Southpaw Jones

Southpaw Jones presents
Is This Interesting?
Thoughts/feelings that just might not matter:

It’s time for me to be honest with you all. Honest with myself.

I just may not be a book reader.

I’m certainly a book owner.
I even like to think of myself as a book lover!
I love bookstores.
I love authors.
I love words.

So what’s the problem?

I don’t admit this with any anti-intellectual pride, mind you. I am not a NASCAR-watching, Paris-Hilton-admiring, Maxim subscriber. This is a source of embarrassment and confusion for me, and I hope that by discussing it with the eight people who read the Gazette, I can either remedy it or at least become comfortable with it.

I read maybe two books a year, three if there’s a Harry Potter release. Those Potter books are the only ones I “can’t put down.” But as great as they are, I think it has less to do with pure interest, and more to do with getting to the end before some third-grader can spoil it for me in the grocery store.

Perhaps a list will make me feel better. Yes, a list of reasons I struggle with books.

1. Books don’t have enough cool lists.

2. I despise elaboration, and books are filled with the stuff. I wish they’d just say something once, and let me flesh out the ideas myself. Me, me, me!

3. I despise description, and books are filled with the stuff. Indeed, Jane Eyre may have damaged my love of reading for life. There’s two people in a room. That’s all I need. What are they saying? What are they thinking? What are they doing? Tell me! If I cared about lamp shades, I would peruse and IKEA catalogue.

4. It takes me five hours to read a book, and it only scores me five minutes of conversational tidbits at a cocktail party.

5. There’s that dang Internet over there, silly book! I could read you to learn some stuff about one thing, or I could leap from article to article to blog entry to review, like a gazelle foraging for information in the great meadow of knowledge.

6. I like the idea of reading before bed, but it’s so fun to listen to Coast to Coast on AM radio! Just last night, I heard that someone in the Middle East thinks they have possession of Jesus’s foreskin! Fabulous.

7. I do have a short attention sp…what does number 8 say, I wonder?

8. I think I’m still in backlash mode from required reading in high school and college. You know, I remember thoughts like, “If I ever get out of here, I’ll show them! I’m never, ever gonna read another piece of literature as long as I live!” It’s hard to break promises I made to my younger, angrier self.

9. I guess, honestly, I don’t see much difference in quality between people who read a lot and people who don’t.

10. I’m a slow reader, and I’m a paranoid reader. If my mind starts to wander while reading, I’ll back up really far and read it all again. And I’m often afraid I’ve skipped pages on a turn, so I’ll flip the corner back to make sure…a couple of times. It’s pathetic.

So that’s my story. I really want to read Freakonomics. I want to read The Denial of Death. I want to be That Guy. But the time and motivation just may not be there. And in the end, I’d rather be thinking, daydreaming, and brainstorming than absorbing someone else’s thoughts. After all, I’ve got a Fun Time Gazette to publish.

Southpaw Jones presents
And Another Thing…
More verbosity with velocity and viscosity:

Now that we’ve seen the Great Ice Storm of 2007, followed by the Great Thaw of 2007, Matt the Electrician and I are ready to return to Cafe Mundi tonight! Austinites, escape the rain and the cold, grab a hot, stimulating beverage, and listen to songs that appeal to you so specifically, you’ll think we’ve been going through your garbage.

Wednesday, January 24th, 2007
8:00 PM
Cafe Mundi
1704 E. 5th St
Austin, TX
512-236-8634

Southpaw Jones presents
Online Museum of the Week
The World’s Stupidest Tattoos:

Bill Passalacqua presents
I am not a smoker…
One man’s reasons for not lighting up in ‘07:

…because I can’t be bothered.

So far I have saved $103.50

Jan. 23rd, 2007

Herman Bennett presents
Plumb, Plumber, Plumbest
Signs of the times from Austin’s singing Jewish plumber:

Thank you, come again!
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