I’m usually not a fan of memes, especially when it comes to answering them. So you can imagine my surprise that I’m writing one. I usually get tagged with assorted-book type memes, so I think I may have inadvertently stolen or closely copied some of these questions from those. In any case:

How many books do you own, and what authors are most strongly represented?

Since I have absolutely no intention of counting all of my books, I’m going to estimate that I have about three to four hundred books. Without a doubt, Stephen King and Patrick O’Brien are the authors most frequently represented on my bookshelves.

What’s your favorite book?

Lot of contenders, but I think I’d have to go with Catch-22, which I was reading on September 11th, 2001. Such a dark, horrible day, but I could escape into Heller’s masterpiece (and his only book worth any salt) and be unable to keep the laughter down. No, seriously, I was pissing people off in the Student Union because I couldn’t keep myself quiet.

How much do you love books?

I would love a personal library, except, that if I had a library, I would feel compelled to keep all of my books in it. And if I did that, the rest of my place would feel cold and lonely, because a room without books is a very sad room indeed. (I even have a couple of books in my closet!)

What book do you own the most copies of?

Surprisingly, Harry Potter & The Prisoner of Azkaban — I have three copies, one hardback, two softcover. There are lots of books I own duplicates of, usually because someone will give me a copy of something I already own (that’s how come I have two copies of The Kite Runner). Other books I own multiple copies of: Last Lion Volume II by William Manchester, Zodiac by Neal Stephenson, and Chris Buckley’s Supreme Courtship (both ARCs).

How do you organize your books?

Well, I put them on shelves. Some may be stacked on the floor. However, I’ve never been very good at sorting by genre or subject matter or, for that matter, the alphabet. I try to keep an author’s works together, but truthfully, I’m not particularly good, or stringent about it. I mean, it’s weird, because I’m pretty anal about keeping my DVDs sorted properly, but, I mean, hell, one bookshelf has a giant Chaucer textbook, a Harry Potter, a cheap sci-fi, novels by Stephen Amidon, Stephen fry, Margaret Atwood, a Tim O’Brien, two by Kate Atkinson, and a book on libertarianism. Could you get more random? Well, yes, of course you could.

How many bookshelves do you own?

Nine, including two wall-hanging units. Admittedly, two of them — an IKEA Artist unit, and a 2×4 IKEA Expedit, are used for media storage. DVD shelves? Well, seven, then. Actually, I have another in my closet that I use for storage needs. So I think I need to answer “ten.” And I gave two others away when I moved.

Bathroom reading?

You know it! Sometimes you know a bowel movement is in the process, so you’re set up and waiting, and, damn, a book is far more interesting than staring at the off-white wall (and yes, I do keep books in my bathroom — stacked on the litter box, interestingly enough). However, when it’s actually in the process? Sorry, the book’s got to go down — otherwise, it’s sort of like pooping with the bathroom door and the apartment door wide open, and I like doing my business in private (my cats don’t — they always want to know just what the fuck I’m doing in there with the door closed, I think the assorted grunts and groans intrigue them).

Who is the most overrated author of all time?

Oh, there are a lot, but I think James Patterson has to top my list. I get nearly sick to my stomach when someone tells me he’s their favorite author (moreso when they describe him with any flattering words, especially ‘brilliant’), because, y’know what? He writes fifty pages, his editors enlarge the font, triple space, and pack it into 300 pages. I bet I could read one of his books twice over on the Red Line from Shady Grove to Glenmont.

So, here comes the anarchist aspect of this meme. I’m not tagging anyone — although I do have people in mind — so complete this meme, or not, based on whether you want to or not. Also, if you don’t like the questions, fuck it, make up your own. Link back to me, or not. It’s all your choice. (That’s why it’s an anarchist meme).

So I just went down to pull my clothes out of the dryers in the laundry room, in the basement. As I began pulling clothes out of the left-most machine, I noticed what appeared to be a milk cap. And then I noticed a milk carton.

Thankfully, it had already been cleaned. Unfortunately, whatever asshat fuck decided to throw their milk carton in the machine declined to restart the dry-cycle, so my clothes were damp, and now I have to dry them again.

I really should just take a book with me and camp out the room from now on.

From CNN:

The image, taken by NASA’s space-based Chandra Observatory telescope, shows an X-ray nebula 150 light years across.

It shows what appear to be ghostly blue fingers — thumb and pinky clearly discernible from index, ring and middle digits — reaching into a sparkling cloud of fiery red.

NASA says the display is caused by a young and powerful pulsar, known by the rather prosaic name of PSR B1509-58.

I prefer Star Trek’s explanation of mysterious giant hands in space:

I love this image, from a SKY TV advertisement for Alien v Predator.

Although I’m usually pretty good about dragging myself out of bed on time, today? Not so much. I finally stumbled up at about ten of six, but I was still running late to catch my Metro train.

Yes, I catch a specific Metro train. Every weekday. I couldn’t tell you what time it pulls into Woodley Park station, but I can tell you that if I’m out of bed at 5:40, by the time I’m dressed and out the door, a short walk to the station, an elevator ride down into its depths, and I’m on the platform several minutes ahead of its arrival. I can’t tell you what train number it is, but I can tell you that from the first bench back from the escalator, the car that stops there is occupied by (in addition to assorted other people) three ladies with whom I ride the bus from Grosvenor.

You can imagine my surprise, then, as I thought I was running late, that I got onto the platform just as a train was arriving, and darted into my usual car. And what should I see? My three bus companions.

Much to my shock, I was on time!

And then one of them saw me, turned to the others, and said, “Daaaamn, we’re all late today!”