I have a very bad reading habit. I have the tendency of reading multiple books in parallel. After I started a book, reading it half way, sometimes even just the first few chapters, I may get distracted by a new book. Then I will put down the old book and start the new one. I just count the number of books that are reading in progress, I have 8 books pending to finish. I am not abandoning the unfinished books, I will still read a few chapters from time to time, until I got distracted by another book again. I just finished a book that I started 2 years ago. Here are the books pending in my reading list:
1. Asimov’s Guide to the Bible
2. Dimensions of Moral Theory
3. Free Culture
4. A History of Christian Thought
5. Philosophy of Bullshit
6. A Good Book, In Theory
7. Philosophy of Law
8. Contemporary Political Philosophy.
The oldest book stuck in the queue started almost 7 years ago. My reading pipeline is so full that I really should refrain myself from the temptation of new books. I should focus on the books in hand and just be content with what I reading. Interesting though, I only have this problem with non-fictions. It is easier to concentrate when reading a fiction. It has the element of a story to keep my attention until I flip to the last page or it’s so boring that I give up.
I have been a read of the PC Magazine since grade 9. It was the most popular computer magazine back then. Another computer magazine I used to read is the Byte Magazine, which flopped a few years ago. In Hong Kong imported magazine was expensive and hard to find. Being a poor student, the only place I could read PC Mag was at the central library, which close to where I had my math tutorial. I remember after the tutorial lesson, instead of going home straight, I used to spend an hour or so at the central library, checked out the magazines every week. Among the columnists in PC Magazine, I had been a loyal of John C. Dvorak, whose articles have good insight into the trends of the computer industry. I think my opinions on high tech related issues more or less had been influenced by him over these years. When I was waiting for my prescription at Safeway this evening, I browse the magazines section to kill time. To my surprise, I couldn’t find PC Magazine on the shelf. How can PC Magazine not carried by the biggest supermarket chain in Canada? The only logical conclusion is that it is not selling well, and Safeway decided to drop it. I have a bad feeling that PC Magazine is going to disappear soon, when its parent company ZD publication decided to cut the lose.
Today is a busy day. Since I left home at 9:30a.m. in the morning, I had went to 6 different events non-stopped. First attended the Sunday mass as I had promised yesterday, then have dim-sum with colleagues that happen to go to the same church. After that is the World Youth Day meeting at St. Paul, followed by dancing class with Pat. After the class I have to drive back all the way back to Burnaby to pick her friend and go to a church dinner in Richmond again. The dinner is really boring and doesn’t taste good. Other than have some unimportant conversation with someone I barely remember their names, there is nothing else worth to mention happened. At last when I though i can go home and hit my bed, Pat’s friend somehow hooked up a group of Pat’s highschool friends and decided to have a drink together. It’s the first time I met Pat’s highschool friends, all girls, but none of them are pretty. I end up reading my Da Vinci’s Code instead being brothered by their girly talks. I would like to write more about my reflects about the Pope, but I’m too tried now. Maybe I’ll save it for the next day.
蘋果日報作者 – 陳馬：書評，影評，動漫，旅行，哲學筆記