What do you think?

The Best Part of Today #93:

Renwed hope in an old industry.

I saw a television ad for the Kindle the other day that ended with the tagline "the book lives on." It may just be me and my excessive dislike for Kindles (not all eReaders, just Kindles), but I feel that statement is grossly inappropriate for the product it is advertising. Concerns over "the death of the book" have stemmed from the creation from electronic reading devices such as the Kindle. Literature may evolve in the form of an eBook, a platform that devices the like the Kindle are perpetuating, but it will always be around. No one is fearing for the imminent death of literature. What is at stake is the printed book, not literature itself. To say that the thing endangering paper books is also something that keeps books alive is more than an atrocious fallacy.

The book publishing world has faced some severe shakeups recently, notably the chain bookstore giant Borders declaring chapter 11 bankruptcy a week or so ago, and is set to close 200 stores, about a third of its locations nationwide. But recently, while reading the same medium that brought me news of Border's financial woes (the print New York Times), I read a very encouraging article about the state of the printed industry called "Books Fly Off Unusual Shelves." In spite of, or perhaps even because of, bookstore closings, publishers have been seeing a growth of revenue from books sold in specialty stores. Boutiques like Kitson in LA, as well as edgy national clothing chains like Anthropologie and Urban Outfitters have experimented with selling "novelty books" in the past. Now publishers are pouncing on the opportunity to sell more popular mainstream books in such stores.

This heartens me, and makes me believe that, like literature, which will always be around in various evolving capacities, bookselling will evolve too, not disappear entirely. I can only hope that this is the case for the future.

The Love Drug

The Best Part of Today #92:

Cuddling.

Cuddling is not just fun, it is a physical human need. It increases the level of oxytocin in your body, the "cuddle chemical" that increases feeling of contentment, affection, and trust. Everyone needs to do it once in a while. A good opportunity for cuddling is while watching a movie, like I did tonight while watching A Muppet Treasure Island. It was a good time.

Gallivanting

The Best Part of Today # 91:

Unexpectedly seeing an old friend.

One of my very good friends from my freshman year texted me in the middle of my second to last class of the day, telling me she was in my dormitory. I hadn't seen her in a good long time, so I was thoroughly excited. We're both Harry Potter geeks too, so it was perfect that tonight I was going to a HP themed dinner with my roommate and her boyfriend, who was driving her for the weekend. After my last class, after dinner and after my roommate had gone, my friend and I, along with two other friends to see HP 7 in our theatre, and then went gallumphing through the rain and talked and did other pleasant things. The best part about it though, was that I thought I wasn't going to do anything tonight. Gotta love serendipity.

Random Acts of ART

The Best Part of Today #90:

GUERILLA ART.

Something that needs to happen more often in my opinion. Today my roommate and I discussed guerrilla art projects we could do with sticky lights (led bulb + watch battery + magnet + tape) and gels (colored transparencies that cover larger lights.) More to come about this later.

Do you have any good (minimally destructive) guerilla art project ideas? Liberal use of the comment box below is encouraged!

Good old fashioned entertainment

The Best Part of Today #89:

Learning to play poker!

Ok, so I've learned to play poker before. Learning is not the problem. If someone says something is easy to learn, you have my permission to slap them because EVERYTHING is to learn. Retaining what you have learned is the hard part.

Now learning poker is a difficult problem for me because anyone who would ever want to teach me are only people who are really obsessively good at it. Then once they explained the basics to me, they would launch into complicated strategy that I could neither understand nor stand a chance against. I would never learn successful strategy because I would always lose. Or I wouldn't get to play, because the guys (and they were always guys) would always want to play for money, which I didn't want to waste (and I would always waste it because I would always lose).

But tonight, my roommate taught me and her boyfriend both how to play. First of all, I had NEVER met a guy who didn't know how to play poker. So that made me feel better, plus hearing it from a girl's perspective just made it easier for me to learn, for some reason. Hopefully this time I'll remember it. I only won one round in the whole game, but it was still fun.

We also played Egyptian Ratscrew, which I won, so there's no way it could have not been fun.

Hvor heldig er det?

The Best Part of Today #88:

Connections you never thought you'd use.

Today my Newswriting class had a guest speaker who was very generous with his advice for students getting into the print journalism market. He also mentioned his mother was in book publishing, so I asked him about getting in contact with her after class.

"Well I don't know," he said, "She lives in Denmark. I don't know if she'd want to talk to you."

Ironically, I said the first thing that came to my mind, which was "I'm part Danish." Which is, in fact, true. My mother was born in Denmark.

"Oh!" he said, "Well in that case, I'll give you my email so you can contact me in two weeks when I go see her in Copenhagen and I'll tell her about you."

We'll see how far this gets me, if anywhere. You never what will give you an edge in this world.

Get ready

The Best Part of [Thursday] and Today #86 + 87:

WARMMMMM.

This is such a wonderful thing, that it takes up two days. For the past week, it has been at least above freezing every day (tuesday was cutting it close, but it was still warmer than it has been). The raised temperature has heightened everyone's mood too, including mine. As I walk around campus, I see fewer scowls on heads bowed to the wind and more genuine smiles, faces turned upwards to bask in the sun, like sunflowers. (Did you know sunflowers always turn towards the sun? And that they are called tourne-soleils in french? You do now!) You simply cannot be in a bad mood on sunny day. Or at least, it's a little harder. For one thing, everyone is very pleased to see the snow slowly recede, thinking this will remove the necessity to tip-toe around sock-soaking slush piles. Unfortunately, the snow is not uncovering the green lawns of summer but rather revealing a new hazard: mud. But remember, even this has it's merits: if the ground is muddy it means it isn't cold enough to be frozen. So set your countdown clocks, if you haven't already, because Spring is on its way!