Kidzdoc Strives for Insanity in 2024 (4)

My previous thread was utterly stale and unfocused, so it's time to start a new one for the fourth quarter of 2024, which will hopefully be a much more productive one.

Currently reading:

    

The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese
Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain by Sathnam Sanghera
Baldwin: Collected Essays by James Baldwin

January:
1. The House of Doors by Tan Twan Eng
2. The Upcycled Self: A Memoir on the Art of Becoming Who We Are by Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter
3. The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017 by Rashid Khalidi

February:

March:
4. An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness by Kay Redfield Jamison

April:
5. Bipolar Disorder: A Guide for You & Your Loved Ones, 4th Edition by Francis Mark Mondimore, MD
6. The Details by Ia Genberg
7. What I'd Rather Not Think About by Jente Posthuma
8. Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieria Junior

May:
9. The Heart: Frida Kahlo in Paris by Marc Petitjean
10. Black AF History: The Un-whitewashed Story of America by Michael Harriott
11. Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward
12. Medgar & Myrlie: Medgar Evers and the Love Story That Awakened America by Joy-Ann Reid
13. Travelers to Unimaginable Lands: Stories of Dementia, the Caregiver, and the Human Brain by Dasha Kiper (DNF)
14. My Father's Brain: Life in the Shadow of Alzheimer's by Sandeep Jauhar

July:
15. Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder by Salman Rushdie
16. The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human by Siddhartha Mukherjee
17. The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride
18. Moral Man and Immoral Society by Reinhold Niebuhr

August:
19. James by Percival Everett
20. There There by Tommy Orange
21. Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange
22. Orbital by Samantha Harvey
23. My Friends by Hisham Matar
24. Desperately Seeking Basquiat by Ian Castello-Cortes

September:
25. What Kingdom by Fine Gråbøl
26. Orwell's Ghosts: Wisdom and Warnings for the Twenty-First Century by Laura Beers

October:
27. Held by Anne Michaels
28. Sister Deborah by Scholastique Mukasonga

November:
29. Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood

The African Diaspora: Fiction and Poetry

Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieria Junior
The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store by James McBride
James by Percival Everett
My Friends by Hisham Matar
Let Us Descend by Jesmyn Ward
Sister Deborah by Scholastique Mukasonga

The African Diaspora: Nonfiction

Black AF History: The Un-whitewashed Story of America by Michael Harriott
Medgar & Myrlie: Medgar Evers and the Love Story That Awakened America by Joy-Ann Reid
The Upcycled Self: A Memoir on the Art of Becoming Who We Are by Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter

2024 International Booker Prize Longlist:
Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieria Junior
The Details by Ia Genberg
What I'd Rather Not Think About by Jente Posthuma

2024 Booker Prize Longlist:
Held by Anne Michaels
James by Percival Everett
My Friends by Hisham Matar
Orbital by Samantha Harvey
Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood
Wandering Stars by Tommy Orange

Dignidad Literaria: Literature and Nonfiction by Authentic Latinx Writers

Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieria Junior

Medicine, Illness, Public Health and Science

An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness by Kay Redfield Jamison
Bipolar Disorder: A Guide for You & Your Loved Ones, 4th Edition by Francis Mark Mondimore, MD
My Father's Brain: Life in the Shadow of Alzheimer's by Sandeep Jauhar
The Song of the Cell: An Exploration of Medicine and the New Human by Siddhartha Mukherjee
Travelers to Unimaginable Lands: Stories of Dementia, the Caregiver, and the Human Brain by Dasha Kiper (DNF)

Philosophy & Religion:

Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics by Reinhold Niebuhr

Politics & Current Affairs

The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917-2017 by Rashid Khalidi
Orwell's Ghosts: Wisdom and Warnings for the Twenty-First Century by Laura Beers

Congratulations to Han Kang, the winner of this year's Nobel Prize in Literature. I've read three of her novels, The Vegetarian, Human Acts, and The White Book, and I enjoyed each of them. The US Kindle edition of her fourth full length novel to be translated into English, Greek Lessons, is currently being sold for $4.99, so I purchased it and will plan to read it later this year. According to Wikipedia her latest novel, We Do Not Part, will be published in English translation sometime next year.

Happy new thread, Darryl. I hope you are well.
I still have The Vegetarian on my TBR.

Happy new thread, Daryl.
I think I will save Han Kang's writing until the world is in a happier place.

Happy new thread, Darryl!

Happy new thread!

Happy new one, Darryl. Hope things are going well.

Happy new thread!

Happy new thread! I look forward to your thoughts on Sister Deborah.

Well, I hope it will be a happy new year for us in the US. I received my ballot papers today and will do my best🫤

>10 Ameise1: Thanks, Barbara. I hope that you enjoy The Vegetarian as much as I did. It's a strange novel, but it absolutely worked for me.

>11 tangledthread: Thanks tangledthread. I can only hope that the result of next month's election is so decisive that there is no doubt about its validity. Unfortunately I'm anything but confident about that.

>12 EllaTim: Thanks, Ella.

>13 figsfromthistle:;Thanks, Anita.

>14 jessibud2: Thanks, Shelley. It's going relatively well for my mother and myself, although it's still a challenge to get as much done as I would like to, including reading for pleasure.

>15 rv1988: Thanks, Rasdhar.

>16 Sakerfalcon: Thanks, Claire. Unfortunately I didn't enjoy Sister Deborah, which I finished yesterday. It came as part of my most recent shipment from my subscription to Archipelago Books, a Brooklyn based publisher of translated literature. I'll give it some thought and write a review of it this weekend.

>17 kjuliff: I'm hopeful, but not confident, that Kamala Harris will win. Ideally the races in key states will be much more in her favor than they were for Joe Biden, so much so that the vast majority of reasonable people won't question the validity of the results. Unfortunately I'm not expecting that to be the case, and I fear that we are heading toward some very dark days ahead.

I submitted my ballot to my local government services center on Monday, the first day I was eligible to do so in my county.

>19 kidzdoc: On the upcoming election - I completely agree with you.

>17 kjuliff: >19 kidzdoc: Here in New Hampshire, I've recently seen a political sign saying something like 'Voting for Communists will harm your family.'

There are, of course, no communists running in NH that I know of.

>21 dukedom_enough: The false statements sicken me. How can people believe them, yet they do.

Happy new thread, Darryl. The Vegetarian is a book I own, but I'm waiting 'til I'm in the right mindset for it, as I expect it to be difficult for me to read.

>20 kjuliff: I fear that there will still be civil unrest in this country if Trump loses, whether in an blowout or a landslide, with potentially an even worse degree of anarchy than we saw on January 6th, 2021. The most rabid elements of the far right and the MAGA cult show no evidence of retreating quietly if Harris wins. On the other hand a Trump victory could cause serious and long lasting damage to our democracy, depending on how many elements of the Project 2025 playbook are able to be enacted. I'm getting increasingly more anxious watching MSNBC or CNN, or reading the NYT, and yesterday morning I nearly decided to take half of a Seroquel tablet, which my psychiatrist has prescribed me for daily and as needed use for general anxiety disorder.

>21 dukedom_enough: Yikes. I've heard Trump refer to his opponent as "Comrade Kamala Harris," which I suppose is one explanation for that sign. Is this 2024, or 1954?

>22 kjuliff: Right, Kate. The latest comments from Trump and his minions about Hurricanes Helene and Milton are so extreme that the conservative governors of Georgia, South Carolina and even Florida have pushed back against them, in a show of responsibility toward their citizens instead of blind loyalty to him. Although I certainly mourn the loss of life and property as a result of those hurricanes I also hope that Trump only cares about winning the election and demonizing Biden, Harris and FEMA.

>23 bell7: Thanks, Mary. There is a good chance I'll read The Vegetarian again in the not too distant future. I remember being struck but also moved by its main character and story.

>24 kidzdoc: Darryl, I totally agree with you on both points. I too am increasingly anxious and have been taking Xanax. If I could - I am physically unable to take the long haul back to Australia -I’d leave now.

I don’t think enough people in the U.S.are taking the situation seriously. I will never forget the attack on the Capitol January 6 2021 which I watched live. The country is much more divided more and Trump much more extreme and emboldened.

>25 kjuliff: I'm very sorry that you are unable to leave the US due to your health, Kate. My brother is taking Xanax for generalized anxiety disorder, but my psychiatrist thought that Seroquel, in addition to Divalproex, would be a better option for me, as she diagnosed me with bipolar I disorder and generalized anxiety disorder this past February. I have mostly mild anxiety spells and panic attacks, but they have been increasingly rare and significantly less since March.

I agree with you about people not paying close attention or taking this election seriously. The lead article in today's NYT —I've subscribed to the print edition since 2000—describes the difficulty that Kamala Harris has had in convincing African Americans, especially men, to express support for her campaign, especially in comparison to Obama, Hillary Clinton and Biden. How any Black man in this country could think that Trump gives a damn about him is nothing short of incredulous, and anyone who takes time to read about his views towards us will quickly learn that he and his Nazi father have been virulently racist for decades. I loved the speech that Barack Obama gave at Pitt's Fitzgerald Field House earlier this week (I went to medical school at Pitt, the University of Pittsburgh, so I've passed by the Field House dozens of times), and the call to action he gave to community organizers in Pittsburgh's Hill District and the talking points he gave them to bring up to their friends and acquaintances, mainly other Black men, who may still be on the fence about whether to vote for Harris, Trump, or to sit out the election altogether.

I went to my local barbershop on Friday and discussed the election with my barber, telling him that I had already cast my ballot for the Harris/Walz ticket and for Bob Casey for another term as the senior US senator from Pennsylvania. Black barbershops serve as community centers for African American men, places where we can relax, let our hair down (so to speak; I've had a "high and tight" haircut for most of my adult life), and discuss topics as trivial as sports and more serious such as politics and health. My barber is 80 years old and only works a few hours a week, so there was no one else to talk about the election other than him. In contrast, my old barbershop in Atlanta had 4-6 barbers and a dozen or more clients at any given time, and because all of the barbers and most of the regular clients knew that I was a physician (everyone there addressed me as "Doc," and I doubt that anyone other than my usual barber knew my real name) they often asked me for medical advice, even though my knowledge of adult medicine is limited by being a pediatrician.

I remember the skepticism in the Black community when Barack Obama first announced he was running for the presidency, as many outside of Chicago openly expressed support for Hillary Clinton. I think that Harris and influential people such as Barack & Michelle Obama and Oprah Winfrey need to get out more and convince the Black community that Harris, despite her past history as a prosecutor and vice president in an administration that has been unfairly tied to accelerated rises in food and housing costs, will be better choices for them and their loved ones than Trump.

*end of rant*

>26 kidzdoc: Yes I’m aware of the function of the barbershops - there are a few close to me. I wish there was an equivalent for people like me :).

I’ve persuaded one of my Hispanic friends to return to the Dems. I don’t understand the way so many can support Trump on the refugee issue. I’ve tried saying - “but you came in that way”, but it doesn’t seem to matter.

In Australia we have a similar problem of established immigrants from one country (there is a tendency for refugees to come in waves there, to oppose immigrants from new countries. So Vietnamese opposed Italians, Lebanese opposed Vietnamese, and so on. But we’ve not had the same ethnic groups showing hostility to their groups’ newer arrivals.

But of course it’s very difficult for refuges to even enter Australia. It’s a wonder Trump hasn’t adopted the cruel policy of Australian governments (both major parties) of never allowing an undocumented refugee to set foot on Australian soil.

>24 kidzdoc:

That centre-right figures like Obama and Harris get attacked as "communists" just shows the utterly deteriorated state of American education and public discourse. This is the fruit of many decades of anti-Communist indoctrination and demonisation of the left. In the US, "communist", "socialist" have no meaning whatsoever, they are simply slurs.

>26 kidzdoc:

I haven't read the NY Times article and don't mean to criticise Obama's speech (calling out misogyny, as he seem to have done, is welcome within any group), but I do get angry when yet again people zero in on minorities, who time and again vote more progressive than anyone else, and there is NEVER a comparable dressing down of those who actually vote for fascism enthusiastically and consistently the most: white men. When was the last time, or any time, that anyone, let alone someone of Obama's stature, lectured the white male demographic in the pages of the NY Times? Nope, that's a hard target. About 75% of white men support Trump, but yeah, let's lecture Black men, a whopping 9% or so of Trump voters.

I understand that if there is any trend of increasing support for Trump anywhere, that's not good news. But let's be real. If Mango Mussolini wins again, it'll be squarely because of whites, and white men especially.

Apologies if I'm meddling.

>26 kidzdoc: "I'm getting increasingly more anxious watching MSNBC or CNN, or reading the NYT, . . .

I think sometimes that these sorts of outlets feel like they need to over-emphasize the problems Harris' campaign is facing so that they won't be accused of "left-wing bias." I try not to let it make me crazy. But I fully agree with your statement about "hopeful but not confident."

>28 LolaWalser: "That centre-right figures like Obama and Harris get attacked as "communists" just shows the utterly deteriorated state of American education and public discourse. This is the fruit of many decades of anti-Communist indoctrination and demonisation of the left. In the US, "communist", "socialist" have no meaning whatsoever, they are simply slurs.

I agree entirely. Regarding specifically your last sentence, whenever I'm speaking with someone who criticizes a particular government program, enacted or proposed, as "socialist," I respond, "Now you're asking me to be scared of the bogeyman. I'm in favor of whatever programs will benefit the most number of people. When you criticize ideas solely by applying the label "socialist," you're just name calling. Since I'm no longer in the 4th grade, that no longer impresses me."

Regarding the Obama speech and who he did or didn't call out, I think his tendency would be to speak to the people who might possibly listen to him. For Obama to chastise fascist-leaning white dudes for being fascist-leaning would probably do about as much good, I'm afraid, as chastising the moon for only being full once a month.

I recently saw a clip of a conversation between a journalist and someone who studies voting trends, both African American (sorry, names escape me). They were talking about African American voting patterns. The voting trends guy identified one group he labeled "understandably skeptical," whose attitude is, more or less, my life didn't get any worse when Trump was president and it hasn't gotten any better since Biden's been president." Hence their possible apathy.

This seems a fairly decent description of the overall situation. The news is basically good, with some provisos:
https://apnews.com/article/harris-trump-election-black-voters-biden-78e344ddea48...

Matt Brown, the AP reporter who wrote that article, also wrote this one, which directly addresses Obama's comments and the larger implications of what he was getting at. In the article, Brown quotes both Khalil Thompson, co-founder and executive director of the organization Win With Black Men, and Philip Agnew, founder of the grassroots political organization Black Men Build.
https://apnews.com/article/election-2024-black-men-obama-harris-misogyny-c468d83...

More about Brown:
https://blog.ap.org/matthew-brown-named-race-and-politics-reporter

It remains an astounding fact to me that when Trump beat Clinton, he had a majority among white college-educated women. Things look much better this time, however, at least according to Politico:

"Not only do women prefer Vice President Kamala Harris over former President Donald Trump by 15 percentage points, according to a new poll. They are starting to give Harris the edge on one of his strongest issues — the economy.

An American University poll, shared first with POLITICO, found that a majority of women trust Harris over Trump to address inflation and bring down the cost of living. Another 46 percent prefer Harris over Trump to handle the economy, while 38 percent prefer Trump on it. Nearly two-thirds of the women surveyed said inflation and the economy were the most important issue for them as they decided on their vote."
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/10/04/trump-women-economy-poll-00182451

A week ago Saturday, my wife and I took a bus trip organized by a local neighborhood Democratic club from NYC to Easton, PA, to knock on doors, for Harris/Walz generally but for the local congressperson, Susan Wild, who's in a tough reelection campaign, specifically. I don't how much specific good it did, but it was still worth doing, and we're both going to try to get on at least once more such trip in the next week or two.

>29 rocketjk:

I never said I expected anything from Obama, I wrote "someone of Obama's stature".

It remains an astounding fact to me that when Trump beat Clinton, he had a majority among white college-educated women.

This is not true, as I have discussed multiple times in the past, in 2016 and 2020. Trump DIDN'T get "the majority" of the white women vote, let alone the college-educated white women (the latter demographic consistently prefers Democrat candidates, albeit with varying margins).

An examination of the 2016 electorate, based on validated voters (Pew Research Center)

Donald Trump Didn’t Really Win 52% of White Women in 2016

The reporting from 2020, the Covid year zero, was even shoddier.

These are misogynistic dogwhistles spread by the manosphere, for the same reason that "Karen" has become the face of white racism while white men not only outnumber "Karens" by orders of magnitude, the men also commit most heinous and violent racist crimes. Which is not to say that millions of white female voters for Trump are a small problem, or that there aren't millions of racist white women. But the fact remains that far more white men than white women vote fascist, racist, Trumpodial, and yet it's women, or Black men, or Hispanics, who get lectured by the time elections come up, and never the largest fascistic voting block: white men.

Sorry for taking so much space, Darryl, especially as much of this is a repeat.

>30 LolaWalser: Thank you for those two links. I’ve been searching for that evidence as I’ve been having this false statistic - white women and Trump - quoted to/at me far too often lately. I am now armed.

>31 kjuliff:

You're welcome. As I'm sure all would agree, no one thinks that it calls for celebration that "only" around 46% of white women voters chose Trump. Nevertheless, it DOES matter that it wasn't "the majority", but a large plurality of white women voters behind Trump--because the former assertion has been and is weaponised.

For proof look no further than >29 rocketjk:. I make one post about white men as the largest Trump-voting demographic, and how this is never criticised in the way women's and minorities' voting patterns are criticised and called out--and IMMEDIATELY someone deflects to white women! It would be funny if not for the real-world effects and significance of this behaviour.

>30 LolaWalser: Thanks for the information about the 2016 election. I'm happy to know that.

>32 LolaWalser: I wasn't deflecting about anything. I simply mentioned information that I thought was the case based on reading I've done. I made the comment within the context of then posting a link to an article showing how well Harris is doing with women voters now.

ETA: In fact, I have no reason to deflect in the way you allege. I agree with you that white males represent a bulk of the problem in the U.S., voting and public policy-wise.

Thanks for this spirited and educational discussions, including those links. You'll forgive me if I choose not to answer in detail; my spare time is severely limited due to my responsibilities caring for my mother and reading medical journals and a very dense study guide that will allow me to apply for Pennsylvania and New Jersey medical licenses before the end of the year, maintain my standing as a board certified pediatrician, and start the process of looking for looking for non-clinical physician employment that will allow me to work from home and care for my mother with support.

>34 kidzdoc: Looks like everything running smoothly. Hard work but worth it. Good to hear.

>34 kidzdoc:
I am so glad to hear that you have started on the board certification. Getting back to work will be a good thing for you and give you time to be thinking about other things.

I have a moving date set. October 28-29. I will be leaving Tuscaloosa and so am packing, packing, packing right now. The delivery date for my household stuff will be on Friday, November 8. My house here in Tuscaloosa is a wreck and I suspect that will be the case with the house in Kansas when all the stuff is moved. I just have to be patient and take my time getting it all put back into the right place.

I did have a slight glitch as my hotspot fried itself (because I left it in direct sunlight on my office desk here in Tuscaloosa) so I am shopping for a new one. As soon as that gets going I will be able to sign all of the papers online and make the moving official because I will have paid the bills with that electronic signature. In-the-meantime, I get to go to Starbucks once a day to take care of business.

>35 kjuliff: Right, Kate, although I had hoped to be already employed in some capacity this year; unfortunately that is completely unrealistic. I continue to receive almost daily LinkedIn, email and text messages, and yesterday I received a phone call at dinnertime yesterday from a particularly obnoxious physician recruiter organization that used to torment me when I was working in Atlanta. I was very unique in that I had spent more than 20 years working as a pediatric hospitalist for a highly regarded healthcare system, with plenty of recommendations from my peers, and that was enough for recruiters to seek me out for full time or locum tenens positions outside of Atlanta. At this point it seems highly unlikely that I will ever care for another hospitalized or clinic patient again, which is a sad reality for both me and especially the nurses and fellow physicians I used to work with; I knew that I would "hang up my stethoscope" at some point, but I didn't think it would be this soon. Whenever anyone asks me what I do I often tell them that "I used to be a pediatrician," before I correct myself and say that I still am a pediatrican, as I'm fully board certified and could conceivably return to work with my old group in Atlanta, even if just for occasional weekends. I jokingly refer to myself as the "number 1 houseboy" when I'm at my lowest moments, but I'm doing my best to recognize the worth in what I'm doing for Mom, and not let my changed life cause me to descend into the deep depression I was in last year and early this year.

>36 benitastrnad: Right, Benita. Getting back into the workforce will give me some sense of self worth that I'm far too often lacking now. I don't expect to be able to work more than 15-20 hours per week at the beginning, but hopefully I can ramp that up by dropping off my mother at the adult day center I bring her to on days that I have appointments, or need to run errands or have a mental break for a few hours. The one downside is that she isn't fond of going to the center, as she won't participate in group activities or engage with the other adults that go there, most of whom have longstanding developmental delay rather than dementia. I do send her off with a book or two, and she does like looking at them while she's there, so she's doing something at least.

Congratulations on your upcoming move from Tuscaloosa back home to Kansas!

>37 kidzdoc: I’d not ever heard the expression, “hang up your stethoscope” before , but it’s a good one.

It’s weird that you don’t think about the last chunk of your life and what you’ll do with it until it’s on you. Well you think about it, but it’s just imagination. I think the only years we have, when we are unencumbered by the needs of others are few.

I don’t know why I think this, but it seems to me OK that your mother doesn’t like going to the center. It shows a good sense of self and will.

Looks like you have it sorted as they say in Australia.

My son has recently found a job after looking for work mostly via LinkedIn since January. He’s fussy and will only work for ethical organizations. He’s very patient. I would have been a nervous wreck.

I am currently tapering off Prednisone and as a consequence am very critical of books that everyone else here seems to like.

I have been diligently packing and sorting for the last two days and I am already tired of it! There is lots to do before that truck arrives on October 28 and I am not enjoying it. I have slowed down quite a bit and I get tired more easily than I once did. I decided that as long as I didn't have to load a u-haul I would do the packing in order to cut the cost of the move. I know that this means that I have to pay for the convenience of not doing part of the work, but I think perhaps I should have paid for them to do some of the packing as well. I do want to get to Kansas but I don't really like all this other stuff that goes along with it.

>38 kjuliff: "Hang up your stethoscope" is a commonly used term by physicians who are no actively caring for patients (e.g., When is it time for an older doctor to hang up their stethoscope? We owe it to our patients to get it right), as that instrument is so closely attached to us, especially since many, including nearly all pediatricians no longer wear white coats in the office or hospital setting. Mine is sitting on top of the small bookcase we have between our living and dining rooms, as I routinely use it to perform manual blood pressures on myself with my sphygmomanometer, and occasionally listen to my mother's or my lungs, as we both have asthma.

I was in the process of making retirement plans by retiring abroad, as I've mentioned in the past, and unfortunately I was suffering from physician burnout due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the stresses that I and many of my colleagues suffered as a result. I still loved seeing kids, but there was so much hostility, science denial and mistreatment from a large minority of patients that my colleagues and I dreaded having to care for them; that was also the case for advanced practice providers, nurses, and respiratory therapists. Even though it's been nearly three years since the last time I cared for a patient I still don't miss it, although it's certainly (and probably likely) possible that this sentiment could be at least partially erased by rounding on hospitalized patients (many of the nurses I worked with and am friends with on Facebook, including one last night, routinely tell me how much they miss me and commend me, and several of my partners and colleagues, for having a great bedside manner with their patients and parents; forgive me for tooting my own horn). I had every reason to envision a retirement unencumbered by caring for one or both parents, which in retrospect may have been unrealistic, but when it became apparent that each of them were experiencing significant health challenges in, I think, 2018, my brother and I wanted them to take steps to ensure that they would spend their final days together in an assisted care facility. Unfortunately my father doggedly and unrealistically refused to even consider that this would be necessary, and refused to even consider any of my concerns that I would need to resign and move back home if something happened to him. Watching him go downhill was akin to watching a car driven by my father slowly proceed toward the edge of a cliff, but being unable to do anything about it since he refused to allow me to steer it away from certain disaster.

Until the past few years my mother has been very social, and even now at times she will say hello to people she sees, especially children, who she is especially fond of. Fortunately she isn't hostile to anyone.

Congratulations to your son. Being out of work and seeking work for that long would stress me out as well. I have been using the money I had set aside to purchase retirement property, and that combined with my parents' retirement pot means that having enough money is not a concern.

Prednisone can be rough on kids, and I would assume for adults as well. Most kids who take it for asthma exacerbations do fine, but a small minority become emotionally labile and extremely hyperactive, which can be quite distressing for their parents.

>39 benitastrnad: Could you hire one or two local people to help you finish the packing job, Benita?

Book notes: I'm greatly enjoying Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain by Sathnam Sanghera. I'm nearly halfway through it, and hopefully I'll finish it this weekend. I haven't started Stone Yard Devotional yet, but I'll probably do so next week. I still haven't received The Safekeep or Creation Lake from my local library, so I'll probably end up buying the Kindle version of those books, as I would like to finish the Booker Prize shortlist in advance of the award ceremony on November 12th.

I need to return the copy of Orwell's Ghosts: Wisdom and Warnings for the Twenty-First Century to my local library tomorrow, so I'll skip through it, take notes, and write a review of it soon.

>41 kidzdoc: I’m not going to come close to finishing the Booker shortlist this year—I’m impressed at how many you’ve managed.

I’m on a self-imposed news blackout because it was affecting me adversely and there is nothing to be gained by doom-scrolling for me. I was surprised by the number of Harris/Walz yards signs out here in rural SC. I am cautiously hopeful.

>42 RidgewayGirl: Thanks, Kay. My reading output continues to decrease annually; I routinely read 100+ books a year, but it's now a struggle to get to 40. I've only read three of the Booker shortlisted books, so there's no guarantee that I'll finish the remaining three in a little less than one month.

Most of the signs in my majority White neighborhood are Trump/Vance. I wonder if there is a silent majority that don't want to call attention to themselves for fear of a MAGA rebellion similar to January 6th. I'm not completely satisfied with any of the cable news outlets, so I'll probably start watching BBC World News over breakfast, and continue to watch Amanpour & Company and the PBS NewsHour, my favorite television programs, in the evenings.

>43 kidzdoc:
I am cautiously optimistic. In red Nebraska the Omaha area seems to be going for Harris. Since Nebraska is one of two states that splits its electoral college vote, this could be significant if it goes for Harris. have you seen the stories about the Blue Dot campaign?

>40 kidzdoc:
I have decided that I am going to hire a cleaning crew to come in and clean the house after I am out of it. I e-mailed the moving company on Friday and told them that there would be some packing services needed. however, I had a good weekend. A friend came over on Friday night and we packed my pictures. Today a friend came over and we packed dishes and finished the last of the closets. It was significant progress and I am feeling better about how things are going.

I am starting to worry and the stress is getting to me. I have been waking up about 3 AM with my mind abuzz and then am unable to go back to sleep. I don't want this to become a habit and I know it is stress related, but I do need a good nights sleep. On Wednesday evening I sat down to knit as a way to relieve some stress and knitted two rows of stockinette stitch instead of garter stitch and had to rip those rows out on Thursday. Normally, I don't make mistakes like that and find knitting to be a way to move out of the rat race my mind sometimes becomes, but this week I think I was either exhausted or just not thinking about what I was doing. I am going to take most of the day off from packing tomorrow and attend the Art Festival here in town.

>44 benitastrnad: I've heard a bit about Nebraska, Benita, but much more local, national and even international (e.g. BBC, The Guardian) news coverage has focused on Pennsylvania, including the "collar counties" surrounding Philadelphia; I live in Bucks County, which is one of them. Earlier this week Kamala Harris spoke in front of a group of anti-Trump Republicans in Washington's Crossing, which is less than 10 miles from home, and Trump is supposed to man the grill in a nearby McDonald's sometime next week (ETA: He'll be visiting a McDonald's in Bucks County about 5 miles away later today).

>45 benitastrnad: I'm glad that you're getting help in the last stages of your move and that you're spending time to relax.

>46 kidzdoc: Ugh, we're getting a Trump town hall at the downtown convention center this evening. It's an odd place, which increases my anxiety about what they're up to; in previous elections such events have been out in the red county, not smack in the middle of the blue city. There'll be a Harris-Walz counter-rally organized by local political groups in the main public square in front of the convention center.

>34 kidzdoc:, >37 kidzdoc:, >40 kidzdoc: Wishing you success in returning to work. I'd expect stressful trying to find the time and focus attention, but satisfying to renew ties to your professional world.

>47 qebo: Hmm. Could they be fishing for any undecided or easily swayed voters in traditionally blue areas, similar to what Kamala Harris has done in, I think, traditionally red areas of Georgia and Pennsylvania? This week I've received several text messages from volunteers who noticed that my mother and I are registered Democrats, but so far only I have submitted my ballot, and two older women came to our front door yesterday afternoon looking for my mother. She was sleeping at the time so I shooed them away, but after they left I realized that they were probably Democratic volunteers, as the people who typically solicit don't ask for her specifically. I'll have her work on her signature next week, and drop her ballot in a local office once she's shown that she can—or can't—do so.

Yes, finding time to work on completing CME (continuing medical education) activities to both apply for NJ and PA medical licenses and to maintain my board certification, two separate but interlinked tasks.

>47 qebo: CNN is reporting that Trump will work at the French fry station in the McDonald's in Lower Southampton Township, immediately adjacent to Northeast Philadelphia, this afternoon. That area has a large population of eastern European immigrants, who may be more sympathetic to Trump along with the mostly blue collar White residents of that area. It was recently announced that Bucks County now has a slim minority of registered Republican voters, for the first time in many years and in contrast to the other counties of extreme southeastern Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, Bucks, Chester, Delaware and Montgomery).

Is Trump spending much time in Northampton County to your knowledge? I've been reading that Harris or Trump turnout there could also be very important in determining who wins Pennsylvania.

Yeah, I have the feeling that the MickyD stint is in response to a controversy where Ms Harris said she had that job as an undergraduate.

I find the following breaking news story very disturbing. Elon Musk will be giving $1million dollars a day randomly to a Pennsylvania voter who signs a petition saying they will support the first and second amendment. I'm not sure Trump supports the first amendment with his comments about the media.

Here's the story if you haven't seen it: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cg78ljxn8g7o

>50 streamsong: Yes, that is exactly what was mentioned in the CNN article, although it seems utterly silly and inconsequential to me.

Ugh; how utterly disgusting. I would love to see Elon Musk deported back to South Africa for his efforts to undermine American democracy.

>50 streamsong: I saw that article, and another in the NYT today on how Trump’s starting to “entertain” his audiences by being vulgar. It’s a very sad state of affairs indeed.

>52 kjuliff: Ugh. I have the Sunday NYT. in front of me, but I haven't read it yet. One of the front page articles is titled "Trump Banks On Migration As Main Issue," which I would guess is the same article that you read.

>48 kidzdoc: fishing for
Yeah, that's my guess too. Walz was here a few weeks ago, met with local politicians and dropped by the downtown Democratic headquarters to give a pep talk, but there wasn't a public event.

Yikes. The news sez the downtown streets are lined with MAGAs. However, tickets to the actual event are still available.

>48 kidzdoc: My brother was successful in helping my mother vote by mail last week, after talking with her (to the extent possible) over the past few weeks about what she wanted to do. He told her that Jimmy Carter had just cast his vote at age 100, which pleased and motivated her. I vote in person as the polling station is a 5 minute walk from my house and I cross paths with neighbors.

>52 kjuliff:
There was a substantial story on NPR this morning about Trump's mental lapses in the last few months.

>55 benitastrnad: I missed it. Yes he appears to be getting worse. Morally, cognitively and emotionally.

Hi Daryl. It's been a long time since I've reached out to you. I send all good wishes, and a tremendous amount of respect for all you are doing for your mother!

>54 qebo: I think I was right in assuming that the two women who came to our front door on Saturday were volunteers for the Harris/Walz campaign. A man sporting a large Harris/Walz button and a woman came to our front door yesterday afternoon asking for my mother. I told them that I had received her ballot, intended to help her fill it out, and drop it off in a post office sometime this week; she was able to sign her name during the 2022 election, so hopefully she can do it again this week, with practice, otherwise I'll have her write her initials and sign the envelope in place of her. They knew that I had already voted, and since she is a registered Democrat they wanted to be sure that I would submit her ballot as well.

What has been bizarre is the numerous phone calls and text messages I've received from Atlanta area phone numbers, encouraging me to vote. Today's mail included a card sent to my Pennsylvania address asking me to vote in the Georgia election. Even though I've told or sent reply text messages to four or five people to inform them that I no longer live in Atlanta, but that hasn't stopped the steady flow of messages and calls.

If I didn't say so already my mother has viewed Trump with disdain and disgust when she was more lucid than she is now, and when we watched MSNBC and. she saw that Kamala Harris was running from POTUS against Trump is was quite pleased. That, combined with her historical support for Democrats is enough for me to feel comfortable filing out and submitting her ballot.

You may have seen that Kamala Harris was in Malvern, Chester County earlier today, alongside Liz Cheney. I'm sure that this won't be her last visit to the Delaware Valley.

>55 benitastrnad: Thanks, Benita. I'll see if I can listen to or read that story.

>56 kjuliff: Agreed. Apparently he appeared in western PA this afternoon, in the home town of the former famous golfer Arnold Palmer, and made a very vulgar comment about Palmer's virilty. I would like to think that a number of parents who have young children would look at him and decide that he is not an adequate role model for them.

>57 Whisper1: Thanks, Linda! I hope that you're doing well.

>58 kidzdoc: My mother was able to sign the mail-in ballot application early this year, but her vision is poor, and her hands were shaking, so the result was off kilter. She was not able to sign the ballot so my brother signed as witness. A colleague of mine is skeptical and thinks we should not have helped her vote, but my brother (who is entrusted with this task as he has worked in local politics for decades and is the family resource for information) had talked to her over several weeks about what she wanted to do, although communication is difficult she is able to understand concrete questions and can be adamant about answering yes or no, she is the one who instilled in us the importance of voting, she has been a registered Democrat since the beginning of time, and we are 100% certain that she would vote for any Democrat on earth running against Trump.

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/09/06/magazine/grandma-dementia-voting-help-ethics....

I belong to a few pro-Harris groups on FB including my favorite Catwomen for Kamala. There are innumerable campaign options besides the normal doorknocking and calling, such as handwriting postcards for the swing states and (this one tickles me) leaving post it notes inside stalls in women's rest rooms extolling a woman's right to choose. Sounds like you received one of the postcards as well as a doorknocker.

>60 streamsong: I think there should be more effort put into helping older people and the visually impaired in voting. I had a lot of trouble filling out the ballot this year. I couldn’t read all the propositions and had to guess. I was mainly concerned with voting for Harris and am pretty sure I got it right.

I’ve tried calling local congress people etc etc but there’s just no interest. For state and local elections I now just throw the ballot away because I can’t read the paper.

There are many like me. But clearly the Democrats aren’t interested.

I’m from Australia and there we have “How to Vote” cards and volunteers that help the disabled. Maybe it’s just in NYC that there’s a lack of interest.

>59 qebo: I read this after I’d posted. See >61 kjuliff:

>62 kjuliff: Have you tried calling 311 to ask what resources are available to visually impaired voters? The Board of Elections provides audio recordings or electronic copies of voter guides for visually impaired voters who may have difficulty reading printed materials.

There is also some kind of electronic absentee ballot that you can request and then fill out at home. I think it allows you to use your existing computer assistive technology to fill out. But you have to be able to print and mail the ballot.

>63 ELiz_M: No, I didn’t try 311. Good idea. I will do that next time. I’m pretty sure I did the president side of the ballot correctly. I had trouble with the propositions on the other side.

>64 kjuliff: i also found this:
Voters with disabilities can request to receive their ballot in an accessible format, such as large print or audio, by indicating their preference on the absentee ballot application. The voter may also designate someone to assist them in marking the ballot if needed.

>65 ELiz_M: Thanks again. I did not know this. I did manage to register for mail-in voting five years ago but I did not see that option. Not surprising as I can’t read printed material.

Which leads me to wonder again - why don’t the major parties help people like me by informing us as to what’s available? I remember when I was a volunteer in 2016 when I could still read printed material and could walk around, there was very little instruction as to where to direct queries. As it turned out I only managed to get one person to take a registration form and everyone (East Harlem) wanted Clinton anyway.

>60 streamsong: I saw one of the post-it messages in a bathroom stall of a gas station while recently driving through NC.

>66 kjuliff: part of phone-banking for Jaime Harrison’s Senate campaign in 2020 was making sure people knew where their polling place was and answering questions about down ballot races. If I’d gotten a question about accessibility, I would not have been able to answer then, but I would have been able to get that information to you within a short time.

That post-it campaign is a great idea. Kind of reminds me of the old "Guerrilla Marketing" days, when people would people would pull the free weeklies, like the Village Voice in NY or the SF Bay Guardian out of their sidewalk boxes, put fliers for their events or causes within the pages and then put them all back in the box.

My wife and I went canvassing in Easton, PA, a couple of weeks ago, and this Sunday we're going to Poughkeepsie in Duchess County, NY, to knock on doors for down-ballot candidates. New York is safely blue when it comes to electoral votes, but the road to taking back the House of Representatives definitely runs through New York.

>68 rocketjk:
And California. Turing the House Blue is the goal in that state. There was a story on it on NPR this morning. If California can elect two Dems to the US House it would kill the supermajority in the House. There would still be a majority, but it wouldn't be a super one.

Those down ballot races are so important.

>69 benitastrnad: "Those down ballot races are so important."

Amen!

>59 qebo: Thanks, Katherine. I found an article, co-written by the American Bar Association's Commission on Law and Aging and the Penn Memory Center at the University of Pennsylvania Medical Center, which serves as a guide to determine if someone with cognitive impairment, such as dementia, is capable of voting from a legal standpoint. From what I read last night I, as her primary caretaker, can ask her if she wants to vote. If she says yes, which Mom did, I can ask her what her opinions are on POTUS and any down ballot candidates. She has expressed utter disdain for Trump, both recently and historically, and within the past few weeks she said that she was happy that Kamal Harris was running for the presidency, as a woman and a person of color. That is sufficient for me to feel comfortable, and in the right, to mark her ballot for Harris. I was originally going to fill out her ballot with all of the other Democrats running for office, but even though I am all but completely certain that she voted for all Democrats in previous elections and would likely do so this time we have not discussed any of those candidates, I won't choose any of the down ballot candidates on her ballot. Tomorrow we'll practice signing her name on pieces of paper, and if she can still sign her name, which she could do last year, I'll have her sign her name to the outer envelope; otherwise I'll ask her to write her initials and sign the envelope in her stead.

This is the link to the article, which was published last month:

Voting & Cognitive Impairments

>71 kidzdoc: Thanks, that's reassuring. My brother had been figuring on president only, but at my suggestion went for senator also as he is a well known entity. Other races, while we could be realistically certain of my mother's preferences, have unfamiliar names on the Democratic side (alas because the incumbent Republicans are entrenched and likely to win so opposition is token), which would involve too much explanation. We actually knew the ballot had arrived because the social worker mentioned it in a care conference the day before I would've picked up the mail; he had approached my mother to offer help filling out the ballot and she said no. This makes sense because she's not super trusting of staff, but also indicated to us that she is deemed eligible by the people who are most aware of her cognitive capacity.

>72 qebo: You and your brother and I are on the same page, except that I won't ask her about the Senate race, as I doubt that she is the least bit familiar with the two major candidates. I asked her again last night if she wanted to vote in next month's election; she said yes, as she did a few weeks ago, and expressed a clear preference for Kamala Harris. I wanted to have some ammunition to fire back in case anyone wanted to challenge the validity of her vote.

>71 kidzdoc: >72 qebo: Since many people in the US vote a straight ticket relying only on party to make their choice, I wonder if you would feel comfortable if your mother indicated that she was voting for the Democrat in each race rather on a specific name.

Back to books...I remain in a near complete reading rut, even though I am enjoying and learning a great deal from Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain by Sathnam Sanghera. I would like to finish the Booker Prize shortlist by the time of the award ceremony on November 12th, so I'll start Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood today and put Empireland on a back burner. None of my local libraries have Creation Lake or The Safekeep, so I'll purchase the Amazon Kindle versions of them today.

>74 streamsong: According to the ABA/Penn Memory Center voting guide I referred to, "It is permissible to offer support in reading and marking the ballot. You should only mark the ballot according to what the person indicates is his or her choice. If a person cannot communicate a choice, you may not mark that person’s ballot. If a person communicates a choice on some ballot items (e.g., election of a president), but not others (e.g. election of a Senator), you may mark only those ballot items for which a choice was communicated" (italics mine). That is the medicolegal basis that Katherine & her brother and I are assisting our mothers in completing their ballots, which I strongly feel would stand up if someone chose to challenge their votes; voting strictly Democrat would be enough to throw out or at least question their ballots, IMO.

I remember taking my parents to their local polling station in 2020 to cast their ballots; each person must drop off their ballot in person, but at that time my mother was far more ambulatory than she is now. I didn't request a ballot for her in the 2022 election, so this will be the first—and quite possibly last—time I will help her vote, barring a runoff election this year.

ETA: Since we (my parents and I) didn't all vote together in 2020, as I was living in Georgia then, I can only attest to their preference for POTUS. Our US congressman, Brian Fitzpatrick (R), has long been widely touted as the most centrist congressman, as he routinely reaches across the aisle to enact bipartisan legislation, and he rejects the most extreme elements of the Republican Party, although far too often he sticks his head in the sand when it comes time to publicly denigrate or oppose them. He is highly influential, due to his committee memberships, very likable, and productive; however, he is anti-abortion, he caucuses with Republicans, and he continues to refuse to engage in town hall meetings with Ashley Ehasz, his Democratic opponent. I voted for Ehasz in 2022 and this year; I would think that Mom voted for his Democratic opponent in prior elections, but because I can't say that with 100% certainty I don't feel comfortable choosing Ehasz solely based on her being a registered Democrat, especially since I have seriously considered voting for Fitzpatrick these past two elections.

>76 kidzdoc: Our US congressman is Lloyd Smucker, who in his years at the state level was considered reasonable, a business-oriented Republican who supported immigration. However, since his election at the national level, he has gone MAGA; he doesn't have the personality for it, but he parrots the talking points. In 2018 there was a concerted effort to oust him. The Democratic opponent was a prominent director of a non-profit, a local political organization canvassed on her behalf, there were numerous meet-and-greets and ubiquitous yard signs. And still she lost by a significant margin. Since then, the opponents change with each election, all are relatively unknown and people barely know they exist. When PA redistricted to create a more fair map overall, somehow this district became less city and more county. Although I'm certain my mother if fully cognizant would vote for the Democrat, as things stand she wouldn't recognize the name.

>77 qebo: Ugh. I suppose it could be argued that the members of Congress are supposed to represent their constituents, even if they personally don't agree with them. Brian Fitzpatrick represents all of Bucks County and a sliver of Montgomery County, which is probably no more than 55% Republican. Ashley Ehasz, his opponent, has run several local television commercials but not many, and I don't remember seeing a single Fitzpatrick ad. I'm sure that you have plenty of Casey and McCormick ads in Lancaster as we do here in the Delaware Valley, but trying to get my mother to choose Casey would be time consuming and, IMO, intellectually and medicolegally dishonest.

>78 kidzdoc: A neighbor who had some issue, I don't recall details, contacted Smucker's office for assistance with resolution. She is a registered Democrat and adamantly disagrees with Smucker politically, but said the staff member was extremely helpful and competent. So at least in this respect, Smucker is not emulating Trump.

>79 qebo: My mother was able to sign her name on the return envelope, but because I didn't think she could write the date correctly I filled that in, then signed my name as a witness and wrote our address. I'll mail it tomorrow, and check to see that it has been received and accepted. As a triple check I showed her a brief video of Kamala Harris, told her that she was running for POTUS, and confirmed with her that she would like to vote for her.

>80 kidzdoc: Thank you, Darryl. I mailed my ballot half hour ago. Wishing and praying for the best outcome.

>81 SqueakyChu: Thank you, Madeline. I'm becoming more and more worried that Trump will win the election, although it would seem that we won't know the true winner for several days after November 5th. Regardless of who wins I fear that we'll soon experience one of the darkest periods of my lifetime.

>83 kidzdoc: Agree 100% and I’m not coping well thinking about it.

>84 kjuliff: Neither am I, Kate. Watching MSNBC in the mornings isn't helping me at all.

Earlier today the Bucks County DA announced that a viral video of a poll worker tearing up Trump ballots is patently false. Anyone who knows how the process works in Pennsylvania would realize that this is absolutely impossible, as the Department of State does not allow poll workers to begin processing absentee or mail ballots until 7 am on Election Day. I listened to our local NPR station not long ago, which mentioned that an organized group in Lancaster County, where Katherine (qebo) lives, apparently dropped off hundreds of fraudulent voter registration forms on Monday, the last day that people could register to vote.

I submitted my mother's ballot to our local post office this morning, ahead of the October 29th deadline. I anticipate getting e-mail notification that her ballot has been accepted, and another one indicating that it has been recorded. This process is unique to Pennsylvania; I have no idea how it works in other states.

>85 kidzdoc: Lancaster County... fraudulent voter registration forms
Sigh. I was just out on an errand circuit, listening to this on NPR which is my default station in the car. Information is sparse. Everyone is denying involvement.

In other delightful news, not only did we get Donald Trump last weekend, but apparently we're getting Elon Musk this weekend at a mystery location somewhere in the county. Are we really such a rich source of votes?

ETA: Oh FFS. Yesterday RFK Jr. and Dr. Phil were out in the county at the usual venue for such events. The psychological health we should all aspire to.

>85 kidzdoc: in NY you check postal voting status online. Mine arrived, was accepted and verified.
Meanwhile my anxiety is through the roof with my worry about the aftermath of the election plus personal and health problems. The Xanax is some help but not a lot.

>86 qebo: The Philadelphia Inquirer has reports about the incidents in Bucks and Lancaster Counties. The video taken in Bucks County that appears to show Trump ballots being destroyed was made by Russian actors and operatives, according to the FBI, but the fraudulent voter registration applications filed in Lancaster County hasn't been linked to either party...yet.

Ugh. One would hope that enough people would be turned off by having Elon Musk hold a central position in a Trump second term to vote for Kamala Harris. I wouldn't bet much on that possibility, though.

RFK, Jr and Dr Phil?! They should have invited Dr Oz to make it a trifecta of medical science deniers.🙄

Tim Walz was in Scranton yesterday, IIRC. I assume that there will be additional appearances in the Commonwealth over the next 1½ weeks.

>87 kjuliff: I am doing my best to stop doomscrolling or thinking about the election, as my ballot has been received, I mailed my mother's yesterday morning, and my current situation prevents me from doing any sort of volunteer work, including making phone calls. If I let myself get too anxious about it I'll end up taking extra doses of Seroquel, or possibly having one or more anxiety or panic attacks. I would ideally like to finish the Booker Prize shortlist by the time the award is announced on November 12th, so I'll focus on the three books I haven't read yet, starting with Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood, which I began last night.

>88 kidzdoc: Maybe we should tell Musk fans that he won't have time to make Twitter, Tesla and SpaceX great (again?) if he takes a Trump job.

I understand the dread and tendency to spiral into expecting doom, but I don't think anyone is prepared for an election where people's right to control their own bodies is on the ballot. Abortion is a bigger factor than the predominantly male pundits seem able to recognize. The sheer number of people who have contributed to the Harris campaign, compared to the number of people who have donated to the other candidate are also heartening.

Hi Daryl. As a fellow Sarah Moss fan, I wanted to let you know that I've finished her latest book, a memoir titled My Good Bright Wolf. I give it 4.5 stars. It is largely about her struggle with anorexia as an adolescent and a relapse in her mid 40's brought on by the pandemic lock down.
It is beautifully written with literary style, though painful to read at times because of the mental health issues.

I have sent in my ballot and refuse to doom scroll or ruminate on what I can't control. But I won't deny offering up prayers for the outcome.

Sorry to hear that you are still in a book rut. I have two books that I want to get read before I leave Alabama and probably won't get one of them done. I have been too busy to read - or pay attention to the news. I have two more nights in my present home, here in Alabama and am packing furiously trying to get most of it done before the movers get here on Monday afternoon. After October 28 it will be hard for me to get to a computer until I get to Kansas. I hope to be there on Monday, November 4 and will cast my ballot on November 5. Until then, keep the book reading going.

>89 dukedom_enough: I'm not sure that Tesla or SpaceX ever were great, Michael, and he has single handedly damaged X. The common features that Musk and Trump share is that they were both born into wealthy families and have been spectacularly failures as businessmen. Make America Great Indeed Again, my ass.

>90 RidgewayGirl: Remind me, Kay...was preservation of reproductive rights and womens' bodies a key feature of the 2016 election? I would think it would be a more important issue this year, given the draconian regulations that some current state legislatures enacted to restrict abortion, even to save the life of the mother or in cases of rape or incest, and the potential criminalization of mothers and health care providers who wish to treat them.

I hold out (faint) hope that a sizable number of Republican voters will decide to vote Trump out of office, while supporting the GOP in down ballot elections.

>91 tangledthread: Thanks for your take on My Good Bright Wolf, tangledthread. Neither of my local library systems has it in stock yet, so I'll look for it next month.

>92 benitastrnad: I'm glad to report that I've at least temporarily broken out of my book slump, as I'm thoroughly enjoying Stone Yard Devotional so far. I'll probably finish it early next week, then start on either Creation Lake or The Safekeep.

I wish you well on the last stages of your move back to Kansas, Benita!

>93 kidzdoc: I'm glad you're enjoying Stone Yard Devotional. I haven't gotten a copy yet and so am eagerly waiting your thoughts about it. I like the author, but I am not a fan at the moment of books with a spiritual focus.

And yes, reproductive rights were a factor in 2016, but a minor one. We still had Roe then. Now the stories of women dying in the hospital parking lots, waiting to be septic enough to warrant care are common and the right is openly saying that their next target is access to birth control and that the only value women have are as incubators.

The NYT opinion section today had quite the front page.

>94 RidgewayGirl: I ordered the UK edition of Stone Yard Devotional via AbeBooks; as far as I know the US edition won't be available until early next year.

You confirmed what I suspected, in that reproductive rights and societal protections for women were much less important in 2016 than they are now.

Yes, that front page of today's NYT Opinion page is unlike any other I've seen so far. I'm sure you've heard of this week's highly controversial decisions by The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times to withhold endorsements of either Trump or Harris, which were both attributed entirely to their wealthy owners, and thought to be due to their wish to curry favor with him if he were to win next month's election. I gave brief consideration to canceling my online subscription to the WP, but ultimately I decided not to, as I felt that doing so would only harm its excellent journalists and not its owner, Jeff Bezos.

ETA: I haven't read today's NYT yet; I'll do so during the Eagles-Bengals game that begins shortly.

>95 kidzdoc: I also have mixed feelings about my subscription to the Washington Post, but for me the WaPo is also the source of my local news. I hate to get news from (other) online sources because I've come not to trust many of them. What a world we're living in these days. :(

>95 kidzdoc:, >96 SqueakyChu: subscription to the Washington Post
I am similarly ambivalent but have kept it for now. I did though resubscribe to the Philadelphia Inquirer, which I had dropped years ago when I moved away.

>95 kidzdoc: Trump was in NYC today. The NYT just reported on his MSG rally:

“Former President Donald J. Trump’s rally at Madison Square Garden on Sunday opened with a standup comic who called Puerto Rico an “island of garbage” in a set that also included derogatory remarks about Latinos generally, African Americans, Palestinians and Jews.”

>98 kjuliff: Incredible. This has been going on for so long now, and I still find it all so hard to believe.

>99 SqueakyChu: I am so scared now. He’s emboldened and gettng worse

>100 kjuliff: What I truly cannot understand is the hatred that keeps half of the country glued to him.

>101 SqueakyChu: - More than hatred, I truly believe that it is pure, unadulterated ignorance. No one in their right mind would *admire* that man and believe a word that spews out of his toilet bowl of a mouth. He has the maturity of a grade school child. The level of ignorance and the sheer number of ignorant people who would put him back on top is what scares me. And I don't even live there.

My sister had to rethink her subscription the WP. She decided to keep it, but was very disappointed in the paper.

There has been a change in the moving plans. The movers will be here between 9 -10 AM. So at almost midnight, I am furiously washing clothes and drying them before the washer and dryer are disconnected and moved.

>101 SqueakyChu: I think he’s tapped into insecure men. We just didn’t realize there were so many of them.

>98 kjuliff: >99 SqueakyChu:
Various people on twitter have said, and I agree, that the rally shows that they think they'll likely lose, and want to create a story where their winning is guaranteed ahead of time. So the loss will mean that the election was stolen, and any measure to undo the loss will be acceptable. State legislatures throwing out Democratic electoral votes, deciding the election in the House of Representatives, violence at the polls - all good.

>93 kidzdoc: & >94 RidgewayGirl: Re: reproductive rights as an issue in the 2016 election. My memory of it is that what Clinton and her supporters really tried to emphasize was the danger to Roe if Trump was to be elected and start being able to appoint Supreme Court justices.

Just to say I'm thinking of you Darryl, and praying for a good outcome in the Presidential and Congressional elections. A Trump victory will have a terrible impact on the whole world. Well done for taking such care to represent your mother responsibly.

I loved Stone Yard Devotional. It managed to balance the secular and the spiritual very well, and the protagonist's inner life felt realistic.

>96 SqueakyChu: I've recently begun subscribing to the online edition of The Washington Post as I do enjoy reading its domestic and international content and want to support its journalists. I suppose I could cancel my subscription, as I have been a long time subscriber to The New York Times, but it only costs $60 per year ($5 per month) for a premium detail subscription to the WP, which I find to be a reasonable and well worth it cost.

>97 qebo: Thanks for resubscribing to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Katherine. That is a much more costly publication, as the online edition is $5.49 per week, over four times as much as the WP. I'll have to consider if I want to receive the print edition of the Sunday Inquirer instead. I did like the paper's no holds barred endorsement of Kamala Harris, along with the NYT's solid endorsement.

>98 kjuliff: I wasn't aware of the Trump rally at MSG until this morning, but it's being widely covered by NPR and MSNBC (I'm watching MSNBC as I'm typing this, despite my previous comment about taking a break from election coverage). WTF are they thinking?! Do they think that this rhetoric will win any undecided voters to choose Trump?!

>99 SqueakyChu: I would hope and expect that the incredibly racist comments made by that despicable comic would be widely covered by the Latino radio and television. Let's see...yes, it's the lead story on Telemundo Filadelfia, and I'm sure that Univision Filadelfia will prominently cover it as well. Many of the Latino residents in the Delaware Valley are of Puerto Rican descent, and those comments will made it far less likely that Latino residents who haven't voted yet will choose Trump.

>100 kjuliff: Indeed.

>101 SqueakyChu: What I truly cannot understand is the hatred that keeps half of the country glued to him.

As much as I would like to deny it, the cold hard truth is that this is a deeply racist country with a sizable minority if not majority White residents would prefer it if all non-White people simply went away, so that this could be a White nationalist country; that would be Making America Great Again. I suppose it would be better in their eyes if Black people returned to being slaves or other second class citizens who would serve them, as long as they could be kept their rightful place.

>102 jessibud2: Right, Shelley. I think that far too many White Americans, particularly in rural areas, live in isolated areas with little exposure to people who don't look or think as they do, and that has a lot to do with why they could not accept the result of the 2016 election, especially when Trump claimed that he won.

>103 benitastrnad: The WP journalists are even more disappointed and disgusted by Jeff Bezos's decision to pull the WP's endorsement of Harris, which it had planned to do, and that has a lot with my decision to continue my subscription, in their support.

Wow. Good luck on today's move, Benita!

>104 kjuliff: I think he’s tapped into insecure men. We just didn’t realize there were so many of them.

I agree completely, Kate. That is the most compelling reason that voters are choosing Trump. Why so many (White) women chose him in 2016, 2020 and 2024 is beyond my understanding.

>105 dukedom_enough: Right, Michael. I think that is the most likely outcome, and it's the one that most concerns me, as I expect dozens if not hundreds of lawsuits, numerous challenges by state legislatures, and, sadly, episodes of widespread violence toward poll workers, Democratic offices and legislators, and those who display Harris/Walz signs on their lawn or bumper stickers on their cars. I thought about placing a Harris/Walz sign on our lawn but decided not to, as I didn't want to have to live in fear of someone damaging my SUV or our house if she won.

>106 rocketjk: Re: reproductive rights as an issue in the 2016 election. My memory of it is that what Clinton and her supporters really tried to emphasize was the danger to Roe if Trump was to be elected and start being able to appoint Supreme Court justices.

That's what I remembered, Jerry, and that was why I was so surprised and disappointed that so many White women voted for Trump. Apparently it wasn't a majority as was first reported, but a significant minority, especially in comparison to AAPI, Latina and Black women. Of course, the group that deserve the lion's share of the blame for Trump winning the 2016 election is White men.

>107 Sakerfalcon: Thanks, Claire. You're right; a second Trump term will be bad not just for the United States, but the free world as a whole. I waited until I had read information about assisting a person with cognitive impairment to vote and followed its guideline, both to be personally certain that I acted both legally and morally, and the (probably unlikely) possibility that someone challenged my decision to help her with vote.

I'm glad that you loved Stone Yard Devotional. It's absolutely working for me so far, and even the mice won't keep me from finishing it.

I had my weekly appointment with Emily, my weight loss nutritionist, earlier toda.y, who gave me some unexpected good news. I assumed that I needed to get to a BMI of 23 to 25 to reach my ideal body weight, but she said that, as a person in my 60s, a BMI of 25-27 is far more appropriate and healthy. So, instead of losing 25 or more pounds to reach my ideal body weight, as I had thought, I'll only need to lose about a dozen pounds, and start a dedicated aerobic and muscle building exercise routine to replace fat with muscle. I didn't think I was going to reach my ideal body weight until the first half of 2025, but now there is a good possibility I'll do so by mid to late December, as I'm losing 2 to 3 lb per week on average.

>109 kidzdoc: >110 kidzdoc: I could have done without so many muce!

>108 kidzdoc: more costly publication
$1 for the first 6 months so I can decide then whether it's worthwhile.

rally at MSG
Lancaster city is about 40% Hispanic, primarily Puerto Rican, with civic organizations and city council members and a radio station and such. I don't speak Spanish and am not in the loop, but hope negative reaction will counteract whatever gains were made by the two recent pro-Trump rallies downtown (Elon Musk it turned out was at the same convention center). WTF indeed.

>110 kidzdoc: weight loss nutritionist
Congratulations, seems a nice way to wrap up the year.

>109 kidzdoc: I didn't put up a lawn sign this election either, as I was afraid for my Little Free Library. I did drop my ballot off today. Maine is using ranked choice voting for the first time. I hope it doesn't confuse too many people. I wish the election committee sent an election guide to every residence, like they do in Washington State (or at least did when I lived there).

>109 kidzdoc: I agree with the assessment that White men bear the lion's share of the blame for Trump's election, and also the role that racism played and continues to play in the MAGA (which might was well be MAWA {Make America White Again}) tragedy. But in addition to that, as I've read several political observers note, we should not discount the feeling of cultural grievance in play, the idea that liberal America looks down on them and turned its back on them years ago. Not only do they not care about Trump's outrageous statements, they love them, because they love how much he pisses us off. That in and of itself is enough to make them enjoy him. They don't think the Democrats are going to make their lives any better anyway, because they don't think the Democrats really care about them. So why not have some fun and vote for Trump, just to get their kicks by watching us libtards holler and squirm? So it's "Let's keep the minorities down and while we're at it let's get rid of as many as we can." Plus, "Let's make all the phony baloney liberals mad." Plus, when we talk about the men, it's "Reproductive rights? Who cares?"

Although I share the horrible sense of foreboding that has been expressed on your thread, Darryl. Nevertheless, one answer for me has been to stay in motion, at least a little bit. So a couple of weeks ago, Steph and I took a sponsored bus from Manhattan to Easton, PA, to do some canvassing to try to get out the vote for Harris and also Susan Wild, the local Congresswoman in a tough reelection campaign. Just yesterday, we did the same thing for down ballot candidates in Poughkeepsie, NY. During the afternoon in Easton, my canvassing partner and I rang the bell of a house with an art studio on the first floor. We figured, "An artist! This should be a friendly face." Well, the guy came to the door all right, but when he saw what we were there for, he said, "How the hell can you people still be Democrats?" His anger was pitched towards the administrations actions regarding the Israel/Gaza horrors. He said, "No, I'm not going to vote for Trump. I'm going to vote for Jill Stein. (This was Pennsylvania, so that would essentially be a vote for Trump.) This country needs more than two parties." I said that I couldn't disagree with his opinions regarding the Middle East, but weren't there other issues that Harris would be better than Trump for? "Like what?" he said. So I brought up reproductive rights. He actually said to us, "There's only a relatively small group that's affected by that. It has no effect on me at all." I wasn't surprised by a man who didn't think the issue applied to him, but I was surprised, though I guess I shouldn't have been, by the brazenness of his reply. So that's what we're dealing with.

In Poughkeepsie yesterday, I partnered with Steph for the afternoon. The neighborhood we were given to canvass was very much a working class area. What they do is give you a list of addresses and names. The names are of people that the local Dems' database shows to be Democrats or independents with mediocre at best records of actually voting. So you go ask them to make sure they actually vote this time. We had just entered one small apartment building when a door opened and a relatively young African American man stepped into the hallway. He wasn't on our list, so we just asked directions to the particular apartment numbers we were looking for. Since we were talking, as asked him if he wanted any material on any of the candidates we were canvassing for. He said, "No, I don't vote. It doesn't matter. We're screwed either way." I said, "Well I can understand how you'd feel that way, but we're going to try to support the people we think are better." As we started up the stairs, he said, "I feel sorry for you folks. I can tell you're trying to do the right thing, but in the end it's not going to matter." I just smiled at him and said, "Well, we're going to keep trying anyway." He said, "I wish you well." Who knows, maybe he'll go vote this time just to make a couple of cute old people feel better, even if we'll never know it. On both canvassing occasions, the weather was nice and people were mostly not at home on a Sunday afternoon. But both times we spoke to just enough people to feel like the project was worthwhile.

>109 kidzdoc: >113 labfs39:
Here in New Hampshire, Lois and I have a Harris sticker on our car, and she usually wears a Harris/Walz T-shirt when we're out in public; no trouble so far.

(duplicate post)

>114 rocketjk: I've been too ill to knock doors this year, so thank you for doing that.

>115 dukedom_enough: I'm glad you guys haven't encountered any negative responses to your demonstrations of support for Harris. Perhaps I'm being irrational, but the fear of retribution, especially if Trump loses, is strong.

Deleted part of my post, sorry

>108 kidzdoc: Jose has always loved to read our paper (The Washington Post) cover to cover. He still does this every day. It's too much news (most of it bad) for me, but he always forwards the recipes to me and I save them. They always look so good.

And another thing...sometimes one just needs some newpaper in which to pack things. The next thing going into the newspaper are the sweet potatoes (9.6 pounds!) from our garden that Jose just harvested and I am going to cure. :D

In this day and age, another thing I can't believe is that racist jokes are still thought to be "funny". I thought those days were long gone. Apparently not.

Trump did indeed open Pandora's box of racial hatred, but deporting most or even all immigrants is not going to cure this countries ills. I am so scared for people I know and love. I am also now scared to be Jewish in the United States. Never in my life have I ever felt this way. I am just two generations away from my grandparents perishing in Auschwitz. I am glad my late parents (both immigrants, although my mom had been born in the US) do not know what is happening to their/my country now.

>109 kidzdoc: I didn't want to have to live in fear of someone damaging my SUV or our house if she won.

I feel that way, too. In addition, I don't want anyone damaging our Little Free Library (which gives away banned books) which stands on our front lawn. In the past, Jose has had someone scratch a swastika onto his truck.

>110 kidzdoc: Great news about the healthier you!

>113 labfs39: Same! (about the Little Free Library and the lawn sign) I know for sure that I have one Trumper who visits my LFL all the time although she would not be the one to hurt us or our LFL in any way.

I would love to have ranked choice voting. Our representative is Jamie Raskin, and he is pushing for that to happen in Maryland!

I was able to find my state's election guide online. I feel it is important to vote on everything on the ballot so I used that guide when choosing individuals for the Maryland school board and two referendum questions.

>114 rocketjk: Thank you for canvassing.

>117 dukedom_enough: You're welcome, though we've only done it twice. There were some folks on our bus yesterday who have been on a dozen such trips.

>114 rocketjk: Not only do they not care about Trump's outrageous statements, they love them, because they love how much he pisses us off. That in and of itself is enough to make them enjoy him

Put simply it’s about giving them bread and circuses. Well, maybe not the bread.

>109 kidzdoc:, >113 labfs39: My Harris-Walz sign was stolen two weeks ago, but I suspect by someone who wanted it; it was an artistic sign from Etsy. I promptly trekked to the Democratic headquarters downtown to get a standard issue replacement, and a backup replacement, and signs for any local candidates they had on hand. A neighbor's Harris-Walz signs were crumpled into a storm drain, but she suspects a teenager she'd had words with about a noisy motorcycle. My neighborhood has an abundance of signs for candidates of both major parties.

I hope experiments with ranked choice voting are successful and people get familiar with the concept.

>114 rocketjk: Jill Stein
My nephew's Facebook page is a window into 20-somethings. He will vote for Harris, but unenthusiastically as the lesser of two evils; he is angry that she has not distanced from Biden over Israel/Gaza. A commenting friend will vote for Jill Stein, with the logic that Democrats will then see the error of their ways and run better candidates in the future. Another commenting friend, whose account expresses support for Bernie Sanders, may vote for Trump because he is less of a war mongerer (not quite those words, but that's the essence of the rationale). (Please note these are not my opinions! I'm just observing.) I've had occasional behind-the-scenes exchanges with my nephew about some of his rhetoric (he's a good guy, heart in the right place, in person is thoughtful and considerate, but his online persona can be strident), don't know these friends at all.

Hi Darryl. I went to Buffalo (NY) this past weekend with a couple of friends. We went to see 2 museums, left Sat a.m., home Sunday night (it's less than a 2-hour drive from here). We didn't count, but just from casual observation, it seemed to me that there were about an equal number of trump and Harris signs on lawns. One sign I particularly loved, and hadn't seen before, said just 3 words: Harris. Walz. Obviously. The words were printed one under the other, Harris in red, Walz in white, Obviously, in blue (red, white, blue). I liked that one a lot. We did see a dinky, tacky little *trump store* (that's what it said) operating out of a small camping trailer on someone's lawn. Ick.

We were careful not to say anything that might be remotely political. We are not Americans and were not looking for trouble. But seriously, it's still a head-scratcher to me that this race can possibly be so close. As with everyone here, and everywhere, I worry. A lot.

Suggestion- if you are going to start an exercise routine- consider hiring a trainer. A trainer will make sure that you are doing the exercises correctly and doing the right number of repetitions. ( I see one )

Again, you'll forgive me for not responding to each political posts individually. Feel free to continue posting them here, though.

The best thing that happened yesterday is that my mother's ballot was accepted by the county board of electors, according to an email I received just after 7:30 pm. We must have had 8-10+ phone calls on our landline yesterday afternoon and evening yesterday but none so far today, which seemingly confirms my suspicion that these were calls were from Democratic campaign volunteers wanting me to submit my mother's ballot. We had another home visit from volunteers on Saturday, the day after I mailed her ballot in our city's post office but no one came on Sunday, after I informed the volunteers that I had already submitted her ballot.

What has been very strange is the number of mobile phone calls and even post cards I've received from Atlanta area phone numbers, which I assume are asking me to vote in the election down there. I continue to receive one or two a day, even though I've already voted up here and submitted my second ballot as a registered Pennsylvania voter.

>112 qebo: Congratulations, seems a nice way to wrap up the year.

Thanks, Katherine; you're absolutely right. I don't know how much weight I've lost since I saw you, Zoë and Mark in (I think) August 2022 (2023?), but I'm sure that it's been well over 50 lb. If we met in 2023 then it's been closer to 75 lb. I had another nice weight loss this morning as compared to yesterday, so I only have another 9.8 lb to go to reach the top end of my ideal body weight range. This weight loss journey is certainly a great way to end the year, and a great distraction from the current political turmoil.

>119 SqueakyChu: Great news about the healthier you!

Thanks, Madeline. As I'm sure I've mentioned, here or elsewhere, I am now equipped with a framework I need to continue to maintain a healthy weight from here on out. And, as Kamala Harris said, I will not be going back!

>124 torontoc: I agree with you, Cyrel. I've started exercising at home, but I do want to participate in some sort of program in a local gym. I plan to ask my closest friend from medical school if there is anyone he would recommend, as a start, as he has been physically active for essentially his entire life.

>118 labfs39: Maybe it's just that New Hampshire is not a swing state, so individual votes are not so consequential.

Happy Halloween, everyone! This is the third year in a row that I have posted this image from Dr Ali Griffith, a Brooklyn based audiologist and speech language pathologist, on my Facebook timeline, as I find it very relevant to those who will be distributing sweets to trick-or-treaters later today. Our house receives several dozen visits every Halloween, possibly because I give the kids full sized servings of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, M&M's, Skittles, and other candy bars; more than once I've heard an older child refer to this as one of the "cool houses" after they received their candy. In each of the last two years I've seen a at least large older child come to the door accompanied by her or his mother, who seemed to be developmentally delayed, and the message in this image reminds me to treat these kids with the respect that they deserve.

I continue to have a hard time focusing on reading for pleasure, due to my anxiety over next Tuesday's presidential election and what is likely to be the potential fallout, regardless of who wins. Short of an undeniable landslide by Kamala Harris that even Trump or MAGA World can't deny I doubt that I'll finish this year's Booker Prize shortlist in advance of the November 12th award ceremony. So, I'll plan to finish Stone Yard Devotional, put off reading Creation Lake and The Safekeep until later this year, resume reading Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain by Sathnam Sanghera, and get started on The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese.

>127 kidzdoc: This is an excellent reminder. I run a "if you show up at my door, I'm giving you candy" show here (especially to the teenagers shepherding younger siblings around). And I love the teenagers out with their friends for an evening of wholesome fun. I also stocked up on full-size candy -- candy bars were cheap at Costco, and I start looking around for deals on other non-chocolate candy in September, and this year it's Nerds Ropes, which look kind of gross, but I hear that kids love them, and Halloween-themed Mike & Ikes. Fortunately, my husband has promised to take any left-overs to work tomorrow. Have fun greeting the tiny ghouls and princesses!

>128 kidzdoc: I know how you feel. It is hard to concentrate on literature. I have been saved by my book club having chosen a truly bad book for next month. It's distracting to yell at the book and it does have a plot that moves quickly. Have you heard anything about Happiness Falls by Angie Kim? Pattie was given a copy by a relative because her son is autistic and she was hopping mad about it. I can't comment on that element, but I do have many thoughts about the writing.

>129 RidgewayGirl: Same here, Kay. Who am I to deny any older kid the pleasure of trick-or-treating, especially since it may be the last one she or he participates in, and they are participating in wholesome fun, which is always okay with me. And, as you said, that child may be chaperoning a younger sibling; one of my friends in the 75 Books group is planning to do that with her younger siblings this evening. Giving out Halloween candy has been a highlight of the past two years, as it's nice to see the kids' costumes, to hear their squeals of delight or positive comments at getting full sized candies instead of, say, mini Reese's Peanut Butter Cups or Hershey's candies. The neighbors also get a chance to see and, on occasion, meet me, many for the first time, as I didn't live here between 1993 and the beginning of 2022 and hardly anyone besides our immediate neighbors know who I am, although they may have been aware of my father's sudden passing. The middle school aged kids will infrequently say hello to me on their way to or from school, and a couple of them have willingly offered to help me shovel snow, mow or front lawn, etc. in a gesture of good will. Now that I've lost so much weight (80 lb in less than 14 months) and, according to others, look many years younger than my actual age (63 yo), I won't expect the kids to help out the "older man"!

I continue to have great difficulty with reading for pleasure, due to busyness caring for my mother, taking care of the house, and my efforts to get medical licenses in PA and NJ and keep my good standing as a board certified pediatrician, including reading one or more journal article most weekdays. The year will be another one that I won't come anywhere close to my goal for the year, although I'm far more heartened with the great improvement in my physical and mental health in comparison to the early part of the year, so I'll consider 2024 to be an overall success.

ETA: I have not heard anything about Happiness Falls. Are you recommending it as well?

>127 kidzdoc: - That is excellent, Darryl. Thanks for posting that.

>131 jessibud2: You're welcome, Shelley. It's only been 20 minutes since the trick-or-treaters started coming (6 pm seems to be the unofficial start time), but I've already received a visit from one such child, a boy in his preteens or early teens who was nonverbal and was accompanied by his mother.

>128 kidzdoc: >127 kidzdoc:

Well I’m with you about the election anxiety preventing reading. I did manage to read a very light novel suggested by Jennifer japaul22 - posted here - The Husbands. But I think its appeal is to women.

But as to Halloween, I’m with Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm's take on the episode “Trick or Treat”. Watch clip here.
Note in the same episode Larry and Cheryl attend the premiere of a movie written by his handicapped friend Cliff Cobb, during which Larry manages to offend a Jewish neighbour, alienate Cliff (as well as the memory of his salad-inventing grandfather), and send out misguidedlo romantic overtures to Cliff's wife Shelly. AI Google

>127 kidzdoc: I like this too. I didn't have a lot of visitors last night, but I did have one middle schooler who was on the spectrum and his brother. We had an intense conversation about why my porch has steps coming off two sides (to the front and to the garage). I also had a couple of adults who looked like they needed a little chocolate comfort too, which I was happy to provide. I try to have some nonedible halloween goodies (rubber eye balls, Halloween sketchbooks) available for kids with allergies.

>133 kjuliff: I hope that you continue to enjoy The Husbands, Kate, and that it can provide a welcome diversion from the next few days. My problem is not having books I want to read, of different types, but being able to concentrate on reading them, newspapers, of much of anything else for pleasure.

One article that did give me hope came from The Philadelphia Inquirer, the city's major newspaper, earlier this week. It looked at the breakdown of registered voters in Middletown Township, Bucks County, where I live, and despite the overwhelming number of Trump/Vance lawn signs compared to Harris/Walz signs in my immediate neighborhoods (at least 4-5:1) there are still more registered Democrats here than Republicans; my like minded neighbors are just acting more maturely IMO, and not putting their political opinions in the faces of the rest of us. One nearby neighbor has responded in kind by posting several large Harris/Walz signs outside of her house, but I imagine that the rest of us see no point in participating in a glorified pissing contest.

The best thing that happened to me yesterday was handing out Halloween candy from 6 to just after 8:30 pm. I completely enjoyed seeing the kids and their parents, and due to the unusually warm weather (it was still in the mid to upper 70s until late last night) and possibly the reputation I've earned over the previous two years I think I had far more visitors than my immediate neighbors, especially since the kids know me for giving out full sized candies; this is an image of the bowl I used last night to hand out treats:



In previous years I had purchased far more candies than I gave out, but this year was completely different. I ordered four boxes of assorted M&Ms, assorted Skittles, assorted Mars candy bars, and 36 boxes of twin packs of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, for a total of 87 full sized candies. When the last trick-or-treaters left I only had one pack of peanut M&Ms and two twin packs of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups left over, and since I gave the last two sets of kids, about 4-5 in all, have two candies each my guess of 75-80 visitors was spot on. The kids, especially the teenagers, were, with one exception (a boy who was dressed as a patriot and I suspect was the son of one of the extreme MAGAts who live nearby and flies a huge "Trump 2024" flag in front of his lawn, especially since the two of them didn't interact with any of our other, far friendlier neighbors) unfailingly polite, pleasant and very grateful. The only other rude kids were a group of 3-4 very young kids, less than 10 yo, who I didn't recognize, one of whom took two candies without asking and sat something smart to me that I couldn't understand (of course I blame their parents for their rudeness).

However, despite being a busy night, as I had to serve my mother dinner and change her clothes after dinner and between visits from the kids any thoughts about the election or anything else negative or stressful was completely gone, and that good mood has continued throughout today so far, although sleeping a bit late and not watching MSNBC this morning also helped.

But as to Halloween, I’m with Larry David’s Curb Your Enthusiasm's take on the episode “Trick or Treat”.

The pediatrician in me is glad that Larry's house was TP'd, for him not his wife, and he certainly seems wealthy enough to afford to get the paint removed from his front door, although it's obviously a sitcom. I'm sure that some people, although hopefully many, have rules about handing out Halloween candy similar to his, IMO, misguided one. Our neighbors who live three doors down have two kids, and although I know them well, especially the kids, I did not recognize Lorelei when she visited last year, with a painted face, as she had experienced a sharp growth support as compared to 2023. The only reason I recognized her was that her parents were with her; I was absolutely astonished by how tall she was! Even though she was only 12 years old last Halloween she was nearly as tall as I was (I'm 5 ft 10 in) and was taller than each of her parents. I may be taking this too seriously, but the two kids in that episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm could easily have been tweens or young teenagers, and even if they weren't spoiling their fun completely goes against the spirit of Halloween, IMO. I also have some very crabby older neighbors in several of the houses closest to me, a brother and two sisters who are diehard Trumpeters and aren't friendly to anyone, and I'm sure they didn't give out any Halloween candy to even the kids whose families live on either side of them.

I have a completely different view of Halloween than I did when I lived in Pittsburgh and Atlanta from 1993 to 2021. I don't think I had a single visitor in those years, because I lived in secured apartment buildings or gated communities with few if any children, and even if there were kids my work schedule meant that I was rarely home when the trick-or-treaters were out. My parents did like to give out Halloween candy, on a smaller scale (I would occasionally help them out if I was home), so the past three years is the first time I've been able to fully participate in Halloween fun.

>134 labfs39: The boy I mentioned yesterday was, I think, the only developmentally one that visited, although some of the neighbors went in groups, and as many as 6-10 kids visited at one time. I'll have to ask my neighbors, and I'm probably wrong, but I have a suspicion that some of the older kids and teenagers learn which houses give out the best or the most candy. I had far more teenagers come by this year, probably 15-20 or more, especially after 7 pm when most of the younger kids went back home. Their very positive comments were particularly heartwarming, and I loved that they felt comfortable visiting me. The only thing I missed was the ability to chat with the adult neighbors, as there was quite the deluge of kids from 6-8 pm and it took some effort to fill up the candy bowl and care for my mother before the next set of kids visited.

I try to have some nonedible halloween goodies (rubber eye balls, Halloween sketchbooks) available for kids with allergies.

Those are great ideas, Lisa! I'll definitely have to think of that next Halloween, God willing.

I haven't lived in a neighborhood where trick-or-treating was a thing in many years, but do you ever have problems with Reese's Peanut Butter Cups or other peanuty treats? I hear so much about childhood peanut allergies, I'd be terrified to give such things to a kid for fear of being sued for killing someone.

>137 KeithChaffee: Good question, Keith. Peanut allergies are certainly more common than when I was a kid, but their parents are almost always hypervigilant when it comes to exposing their kids to candies and other foods that may expose them to peanuts or other foods that could trigger mild or more serious allergic reactions. There are also many readily guides published by pediatric allergists to guide these parents in avoiding these scenarios, such as this one published by The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia:

Making Halloween Safe and Fun for Kids with Allergies

Of course, some kids unfortunately do fall through the cracks and get exposed to peanuts or peanut containing products unintentionally, and I'm all but completely certain that I took care of at least one child who required hospitalization when I was a pediatric hospitalist during the 21 years I was in practice in Atlanta.

ETA: I see an allergist/immunologist in a busy practice with offices in and outside of Philadelphia every 3 months, who is treating me for moderate persistent asthma and environmental allergies. Her practice cares for adults and children, a service that I doubt was available when I was a teenager growing up in this area.

We have a great neighborhood for Halloween, too, Darryl, and I'm glad to hear you're having so much fun in your current neighborhood! I can tell you, since I have a teenage boy and an 11 year old, that they definitely remember the houses that give full sized candy bars!! Prepare for more trick or treaters every year as word gets out . . .
;-)

We have a neighborhood of single family homes and every few houses sets up a fire pit and the parents gather and bring their candy to hand out. Our neighborhood is generally considered safe enough for most of the kids, except the very youngest, to walk around in groups by themselves. It's such a fun neighborhood holiday.

>138 kidzdoc: That's great, Jennifer! I doubt that I went trick or treating when we moved to this neighborhood in 1976, as I would have been 15 yo at that time, so my memories are limited to Halloweens in Jersey City, my home town. I certainly remember which houses had out the good stuff, such as full sized Hershey's Bars, twin packs of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Twizzlers, etc., and which ones didn't; at the risk of causing a controversy I would not be opposed if candy corn was permanently banned by the FDA or some other government body.

Prepare for more trick or treaters every year as word gets out

That is exactly what has happened every year since 2022, but considerably more so this year. In addition to asking my closest neighbors I would love to know how kids figure out which houses to visit, e.g. word of mouth, social media or both. In any case they are always welcome to visit, especially since the day brings me joy as well. When I ordered these candies from Amazon the week before last I had no idea yesterday would be that warm, of course, and I thought that, once again, I had bought way too much candy and would need to figure out what to do with the excess, especially now that I'm on a strict diet and want to avoid eating too much candy. Fortunately I absolutely nailed it this year, but I don't expect that will happen again anytime soon.

Your neighborhood sounds great. Mine is a comfortable one to live in, despite the preponderance of Trump/Vance lawn signs, and I can only hope that the result of the election doesn't change that. Bucks County and the other three "collar counties" of Philadelphia are generally looked at as one of the main bellwethers in major elections, due to the nearly equal division of Democratic and Republican voters, and people and elected officials here tend to be center left or center right rather than extremists on either side; Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez on the left or Marjorie Taylor Greene on the right would not do well here!

Of course your house is the popular one as you gain a reputation for liking kids and handing out the good stuff! We managed to give away almost all our candy, thanks to a few large groups at the end of the evening and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Our kitten positioned herself in the window next to the front door and enjoyed every minute of it. There is something very community-minded in people going from house to house and the people in the houses giving the visitors a small sweet gift.

>135 kidzdoc: On reading: I’m having problems concentrating on reading. There’s plenty of books I want to read but my fear of the looming election stays with me high anxiety.

On Halloween - In my defense I find Larry David to be really funny. And I didn’t grow up even knowing about Halloween. It only just becoming a thing in Australia but is an American import. Sometimes I forget LT is an American site. Apologies.

>136 kidzdoc: I live in a high rise in NYC and our building has a list put up 2 weeks in advance advising that Halloween trick or treat is only to be done at the apartments on the list below, and then only between 5 and 7. The list gives the apt numbers of al who have opted in for the event. An elevator is reserved for the children as many people still work outside the home and need to get to their apartments.

This is a great idea. It’s not just kids who can have problems. I can no longer keep getting up to answer the door so now I opt out and am not disturbed. Even so some kids still bang on the door and I suspect they are teenagers.

>141 RidgewayGirl: I hope so, Kay! I'm glad that you had a good Halloween as well. We used to have block parties here in the 1970s, when we first moved here, but Halloween is the only day that comes immediately to mind when the neighborhood comes together more than any other one. The only other ones I can think of are when the men and older kids are all shoveling snow at the same time after a major storm, a far less enjoyable scenario.

>142 kjuliff: No need to apologize, Kate. The great thing for me about Halloween is that it nearly completely broke the spell of fear and anxiety that had plagued me over the past several weeks, as I felt as sense of community and goodheartedness that was badly missing before then, as a result of the upcoming election. Despite my diatribe I remain in a very good mood, and I just wanted to explain my point of view.

I admittedly know nothing about Larry David, except that I recognize his face, or Curb Your Enthusiasm, other than it was an American sitcom. I will admit that the clip did trigger me just a bit, as I didn't find his interrogation of those girls to be the least bit funny, especially since I can think of other people I know who might have responded it a similar manner, including some people I know very well, who can be an anti-social assholes more often than not. It's entirely possible that I could enjoy that sitcom, but I don't watch any sitcoms or most of what is on television, save for select public broadcasts on PBS, sports, or, usually far less often than recently, MSNBC, CNN, or the BBC.

I'm now in a good frame of mind to resume reading for pleasure, and I'll use the first day of the month and the beginning of the weekend to jump start my reading, even if only for a few days.

I hope that your anxiety lessens soon.

Edited to not call out particular anti-social individuals who I know intimately well.

I love Reese’s peanut butter cups, a very occasional treat for me Darryl. I love peanut butter full stop. I often have some in my breakfast porridge.

>144 kidzdoc: Curb Your Enthusiasm is not really a sitcom. I can see that for someone who doesn’t know about Larry David could misconstrue this clip. He’s poking fun of himself. He’s actually a very kind and sensitive man. I take it you weren’t a Seinfeld fan?

>130 kidzdoc: You may not reach your reading goal this year, but you have made great strides in other goals in your life this year. Perhaps the reading goal needs to be revised downward a bit to allow you to have that full, well rounded life you are working toward?
Congratulations on your achievements toward better health, re-establishing professional credentials, and caring for your Mom. And enjoy what reading time you amidst all that.

>143 kjuliff: That's a great idea, Kate.

>145 Caroline_McElwee: My problem is that I love Reese's Peanut Butter Cups far too much, Caroline. I haven't touched either of the two packs I bought for Halloween, and if I do I'll have one for an after dinner snack on a day in which I haven't gone overboard on my diet.

I will eat 1-2 tbsp of natural peanut butter most days as a healthy snack, though, either on an apple or multigrain bread, per my nutritionist's recommendation. Again, I'll check to see what my food intake has been before I do that.

>146 kjuliff: I don't watch any of those popular American evening televison programs, Kate, as I alluded to >144 kidzdoc:; I have no interest in any of them. I'm definitely not a member of their core viewership!

>147 tangledthread: Thanks for putting things in proper perspective, tangledthread. Yes, my gauge of success for 2024, and possibly from now on, will be the goals I managed to accomplish, and not an artificial and frankly meaningless count of the number of books I read each year. My weight loss goal of roughly 80 lb in nearly 14 months and resultant improvement in my physical and mental health is the thing I'm most proud of and is far better than reading 75 or more books, I'm very close to completing my CME (continuing medical education) requirements so that I can apply for Pennsylvania and New Jersey medical licenses and hopefully re-enter the workplace next year, and I continue to maintain my status as a board-certified pediatrician; it's far easier to keep that status than to have to reestablish it.

I was in a fabulous mood nearly all of yesterday, which I attributed to the sense of community I felt after meeting 75-80 trick-or-treaters of varying ages and seeing the gratitude in their faces. Despite being awake much of the overnight hours I woke up yesterday in a fabulous mood, and after having an unusually bad week with my mother we had a particularly enjoyable dinner together, which continued into this morning. That reminded me that my mother senses my state of mind, as far as I can tell, and if I'm anxious or stressed she will likely be as well, which only makes me more stressed out and less patient with her. With all due respect nothing and no one is more important than Mom, and I need to avoid any external sources of stress or discomfort.

Having said that I plan to take a temporary break from LibraryThing. My vote has already been cast and counted, as has my mother's, and since there isn't anything more I can realistically do at this point I see no reason to look at election coverage before, or possibly immediately after, Election Day. I'm certain that I can concentrate on reading a couple books for pleasure, and I found a new recipe for Lentil Soup by Cookie + Kate that I'm eager to try, along with perhaps one or two old favorites. I'll post pictures and the recipe for the soup, which I'll probably make after lunch.

>148 kidzdoc: I will eat 1-2 tbsp of natural peanut butter most days as a healthy snack

That is my absolutely favorite "go to" bedtime snack! Although I often like hummus on pita as well.

I plan to take a temporary break from LibraryThing.

Less screen time can be a good thing. Pop in from now and then to let us know you're okay, though.

>148 kidzdoc: Thanks for the soup recipe! I have some French lentils waiting for the right recipe. (Used them in a lentil salad over the summer, but we are now in soup season)

Enjoy your break!

Steph (my wife) came up with a great metaphor about how nerve frazzling the election is for so many of us. "The election," she said, "is like an app you don't realize is running on your phone. Even though you're not looking at it, it's still draining your battery."

>151 rocketjk: that is a fantastic analogy!

>151 rocketjk:, >152 japaul22:. Agreed! May I repeat it to friends who will appreciate it?

>153 jessibud2: Sure, why not?

>154 rocketjk:- Thanks!

I didn't have many trick or treaters this year, but it may be due in part to the new local tradition in our little town. On the Saturday before Halloween, they close off main street (two blocks long), and businesses (not just those on the block) set up booths to give away treats. Kids walk up and down the sidewalk admiring the displays (including blowups) and getting candy. The Congregational Church had a haunted vestry at one end of the street. I went with my nieces, then helped my sister with her booth for a while. It was a very pleasant and positive community gathering for our little town.

I decided to spend yesterday as disconnected from all forms of media as I possibly could, and as a result I had my best reading day of the year. I managed to read well over 100 pages in Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood from this year's Booker Prize shortlist, fell asleep late last night, and finished the remaining 12-15 pages just after midnight. It was good, although I agree with others that the mouse plague was cringeworthy; I'll give it a solid 4 stars.

My shortlist rating to date:

1. James by Percival Everett
2. Orbital by Samantha Harvey
3. Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood
4. Held by Anne Michaels

I should have enough time to read The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden and Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner and finish the shortlist ahead of next Tuesday's prize announcement. The question is, do I want to? At this point the answer is no, and given previous comments from other LTers I'm not exactly chomping at the bit to read Creation Lake. I am, on the hand, chomping at the bit to finally read The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese, one of my favorite physician writers, as I've owned this copy for 2½ years but continued to put it aside, even though it occupied a place of prominence and easy visibility on top of our half bookcase between our living and dining rooms.

These past few days have also allowed me to reflect on my personal goals, including reading, and I began to realize yesterday that I wasn't satisfied, not because of the number of books I wasn't reading, but because I wasn't reading the ones I most wanted to, for example books by authors of color and books about medicine, public health and science. With that in mind I plan to make a significant change in what I read starting in 2025, and select a small core of 20-25 books I will read selectively. I've been increasingly disappointed with the books chosen for the Booker Prize longlist and shortlist, especially after the prize was opened up to American authors several years ago which, IMO, greatly diluted the quality of the award by minimizing Asian and African authors who wrote fabulous works of fiction that are no longer being promoted. With that in mind that award I will be recruiting someone to either take over my position as administrator of the Booker Prize group or let it die a slow death, as it has been moribund for the past several years, possibly due to my increasing lack of interest in it. I may continue to follow the Booker International Prize, though, but it won't be a major focus of my reading goals.

I'll use the next month or so to gather the 20-25 core books I want to read in 2025, and list them prominently in the very first post of the year.

>157 kidzdoc: Lucy and I were discussing the other day that we feel no need to read certain books just because they are prize winners/nominees. I had earmarked Orbital and Stone Yard devotion before they were nominated for the Booker Prize because the descriptions and themes appealed to me. I may read Creation Lake because I've enjoyed Kushner's writing previously. I'm sure all the books are worthy and excellent in their way, but there are so many titles out there (and already in my home) that I have to prioritise somehow. I wish you the best of luck with your newly revised reading plan and look forward to you reporting back on the results.

>158 Sakerfalcon: Thanks, Claire. When I was reading 75-100+ books a year it was much easier to read books nominated for literary prizes along with ones that were already in my library. Now, however, reading 50 books a year is a struggle, and a goal that I generally don't achieve, and many of the books I've purchased the past couple of years with good intentions have been left unread, although the number of books I buy every year has dropped significantly, as I have two superb library systems in my area and, without mentioning anyone in particular, I'm not as tempted to buy books as I used to be. 😎

I am a huge fan of Google Docs, and I'll create a file today with potential 2025 core books in mind, such as The Mirror & the Light by Hilary Mantel, My Struggle, Book 5 by Karl Ove Knausgård, Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi and The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race by Walter Isaacson. It will be a fluid list in the beginning, but at least it will be a start toward a more productive and satisfying literary journey from next year forward.

Like you Darryl, there are too many books I really want to read, and books I already own, I've been a disaster at challenges, and rarely go to my real book group now. The change in how they chose books often meant I'd already read the book and didn't want to revisit, or it was something I wasn't in the mood for.

You have me with both the Kendi and the Isaacson. On the list they go.

>157 kidzdoc: I'm with you on reading fewer shortlists. I'm learning to pick and choose and that it's fine to just not read the ones that don't excite me. Isn't it funny how they start out fun and eventually feel like obligations?

>157 kidzdoc: I've never been one for reading those sorts of lists. I have my own "short list," though, from which I select basically one out of every three books I read. Right now my "short list," which includes, among other things, the remaining books from the series I'm in the middle of, is right around 100 books. So I've got my work cut out for me!

>157 kidzdoc: I spent a few years chasing all kinds of awards list and then realized that it had become a chore and I am getting nowhere and just generally end up dropping everything anyway and (which was probably the worst part) I never got to read the books and authors I really want to read. So... now it is "I read what I feel like and I do not leave my favorite authors for some time later" which seems to work better for me. Life is too short anyway.

Unless you can be like Dan (I swear, he is the only person I know who can make a plan and stick to it - which I respect a lot and I want to be like him when I grow up), make sure you leave yourself space for books that just catch your eye out of nowhere - at least that seems to work better for me when I make plans :)

Careful, Darryl, you might end up with a viable plan. I like your shortlist ranking and glad you enjoyed Stone Yard Devotional. It might be a perfect book to read if you need to hide from the world a bit.

Darryl, that's a super good idea to stop with nominated lists and only read what's important to you personally. That's how reading should be. It doesn't matter whether you follow a plan of your favourite books or pick one out of your pile of books that you feel like reading. The important thing is that you enjoy reading.

>160 Caroline_McElwee: Right, Caroline. Granted, reading books from literary awards has allowed me to discover authors previously unfamiliar to me who I would now consider to be favorites, such as Hilary Mantel, Sarah Moss, and Kate Atkinson; the same can be said from reading reviews of their books from respected friends on LibraryThing. That is no small thing to be thankful for. However, I'm also putting on the back burner books by authors that I've wanted to get to sooner, especially works of fiction by writers of color whose works aren't widely promoted by the major publishing houses and literature in translation, especially ones I receive as part of my subscription to Archipelago Books, along with books on medicine, public health and science as I had mentioned earlier. (The books in the latter category will now gain much greater importance, now that the "American people" have spoken and decided to give Donald J. Trump a second term in office.)

One major change is that my current situation as caregiver for my mother has essentially eliminated my ability to travel abroad and buy books from the UK, and I have to be mindful about what books to buy, as my parents' house is best described as comfortable rather than spacious. When I was purchasing books from London publishers I was much more likely to see them through to the end, whether I ended up liking them or not. Now I can borrow the vast majority of new books from local libraries, set them aside if they don't grab me, and move on to something more appealing.

I'll have to give it some thought, but I suspect that I've purchased fewer books this year than on a typical trip to Daunt Books with Claire. Liz and I went to a bookshop (Head House Books) when she and I met in Philadelphia this spring, and other than a small number of books from a variety of sources I think that's it; I doubt that I've bought more than 10 books, but I've borrowed far more than that.

Certain book awards in the past were very compelling to me. The 2009 Booker Prize longlist is the best example I can think of in that regard, as I loved many of the chosen books, including Wolf Hall, The Children’s Book by A.S. Byatt, Summertime by J.M. Coetzee, The Glass Room by Simon Mawer, and Brooklyn by Colm Toíbín. Unfortunately recent finalists haven’t come anywhere close to the excellence of longlisted books published that year and in the early 2010s, especially after American novelists were eligible for the prize in 2014.

One group of awards I’ve ignored for far too long but will read selectively are the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards, which are amongst the oldest literary prizes in the United States and “recognize books that have made important contributions to our understanding of racism and our appreciation of the rich diversity of human cultures.” The first awards were given in 1935, and although I’ve read a fair number of the winners I’ve spent far too much time reading books about, say, mouse plagues in Australia. This year’s winners are Tremor by Teju Cole (Fiction), From From by Monica Youn (Poetry), and The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of American History by Ned Blackhawk; the great Chinese American author Maxine Hong Kingston was chosen as the winner of the Lifetime Achievement Award, and rightfully so. I’ll look for those books in my local library systems, especially the novel by Teju Cole, who is becoming one of my favorite American writers.

The National Book Awards are also rich sources of the best American writing, and I’ll start paying more attention to the finalists going forward as well. A book I definitely want to read is Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar, which I’m sure I would have read by now if it was chosen for the Booker Prize longlist or if I wasn’t distracted by it.

>161 RidgewayGirl: Right, Kay. Reading the Booker Prize longlist and shortlist every year has, unfortunately for me, turned into an increasingly unpleasant assignment for a “course” that I signed up for but no longer enjoy. There are a small number of winning books that I enjoy and would not have read save for the prize, but this year so far that has been limited to only one book, Orbital by Samantha Harvey. I would have read James by Percival Everett in any case, and none of the other book were worth the effort and time spent reading them.

Even though my health is the best it has been in over a quarter of a century I’ve become more cognizant of my own mortality (I’ll turn 64 next March), and that, along with my mother’s dementia, has made me realize that I probably only have another 20-30 years left to read for pleasure, at most. That being the case I want to maximize the time I spend reading books I truly want to, and go back to old favorites, such as James Baldwin’s great novels.

>162 rocketjk: Good luck, Jerry!

>163 AnnieMod: I agree, Annie. “Life” is much shorter for me, now that I’ve taken on the challenge of being my mother’s primary caregiver and running the household. Doing so has made me far more sensitive to the stresses my father faced on a day to day basis, and although I would have thought that it was far more difficult to work full time as an inpatient pediatrician this is far more difficult, and exhausting. One book I have, but haven’t read yet, is The 36 Hour Day: A Family Guide to Caring for People Who Have Alzheimer Disease, Related Dementia, and Memory Loss. Ironically I haven’t read it yet, in part because I don’t know where I put the book.

Attempting to read books because someone else, such as Booker Prize judges, has told me that I should read them has become increasingly frustrating, especially since I’m foregoing books that I almost certainly would enjoy much more and find more personally satisfying.

So... now it is "I read what I feel like and I do not leave my favorite authors for some time later" which seems to work better for me. Life is too short anyway.

I think I’ll give you proper credit for that quote, and adapt your approach to reading.

make sure you leave yourself space for books that just catch your eye out of nowhere - at least that seems to work better for me when I make plans :)

Absolutely! Now that I’m only buying a fraction of the books I did before the COVID-19 pandemic and very infrequently going book shopping I will still adhere to that plan. My two favorite bookshops in Philadelphia have nice selections of books, many that are completely or relatively unfamiliar to me, and I’ll continue to give them a try, especially given that I doubt that I’m buying no more than 10-15 books combined from them.

>164 dchaikin: I may have overstated my feelings toward Stone Yard Devotional, Dan. It’s more accurate to say that I “enjoyed” it relative to other books on this year’s shortlist, and not the works of fiction I’ve read this year, or recent ones in previous years that were far more meaningful to me.

I can think of many other books that would serve as escapist literature. Now that I’ve started The Covenant of Water, Abraham Verghese’s epic multigenerational novel set in India from 1900 to 1977, it definitely fits the bill as a book I can devote my time to with great pleasure over the next week or two; it has over 700 pages, and I love long novels like it much more than shorter ones such as those chosen for the Booker Prize.

There is a good chance that Stone Yard Devotional is the last book I’ll read because it was chosen as a finalist for the award rather than the other way around, a book such as James that I wanted to read which happened to be selected by the judges. Earlier this morning I (quietly) left the Booker Prize group in Facebook, and after this year’s award is given out I’ll announce my decision in the Booker Prize group on LibraryThing to resign as administrator of the group, a position I’ve held for over a decade. I know that you’re not active over there, but the group has dozens of members, and I have at least one person in mind who follows the prize closely and might be willing to take over. If you think of anyone who might fit the bill please let me know.

>165 Ameise1: Thanks, Barbara. I have been increasingly unhappy with the books I’ve chosen to read this year as a whole, and my struggle to read books from the Booker Prize longlist played a role in that, although it would be grossly unfair to place the majority of the blame on it.

>167 kidzdoc: Ironically I haven’t read it yet, in part because I don’t know where I put the book.

LOL! Darryl, usually your thread does not make me laugh, but this line was an exception. Being 13 years older than you, I’m a bit more forgetful at times and can identify with this situation. Regarding dementia, I learned last year that a friend of mine was diagnosed with it. She is a few years older than I. A recent fall sent her to assisted living where my group of friends hopes she’ll be able to stay. Her mental decline is sadly proceeding rapidly.

Regarding prize-winning books…I’ve tended to stay away from most of them because I often disagree with their being chosen, but perhaps that’s because my taste in what I read differs from that of the judges in those contests. My preference has always been with mid-list authors. I like to discover great writing by lesser known authors and support them in any way I can. In addition, I also love to support indie publishers rather than big publishing houses. My favorite of these is SFWP.com whose founder I know and whose company has published some fine books of all genres.

>168 SqueakyChu: I'm sorry to hear about your friend, Madeline.

I'm glad that you've found a publisher whose books you enjoy. I've had a subscription to Archipelago Books, a Brooklyn based small nonprofit press which specializes in classic and contemporary works of translated literature, for several years. I receive 10-12+ Archipelago books every year, so it makes sense to read those books preferentially over Booker Prize longlisted novels, especially since they continue to gather into ever increasing unread piles.

>157 kidzdoc: I think a day (or two or three...) off from social media and news is a good self-caring strategy now and then. I also took some time off and, while I didn't have as good a reading day as you did, I felt better.

I love Archipelago Books (even the held objects are lovely) and now I'm going to investigate SFWP.com.

I have been out-of-touch due to the moving and it was nice to not be able to have the TV on. I got TV back on Monday, November 4 and wish I hadn't. I have been avoiding any news this last week and will continue to do so for the rest of the week.

Interesting, about you and the Booker. I’m obsessed and addicted, but not involved in the group here. I’m not interested in running that group. Appreciate your asking.

>170 EBT1002: Right, Ellen. Self care, as you said, will be the manner in which I live my life for the foreseeable future. Maybe it's a withdrawal from the world and its evils, but I've also been heartened and blessed by the kindness shown to me by family, close friends, neighbors and strangers, so much so that I will not allow myself to be dragged down into hatred towards those who voted for Trump, especially since several close friends of mine did.

I now realize that watching inflammatory left wing news media, namely MSNBC, before the election was only making me more anxious and agitated, as were the talking heads on CNN. I have not watched any television shows over than my mother's beloved music channels since Halloween night, nor read the NYT print edition, and I plan to keep in that same mode for maybe a few weeks, especially given my mental health problems, as doing so has helped keep me sane and stable.

I have at least two dozen unread Archipelago Books titles at home of varying lengths, and reading them will largely supplant the Booker Prize finalists for both awards. I'll still look at the 26 titles that are chosen as finalists, and consider borrowing any that resonate with me.

>171 benitastrnad: Sounds good, Benita.

>172 dchaikin: I knew that there was a more than 99.9% chance that you would have no interest in taking over as administrator of the Booker Prize group on LT, but being the most visibly devotee to it I felt obligated to let you know that I was stepping away from the group, and the Prize. It's very possible that the Prize's page on LibraryThing dies quietly, as there have only been one or two posts from members other than myself.

Several years ago I hoped to reinvigorate the Medicine group on LibraryThing by posting reviews regularly, but since no one else was doing so I gave up.

Hey, Darryl! You are invited back into the TIOLI challenges where you can read anything you want (as long as you shoehorn your book into an existing challenge, which is easy enough!). You don’t even have to finish any book you don’t like. Just sayin’. :)

I agree that input of news has to be decreased to maintain one’s mental health. I discovered that during Trump’s first term as president when I experienced actual anxiety attacks reading the news online. I initiated doing 4-7-8 breathing to control my anxiety (which works amazingly well) and am taking other measures to try to prevent anxiety and depression from grabbing me at this time which has been tough due to some recent family deaths). Reading is one of these as it prevents me from doom-scrolling. I do check Israeli news frequently as I worry about my family and friends (and Polaris and, this week, Smiler69) there. I don’t linger on the news. I read the headlines just to keep informed and move on from there.

*high five* for self care!

>174 SqueakyChu: Thanks, Madeline. However, I plan to minimize all group related activity, including the Booker Prize group and the TIOLI Challenge, for the time being. You may have seen my Facebook post from Friday about the very painful case of trochanter bursitis that I was diagnosed with that day and am currently dealing with; the last thing I want to give any thought to are any LibraryThing challenges!

Likewise, anything that is going to unnecessarily elicit any anxiety or depression, such as reading about the excessive deaths of innocent Palestinian and Lebanese children by US-made bombs sent to Israel, may well provoke an intensively negative reaction in me that could lead to another manic-depressive episode, which is what happened to me in early February of this (not last) year. With that in mind and recent previous posts of mine indicating that I needed a break from LibraryThing I get the sense that not everyone gets where I'm coming from, at least not yet, and that a prolongation of my break, maybe until the end of the year, may be in order. We'll see...

>175 kidzdoc: You can make your thread a strict "no politics" zone. I think your willingness to talk about it here has made your thread the place to vent, while everyone else can keep their threads pleasant and book-focused. That's unfair to you and, going forward, we can all keep our comments focused on the books.

Take care of yourself, Darryl.

As I indicated in >175 kidzdoc: I was diagnosed with trochanter bursitis on Friday afternoon by an excellent immediate care physician our neighbor brought me to; the pain began on Thursday afternoon when my mother and I returned from a shopping trip, and its severity increased from moderate to severe to excruciating by Friday morning, to the point where walking downstairs unassisted was all but impossible. Fortunately we still have my father's walker, which I needed to go into the immediate care center and continue to rely on walking downstairs, and a good history and focused physical examination by Dr Rutkiewicz that elicited the source of pain allowed her to make a quick and accurate diagnosis. After I all but begged for pain medication—I think I have a relatively high pain tolerance, and the only thing I can compare this to is the case of appendicitis I had during intern year in 1997—Dr Rutkiewicz gave me prescriptions for a methylprednisolone (steroid) taper and Percocet (combination of acetaminophen and oxycodone), and I'm using Voltaren cream for pain in my sartorius (anterior hip) muscle, whose tendon inserts directly onto the greater trochanter, whose bursa underlies that bony prominence as you can see in this image and is the source of this inflammation, which is a common overuse injury. I had started using my exercise bicycle recently but only at a moderate intensity, and I do have well controlled gout, so I can't blame either of those conditions for this bursitis.



Janet from the 75 Books Group is dealing with trochanteric bursitis, and her physiotherapist recommended Voltaren for spasms in the sartorius muscle, which is an anti-arthritis nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAID) cream. I'm definitely experiencing that, particularly when I change positions, so I'll put another dollop on now, then take a long nap before I have to make dinner for Mom again.

>176 RidgewayGirl: You're absolutely right, Ellen. I have felt the obligation to reply to every post on my thread, and that has led to some unnecessary stress and drama. So, with that being said:

Darryl, I hope you are steadily improving. It didn't have to be like this, you've had a tough year. I wish you a speedy recovery and send you lots of healing vibes. 😘💖

That's what I enjoy about the CR group, that it's not about politics and war. I can immediately sign and respect >178 kidzdoc:.

>178 kidzdoc: noted. And I wish you well with dealing with this trochanter bursitis.

I will interject with the fact that I admired you for allowing political postings. It shows great tolerance. I also understand about the adverse effect of that liberal thinking. I generally think that my reading effects my political thinking and the way I live my life. I firmly believe that books change minds, hearts, and politics so sometimes it is hard to separate all of that when posting about books. However, generally I try to let the venting go and then bring things back to books. To do that takes a tolerant moderator. I think you have been that tolerant moderator and I appreciate it.

I also understand the mental toll that takes on a person and so also understand why you want to step back from this. I think that all of us thinking people are trying to step back and breathe. I am sure that your thread will return to more normal topics as all of us learn to accommodate the new state of affairs.

I have been following your discussion about the Booker Prize and want to add my two cents into that discussion.

I was very disappointed with the decision to allow US authors into the mix. One of the main reasons that I took the Booker seriously was that it brought to light authors who were not well known in the US. The huge population in the US and the large number of authors in the US all combine to overshadow authors from other countries and that matters to me. For this reason I sort of stopped paying much attention to the Booker.

The scandal with the Nobel Prize also affected the way I look at many of the major prizes and I can say that because of the Booker and Nobel changes I don't regard either of those lists as something to which I am going to ascribe much credence.

Of course there are always contradictions with me, and I was astonished when Gurnah was awarded the Nobel Prize. I got curious about him and his work, because this was an author about which I knew nothing. I looked into his work, and immediately checked out a book from our university library. I was totally blown away by his writing and am now trying to read everything I can find that was written by him. If it were not for that Nobel Prize I doubt I would have been exposed to his work and thus missed a very good author.

I do pay attention to some of the lesser known prizes and will continue to do so because they widen my reading choices, but the biggies - not so much for me anymore.

>177 kidzdoc: Sorry to hear about your bursitis Darryl, I hope things get better soon.

>177 kidzdoc: Ow, ow, ow. I'm sorry you're dealing with that.

>177 kidzdoc: Ouch. And this has to be making caretaking more difficult.

I also have bursitis in my hip but it is not as bad as yours sounds (knock wood). Yet, anyhow. I remember my father had surgery when he had it in his shoulder. He was a bowler and a golfer and a swimmer so that shoulder was important to him.

Right now I have started using Voltarin on my knee which suddenly began hurting like hell a few days ago. To be honest, I am not noticing much improvement but I will ask my doctor about it when I see her tomorrow for a different matter (I think I may have neuropathy but that's only because that's what Dr. Google is suggesting so far, for my symptoms. My regular doctor may have better insight).

Good luck. Someone once said aging ain't for sissies. I am a very big sissy so this is a challenge but I guess we are all aging so we're not alone. We used to laugh that you know you're getting old when your aches and pains are the main topic of conversation. Suddenly, it isn't really funny any more, is it? But then, as they say, it's better than the alternative. Hmmm, I am full of cliches today...;-p

Ouch, Darryl. I had trochanteric bursitis on both sides while waiting for my hip replacements eleven years ago. When my surgeon replaced my hips he also removed the bursae and lengthened my IT band. Bursitis can be so painful. Wishing you a speedy recovery.

Thanks for your kind thoughts about my bursitis, everyone. It is improving, albeit slowly, and I simply need to rest as much as possible and follow the instructions I have been given so far. I have an appointment with my excellent primary care physician tomorrow afternoon, which I'm sure will also be helpful. I'll look up stretching exercises for trochanteric bursitis online but I wait until I talk with him to start anything. My body is clearly telling me to stop doing any unnecessary activities, but I still have to care for my mother, as much as I could use a temporary break.

>185 qebo: Absolutely, Katherine. The only reason I came downstairs the last three mornings is that I knew I had to get my mother changed, dressed and fed breakfast. I would have been happier lying in bed with the box of high protein bars I had ordered from Amazon, as I've been increasingly able to assume positions of comfort when lying in bed, and now on the living room couch I usually use.

>186 jessibud2: I had said somewhere that I thought I had a relatively high pain tolerance, but without much basis. I gave this some thought, and realized that I've had three significant musculoskeletal injuries as an adult that were less painful than this bursitis or the case of appendicitis I had as a pediatric intern in 1997. Sometime in the mid 1980s I suffered what I thought was a severe ankle sprain during a lunchtime pickup basketball game at work, which caused my ankle to swell up to the size of a softball. I walked on it to go to night classes at Rutgers that evening, and got crutches from somewhere that I used for a week or so. I did not seek medical attention for it, and the swelling and pain gradually subsided. Roughly 20 years later when I was an attending physician in Atlanta I did see an orthopedic surgeon for persistent pain in an Achilles tendon, after I had slipped on a staircase several months earlier as I was running to catch a subway train in Brooklyn (stupid!). A guy who I knew from residency was a surgeon there, and after X-rays showed that I did have a partial tear of the Achilles tendon with some calcification, not enough to require surgery, he asked me when I broke my ankle, and said that it did not heal completely. I looked at him dumbfounded, so he showed me the fracture on the X-ray. A few years after that I slipped at home, landed with essentially all of my weight onto my left shoulder, and suffered a partial tear of my left rotator cuff. I saw Ortho again, had X-rays which confirmed the tear, and after being told that it was not large enough to need repair I refused a steroid injection or oral medications for inflammation or pain.

All that to say that this case of bursitis is worse than any of those injuries!

>186 jessibud2: The box that contains the tube of Voltaren indicates that it can take up to seven days to work. I am noticing a difference after I apply it, as the muscle (probably the sartorius, based on its anterolateral path from the thigh to the pelvis superiorly) is less tight, meaning that it is not spasming to the same degree as it is when I'm trying to ambulate or change positions. The heating pad I ordered should be arriving here very soon, and I'll start applying it to my thigh and hip this afternoon.

I hope that you get a good report from your physician tomorrow, Shelley.

>187 labfs39: Ouch. Having this on one side is bad enough; I couldn't (and don't want to) imagine having it on both sides! I've received some good advice from friends who have had this so far, and I'll be curious to see how I respond to these conservative measures. For now I'll follow one of my late father's favorite sayings, "Be your own best friend," and listen to what my body is telling me.

When it rains, it pours… hope your bursitis calms down and you feel better quickly. Grab a book and curl (or not - depending on how you feel and what is comfortable) in your favorite chair and get some rest.

>189 AnnieMod: Thanks, Annie. It's been a relatively good day, as I only took one Percocet tablet today, in contrast to the two tablets I took each of the previous three days, the Voltaren cream is helping with the muscle spasms, and I'm now lying in bed using the heating pad I ordered, which is also working so far. I was more ambulatory this afternoon, although at least two sudden movements that sent searing pain through my sartorius muscle was a reminder to not rush things.

Hi, Darryl! I've been following along but not commenting over the last few days. I hope your bursitis continues to improve. The worst pain I've ever felt, personally, was rebounding pain from appendicitis when I was 10, so thinking about it being worse than that - ouch!

Love your plan of reading what you want in 2025. Should you decide to have an active thread next year, I will follow along with interest.

By the way, two of the books we read around the same time will be vying for my top reads of the year. Both Knife and James were particularly excellent reads for me this year.

>191 bell7: Hi, Mary! The bursitis continues to slowly improve, although I'm sure that I'll continue to need a walker to ambulate in and especially outside of the house.

Oh, yes...I'll never forget the rebound tenderness you're referring to, which is at McBurney's point in the right lower quadrant of the abdomen, the anatomic location of the appendix in most people. When I had appendicitis as a pediatric intern in 1997 I told the ER physician that I probably had a bad case of food poisoning. The far more experienced physician, undoubtedly aware that interns don't know 💩, said "Hmm, we'll see." After a slow and careful examination of my abdomen she pressed directly onto my McBurney's point. I remember seeing stars, and she held me turned to the side in a motherly fashion with an emesis basin, as I was dry heaving. When I gathered myself she looked at me and simply said, "You know what this is. I'll page the surgeon."

I'll definitely have an active thread in 2025, but it will contain a core of 20-30 books that are already in my library, particularly ones that I keep putting off for a variety of reasons. I'll spend the next couple of weeks preparing a list, and mention it in my first thread of 2025, and possibly my last thread of this year.

I completely agree with you; Knife and James are highly likely to be amongst my favorite books of the year. Hopefully one or both will earn a National Book Award as well.

Okay...this is my first stab at creating a core set of books that I intend to read preferentially in 2025 without getting distracted by anything else. All of them are or soon will be in my personal library; the books by the famed and recently deceased Palestinian novelist Elias Khoury were published by Archipelago Books and I should get them later this month.

Black and British: A Forgotten History by David Olusoga
The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk, M.D.
Children of the Ghetto: My Name Is Adam by Elias Khoury
Children of the Ghetto: Star of the Sea by Elias Khoury
Collected Essays & Memoirs by Albert Murray
The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene Editing, and the Future of the Human Race by Walter Isaacson
Flood of Fire by Amitav Ghosh
Haiti After the Earthquake by Paul Farmer
Latinx: The New Force in American Politics and Culture by Ed Morales
Life Embitters by Josep Pla
A Mind at Peace by Ahmet Hamdi Tanpinar
The Mirror & the Light by Hilary Mantel
More Than I Love My Life by David Grossman
My Struggle, Book 5 by Karl Ove Knausgaard
Nineteen Eighty Four by George Orwell
Pessoa: A Biography by Richard Zenith
Signs for Lost Children by Sarah Moss
Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi
W.E.B. Du Bois: Biography of a Race, 1868-1919 by David Levering Lewis

There will undoubtedly be a small number of additions, but probably few if any subtractions, so I'm happy with this list for now.

>193 kidzdoc: It's always difficult to judge tone in a message, so I'll jump right in and say this is meant with the best of intentions - how about adding in something lighter (says she who mostly reads dark) to your mix?
It's could be part of that self care.
Otherwise, congratulations on breaking free from the tyranny of others' lists!

>193 kidzdoc: I've read Children of the Ghetto: My Name Is Adam and it was excellent, if sometimes difficult to read. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it and on Children of the Ghetto: Star of the Sea.

>194 SassyLassy: Ha! You're far from the only person who has commented about the grim nature of my reading, Sassy, so no offense taken. Some of you may know or remember Rachel (FlossieT) or Fliss (flissp), who were active on LibraryThing but not in the past 10 years or so. I see them practically every time I visit the UK, and Fliss in particular will chide me about the books I choose.

The book I'm reading (and thoroughly enjoying now), The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese, is very well written, full of humor, including a very nosy and troublesome elephant, and it's been a great respite from my Booker Prize reading. It's also quite the tome at over 700 pages, so it's my kind of book and fits well into my need for "self care."

>195 RidgewayGirl: Thanks, Kay. I don't seem to have received Children of the Ghetto: My Name Is Adam from my Archipelago Books subscription, or perhaps it was published during a period that I didn't have an active membership. I saw from the Archipelago Books' web page that Children of the Ghetto: Star of the Sea will be published today, so I ordered the first book of the trilogy as well.

Have you read A Mind at Peace? That's a great example of a highly regarded novel (about Istanbul) published by Archipelago Books that I keep meaning to read but never seem to have time for. Next year will be different!

I love your list. I didn't get very far reading the books I purchased this last year. I keep getting distracted by the wonderful reads on others' threads, adding them to my library list, and then 'needing' to read them when they arrive. But the alternative of not visiting threads so I don't get distracted is unthinkable - I so love people writing about the books they've read and what worked - or didn't work - for them. It's a community I don't have where I live, even with the real life book clubs I belong to. I always read your posts with much interest, even when they are books I know I won't be reading in the near future.

Glad to hear you are starting to feel better. Me too.

>193 kidzdoc: Darryl, I'm assuming you've read Ghosh's first two volumes. Can you recommend them?

>195 RidgewayGirl: So, when I returned home from my follow up appointment with my PCP not long ago I noticed a very familiar book mailer. Sure enough, it was from Archipelago Books, and inside was a copy of Children of the Ghetto: Star of the Sea by Elias Khoury, the latest book from my annual subscription. The copy of Children of the Ghetto: My Name Is Adam should arrive by the end of this year, so the first book in this trilogy should be the first novel I read in 2025, given that it takes place during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. I'll wait until February or March to read the second novel, depending on when the third is scheduled to be released.

>198 streamsong: Thanks, Janet. TBH I don't think I get all that distracted by online or print reviews of books as much as personal recommendations from close friends who know my tastes in books. The one person who has been my most reliable source of books is Rachael (FlossieT) from the UK, as she has introduced me to several authors who have become favorites, most notably Hilary Mantel, Kate Atkinson, and Sarah Moss. (That reminds me, I need to reach out to her and see if she has any new recommendations for me, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic and my caregiver responsibilities have kept me from seeing her in person since 2019.)

One book award I really miss is the Man Asian Literary Prize, which introduced me to half a dozen or more excellent Asian writers I hadn't heard of before. I would much rather read books by those authors than the vast majority of ones that have been chosen for the Booker Prize in recent years.

My PCP wants me to see Ortho. Apparently the nearest office has a walk in clinic, so I'll head hobble there one day this week. He noticed that I was tight in both hips (and I felt it as well when he examined me), and was concerned that I could develop bursitis in my left hip as well. I was able to walk into and through his office without assistance, although it was modestly painful, so that's an improvement, and I have still only taken one Percocet tablet today, leaving me seven left over to use the remainder of the week. I'm trying my best to avoid taking it other than first thing in the morning, and relying on Voltaren gel and a heating pad to relieve the spasms of pain in the afternoon and evening. I think I'll take one at 6 am every morning, and let it work for two hours before I get up, showered, and go downstairs to prepare breakfast for Mom.

>199 Ameise1: I did read those first two volumes many years ago and I can recommend them, Barbara. That is exactly why I want to read Flood of Fire. For that matter that's also why I want to read The Mirror & the Light.

Congratulations to Samantha Harvey for her superb novel Orbital, which is the winner of this year's Booker Prize. It was one of my two favorite books from this year's shortlist, along with Percival Everett's splendid historical novel James; My Friends by Hisham Matar should have made the shortlist in my opinion, but didn't.

>202 kidzdoc: I picked this up from my library yesterday, so that was a fun bit of serendipity. I'll add My Friends to my list, based on your recommendation.

>201 kidzdoc: Many thanks Darryl.
I am probably one of the very few people who did not like Wolf Hall, but I will read the first Ghosh volume.

>203 RidgewayGirl: Well done, Kay! I hope that you enjoy Orbital as much as I did.

>204 Ameise1: You're welcome, Barbara. I could not get into Wolf Hall the first time I read it, and I put it aside after 50 pages or so. I can't remember why (possibly encouragement from Rachael?), but I picked it up again a month or so later, when I could give it my full attention. After stalling over the first few pages something clicked, and I loved both it and Bring Up the Bodies from that point on.

>202 kidzdoc: I'm happy with Orbital winning the prize. I thought it was very good. Although I haven't read it, I would also have considered James a worthy winner based on the praise I've seen from you and others.

I found Wolf Hall a bit of a struggle but worth the effort. Bring up the bodies was smoother sailing, partly because Mantel made clearer distinctions between the many Thomases. Like you, I still have to read The mirror and the light.

Hi Darryl! I started to read this thread and realized why I'm bored with LT lately. I'm not following the most interesting people and conversations! Now that I'm here, I'll continue to follow you and the people who talk so intelligently about books and the world.

And then because of some references made here, I went back and skimmed your other threads this year. Oh, so sorry for what you went through, and how difficult your year has been. Dealing with your own health issues and your mother's must be grueling. I'm glad you found the day-care place, and have more time for yourself. And I hope you find new friends as you go.

>206 Sakerfalcon: Orbital and James seem to be the the two favorite books from those who read them, Claire. I gave Harvey's novel 4½ stars in my review, said that it was just behind Everett's but that I would be happy if it won, which remains the case.

It's been so long since I read Wolf Hall that I can't remember as much detail about it, other than it remains one of my favorite novels of the 21st century.

>207 ffortsa: Hi, Judy! It's been far too long since I followed your thread or saw you in person, so hopefully I can make up for my lapses. If anyone honors me by visiting my threads, especially from a different group from Club Read, I feel obligated to return the favor in kind.

My life changed dramatically after my father suddenly and unexpectedly died in December 2021, as I made the difficult but necessary decision to resign from work, and move back from Atlanta to suburban Philadelphia to provide 24/7 care for Mom, who has moderate vascular dementia. My spare time for pleasurable activities plummeted, and I'm now only able to read 30 to 40 books a year instead of 100+ without breaking a sweat. Similarly it became far too time consuming to keep up with threads in the other group, and because of that and feeling more at home here I decided to make Club Read my permanent home, and follow a limited number of threads in the other group that I could reasonably keep up with and were of special interest. I'm much more content this way.

My recent decision to focus on a core of 20-30 books to read every year is one that I think I can stick to, and it should give me greater personal satisfaction with my reading, although I'll stay flexible and read another 20-30 books that I find particularly compelling.

The adult day center has been tremendously important, as dropping Mom off there allows me to run necessary errands, such as seeing my primary care physician yesterday for follow up evaluation of the hip bursitis I was diagnosed with on Friday. Unfortunately my pain has been much worse today, so I'll spend most of the day lying down under a heating pad, and see Orthopedic Surgery tomorrow.

It has been quite the year, with the downside being the nervous breakdown I suffered in February and the sobering diagnosis of severe bipolar I (manic-depressive) disorder with psychotic features by my excellent psychiatrist, which has been well controlled, thanks to her. The best news has easily been the dramatic weight loss that you already know about. I'm only 6 lb above the top range of my ideal body weight for my height and age, and I have every intention to never be that overweight again.

I'm really sorry to read about your bursitis, Darryl and the pain . I hope that improves soon . I agree, My Friends should have made The Booker Shortlist, and I think, should have won. I'm glad you enjoyed Orbital. It's great idea to read what appeals to you, instead of focusing on the Booker. Now that the Booker season is over, I intend to do the same. Again, congratulations on your weight loss. My doctor would like me to lose 25 lbs, but I am not having any luck so far.I'd like to lose 35 lbs, as I weighed that about 5 years ago and felt good at that weight.

Sorry your bursitis flared up this morning. Mine tended to come in waves too. I found corticosteroid injections to be helpful, though mine came back until the sacs were removed during my replacement surgeries.

>193 kidzdoc: I love this list. I too should prioritize reading Flood of Fire (having read the first two) and Haiti after the Earthquake (since I admire Farmer so). I'm tempted too by the Children of the Ghetto books. I have read Gate of the Sun and White Masks, but wasn't particularly drawn to them. I own Yalo, also an Archipelago edition, but have not read it. I should also return to the Knausgaard books. One series I did finish was the Wolf Hall one. The Mirror and the Light was my least favorite of the three, but still very good. I just loved the other two, especially Bring Up the Bodies, so much that it was hard to measure up. Finally, I have been meaning to read David Grossman for years. I'll look forward to your impressions. I have See Under--Love sitting on my shelves.

No obligation to follow my thread, Darryl. It's not nearly as interesting as yours!

I'm glad your mother's day-care is working out. When my mother moved to a continuing-care community in Monroe Township, she rather promptly began to deteriorate mentally, ultimately cycling through assisted-living and locked assisted-living components of the complex. Then she contracted a bad UTI and ended up in the hospital for several days. When she returned, they temporarily placed her in the nursing home portion of the facility, where she promptly colonized the single room and decided to stay. Thank goodness her long-term care policy covered the expense. When I checked out other closer facilities, the eldercare consultant evaluated the one she was in and thought very well of it, so we continued her placement. Jim and I drove down to see her about every three weeks, and we put in calls to my siblings while we were there. She did seem well cared-for and adapted very quickly. Jim and I drove down to see her about every three weeks, and we put in calls to my siblings while we were there.

There was no way I or my siblings could have cared for her in her condo. I remember, before we were able to find a nursing home for my grandmother, that she became physically vicious toward my mother. When the police came, our neighbor made sure that they knew which way the abuse went, and after that we found a nursing home for her. Traveling to see her twice a week took a grave toll on my mother.

I hope you get all the support you need in this generous care you are providing.

>209 vancouverdeb: Thanks, Deb. I had a better night last night, as I took 400 mg of Naproxen in the early afternoon, another 400 mg before bedtime, and spent most of the afternoon and evening lying in bed with a heating pad over me. I felt great when I woke up this morning, but after I started walking more than a few steps the spasmodic pain returned. It has now migrated to the sides of my thighs and lower legs and up the right side of my lower back, so I'll have to see a spine surgeon on Tuesday morning to make sure there isn't a problem there. I had forgotten until I talked with the patient coordinator in the Ortho group I'll be going to that I had a partial intervertebral lumbar disc herniation about 15-20 years ago, at the L4-L5 level. Fortunately it resolved with a week's worth of bed rest and exercises. I can't remember how that pain compared to this one, but they seem fairly similar.

My Friends should have made the Booker Prize shortlist, and it would have been a worthy winner. Hisham Matar is certainly worthy of greater attention, and he could win the National Book Award for Fiction, which will be announced on Wednesday.

There are some book awards that I plan to pay more attention to, such as The Warwick Prize for Women in Translation that Rasdhar mentioned earlier this week, and the Anisfield-Wolf Awards I mentioned earlier this month.

My "bursitis diet" has been even more successful than my usual one. I've been skipping dinner most of the past few nights, as it's more comfortable for me to eat a protein bar in lieu of going downstairs, provided that Mom doesn't ask for food (if she says she's hungry I'll gut it out). I'm now down from 194 to 189 lb, or only 1 lb above my ideal body weight range (172-188 lb) for a 60+ year old man of my height. I'm pretty sure that Emily, my nutritionist, will be understanding but not completely happy, since I've probably lost some muscle in addition to fat. Unfortunately exercise at this time is completely out of the question, and she did tell me not to worry about it, given the degree of pain that I'm in.

There are many women I know well who are having a much harder time that I’ve had losing weight, including a dear cousin of mine, the sister I never had. She is also under the care of a nutritionist and participating in a support group, but without much success. Some of it is due to the fact that she is burning the candle at both ends, working a full time day and at least a part time night job, and thus has a hard time sticking to a plan outlined by her nutritionist. As her older “brother” I’m encouraging her to put herself first, as she has some underlying health problems and is at risk for developing others.

There needs to be research done to help nutritionists, clinicians and patients in the weight loss process, IMO. Far too many studies are still done predominantly in men, with little if any applicability to women, people of color, and other understudied groups.

>210 labfs39: Thanks for your insight, Lisa. This is all new to me, so I appreciate any information that could help me. I’m perfectly comfortable sitting in a sofa in our living room under a heating pad, and I was even able to go outside to pick up the NYT which was deposited closer to the curb than to the front door without even a twinge of pain. If I knew the pain could stay at this level I would feel comfortable seeing Emily tomorrow morning; however it was only an hour ago that I was squirming with moderate discomfort, so it’s probably for the best that I wait to see her until next week, especially since I should have a diagnosis by that time.

I loved the first two novels in Amitav Ghosh’s Ibis Trilogy, and LT tells me that I purchased Flood of Fire from the London Review Bookshop in June 2015, so I’m long overdue in getting to it. The unifying features of many of these books is that I’ve owned them for years but haven’t gotten around to them, and that many of them are tomes (500 pages or more) that I avoided in part because my focus was on reading 75 or more books in a calendar year for the other group, which was a terrible idea and approach to reading.

I definitely want to read more of David Grossman’s books. The only book of his I’ve read so far is A Horse Walks into a Bar, which was uniquely superb, and in addition to More Than I Love My Life I would like to read To the End of the Land this year or next.

>211 ffortsa: Thanks for your insight about your mother and grandmother, Judy. Unfortunately my father made no provisions for long term care for himself or my mother, and he steadfastly refused my and my brother’s concerns that his increasing health problems combined with the challenges of taking care of Mom could mean that he might die “prematurely” (it’s hard to describe the death of an 87 year old man as “premature”) and leave me in the situation of having to quit working and care for her. He refused to consider that as a possibility and became fiercely angry at me if I brought up the topic. I increased the frequency of my visits home after he came close to dying several years ago, cut back my hours at work so that I could spend more time caring for them (he did not like that), and made sure to bring them to their physician appointments and respectfully express my concerns with how things were going at home to their doctors. My mother, who has moderate vascular dementia, remained relatively stable from month to month, but my father took a sharp decline over the last 6-9 months of his life, and watching him try to take care of Mom and himself was akin to watching a car heading to the edge of a cliff at 5 mph while being powerless to do anything about it.

My mother does not do well in hospitals or other care facilities; she tolerates the adult day center for a few hours the days she goes there, but mainly because she knows that I’ll be back to pick her up that afternoon. I’ve felt for a long time that my mother would rapidly deteriorate if I was to place her in a nursing home, and I feel no different today than I did 3+ years ago. I can care for her at home, with assistance, and as long as that remains the case I am duly bound to show Mom the devotion and love that I think she deserves as her oldest son.

On a happier note, Abraham Verghese's latest novel The Covenant of Water is an absolute delight of a novel so far, and even though I haven't gotten all that far in it (I'm on page 83 of 715) I suspect that it will be one of my favorite books of the year.

>213 kidzdoc: I'm so glad to hear that you liked the latest Verghese. I'll mark it down for 2025.

I entirely understand your approach to your mother's care. Bringing in more aides is likely to be expensive, so I hope she adjusts to the day-care facility and makes some friends there. It's a pity your father was not willing to purchase long-term care insurance, but considering his and your mother's ages it would probably be prohibitively expensive if you had been able to convince him.

One of Biden and Harris's ideas was to provide home care as a component of Medicare. Doesn't look like it will come in any time soon, alas.

on another note, one of our reading groups selected Celine's Journey to the End of the Night for our December meeting, and I'm plowing through it dutifully, if not enthusiastically. Have you ever read it? So far it oscillates between sarcasm and some acute perceptions; here's one that suits our time:

When men can hate without risk, their stupidity is easily convinced, the motives supply themselves.

>214 ffortsa: Yes, The Covenant of Water is an epic multigenerational novel that spans most of the 20th century, in which at least one member of the family experiences a tragic accident. I've finished the first part, which is set in the south Indian state of Kerala from 1900 to 1910; part two is set in Glasgow. There is apparently a strong theme of medicine in the book, and the image that begins Part Two is a stethoscope.

I don't know how much long term care would have cost, but my father was an aerospace engineer with a master's degree in theoretical physics from CCNY making, I think, a six figure salary at the time he retired, and I think I remember him or someone else telling me that his pension was in the neighborhood of $75K per year, which I assume would have been enough. The issue as I see it is that he didn't want to spend the money on something he thought was unnecessary. He was a proud, self made man who overcame many obstacles on a path to success, he was the best and most dedicated provider for us, and his pride often impacted his otherwise good judgment, especially at the end of his life when he could no longer take care of his beloved wife for over 62 years as he had done. He was and always will be my primary role model, and although his stubbornness has placed me in this position his decision to not burden me with his wife, my mother, was made out of his desire to protect me from their needs, even though he knew that I would do anything for them. He called me his "rock" in his final years, the best compliment anyone has ever given me.

I am trying my best to avoid the announcements of Trump's Cabinet of Clowns, and not trying to get stressed out about what this may mean for, especially, government health programs such as the Affordable Care Act, Medicaid, and Medicare. I have an online subscription to the public health journal Health Affairs, but my access code is linked to my former work email address, so I'll have to contact Customer Service so that I can start reading it faithfully again. I also have a subscription to the weekly print edition of The New England Journal of Medicine, which typically has articles related to the US public health system and will become increasingly important in the coming months. I'll also have to pay closer attention to the doings in Harrisburg, to see how legislation passed there affects me and my mother. Scary times are ahead...

I have not read Journey to the End of the Night, so I look forward to your take on it. That is a great but disturbing quote.

I did add Nineteen Eighty Four to my core list of books to read next year. I haven't read it, believe it or not, but I managed to score a last second ticket to the theatrical version of it that appeared at the Almeida Theatre in London in 2014 which was utterly chilling. If I recall correctly it had a brief run in NYC after that; did you and Jim see it?

Hello, Darryl. I've taken a small step back from LT the past several months, and while I don't regret that, I do regret that it's meant some friends, like you, have fallen through the cracks. Shame on me.

I'm sorry to hear about your various challenges, but you seem to have a good handle on things now and are clear-eyed in your assessment of your own needs, as well as your mother's. Having lost both my parents rather suddenly, I did not have to navigate elder care and end of life issues. I can't imagine the challenge of it all, so you certainly have my respect.

I've starred this thread and will try to be a better visitor here on out. Take care!

>216 katiekrug: Thanks for visiting, Katie! I can understand stepping back from LibraryThing, so I did the same thing when my father's health began to decline sharply toward the end of his life. In any case you have nothing to feel sorry for.

I don't know, but I would think that losing your parents at young ages would be much harder than if they were well up in years, and especially if those sad events fell close to each other. Without saying who it is there a dear friend of mine, both online and in real life, who was formerly active on LT whose parents also died at young ages, and I know that she was, and still is, very deeply affected by their loss to this day, and my heart goes out to her. I haven't heard from her in a few months so I'll have to reach out to her this week.

Eldercare is new to most of my family, as is dementia, as all of my father's siblings died over 20 years before he did, and my mother's younger sister is alive and relatively well.

I'll star and follow your thread as well; I'll do my best to keep up!

The appointment that I suspect most medical professionals feared has come to pass: Trump has announced Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as his nominee for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. This is utterly unacceptable and could do untold harm to the health care system* in this country and the safety net of everyday Americans, something that I doubt that even the majority of MAGA Nation would approve of. I will be following this issue very closely and participating in any way I can to ensure his nomination isn't successful. Fortunately he requires Senate confirmation to be installed, and hopefully there are enough Democratic and non-MAGA Republican senators willing to stand up to Trump to keep this nightmare scenario from happening.

*It can, of course, be easily stated that there is no "health care system" in the US, and that it is far from perfect, but I would suggest that it would be far better than anything that Project 2025 would propose, especially since Trump came that close to overturning the Affordable Care Act ("Obamacare") during his first days in office in 2017.

Now that I'm unemployed while I'm caring for my mother I get my healthcare through the ACA market, so this could affect me personally and make my insurance rate much higher, and possibly unavailable.

>218 kidzdoc: What can one say, in this politics-free zone? :-)

>219 qebo: Thanks for reminding me as I was about to comment. I agree- The appointment that I suspect most medical professionals feared has come to pass: Trump has announced Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. as his nominee for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.

>213 kidzdoc: Darryl, I saw that my library has a copy of this book. At 894 pages, it's a 'weighty' work. I've bookmarked it and look forward to your review to decide if I'll read it.

>215 kidzdoc: I read 1984 during my time at grammar school and was very impressed. I'm sure you'll like it.

>212 kidzdoc: I hadn't heard of the Warwick Prize, but that longlist looks excellent! I shall definitely start following it. I really enjoyed The factory but haven't read any of the other titles. Thanks for the heads-up!

>218 kidzdoc: Thinking of you and your loved ones, as always. Sending you strength and prayers.

I'm so glad you are enjoying Covenant of Water, Darryl. The characters are wonderful.

>219 qebo:, >220 kjuliff: On a superficial level I would agree that my post in >218 kidzdoc: goes against the spirit of me wishing to keep this a "politics free zone." With all due respect, though, I was speaking as a physician who is concerned about the damage that could be done to the medical infrastructure of the citizens of this country, particularly the ones at greatest risk including children, the elderly, and the poor, and not as a panicky private citizen fearing a second Trump presidency, even though that is perfectly valid. Pediatricians view themselves as advocates for children since they can't vote, and we are probably more active in the political arena than any other medical group.

Even though I do want to spend more time focusing on books than on politics public health is very important to me, and I reserve the right to engage in topics related to it on my thread.

>221 Ameise1: I own the US edition of The Covenant of Water, and it has 724 pages including notes. I'll be bedridden for most of the next four days so I should make good progress in it.

>222 Sakerfalcon: Rasdhar deserves all of the credit for highlighting The Warwick Prize to the rest of us in Club Read. I was completely unaware of the award until she mentioned it.

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers. I'll admit that I am concerned about what this is, but I'll continue to pray that it isn't anything serious.

>223 labfs39: I agree, Lisa. Verghese's ability to develop memorable characters is remarkable, both in Cutting for Stone and so far in The Covenant of Water.

>218 kidzdoc:

Lois and I were on the ACA for several years, before Medicare. Worked pretty well. Let's hope it survives.

RFK will be a nightmare. Call your Senators, everyone.

I listened to Verghese's Cutting for Stone on audiobook, read by a truly wonderful narrator, Sunil Malhotra. If I can find out if this new one is on audio, and if Malhotra reads it, I will borrow it from the library. I have seen the book in the store and it is a tome. I don't think my wrists can handle that these days. I do love his writing. I have read all his other books so I am very sure I'd love this new one.

>227 jessibud2: I listened to the audiobook of Covenant of Water read by Verghese himself. He did a fantastic job. I would highly recommend it.

P.S. Having firsthand experience of Indian, British, and Scottish accents gave his voices authenticity.

>228 labfs39: - I had no idea there was a version that Verghese read. That would be good to know. Malhotra is also of Indian heritage and his accents even of the various dialects, was what made it so good and so authentic, for me. Not all authors are good narrators but I have a small list of those who are and now I can add Verghese to that list. Thanks!

>224 kidzdoc: I reserve the right
Absolutely!!! But alas I am a mere panicky private citizen, and my understanding of the rules is that I can agree 100% with your alarm but can't say so lest your thread escalate with mass anxiety. So I was merely acknowledging.

>226 dukedom_enough: Same here, Michael. I'll be eligible for Medicare in March 2026, so I selfishly pray that Trump doesn't mess with the ACA marketplace until then. Unfortunately many of the states in the Deep South do not provide adequate coverage for many of the children who rely on the public health insurance programs, namely Medicaid and CHIP, the state Children's Health Insurance Programs. Republican governors and legislatures balk at granting access to their residents who are poor or people of color, which is a main reason why health outcomes in places such as the Mississippi Delta are so bad, and life expectancies are closer to second world countries than they are to much of the rest of the country. In south Georgia numerous rural hospitals serving the poor have closed due to lack of funding, many of the state's 159 counties lack even a single pediatrician, and infant mortality rates are shockingly high in comparison to even the poorest cities in metro Atlanta.

In keeping with my concern, NPR is reporting that RFK, Jr has "plans to massively overhaul public health." Yes, Michael, we will all need to contact our senators, and sooner rather than later. I will provide information on my thread for everyone here as I get it.

>227 jessibud2: That sounds great, Shelley. I'm not sure that I've ever read an audio book, but this would be a perfect one to at least try, even though I already have the print edition.

>228 labfs39: That sounds great, Lisa. It wouldn't take much for me to give Cutting for Stone a second go at some point.

>229 jessibud2: That is good to know, Shelley.

>230 qebo: Ha! You understand my "Rules of Service" perfectly, Katherine. Medicine, illness and public health are, needless to say, important topics of conversation here, and all posts that fit are freely welcomed. Others can use their own threads to express their personal concerns.

>231 kidzdoc: >230 qebo: I’m confused. I’m seeing posts about which I have opinions but am told in no uncertain terms not to comment.

>195 RidgewayGirl: The copy of Children of the Ghetto: My Name Is Adam by Elias Khoury I ordered from Archipelago Books on Tuesday arrived this afternoon, Kay. It will be tempting to start it before the year is out, but I'll do my best to hold off.

Thankfully my leg pain has been much better today. The mornings are always the worst, as I get sharp searing pain down the sides of my thigh that sometimes extend below my knee. Fortunately we don't have to go out this weekend, and other than caring for my mother I can lie in bed and use a heating pad to relieve the worst of the pain. I look forward to making a big dent into The Covenant of Water, which continues to be excellent so far.

>231 kidzdoc: "Rules of Service"
Noted. :-) Really I should just get my act together on my own thread.

>234 qebo: Ha! Unless I'm missing something the last post I see from you was from mid July, when Zoë, Mark, and their baby were en route from Virginia back to upstate New York and met up with you in Lancaster. I love that they created a LibraryThing account for the baby's books as well!

I couldn't remember if we had met up in Philadelphia in August of 2022 or 2023, but it now seems that it must have been 2022, as Zoë would have been quite pregnant in the summer of 2023.

I was looking at my Facebook photo albums to see when the first Philadelphia LT meet up was, but I don't see it, nor do I see one in LT's Gatherings and Meetups group. Very strange. I have photos from when Zoë, Fliss from Cambridge (UK) and I met in San Francisco in 2012. I knew both of them, but that was the first time they had met each other. There was a meet up in NYC in 2010, on Black Friday or Boxing Day, and I suspect I met you and Zoë then or shortly afterwards.

ETA: Ah. The first Philadelphia weekend meet up took place in the spring of 2013. That makes sense because she (and you?) and I were co-planners of it.

>235 kidzdoc: I've been adding to the list of books read at the top of the thread, but that's it.

I remember August (never again!), because I walked from the train station to the bookstore on 2nd St and the temperature was around 95 degrees. And yes, photos on my 2022 thread. Yes again, the big Philadelphia meetup was in 2013! Time flies. I wasn't involved in the planning.

>236 qebo: That's right. I was admittedly alarmed that you walked from 30th Street Station to Head House Books in Society Hill, and after we had dinner at Gabriella's Vietnam on Passyunk Avenue I insisted on driving you back to 30th Street Station, despite your protests. I drove Zoë and Mark back to their hotel, and because time wasn't an issue, as my cousin was watching my mother, I thought that was the least I could do.

We should all restrict our Philadelphia meet ups to the spring or autumn. Liz and I went to Head House Books and lunch in the Reading Terminal Market for a quick meet up this past spring when my mother was in the adult day center she goes to, which was quite enjoyable.

>237 kidzdoc: IIRC between the train schedule and the meetup time, I had 2-3 hours so I paused in the air conditioned Barnes & Noble at Rittenhouse Sq.

>238 qebo: Nice. I think we went there briefly during the 2013 Philadelphia meet up, right?

It's time for a new, and very different, thread.