2010 March » Mostly Harmless

Headphones

Mar 312010

My headphones at work are dying. This is a problem, because if I have to listen to the inane chatter of those around me, I will be sad.

For the last six months or so, only the left ear piece has been working, and this was actually an optimal solution. I could still hear what was happening in the office if I felt like it, but didn’t have to participate in the meaningless drivel that is always part of an office environment.

Because the problem seems to be somewhere in the cord, they sometimes work, and sometimes don’t. This is entirely dependent upon how I hold my head, so this morning has been spent tilting my head at weird angles to try and make these damn things work. When I find a position that works, I then try to sit as still as possible, which makes my neck still and cranky.

Is not conducive to a happy Work Shannon. Getting new headphones is going to the top of my Wednesday night priority list.

Don’t Make Me Think

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Mar 302010

Steve Krug - Don't Make Me Think

Don’t Make Me Think – A Common Sense Approach To Web Usability
Steve Krug
2006, 202 pages

This is the first technical book I have ever talked about on my blog. Seeing as I usually talk about story lines and writing style, I’m not really sure what I’m going to write about when it comes to technical books, but that’s never stopped me from babbling about other things here.

Don’t Make Me Think is exactly what the cover says it is: A common sense journey through the basic elements of a web page. Though it could have also been subtitled “Why Amazon is better than your website”, it brings a lot of very dull topics to light in ways that help you understand why they’re actually important. Krug’s style is conversational and light-hearted, and though the book is not very dense, it is a great introduction to usability. The basic premise is that the more you have to make end users think, the less happy they will be with your website, and it goes through menu design, navigation, basic form layout, and the whys and hows of these elements.

I have been taking his suggestions to heart at work as well as tweaking this blog’s CSS and plan on doing more in the near future. I know a lot of graphic designers and web developers, and I would think that this book is too introductory for the former group, but that all web developers should read a book like this before starting any new project.

Remember kids: test early and test often. You know what happens when you assume things.

The Extraordinary and Unusual Adventures of Horatio Lyle

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Mar 292010

Catherine Webb - The Extraordinary and Unusual Adventures of Horatio Lyle

The Extraordinary and Unusual Adventures of Horatio Lyle
Catherine Webb
2006, 311 pages

Upon reading a rave review from a friend, who also forced the book upon me a year or so later, I knew I would have to read Horatio Lyle, if only to know what she’s been raving about for so long. I’m not typically a young adult book fan, and I don’t think this book is going to turn me into a convert, but it was definitely good.

It’s your typical Young Adult fare; plucky 18th century detective has to team up with plucky young thief and plucky young rich boy to solve a mystery using fun, adventure, and a little bit of random science. It seems inevitable that the boy and the girl will hook up in the 3rd or 4th book, and that the detective will blunder through if not for the help of the children. In the end, the mystery is solved, people get scraped up a bit but nobody dies, and we all learn a little bit about the people who live on the other side of the tracks. It’s all very wholesome, straightforward and expected.

So what I didn’t expect was that I would actually like it. I didn’t really love any of the characters, and I wasn’t left gushing about how awesome Horatio was, or how much I loved his mom, or anything like that, but it was really well written.

Nothing bugs me more than when books set in the past that don’t get their facts straight. I haven’t done any research to verify this, but I think Catherine Webb actually got the science and history right in this book as well. I certainly appreciated Webb’s attention to detail in that respect. She writes action very well; even her sentence structure at times implies how slowly or quickly events are unfolding. That’s very difficult to do, and she did it very well. Catherine Webb was only nineteen when she wrote this book, and on that itself, I know I will pick up the other books, if only to see her development as an author.

So I didn’t love it, mostly because I don’t love YA fiction, but it was very good. If I was trying to get a young teen into reading, this is a book I would buy for them.

A Secret Between Us

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Mar 222010

Daniel Poliquin - A Secret Between Us

A Secret Between Us
Daniel Poliquin
2006, 291 pages

A Secret Between Us is the first-person narrative of a French Canadian man, Lusignan. He experiences a tragic Catholic upbringing, less than stellar writing career, surviving the first world war, and most of the rest of his less-than admirable life. The turning point in his life appears to be a romantic afternoon spent with a fellow officer, Essiambre d’Argenteuil. He spends the remainder of his life chasing that unrequited love, through watching Essiambre’s former lover, Amanda Driscoll, and Amanda Driscoll’s former servant Concorde.

I finished reading this book well over a month ago, and only now am I getting around to reviewing it. It didn’t stick with me. I had to go seek out other reviews of this book to even remember what happened or what the characters were like. I liked Poliquin’s writing style, similar in style to Kurt Vonnegut’s, and at the time I felt the story was engaging, but overall it didn’t capture my imagination.

While reading this book, I kept muttering to myself about why this loser couldn’t get over a blowjob he received from a now-dead-man over a decade earlier, why the girl he was stalking mattered in any way, and why I was still reading this book.

If you like books where characters evolve over time, or where something happens, this isn’t the book for you. It wasn’t the book for me either. Because I found the writing engaging at the time, I wouldn’t mind seeking out another one of Daniel Poliquin’s books, but I wouldn’t recommend this one to a friend. However, I think I’m alone in disliking this book. It was recommended by a friend, and short listed for the 2007 Giller prize. Lots of reviewers liked it a lot. Just not me. You can’t please everyone.

Wedding

Life 2 Responses »

Mar 192010

We did indeed get married. There was lots of fun to be had last weekend in Camlachie, Ontario. Am still working on getting pictures, but for now, here’s three: