Microposts

@amylouise on Madame Bovary:

I hope that when you pay attention to the world, see every flower on every oat-stalk and every bumbling country doctor, you find that you can look them into loveliness. I hope that even being bound to a dull community of foolish people could bring unexpected graces. I hope that reality has a richer romance than fantasy.

I loved every word of this review. πŸ’™πŸ“š

Finished reading: The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald πŸ’™πŸ“š

See my review for notes and favorite highlights. Still and always β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜….

The Rose Reading Room at the New York Public Library. It’s just a few subway stops from our apartment, so I’m able to spend time here often. What an inspiring place for a reader or writer!

Finished reading: Brightness Falls by Jay McInerney πŸ’™πŸ“š

McInerney’s great American novel: flawed characters grappling with timeless themes, set in what is arguably the greatest city on earth. I loved it. β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…

See my full review for notes and favorite highlights.

After poking and prodding the capabilities of Micro.blog for the past 18 months, I have decided to consolidate my online writing on Wordpress where I’ve kept a blog for more than a decade.

This wasn’t an easy decision. Micro.blog is an innovative, capable, affordable service run by a smart, conscientious entrepreneur. It balances simplicity and power like no other blogging platform.

I’m always curious about why a blogger leaves a certain platform and moves to another. In case this is helpful to others, I’m sharing why I am making this change.

Continue reading β†’

Currently reading: The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of Nazi Germany by William L. Shirer πŸ’™πŸ“š

Seems timely.

Currently reading: Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain πŸ“šπŸ’™

This has been an eye-opening book for the ways that extroverts and introverts differ. Bloggers, who Cain suggests are almost all introverts, will share personal details with an online multitude they would never disclose at a cocktail party. This hits close to home!

Susan Cain, Quiet quote: Introverts and extroverts also direct their attention differently: if you leave them to their own devices, the introverts tend to sit around wondering about things, imagining things, recalling events from their past, and making plans for the future. The extroverts are more likely to focus on what’s happening around them. It’s as if extroverts are seeing β€œwhat is” while their introverted peers are asking β€œwhat if.”

Om Malik recently launched a separate “daily” blog, which looks like a subdomain off his Wordpress site. For folks who keep a Wordpress blog, have you considered this as an alternative to separate Wordpress/Micro.blog sites for short and long posts? Puzzling through a longer term solution to POSSE.

Currently reading: Laozi’s Dao De Jing by Laozi πŸ’™πŸ“š

To solve the hard you must begin with the easy; To do something big you must start very small. All difficulties must be resolved through simple steps. All grand deeds must be performed through tiny details.

One of my minor complaints about the Matter read-it-later app was addressed in a big way today. “Co-Reader” provides AI assistance at the paragraph level. Tap any paragraph in an article and to see AI-generated questions and answers. All within the app. Immersive reading at its best.

Question for @manton: I notice that sometimes when I make small changes to my site, like changing the category of a post, my website won’t reflect the change. I’ve switched devices, browsers, etc. No difference. The only thing that works is rebuilding the site. Is this normal or a sign of a problem?

Wisdom from Kevin Kelly:

Productivity is often a distraction. Don’t aim for better ways to get through your tasks as quickly as possible, rather aim for better tasks that you never want to stop doing.

Apple is launching a new product this week β€” probably an iPhone SE. But what if they unveil an e-reader and a subscription reading service? Books are in the cross-hairs of the intersection between arts and technology. Amazon and e-readers are ripe for Apple-style disruption. A man can dream!

I love my Kindle Oasis, but Amazon is sure making it hard to stay loyal. Maybe Kobo will save the day and release an updated black and white e-reader to replace its discontinued Libra 2. This should be the golden age for e-reader innovation. Kobo? Apple? Sony? Anyone?

Screenshot from Amazon telling customers that downloading Kindle books will no longer be an option after February 26, 2025.

Ah, Patrick O’Brian. He was truly one of a kind. If you haven’t discovered Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, there’s not a moment to lose. πŸ’™πŸ“š

Patrick O'Brian from Post Captain: "Life is a long disease with only one termination and its last years are appalling: weak, racked by the stone, rheumatismal pains, senses going, friends, family, occupation gone, a man must pray for imbecility or a heart of stone. All under sentence of death, often ignominious, frequently agonizing: and then the unspeakable levity with which the faint chance of happiness is thrown away for some jealousy, tiff, sullenness, private vanity, mistaken sense of honour, that deadly, weak and silly notion."

πŸ’¬ You learn to dance with the limp.

Sometimes I’ve thought of grief as missing an amputated limb, but walking with a limp is better. Thank you @chrisheck for sharing this.

Anne Lamott: You will lose someone you can’t live without, and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly β€” that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.

My blog had its tenth birthday last July, and I forgot to celebrate: Why Blogs Matter

Think different. πŸ’¬

Finished reading: Storyworthy by Matthew Dicks πŸ’™πŸ“š

An entertaining book filled with practical advice on how to improve your storytelling, whether in front of a live audience, on a date, or in a written essay. Dicks shares examples of his own stories, then breaks down why they work. β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜†

<img src=“https://cdn.uploads.micro.blog/125484/2025/dd54e41e-b5b4-42ca-bc9a-83d3b708188c.png" width=“600” height=“337” alt=“Quote from Storyworthy by Matthew Dicks: “Storytellers end their stories in the most advantageous place possible. They omit the endings that offer neat little bows and happily-ever-afters. The best stories are a little messy at the end. They offer small steps, marginal progress, questionable results."">

Incredible update to the Readwise app today. You can now “chat” with your highlights, which uses AI to find connections you probably overlooked or forgot from your reading. Since it only draws from the highlights you saved, the results are astonishingly personal. This is my kind of AI! πŸ’™πŸ“š

Screeshots of the new Readwise app showing new AI chat feature.

Finished reading: Fallen Leaves by Will Durant πŸ’™πŸ“š

In 208 eloquent pages, Durant shares his views on death, religion, education, war, politics, spirituality, and, through it all, the meaning of life. Truly a gift to humanity from a scholar who devoted his long life to the study of history. β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…

Full Review.

Photo of a paper book book: Fallen Leaves by Will Durant

Connor would have turned 23 today. The very prime of life. There’s not a day that goes by that I don’t miss him, but these birthdays are tough. Hug your kids. #forever20

Connor Breen

Finished reading: Just After Sunset by Stephen King πŸ“š

Read: 2025-01-27 | β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜† Horror

On a quest to read the few Stephen King books I missed along the way. I forgot how great of a short story writer King is. Probably some of his novels should have been short stories! Gingerbread Girl and N were my favorites in this collection.

Continue reading β†’

Finished reading: The Godfather by Mario Puzo πŸ“š

Read: 2025-01-13 | β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜† | Mystery-Suspense

I read the book during a recent visit to New York City and watched the movie on the plane ride home, which made for an immersive experience. The movie stayed very true to the book, though some big sections were left out. I loved reading the backstory of how young Vito Corleone eventually became the Don. Yes, some of it is dated, and yes, there were a few choppy parts that felt in need of editing, but I was pleasantly surprised by how really good this book was. If you loved the movie, you’ll enjoy the book.

Highlights

The word β€œreason” sounded so much better in Italian, ragione, to rejoin. The art of this was to ignore all insults, all threats; to turn the other cheek.

a friend should always underestimate your virtues and an enemy overestimate your faults.

Finished reading: The Notebook: A History of Thinking on Paper by Roland Allen πŸ“š

What a delightful book. The first chapter reeled me in with the story of how the Moleskin notebook exploded in popularity in the 1990s. The author clearly has been bitten by the same notebook fetish bug. He cites brand names of notebooks that are all too familiar to me. He decided to write a history of the notebook about ten years ago and proceeded to fill four or five notebooks with scribbles and quotes and references that ultimately became this book.

Allen used effective storytelling techniques to share dozens of examples of notebook usage over the past six hundred years from accounting ledgers in the 1400s, artist sketchbooks in the 1500s, Darwin’s field notes, to modern day journaling. Definitely a niche book, but great for any lover of notebooks and journals.

β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…

New post with my favorite books from 2024 along with updates to my reading system. My year in books for 2024.

Home library

Finished reading: Rousseau and Revolution by Will Durant πŸ“š

The tenth volume of the Story of Civilization by Will and Ariel Durant. This one provides an immensely readable history of Europe leading up to the French Revolution. This series has been such an education. β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…β˜…

Finished reading: The Work of Art by Adam Moss πŸ“š

Finished reading: The Comfort of Crows by Margaret Renkl πŸ“š