Paddle Your Own Canoe: One Man's Fundamentals for Delicious Living

by Nick Offerman

This book is an autobiographical book by Nick Offerman, the TV actor in the show Parks and Recreation. He talks about his upbringing and life to the current point, and all the ups and downs in his life. It is a very interesting story from the perspective of a sort of outsider of Hollywood, who is not one of those glitzy and glamorous actors. It is also a very interesting (and humorous) insight into an actor who was raised on a farm outside Chicago and went through the Chicago theatre ranks before moving to Hollywood and struggling before making it big. What really made this book interesting in his focus not only on acting but also pursuing his other interests in life, primarily woodworking.

I can relate to Nick with his need to creating things, in being involved in not only acting but also creating wooden furniture and things. I think there is a real joy in creating things by yourself, be it a piece of furniture, painting, sculpture etc. All in all, a good and very funny read. I would recommend this.

The Reason I Jump

by Naoki Higashida (translated by KA Yoshida & David Mitchell)

I just finished this book today. A good short read, it was written by a 13-year old autistic kid. Very insightful into the mind of an autistic person and their struggles, conditions and aspirations. One point to note was that one will never know where the austism starts and the personality ends. What I mean is what trait is due to the individual's personality, and what is due to the condition that is autism. However, I am very much able to draw a lot of similarities between how I feel and the experiences described by the author. This is either a great testament of the author's ability to connect with the reader, or simply I am perhaps exhibiting some autistic tendencies as well. Or perhaps it is simply these emotions are commonalities for all human beings and autistic individuals are simply more sensitive and atuned to their emotions. Overall, a very good read and breaks a lot of taboos on the subject of autism.

Reads Update

I have not been updating my blog because work has been hectic and PhD. has gone a bit on the wayside lately. But here's the stuff I have read lately and some notes.

1. For One More Day by Mitch Albom - This is a nice book about appreciating life and what if we had one more day to spend with our loved one when they say their final goodbye. The themes of Albom's book are pretty much all the same. Same vein if you have read any of his other work, just as good.

2. The Associate by John Grisham - Who can write better law thrillers than Grisham? Not many. Good solid story about a lawyer caught between his conscience and an industrial espionage ploy.

3. My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult – This story is about a family who have a daughter that has cancer (I think?), then the family has the idea of genetically engineering another child to be a perfect donor match for their sick child, so she could donate bone marrow and blood for the sick child to survive. This book is about their life journey, struggles, etc. The book started off well enough, but I felt the story towards the middle and especially the end was really terrible. Firstly I did not like the ending. Secondly all the subplots are very self-serving and too nicely encapsulated within themselves. Very predictable, not organic.

4. The Street Lawyer by John Grisham – Another lawyer book. This is about a lawyer who decided to trade in his high-paying corporate law job for a public interest law job for the homeless. Defending the weak and poor as it were. He decides to do this after undergoing a traumatic experience. I love Grisham books. Perhaps it is his story-telling, very straightforward and to the point.

It made me wonder how colourful and stressful lawyers’ lives are. Then I thought about my own work as an engineer. I mean both are professional jobs, but I think if there is an engineering story, it’d be like watching paint dry. If there are good engineering stories out there, I’d be all for reading those too though. I guess there would be great stories in the form of industrial espionage, the inspiration of engineering creations. Nah, there is space for nice engineering fiction, just need to find out who writes those…but for the moment, I am still very much into Grishams. So will read a few more before I move on.