Wanderings…

I like to treat myself at the end of the school year. This year, I am struggling over what to buy to satisfy my inner geek.

Netbook or Kindle??

NETBOOK
I already have a laptop.  I love it for working at home because it has a big 17 inch screen and a big keyboard.  But I don’t take it with me as often as I anticipated.  The problem? It is heavy and the battery life is not very long.  A netbook  would fix those problems.  I just feel slightly ridiculous and self-indulgent to spend the money when we already have 2 computers in our house.  New computers.  ……And there are only 2 of us……

KINDLE
I am definitely interested.  Problem?  I don’t buy books.  At least not very often.  Seems an odd thing for a librarian to admit.  But at heart, I am a die-hard library person.  I truly believe in the most fundamental reason to use a library – FREE BOOKS!!  I was excited when our public library system started a downloadable audio book and ebook collection.  Not that I care about audio books.  I am constitutionally incapable of listening to a book.  I MUST read books.  Ebooks seem a good solution.  But the collection currently on offer from the public library is dismal.

So….go to Amazon, right?  No.  It would cost money.  I read fiction.  It is very rare that I would want to read a novel more than once.

So, why on earth should I buy a Kindle?

Guess I’ll resist the siren call.  Even though every time I go to Amazon I hear it.  “Buy me, buy me, buy me…….”, the beautiful device chants seductively.

I will try to be strong.  If I succumb, the Kindle will end up like many a toy I had as a child – abandoned under my bed in favor of my trusted old friends.   Yes…yes…there are definite advantages to the Kindle.  The price is not the barrier.  It’s the maintenance.  Right now the pretty little toy just costs too much to feed….

Long live the free lunch!  Long live the library!

Meme begun by Stephen Abrams of Stephen’s Lighthouse, and continued by Doug Johnson at Blue Skunk.

The book that is right next to me right now is: The Dumbest Generation by Mark Bauerlein. I feel it is a much (and unfairly) maligned book with a lot of good things to say about (among other things) how learning could be improved by reading for pleasure. Lot’s of folks just can’t get past that title….

Anyway – in keeping with the meme rules – here is the 5th sentence on page 56.

The school year lasts only 30 weeks, leaving 22 weeks to plow through some trashy novels at the beach or pick up a popular text or two related to their studies, Freakanomics for econ majors, for instance.

Meme Rules:

* Get the book nearest to you. Right now.
* Go to page 56.
* Find the 5th sentence.
* Write this sentence – either here or on your blog.
* Copy these instructions as commentary of your sentence.
* Don’t look for your favorite book or your coolest but really the nearest.

I hope lots of people join in on this fun meme!