New Blog

Over to the right, in the Links section, there's a new link to a new blog I started for the company I work for; AVRP’s Blog. It'll be an online newsletter for us to highlight new people coming in, long time members of the firm that are going on to new things, and some of the amazing buildings and interiors that the talented members of the firm create.

A few weeks ago I did a 6 page newsletter for the firm and everyone seemed to like it, but we needed some way to get the word out faster and to more people. This will give the marketing department a place to refer people and it'll save paper and money over a printed newsletter. Our ultimate goal is to get the actual website updated so we can do this as part of AVRP.com, but until then a blog is a good alternative.

So for more information on who I work with and what we do, check it out and let me know what you think.

Remember Me? by Sophie Kinsella

My review

This was the 2nd time I read this book. I'd woken from a nap and needed something light and easy to read. This is a very fun and funny book with charming characters you'll enjoy getting to know. And along the way it asks some good questions about love and friendship and success. The author doesn't take herself or her characthers too seriously, she just keeps it light and fun.

Heroine Lexi Smart has a loser boyfriend and not a great job, but she loves her tiny flat and going out with her three best friends; until one night she slips and falls, hitting her head. She wakes up in the hospital 3 years later and everything's changed: she's a successfule business woman with an incredibly rich, handsome husband. As she tries to fit into her Cinderella life, she learns that happily every after ain't necessarily so. This book is a well written, entertaining read; especially for those times when you need a little something, but not too much.

View all my reviews.

Sex and the City by Candace Bushnell

My review

I haven't seen the movie yet, but it's on my A list. I had the First Season on DVD in my hands at the store, but decided to put it back and be a smarter consumer and watch in on Netflix. I've seen many of the episodes, but not all.

The book that inspired it all is not fabulous the way the TV series is fabulously written, acted, and produced. I thought the TV series was way better than almost any other series out there, but the book, compared to other books, not so much. The book is good, but the material probably worked better as a series of columns.

While the TV series is driven by an ensemble group of characters that you get to know and care about; the book talks about various situations people find themselves in. Candace Bushnell takes the topic and puts it in a room on a stool with one light overhead exposing it for your review. She doesn't making any judgements: she just reports the situation, brings it to light, and lets you make up your mind about it yourself.

This is a great book for a light summer read at the beach or the park; perfect for a plane. But be warned: if you're a stickler for good sentence structure and well used colons and semi-colons; there's one each in the whole book. She tries to create a conversational tone using only commas and periods, leaving sentence fragments scattered about like so many cigarette butts.

View all my reviews.

Fatherly Advice

This is a picture of my father at about 12 or 13 years old with his brothers, baby sister, mother, and, we think, his maternal grandfather. My Dad is second oldest and second from the right. The husband of one of my cousins had this photo and gave copies to everyone at my father's funeral 2 years ago. I love old photos and we all enjoyed marveling at how easy it was to tell which boy had turned into which uncle.

This morning I was thinking about the only real advice about growing up he gave me. We'd been on some outing together and were back at his house. Before I got out of his car to get into my own car to drive home he said, “You know, you're getting to the age where you need to start trimming your nose hairs.”

I said, “Thanks Dad” and got out of the car.

While driving home I remebered that my father gave my older brothers fairly nice electric shavers when they were old enough to need them. I taught myself to shave using my mother's shaver. At Boy Scout Camp that summer one of the Scoutmasters loaned me a disposable razor and encouraged me to use it. And it was my mother, not my father, who told me about love and sex.

When I got home I looked in the mirror and thought; no tips on sex, no advice about love, didn't even teach me how to shave, the man may be largely inadequate as a father, but he's right about one thing. So I looked for the smallest pair of scissors I could find.

A Classic of a CLassic

Click to enlarge

Wisdom

"You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. You can tell whether a man is wise by his questions." - Naguib Mahfouz