Of note this year, many of these books I checked out from the library or borrowed from friends, so I managed to save a significant amount of money over my usual book reading expenditures. I have marked the borrowed books with an asterisk.

1. The Gathering Storm (Wheel of Time, #12; A Memory of Light, #1) - Robert Jordan
2. * The Last Colony - John Scalzi
3. * The Ghost Brigades - John Scalzi
4. * The Millionaire Next Door - Steven D. Levitt and Thomas J. Stanley
5. * Under the Dome - Stephen King
6. * King Solomon's Mines - H. Rider Haggard
7. * Old Man's War (Book 1) - John Scalzi
8. * The Salmon of Doubt: Hitchhiking the Galaxy One Last Time - Douglas Adams
9. * Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values (P.S.) - Robert M. Pirsig
10. * The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins
11. * This Immortal - Roger Zelazny
12. * Drood - Dan Simmons
13. * Batman: The Killing Joke - Alan Moore
14. * Physics of the Impossible: A Scientific Exploration of the World of Phasers, Force Fields, Teleportation, and Time Travel - Michio Kaku
15. * The Design of Everyday Things - Donald A. Norman
16. * I Don't Know What I Want, But I Know It's Not This: A Step-by-Step Guide to Finding Gratifying Work - Julie Jansen
17. * Definitely Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #6) - Charlaine Harris
18. * Dead as a Doornail (Sookie Stackhouse, #5) - Charlaine Harris
19. * Dead to the World (Sookie Stackhouse, #4) - Charlaine Harris
20. * Club Dead (Sookie Stackhouse, #3) - Charlaine Harris
21. * Living Dead in Dallas (Sookie Stackhouse, #2) - Charlaine Harris
22. * Dead Until Dark (Sookie Stackhouse, #1) - Charlaine Harris
23. Debugging by Thinking: A Multidisciplinary Approach (HP Technologies) - Robert Charles Metzger
24. How to Win Friends & Influence People - Dale Carnegie
25. * Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High - Kerry Patterson
26. How to Read a Book - Mortimer J. Adler
27. * Agent to the Stars - John Scalzi
28. Software Exorcism: A Handbook for Debugging and Optimizing Legacy Code (Expert's Voice) - Bill Blunden
29. The Prince - Niccolo Machiavelli
30. Mayflower: A Story of Courage, Community, and War - Nathaniel Philbrick
31. Godel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid - Douglas R. Hofstadter
32. Preacher Vol. 1: Gone To Texas - Garth Ennis
33. The Double Helix - James D. Watson
34. I Am Charlotte Simmons: A Novel - Tom Wolfe
35. The Sandman Vol. 01: Preludes and Nocturnes - Neil Gaiman
36. Of Saints and Shadows (The Shadow Saga, #1) - Christopher Golden
37. Bone Crossed (Mercedes Thompson, #4) - Patricia Briggs
38. Iron Kissed (Mercedes Thompson, #3) - Patricia Briggs
39. Blood Bound (Mercedes Thompson, #2) - Patricia Briggs
40. Moon Called (Mercedes Thompson, #1) - Patricia Briggs
41. The Blind Watchmaker - Richard Dawkins
42. * Just After Sunset - Stephen King
43. * The Breakthrough Company: How Everyday Companies Become Extraordinary Performers - Keith R. Mcfarland
44. Code Complete, Second Edition - Steve McConnell
45. The Mind Map Book: How to Use Radiant Thinking to Maximize Your Brain's Untapped Potential - Tony Buzan
46. 1984 - George Orwell
47. Mean Streets - Jim Butcher
48. Storm Front (The Dresden Files, #1) - Jim Butcher
49. Batman: Year One - Frank Miller
50. Pragmatic Thinking and Learning: Refactor Your Wetware - Andy Hunt
51. Crisis on Infinite Earths - Marv Wolfman
52. The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master - Andrew Hunt
53. Turn Coat (The Dresden Files, #11) - Jim Butcher
54. Batman: The Dark Knight Returns - Frank Miller
55. Upsetting the Balance (Worldwar Series, Volume 3) - Harry Turtledove
56. * The Pinball Effect: How Renaissance Water Gardens Made Carburetor Possible - and Other Journeys - James Burke
57. * The Conscience of a Liberal - Paul Krugman
58. * The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life - Twyla Tharp
59. Welcome to the Jungle (The Dresden Files, Prequel) - Jim Butcher
60. Lord of Chaos (Wheel of Time, #6) - Robert Jordan
61. Furies of Calderon (Codex Alera, #1) - Jim Butcher

This year, I hope to do more mathematics and computer science reading than I normally do, as well as doing more study on personal finance. I am sure a healthy bit of fiction will fall into my reading list as well.

First, let us imagine an author that you are interested in. For the sake of argument, let us say that author's name is Dan Simmons. Now, I have read several of his books and would like to find some new ones. In most libraries, I would just head to the fiction section and look in the 'S' section for the last name 'Simmons' an, lo, there would be books by the author that I want to read. Sure enough, if I do that at my local library, I can find a few books. However, I could also check the Mystery section — apparently, mysteries are not fiction after all. Look, there are a couple of Dan Simmons books over in the Mystery section. Oops, watch out, he has also written some Science Fiction novels; we had better check the Science Fiction section as well. Wait a minute... there are two Science Fiction sections, one for hard-cover and one for paper-back. I guess I have to check them both to see if he has any books. Oh wait, seeing the paper-back Science Fiction section reminds me, there is also a paper-back Fiction section! So, let us count them up: Fiction, Packet-back Fiction, Mystery, Science Fiction, and Paper-back Science Fiction! There are five different places I have to check to browse and see if this author has books in this library.

"Wait," you may be thinking, "this is the age of computers. Surely you can just use the same website that you used to reserve books to find what sections books by your favorite author are in!" If you have thought that, you and I are of like mind. That does narrow down the search to just one section when I find a book I want. However, this raises another issue. While searching the library's website for King Solomon's Mines, I saw that my branch of the library had the book, listed under F HAG. That tells me to look in the Fiction section under the 'H' section and I should be able to find books by H. Rider Haggard. So, I look and look and look, to no avail. Finally, I give up and just put the book on hold, expecting the library to pull the book for me and send me an email when they find it. Weeks go by and I do not get an email. Finally, by random chance on Saturday, I happen to walk by a self labeled "Classics." I think to myself, "Well, King Solomon's Mines is pretty old. Maybe it is in the Classics." Sure enough, I find it. I look at the code, and it is F HAG. So, not only do I have to look in five different sections to find books by authors that I like, I also have to know whether a book is considered a classic or not to know whether a Fiction book is located in the Fiction section or the Classics section. Before you say "That should be obvious," remember this: I found Crime and Punishment
in the Classics section, but War and Peace
was in the Fiction section.

1. He almost gets eaten by a tree,
2. He sees lots of scary things occur, such as flying objects, ghosts, flashing lights, etc., and
3. He gets accosted by one of the scariest, freakiest, clown toys that I have seen in a movie (Yes, I had a bit of an issue with clowns when I was younger, why do you ask?).

This identification with the little boy occurred well into my twenties. This is a horror movie — scary stuff happens, so you should be scared of it. This view of Poltergeist was different for me, though. Now, I have a two year old little girl of my own and I found that I identified with the parents in the movie much more than any of the other characters and that made the movie much more frightening to me than it ever really was in the past. Why? Well, let us examine what the parents go through in the movie.

First, their little boy almost gets eaten by a tree and, although the father is pulling and pulling, he really can do very little to stop it from happening. Next, they go back into the house and their little girl is missing. They search and they search, but to no avail — Carol Anne is nowhere to be found. Oh my God! She might be in the swimming pool. THE SWIMMING POOL! The abject terror that is evident on the parents' faces as they are searching for her is bone-chilling. Then, they discover that Carol Anne has been taken by the TV people. They can hear her over the static of the TV, they hear the fear in her little voice, but they cannot get to her — they cannot comfort her. Through the rest of the movie, the parents take all of the other strange goings-on in stride — they can deal with anything that the house can throw at them so long as they can get Carol Anne back. Finally, the parents manage to get their daughter back, only to have the spirits try to take her again. Once again, that feeling of powerlessness is overwhelming.

Poltergeist is one of my favorite horror movies of all time. Now, I can watch it and gain a sense of dread that I did not have before. It is like a completely new movie to me.

Yesterday morning, as I was brushing my teeth, Emily came into our room and seemingly noticed this figurine for the first time. What did she think it was? "Here is Daddy and here is Mommy!" Do you think that she may be saying that Ashley is a bit on the short side?

I asked Emily what she was doing and I got this response: "I see snakes." I asked her where and she pointed at the pillow and then swung her arm around to point at a random place on the floor. "Oh no! Snakes!" she exclaimed. I decided to play along, so we spent the rest of the morning, until time to go, chasing around the house, hunting for snakes and catching them.

This evening, after we got home, I was sure that she had forgotten all about the snakes. However, after dinner, she suddenly turned to me and, in that cute little two year old voice, whispered "Daddy! Snakes!! I get two snakes, kay?"

The great snake hunt of 2009 was on again.

To be informed is to know simply that something is the case. To be enlightened is to know, in addition, what it is all about: why it is the case, what its connections are with other facts, in what respects it is the same, in what respects it is different, and so forth.

Adler and van Doren posit that there are four levels of reading: elementary, inspectional, analytical, and syntopical. Elementary reading is the reading skill that children are taught in grammar school and that gives us the basics of reading for information and pleasure. To be sure, having a high percentage of the population literate in this sense is a great accomplishment. This allows a large portion of the population to gather information from reading books. However, the first level of reading can only take you so far.

Inspectional reading is meant to give you an overview of a book, of both its structure and its contents. Inspectional reading can be thought of as pre-reading a book, in preperation to reading a book analytically. Additionally, inspectional reading plays an important role in helping you determine which books are worth reading analytically; this is helpful in preparing to undertake a syntopic understanding of a subject.

Analytical reading is meant to increase you understanding through a thorough reading of the book. Adler and van Doren state that there are four questions you must ask and, through analytical reading, answer about a book:

1. What is the book about as a whole?
2. What is being said in detail, and how?
3. Is the book true, in whole or in part?
4. What of it?

If you can answer these questions about a book, you have done your job as an intelligent reader and increased your understanding by learning what the book had to teach you. Adler and van Doren provide a thorough set of rules that will enable you to learn to read analytically.

Syntopical reading goes a step further than analytical reading; syntopical reading acknowledges that any one book is not likely to contain the complete story and that a survey of several books may be needed to fully understand the subject matter. To that end, Adler and van Doren lay out a process through which you may combine the skills of inspectional and analytical reading to find and understand the relevant books to your chosen subject.

So, what of it? Does "How to Read a Book" accomplish its purpose? I believe that it does. Since reading it, I have begun to actively read the books that I am consuming so that I may come to an understanding with the authors instead of being a passive participant in the conversation.

Now you are two. My how those two years have flown. You have grown so much in these past two years that it all seems like a blur. I can remember carrying you in my womb, giving birth to you, and bringing you home for the first time. You have come a long way since then. It seems like yesterday you were beginning to crawl and taking your first steps. We have since moved on to first words and now short sentences. It will not be long before you are telling us exactly what you think about everything when you think it. Although I look forward to the many firsts we have yet to encounter, it is bittersweet at the same time. I miss the little Emily wrapped up in a fluffy towel snuggling into my lap right after bath. I miss the Emily that I could carry and swing around with the greatest of ease. These days, your legs dangle past my knees when I pick you up. I am glad you are a happy, growing girl but the time is going by too fast.

I watch you every day and try to committ it all to memory. I don't ever want to forget the way you come running up to me after a day at school or the way you smile and laugh with your father. I especially love the wrestling matches and tickle fests that you and your dad engage in. Every morning I look forward to seeing your smiling face and hearing your sweet voice. Even though I know the day will certainly have its share of tears and "no's"; I know that your infectious laughter will also be plentiful. I love the way you are surprised at the simplest thing, like bugs and water, and how you shout "Airpane!" when you look up at the sky-even if there isn't one. One of my favorites is when you see something you find amazing, look back at me with a surprised look on your face and say "Whoa!". You are becoming imaginative and starting to pretend on your own. That process has been amazing to watch. You make me laugh at so many things and appreciate things even more. Seeing the world through the eyes of a child is a wonderful thing.

I jokingly say to friends and family that you can't be my child because you don't like to get dirty or paint or play in the water. But the truth is, you are my child, and I would never change that. You are mine, your father's, you are ours. That will never change, no matter how much you might wish that when you are a teenager. I now understand all those quotes and stories about motherhood. You are my heart. Letting go is and will be the hardest thing I ever have to do. Already I have had to let go of the baby you use to be and accept the strong-willed toddler saying "Help" at the top of her lungs, which is your equivalent of saying "I can do it myself". Come August, we will be letting go of the little girl in diapers and accepting the big girl who no longer needs them. Even though I try to encourage your independence, it is a double-edged sword. Part of my job as a mother is to ensure your health and well-being as a child, and help you grow into a mature, well-adjusted, productive adult. However, that part of my job conflicts directly with the other part of my job, to love you and protect you from any number of things, no matter how big or small the threat. I only hope that you one day will understand these things for yourself.

It is amazing to me to see the parts that your father and I passed on to you. You have my nose and your father's eyes, and our red hair. You have many of your father's personality traits, including his stubborness, and my inability to sit still for more than five seconds. It is interesting to see the results of your father and I squished into one tiny little person who also has a personality of her own. I look forward to watching your personality develop and I cannot wait to meet the person you are destined to be. But for now, you are mine, and I will treasure every minute of it.

You are my little girl, my baby, my angel now and forever.

I love you, Emily, so very much. We both do.

Happy Birthday.

First, I have gotten out of the habit of getting up early and exercising in the morning. I believe that not exercising during our vacation has started a positive feedback loop. Not exercising means I am not as physically worn out at night, so I do not sleep well. Not sleeping well means that I feel too tired to get out of bed early enough to go exercise in the morning. Both of these symptoms feed back on each other causing both to get worse.

Second, it has been difficult for me to focus on projects that I have been wanting to get done. When I get home at night and finally get Emily to bed, I have been so tired that I just want to watch television for the 1.5 hours I have before I go to bed. Generally, this makes me feel guilty since I can think of so many other things that I want and should do. The guilt is likely contributing to my lack of sleep as well. Additionally, my task list and inbox keep growing since I am not really clearing them out. All of these contribute to a downward spiral where I get very little done.

So, what can I do to turn things around?

1. I need to start exercising again as soon as possible. This weekend will be the perfect time because I do not have to worry about getting up extra early to exercise. Getting back in the exercise routine in the morning will increase my endorphin output and cause my day to start on a bright point. This alone might be enough to turn my mood around and kick me out of the funk.
2. I need to do a really good weekly review. I put it off completely right after vacation because I was unable to get any "me" time to work on it due to sleeping in so late. This past week, I managed to get one done, but it was hurried and really was not very good. Doing a weekly review will get things out of my head. Getting "stuff" out of my head will let me concentrate more on what I am doing and less on what I could be doing.
3. Strangely, I have found that getting out and working in the yard is putting me in a better mood. On Friday, I came home in a bit of a funk and just really wanted to be by myself. Luckily, I needed to get out and mow the yard. Doing that before dinner relaxed me and made it so that I could be back inside with the family without being irritable. Working out in the yard allows me to have the little bit of "me" time that I need to recharge my batteries after a long week.

I am going to work on applying these three principles over the next couple of weeks and see if that will break me out of these post-vacation blues.