mountains beyond mountains - tracy kidder (2003)

once in a while you read a book that makes you want to have been better to have done more to have loved more fearlessly to have given and not counted the cost.

perhaps this is a book to alter practice and life, seeing as one stands at the cusp of new phases and all.

certainly it is a book to humble and to stretch.

and here is a man who lives matthew 25 when i who live in so much fullness and comfort have almost forgotten about the hungry and thirsty and the imprisoned.

family reunion, or not

one could ask, when will we meet again?

but we have! we have weekly meetings and look and chat and laugh and pray!

one could say, it's not the same.

and so they are not. he replaces the old with the new.

is this not an inferior substitute?

must it be? i am grateful enough.

dryer repair, or, why you must read the instruction manual

the dryer is failing us, i tell HOM. heat pump technology notwithstanding.

HOM looks up the instructions. it says to clean the filter every three uses. have we been doing that?

not for four-odd years, no. because uh, is the lint filter not the filter? no? 

xxx

the dryer is working again, very much better than before too. this is a most satisfactory recovery. 

year of the ox

au courant: family photos in matching colors, and little doggies in festive togs.* 

thanksgiving: for family catch-ups, with family at different stages of expectation and stress. everyone is in a bit of an equipoise this year just for the season.

best thing ever: the enforced social distancing. i'm afraid i love it.

*not for us and not for E! our independence and E's self-respect are intact!

john kotter (2006, 2016)

he calls them fables. wise they are too, and charmingly MBA in the tradition of the moving cheese. i started the year with these before the bridgertons took me on a ten-book detour. 

two dinky books, is wot i say.

 

range - david epstein (2019)

this is a good ego-patting pick-me-up for a career generalist with incorrigible side interests unrelated to core business. epstein does a good job of exploring the various facets of the generalist perspective in business and science and makes sense pretty much to the end, unlike some other two-chapter wonders. although the conclusion chapter is a little mushy for my liking. 

i very much enjoyed this after beginning the year with a series of forgettable chick lits. (i blame the bridgertons for that foray.)

and he says i can and should freely read outside of my specialty. the cat in me is happy to be legitimized.