{"id":5691,"date":"2025-10-01T09:25:46","date_gmt":"2025-10-01T15:25:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/?p=5691"},"modified":"2025-10-01T09:36:06","modified_gmt":"2025-10-01T15:36:06","slug":"5691","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/?p=5691","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I read some books in September!<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>&#127911; <b>Odyssey<\/b><em> The Greek Myths Reimagined<\/em> by Stephen Fry<\/li>\n<li>&#127911; <b>10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World<\/b><em> How Parents Can Stop Smartphones, Social Media, and Gaming from Taking Over Their Children&#8217;s Lives<\/em> by Jean Twenge<\/li>\n<li>&#127911; <b>Nowhere for Very Long<\/b><em> The Unexpected Road to an Unconventional Life<\/em> by Brianna Madia<\/li>\n<li>&#127911; <b>Shroud<\/b> by Adrian Tchaikovsky<\/li>\n<li>&#128218; <b>Infinite Jest<\/b> by David Foster Wallace<\/li>\n<li>&#127911; <b>The Circle<\/b> by Dave Eggers<\/li>\n<li>&#127911; <b>The Every<\/b> by Dave Eggers<\/li>\n<li>&#127911; <b>Ghost Work<\/b><em> How to Stop Silicon Valley from Building a New Global Underclass<\/em> by Mary L. Gray, Siddharth Suri<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I finally finished reading Infinite Jest in non-audio form. I started it last December, though I did take a few breaks to read other non-audiobooks between then and now. Plus I only ever read it in 10-20 minute chunks right before bed. Plus I took the time to highlight 1,699 passages in the process. This is by far the hardest, yet most rewarding, book I&#8217;ve ever read. The audiobook is much more approachable, an absolute masterpiece. I&#8217;ve never enjoyed any book as much as I enjoy this one. It&#8217;s smart, funny, and weird as hell.<\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s a random representative sample of snippets that make me grin:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\n  it is often more fun to want something than to have it.<\/p>\n<p>  My dad used to bowl, too, when he still had a thumb.<\/p>\n<p>  tastes like skim with a brown crayon melted into it.<\/p>\n<p>  his handbag, which failed to complement his shoes.<\/p>\n<p>  it is possible to learn valuable things from a stupid person.<\/p>\n<p>  secloistered<\/p>\n<p>  I am kilometers ahead of you.<\/p>\n<p>  logical validity is not a guarantee of truth.<\/p>\n<p>  My father was whispering to himself in brief expletive phrases<\/p>\n<p>  The string of mucus from Kevin&#8217;s nose trembles and swings.<\/p>\n<p>  \u2018The son described his father as quote \u201cgenre-dysphoric.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>  Gately lay there, overhanging all four sides of his bunk,<\/p>\n<p>  He said &#8216;Fuck it&#8217; again, and I remember not being clear about what he was referring to.<\/p>\n<p>  DeLint described winter sports as practically getting down on one knee and begging for an injury.<\/p>\n<p>  his weekend binges with the glass pipe caused them no end of Financial Insecurity, which he mispronounces.<\/p>\n<p>  A direct assault upon the Academy of Tennis itself was impossible.<\/p>\n<p>  I\u2019d heard the term projectile vomiting but I never thought that I\u2014you could aim, the pressure was such that you could aim.<\/p>\n<p>  their classes are usually fascinating the way plane-crash footage is fascinating.<\/p>\n<p>  He killed himself less than ninety days later. Fewer than ninety days?<\/p>\n<p>  no single, individual moment is in and of itself unendurable.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I read some books in September! &#127911; Odyssey The Greek Myths Reimagined by Stephen Fry &#127911; 10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World How Parents Can Stop Smartphones, Social Media, and Gaming from Taking Over Their Children&#8217;s Lives by Jean Twenge &#127911; Nowhere for Very Long The Unexpected Road to an Unconventional Life &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/rob.rs\/?p=5691\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\"><\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[75],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s87lvI-5691","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5691"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5691\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5693,"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5691\/revisions\/5693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rob.rs\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}