In the past month or so, I read two memoirs Kurt Vonnegut's "A Man without a Country" and Rian Milan's "My Traitor's Heart." Ironically, I finally got to reading Milan's memoir in a hotel airport outside Jo'burg! during a sleepless layover, and I agree that it is very good. The Vonnegut reads very well, like most Vonnegut, and with the exception of a few points that are repetitive and old-man rants, makes some nice insights.

The memoirs have a surprisingly similar outlook on life, which is that human's generally don't behave well. Vonnegut says he had given up on humans; and Milan critiques most people rather harshly. He more or less smashes white liberals for being against apatheid, poverty, inequality etc. but never really trying to understand their orgins nor experience how shitty it really is, but he also can't get behind African life. But both also contrast their pessimism with exceptions. Vonnegut reminisces on Eugene V Debs and other people who stick out in his mind as great humans. Milan focuses the last third of his memoir on a couple who move into Zululand to build an ecologically and socially sustainable dream farm, which makes for a beautiful story.

Also, Vonnegut's book was written before "No C0untry for Old Men" so he is not playing off of that.

Ari

Anna Karenina, Harry Potter

Well. I revisited all the Harry Potters this summer. Good shit. Made me feel happy, youthful and like a very fast reader. Any of ya'll seen the new movie yet?
I'm currently trying to read Anna Karenina. It's really frustrating, though not in the way you might imagine. I really really like it, but for some reason I can only read it for like... 30 mins a sitting. I dunno. Maybe it's tooo epic.
Salani kakuhle Padkos,
Kat
PS. Kate-- I've heard a lot about Sherman Alexie since you posted about him.

i don't read...

...but, if you really want to know, i just read this crazy sci-fi prediction-of-an-apocalytic-future book called "snow-crash", by neil stephenson. pretty neato, kind of like the fifth element, blade runner and matrix...sort of.

also, i'm starting to read a book called "the transition handbook" by rob hopkins. this is a prediction-of-an-apocalytic-future book, but it's not science fiction, and talks about peak oil and how we're going to run out of oil to feed the global demand, and how we should prep for the end. kind of depressing, but pretty interesting.

back to farming. happy trails!

dan

Hey guys! I just finished The Toughest Indian in the World by Sherman Alexie and it was really, really good.

love,
Kate

First Post!

Hey Ari/Darcy. How do you like the blog?