KatrinaReads on Xanga

Monday, 31 August 2009

Currently
The Female Brain
By Louann Brizendine
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The Female Brain

Wow. This book was so insightful and informative without being dry or boring in the least. Louann explores the various phases of a girl/woman's life and explains exactly what the chemicals and hormones in her brain are doing, why they're doing it, and what the results of that activity are.

I already knew about half of the information she presented here, but I didn't know much of the more fascinating and intricate details she lays out. I'd definitely suggest this book as required reading for all men AND women! There are things in there that I don't agree with but overall it's a great resource to learn more about the amazing, female brain!

Tuesday, 04 August 2009

Currently
New Book of Herbs
By Jekka McVicar
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New Book of Herbs
I was browsing the library the other day for something that looked interesting. As I walked by the gardening section, this book really caught my attention. That surprised even me, because I'm the kind of person who you wouldn't expect to put "interesting" and "gardening" together positively in a sentence. But the front cover had some beautiful photographic work and when I picked it up it seemed pretty solid and thorough. "What the heck," I thought, "I might as well give this one a try."

I took it home and started reading... and several hours later I was still reading. With a wide array of beautiful photographs on every single page and basic information conveyed in a very simple way, this book was one that I just could not put down.

Written by Jekka McVicar (I LOVE unique names like that!), who runs her own HUGE herb farm, the book is filled with details on the following:
- What is an herb?
- Why grow herbs organically?
- Managing herbs the natural way
- Your garden environment
- Soil analysis
- Preparing new beds for planting
- Designing an herb garden
- Feeding the soil
- Herb propagation
- Seasonal maintenance
- Harvesting
- Why use herbs in cooking?
- Hot and cold beverages
- Salads
- Mayonnaise and mustards
- Oils and vinegars
- Marinades and butters
- Sweet and non-sweet sauces
- Cooked dishes
- Why use herbs in the home?
- Furniture, fabric and surface cleansers
- Home fragrance
- First aid
- Beauty
- Relaxation
- Pet care
Not to mention that at the end of all this enlightenment is complete information relating to the propagation, maintenance and harvesting of her Top 100 Herbs, along with their suggested culinary, medicinal and household uses.

Thorough and beautiful, I will definitely be buying this book soon!

Thursday, 23 July 2009

The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody

This book is simply the best collection of condensed history lessons I've ever had. Snarky, sarcastic, droll and hilarious, it embodies everything that majorly cracks me up and makes me not not want to put it down.

Basically, it's a brief, humorous commentary of all the major historical figures from Hatshepsut to Miles Standish, complete with multiple footnotes just bursting with dry wit. The first time I read this, I laughed almost nonstop from cover to cover. I had a pretty sore throat afterward, but it was so worth it!

To whet your appetite and convince you that this is a must-read, here are a few of my favorite quotes:

The Egyptians of the First Dynasty were already civilized in most respects. They had hieroglyphics, metal weapons for killing foreigners, numerous government officials, death, and taxes.

Pericles was the people's friend. [Footnote: The very poorest citizens had a chance to become President, but somehow they didn't. It may have been just a coincidence.] He was so fond of the people that he paid them to go to the Assembly and vote, and they were so fond of him that they elected him year after year.

Alexander III of Macedonia was born in 356 B.C., on the sixth day of the month of Lous. He is known as Alexander the Great because he killed more people of more different kinds than any other man of his time. [Footnote: He did this in order to impress Greek culture upon them.]

Aristotle is famous for knowing everything. He taught that the brain exists merely to cool the blood and is not involved in the process of thinking. This is true only of certain persons.

Whenever a thousand or so of his men would fall off an Alp, he [Hannibal] would tell the rest to cheer up, the elephants were all right. If someone had given him a shove at the right moment, much painful history might have been avoided.

He [Julius Caesar] stayed in Egypt from early October until late in June settling affairs of state. It was a boy and they called him Caesarion, or Little Caesar, so Cleopatra now regarded herself as practically engaged. Caesar might have married her, but he had a wife at home. There's always something.

In some respects, Nero was ahead of his time. He boiled his drinking water to remove the impurities and cooled it with unsanitary ice to put them back in. He renamed the month of April after himself, calling it Neroneus, but the idea never caught on because April is not Neroneus and there is no use pretending that it is. During his reign of fourteen years, the outlying provinces are said to have prospered. They were farther away.

Attila was now sixtyish. His mind was weakening and he decided to marry again, as he had been terribly misunderstood the first three hundred times.

Charlemagne lived away back in the Dark Ages when people were not very bright. They have been getting brighter and brighter ever since, until finally they are like they are now.

As for Lucrezia, there wasn't even a rumor in her own day that the strawberries at her Wednesday luncheons were dipped in sugar of lead and the other dishes tastefully sprayed with antimony, hellebore, corrosive sublimate, and deadly nightshade, all popular Renaissance flavors.

Other kings let their ministers make their mistakes for them, but Louis insisted on making the important mistakes personally.

She [Jeanne du Barry] was one of the victims of the French Revolution, a thing thought up by some philosophers who wished to make the world a better place to live in. They wanted all the French to be free and equal and happy, and they tried to bring this about by decapitating as many of them as possible.

As Catherine learned later that night [her wedding night], Russia makes strange bedfellows. Peter got into bed with his boots on, played with his collection of dolls for an hour or so, and told the Grand Duchess about his new mistresses. [Footnote: He had no mistresses, really, but he thought he had. It was all in his head.]

Catherine announced that he [Peter] died of hemorrhoidal colic, and people who went to the funeral wondered why, in that case, the large bandage was tied around his neck. And that, gentle reader, is what comes from playing with dolls at the wrong time.

In 1740 Frederick became King and wrote a book to prove that lying, cheating, and highway robbery are wrong and that true happiness comes only from helping others. He then took Silesia away from Maria Theresa of Austria, who he had promised to protect, and was called Frederick the Great.

The Bayeux Tapestry is accepted as an authority on many details of life and the fine points of history in the eleventh century. For instance, the horses in those days had green legs, blue bodies, yellow manes, and red heads, while the people were all double-jointed and quite different from what we generally think of as human beings.

The colonists, it seems, had to "pay taxes to which their consent had never been asked." [Footnote: Today we pay taxes but our consent has been asked, and we have told the government to go ahead and tax us all they want to. We like it.]

He [Christopher Columbus] believed you could reach the East by going west. That is true enough, if you don't overdo it. You can reach Long Island City by taking the ferry for Weehawken, but nobody does it on purpose.

Montezuma had a weak and vacillating nature. He never knew what to do next. [Footnote: He had the courage of his convictions, but he had no convictions.]

Captain Smith reached Virginia on April 26, 1607, with a number of English gentlemen and some people who were willing to work. Then they all held a meeting to discuss ways and means of civilizing everybody. They made a great many speeches and accused each other of various crimes and misdemeanors and arrested some of themselves as an object lesson, and American history was started at last.

If the Pilgrims were looking for freedom of conscience, they came to just the right place. In America, everybody's conscience is unusually free.

So there you have it. A most excellent read!

Monday, 20 July 2009

Currently
The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody (Nonpareil Books)
By Will Cuppy
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A Bright Idea

I've been on Xanga for several years now, but I've recently been thinking about starting one or two new blogs for some particular interests of mine. One of those interests is reading.

I've been reading since I was three/four years old. I started out reading simple children's books when I was three and by the time I was five I could read the KJV. Granted, I didn't always understand what the words meant, but hey, I could read them! I always loved learning new things and/or being entertained, and books were such a great way to do that. I read daily... constantly... up until around the age of sixteen. Then that little thing called growing up happened.

I graduated high school, got busy first with one job and then with two, got into a serious relationship, moved out on my own, started my own business, got married... and time for reading just kind of flew out the window. Fast forward to my twenty-second birthday in the beginning of this month.

Every birthday I make one or two resolutions for that year (It's basically like New Year's resolutions, except that I've never felt that January 1 was really the start of my own personal new year). This year I decided to read one book a week - then changed that to one every two weeks so that I don't speed read through it and end up missing something. It's high time I start doing what I love again and prioritize time for it instead of just claiming I have no time and letting other things get in the way.

So I finally have an excuse to create a new blog and read a book every other week! And I intend to write about them here as I read them, both for my own amusement - and yours, hopefully - as well as for the purpose of better retaining the information I pick up.

I'm starting with an old favorite I haven't read through in a while: The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody by Will Cuppy. Look for my thoughts about it approximately two weeks from now!

~Excited Katrina