi-Huat Jing as well as non-human characters. (I haven't read it, so I can't speak to other specifics.)

[Whistler]

yes, it was! you and the goodreads group I posted in are so excellent.

[Katya]

Well, you can tell the Goodreads group that I use LibraryThing to find it, so there!

[Katya]

(Specifically, I used LT's feature that lets you search for character names. I typed in "Jing" and ruled out the historical fiction and contemporary memoirs, etc.)

[Whistler]

oh, cool! I was wondering how you did that.

Can you help me find a research article while we're at it (if you don't want to work on your non-work time I also understand)? I read that when you're having the tip-of-the-tongue phenomenon, it's better for your future memory of that thing you're trying to recall for someone to tell you the word, rather than sit there and let the memory come to you. It might have been in a foreign language context. It came up in a discussion on my kanji flashcard website, and I couldn't find the source, which is now bothering me. I read several psychology research digests, and it was probably from one of them but my usual trick of searching through google reader isn't working.

[Katya]

Hmm. I don't mind working on non-work time, but tonight I've got a lot to do to get ready for actual work (starting tomorrow), so I can't do more searching tonight. I'll check back tomorrow after work, if no one else has found it.

[Marduk]

So I just realized I love Joni Mitchell even more.

I knew "River" and "Blue" (both of which Sarah Mclachlan covered, and I love both versions of both) were hers, but I just found out that "Big Yellow Taxi" (which most people probably know of from Amy Grant) and "A Case of You" (which I knew of from Tori Amos, and it was one of my favorite songs of hers) were both originally Joni's too.

That woman is amazing.

[Zedability]

Really? I always knew Big Yellow Taxi was Joni Mitchell, it was like the first song of hers that I heard. And I have no idea who Amy Grant is.

[Marduk]

Well of course the Canadian hears it from Joni first.

Looks like the billboard numbers for both versions are about the same, although Amy Grant's is much more recent.

[Zedability]

"Just to be clear, I have nothing against Canada. In fact, it's my third favorite country in North America." hahahahaha

From this article, which is otherwise pretty boring.

[UffishThought]

I just finished The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck.

Really, really liked it. It was slow and steady but still interesting, and I liked the pacing and the themes and the style. Looking on Goodreads, many of my friends and other reviewers really hated it. That surprised me. Anyone else read it? What did you think?

[Laser Jock]

I just finished The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck.

Really, really liked it. It was slow and steady but still interesting, and I liked the pacing and the themes and the style. Looking on Goodreads, many of my friends and other reviewers really hated it. That surprised me. Anyone else read it? What did you think?

I read it quite a while ago, so I can't really critique it or anything. But I can say I had to kind of push to get through it. I know it's supposed to be really good, but I found it really not that much fun to read. Perhaps if you read it specifically for its cultural commentary it's better?

[Defy V]

I just finished The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck.

Really, really liked it. It was slow and steady but still interesting, and I liked the pacing and the themes and the style. Looking on Goodreads, many of my friends and other reviewers really hated it. That surprised me. Anyone else read it? What did you think?

When I was in 7th grade, I lived in New Jersey. I think they had fewer qualms back there because I read it for school. I remember worksheets on concubines and whatnot. Twas eye-opening, if nothing else.

[Squirrel]

I had to read The Pearl by John Steinbeck in seventh grade. It was way too early. It was just too graphic for me, and was made worse because of my age. It still comes up in nightmares- that's one of the few books that I think is truly disgusting- because of the graphic way he describes things, but also because of the circumstances in which I read it. Why can't the whole seven Chronicles of Narnia be on the school reading list? I think the only book I ever liked that I read in school was Crash, by Jerry Spinelli

[Digit]

I was searching Locus of Control and found an interesting passage here.

People with a high internal locus of control use the Internet as a supplement to other activities and in a more goal-directed manner, for example, as a tool to search for information to complete a task, or to reduce purchase uncertainties, whereas people with an external locus of control tend to use the Internet more experimentally as a substitute for other activities, such as spending time with friends. They tend to spend greater amounts of time surfing the net than surfers with an internal locus of control.

This sounds like an interesting book, the Oxford Handbook of Internet Psychology by Oxford University Press.
Copy about the book:

What do we know about how people behave in cyberspace? Since the birth of the internet, we have witnessed alarming demonstrations of just how the power of the internet can be harnessed by those with darker motives - terrorists, sexual offenders, criminals. What is it about this unique environment that might cause people to behave in ways they might never consider in the outside world?

So an academic analysis of how the Internet affects people's behavior. Too bad I don't have an extra $125 lying around.

[Katya]

Too bad I don't have an extra $125 lying around.

Inter-library loan is your friend.

[Yarjka]

Too bad I don't have an extra $125 lying around.

Inter-library loan is your friend.

I never knew libraries were in the business of loaning money. What is the interest like?

[Katya]

Too bad I don't have an extra $125 lying around.

Inter-library loan is your friend.

I never knew libraries were in the business of loaning money. What is the interest like?

Pretty steep, actually. (A dollar a day per book. )