I read quite a bit, though it’s notched down a bit since my wife and adult son got me back into playing WoW in the evenings (we used to be away into it, then stepped away for some years). Like others have said, my book reading is 100% for pleasure, and I don’t feel bad if I don’t read, except that I feel reading is healthier downtime than WoW or TV.

A key for me is having some consistent times that I read. Most important for me is that I read in bed for about half an hour before going to sleep, and I find that that routine helps me go to sleep (I have trouble shutting my brain off). I take the dogs for a jog/walk on weekend mornings, and also consistently read for a while after I get back.

I read almost exclusively science fiction with a dash of fantasy. I’m an older guy, nearing retirement, and the only factor there is that our kids are grown and I can afford a gardener, so I have more free time than when I was younger.

Yes, Leckie writes SF. If you’re interested, I would start with Ancillary Justice, her first novel. It’s really good, and the first of a trilogy that’s all excellent.

I think you saw a post by me long ago where I posted my short notes about the books I’d read in that time frame. If you’d like me to pass along those notes for any of the books we talk about, like Leckie or the more recent Gibson novels, I’d be happy to.

And thanks for the offer. I’m good now, but who knows. An interesting time of change for me coming up: I retire in January after 39+ years at the same company, and sometime after we’re going to move from an area of southern California, where I’ve lived my whole life, to northern Washington State. Will be odd for sure.

Oh, good call, I did read those books and liked them quite a bit. Martine’s writing reminds me a bit of Ann Leckie, who I’ve read a lot of and like very much.

Hey, in know I’m just a guy on the internet who you talk about books with, but if you need to talk about more, I’m happy to listen. You might already have a good support network, which is great, but I know not everyone does.

Why does “gruntled” sound even more unhappy than “disgruntled?”

I’m sorry to hear life is having challenges for you at the moment, I hope that resolves soon. A nice thing about a book is that you can put it down for days, weeks, months, whatever, and it’s still waiting for you when you feel like coming back to it.

I’ve been reading more Gibson lately. I read the first two books of the Jackpot trilogy (the third hasn’t come out yet) and the first in the Blue Ant trilogy. They’ve all been very good.

You take care and I hope things get better for you.

Farting as you relax and when you bring your knees up towards your chest (common when you sleep on your side) is pretty normal. It might also be a timing thing based on when you go to bed relative to when you’ve eaten.

You might look into why you fart so much if it’s excessive. For instance, I have an odd food intolerance called fructose malabsorption - excess fructose doesn’t get digested, so it just ferments in my intestines. If I eat a lot of it, I’ll get massively painful diarrhea, but usually I just get some gas.

The same thing happens with people who are lactose intolerant: they can usually have some amount of lactose and they just get gassy, so some people don’t even realize they have it.

Other things can also cause unusual amounts of gas.

Why without you think I didn’t?

For people who have 401Ks or other investments, the likely deregulation pushes up stock prices (which is why the stock market had a big bump this week). Oh, sure, those regulations help protect the environment, workers rights, worker health and safety, etc., but:

It’s not something anyone can just do. America’s borders are more open than a lot of countries’. You have to apply, and it can be a multi-year process even if you do get accepted. It can cost money too.

The women in my life also say that it depends a bit on where. For instance, most just don’t want to be hit on at the gym.

I guess you and I just disagree. Yes, for me there’s for sure a “not Trump” aspect to Kamala, but she seems like the most progressive candidate we’ve had for some time.

No one is saying it’s “the wrong time,” like the people who say we can’t talk about gun control after a shooting. What they’re saying is that a third party candidate is fundamentally a waste of a vote, or worse, in a two-party system. It doesn’t move the needle in the direction you want, it takes a vote away from the major party candidate who is closer to your ideals.

Which is why so many women hate talking to men they don’t know: there’s so often that request for a date after even the most innocuous small talk.

This is a very cool and interesting list. Interesting enough to read from top to bottom, but in bite-sized chunks for people with limited time or short attention spans. Thanks for sharing!

The BBC and Reuters have both gone way, way downhill in recent years, but the concept is reasonably valid. AP and NPR are still good. Aljazeera is actually pretty decent for US news, though I’m not sure if that’s true for US news related to the middle east.

Reportedly he has a very worth of $50M. If that was just in investments getting 4 percent a year, that would be $2M annually for doing nothing. Kind of gross to stoop to that level for money when you have so much.

Courting the same demographic

No, some whoppers end up with the inside not all whipped and crunchy, but a little chewy. They’re great.

Are you taking about those weird chewy ones? Because those are my favorites.

I had no idea it was like that there. Horrific.