Charlie's "100 Things Posts About Me"
#73. I read in waves, mostly science fact and science fiction.
Okay, when I say I read in 'waves', I don't mean that I read on a boat. Or on a raft, or even in the bathtub. What do I look like, Dr. Frickin' Seuss, over here?
What I mean is, I read
compulsively, for weeks at a time, to the exclusion of just about everything else. I read book after book -- anything that makes me
think. Science fiction is good, because anything is possible. Non-fiction science works, too -- things like brain research and quantum physics and astronomy. Philosphy, logic, conjecture, essays...
anything that fills up my brain with potentials and synergies and eye-opening
wow-ness. I don't always
understand what the hell these people are writing about, mind you. But I get bits and pieces, and try to fit it into the other crap that's whizzing through my head. Sometimes these literary binges last for a week or so; sometimes it's closer to a month.
And then it stops. And I go back to watching baseball and playing video games and I don't even want to
see a book, much less read one. I have no idea why. I get all knowledge-thirsty, and I drink for a while, and then I guess I decide I've had enough and want to go back to
real drinking. Like,
beer. And watching
South Park and the
Simpsons and organizing my CD collection. And eventually, I get tired of that, and go through the cycle again.
I get the same way with puzzles. Sometimes, I can't get enough -- crosswords and cryptics and logic puzzles and cryptograms, whatever I can find. And that's
all I'll do in my spare time. Just analyze, and figure, and ponder. And then, I'm done. I won't touch a puzzle book for weeks. I'll be off on some other kick, engrossed in a video game, or books, or just floating by, in between obsessions. It's
quite a way to live, let me tell you.
So, anyway, that's how it is. Looking back over this, there's not a helluva lot of humor in this one. Damn. It's a pity, really. After all, if you can't manicially and uncontrollably giggle about your
own whackjob obsessive tendencies, then whose whackjob obsessive tendencies
can you maniacally and uncontrollably giggle about, hmmm? No, really, tell me. I'm up for giggling at someone. Really. Tell me; I'm serious.