Books And the Desire to Get Out More

I miss the good ol' days in college when friends or dorm mates would pop in and ask if I wanted to go do something. There weren't any plans or preparation. We just went and did something. It's getting harder and harder to do that with my friends here. They've got different work schedules, meetings for organizations, or they've got other relationships that take up their time.

Last night I went to town again by myself. I treated myself to a little dinner and then headed for Barnes & Noble. There's a GLBTXYZ book club that meets there. Since my exposure to the local gay community is two, I thought maybe I could stick my head out there in a more comfortable environment. So I go the Gay and Lesbian section and look out for their flier. They will meet again on the 24th. I look at the book that they are going to discuss. It's a cowboy book. (I'd tell you the name but I've already forgotten.) I look at the back and it says that it as about masculine guys who while together find themselves with new and confusing feelings. Gag me. I don't want to read it. Maybe next month I'll participate. But check out the other blog in the next few days. I'll tell you why I'm skipping it.

With the LSAT disaster this summer, I picked up a book on the Civil Service exam. I've always kept the idea of becoming a bureaucrat on my mind. If you think about it, it kind of suits me. I'm not very capitalistic minded at all but I do like service. That's kind of the reason why I was leaning toward the military for a while. You don't earn that much money but you get job satisfaction.

There was also a Leo Tolstoy book that had his 3 big novels together. It was available for $12. It's thickness was half the size of my forearm. Tempting but I have a fear that I'll fall asleep reading it and it will wind up suffocating me. Actually, it was more of the case where I wouldn't open the damn thing for ages.

Right now I'm still working on Milton's Paradise Lost. It is boring me to the point of tears. Seriously, I can't get out of Book 1 because I keep losing my place. I probably understand 20% of what he is saying if I don't have to open up my dictionary to find out what the hell he is referencing. I am determined to finish it, however.

Aside from the Civil Service Handbook, I did purchase Sun Tzu's The Art of War. I read some of it for AFROTC. I figured that when I get done with Paradise Lost, I could easily kill this within a couple nights. $5 for wisdom.