Building Castles on the Beach

I feel bad about this. I really do. How can I be so negative about a book that helps teens get through tough periods in their lives? A book that even saves lives? My wife says it's because I just don't like people. I'll concede that. But I still don't like this book. Published four years ago, Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher is the kind of book that gains traction with teens, then their parents read it, and suddenly it's a thing. This year the  EW published an article about how it's affecting readers. And now a website asks teenagers to write their responses to the book where they can benefit from each other's stories. So I ask again, how can I hate on a book that's practically its own "It Gets Better" movement? The story is that a boy named Clay gets a package containing seven audio cassettes. When he listens to the first one, he's shocked to hear the voice of Hannah Baker, the girl at school who recently committed suicide. She p...

This particular list began over the summer when I realized how much I was enjoying the new Duran Duran album. I really haven't listened to any new Duran Duran since "Ordinary World" in 1993. But All You Need Is Now sounded to me like the album that should have followed Seven and the Ragged Tiger . After the pleasant Duran Duran surprise, over the next few months these albums dropped from other 80's alumni. None of them are recreating any hit sounds of the past, and they're not breaking much new ground here, either. They are not regaining a once-held popularity, or you all would have heard of them by now. However, they all deserve some accolade for persevering through the years and still creating some great, memorable music. Without further ado, The Sticktoitiveness Awards go to: Duran Duran, All You Need Is Now If you don't know who these guys are, then never mind. You can go back to your Drake and Rhianna. Erasure, Tomorrow's World...

Giving toddlers a reason to walk since 1990.   Xander took his first step two days before his first birthday. I was holding a Seinfeld DVD that he wanted (such good taste already, right?), and he forgot to hold onto the bed as he reached for it. It's a little over a month later and we've had to reconfigure the house. We have many surfaces in our small dwelling, the better to stack books and soda cans and iPods. He can now get to the lower level surfaces: coffee tables, end tables, corner cabinets and shelves. One shelf is restocked at least five times a day with his Boynton board books that end up on the hallway floor every couple hours. He also ends up in the kitchen cupboards. Our Tupperware cabinet has never seen such disarray. Well, are you? So we've had to move things around. Hide our books. Block access to the Christmas tree. We bought a fancy "look ma, no hands" gate for the basement staircase. (We could have just put the actual door back on th...

Each week, follow through on this becomes more difficult. I would never survive some kind of NaNo or ABC challenge certain bloggers can't get enough of. But it's done. Here's some more of the best music from this year. Ladytron, Gravity the Seducer After four or five albums of icy dance tunes, Ladytron put out their most sophisticated album. Still icy, still dancey, but they've added layers and atmospherics that kind of make them sound all grown up. The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Belong  Their first album showed that these guys were the rightful successors of shoegaze goodness that hit a high 20 years ago with My Bloody Valentine and oozed around the nineties until The Jesus and Mary Chain were done. With their second album, they continue in the tradition of hooky melodies buried under fuzzy bass and guitar feedback. Must listen to loudly and repeatedly. St. Vincent, Strange Mercy St. Vincent is Annie Clark, and (forgive the obscu...

I'm a day late and way more than a dollar short, but I'll continue with my December recounting of music from 2011 blogfest or whatever, whether you like it or not. I'll try to keep it short. (Remember, I'm not in it for the videos. Ignore them. Just click play and turn up the volume.) Destroyer, Kaputt Super smooth production for another throwback sound. This time it's the seventies, mixing horns aplenty with a contemporary electropop sound. If that doesn't make any sense, just give the meandering "Bay of Pigs" a listen for 11 minutes of bliss. Florence + the Machine, Ceremonials Some people say Adele is the voice of the century. I say it's Florence Welch. Each song builds to a worthy climax of a crashing sounds and her perfect, brawny voice. Friendly Fires, Pala I liked their first album, but there was something too forced about the efforts. Pala , however, sounds so easy, so fluid. Friendly...

So begins my own blogfest of one. Wherein each Monday in December I present some of the best albums of the year in alphabetical order. Bon Iver, Bon Iver A couple of years ago, Bon Iver's album For Emma, Forever Ago was widely hailed as a neo-folk masterpiece. It was nice, but this self-titled album from 2011 is better. Building off of the stripped-down sound of For Emma , Bon Iver includes layers of horns and keyboards over an ambient sound that's highlighted by Justin Vernon's illustrious vocals. The whole thing has definite retro vibe to it, which is a commonality among many of my favorites this year. The last song, called Beth/Rest, is a shameless, unironic take on 80's pop, complete with Casio keyboards and sax solos. I would have hated this had I heard it in the 80's. Now I love it. Apparently, on the "Delux" version of the album, each song comes with video accompaniment, and each is a visual treat complementing the music beautifully. You s...

I still haven't finished Crime and Punishment . But I have until January before my students will have read any of it, so I'm free to continue not reading it for now. For now, I'll read what I want. It usually takes me weeks to read a book. That's because I read several at once until I get nearish the end. Then I cruise through the rest. This solid technique often results in finishing a couple-few books around the same time, which is what happened this week (or so). This short post is simply to direct you to my latest book reviews over to the left on the Shelfari. Just hover your mouse over the book, and my cogent review pops up for your perusal. Easy peasy Nice N Cheesy. But in case you're too lazy to do even that, here are the books, live and in technicolor, but with fewer words of wisdom from me. The Crystal Bridge by Charles M. Pulsipher I've touted this book before on this here blog, but I've finally finished reading it. Read an interview with ...

When did I become this guy? I used to consider myself a free thinker, an individualist, an anti-establishment nonconformist rebel punk. But I'm not that guy any more. Now I'm the guy who follows the rules, who enforces the rules. The company man. I am the establishment. This could go any number of directions, but today here's where it's going: At school there's a "no food in the classrooms" rule. This is such a strict rule this year that the new custodial staff sends emails warning us of roach infestations if we leave food out for the bugs, and I was recently forced to hold a "Lunch with Shakespeare" discussion in the cafeteria during lunch because I ordered pizza for the my group of students. I try to ask my students to finish their food and beverages before they come to class, and if I see them with food in the room, I kindly ask them to put it away. Of course, this past week, some student group introduced a coffee cart that offers coffe...

Last year I started a journal that I'd hoped to show the boy later as he grows. This blog has turned into that record of his growth and development (but an excerpt of that journal is included below). I posted two other portions of his birth story last spring that you should read if you haven't. My wife's ordeal that ended up in a five week hospital stay before labor is related in p art one , and labor and Alexander Brent Wescott's birth on November 15, 2010, constitutes  part two . Romantic stuff. Part three is to be read to the tune of Israel Kamakawiwo'ole's "Somewhere Over the Rainbow." When Xander was born premature at 34 weeks, within a couple of hours it was clear his lungs hadn't developed enough to handle his own breath, so he was intubated with a CPAP mask that covered most of his face. That mask only lasted a day, but the ventilator tube remained down his throat for a week. Over the next few days, he ...

One year ago today, this happened: You can find out more about what happened immediately before this by reading the first two installments of "A Star is Born": part one and part two . Part three is pending. Look for it this week. Promise. It'll tell more about his time in the hospital, as seen above. After a month, he came home. Then some more things happened. Most of them entailed becoming cuter and cuter. And a little fatter. Despite not leaving the house for the first six months, he's done quite a few amazing things in his short life. He's already had one Christmas. He loved it. He had his church blessing. He loved it. He went to Vegas. He loved it. He went swimming. He loved it. His sister loved it also. He went to Halloween. He loved it. He's been in the snow. He loved it.  He's a pretty cool guy. I'm glad to know him. I'm trying to post this to the minute. He's now exactly one year...