Tim Cahill is a real adventurer. This book takes the reader everywhere – from undiscovered ancient South American ruins to the 1980 eruption of Mount Saint Helens, and lots of other amazing trips in between.

The book is basically a collection of articles that Cahill wrote for Outside magazine, so it’s painless to read. Each chapter is 10 pages or less, and written in that punchy, accessible magazine style.

It sort of made me wistful to read this book. I’m not a hardcore adventurer like Cahill – he gets lost, goes hang-gliding, swims with sharks, rapells, drinks disgusting and potent fermented beverages with villagers all over the world. I like to travel, but I like to be comfortable, know where I’m going, and stay physically safe. I wish I were a true adventurer – I think I’m just a tourist after all. But I’m glad Cahill wrote about all these places and experiences so I could get the vicarious thrills.

Nice sense of humor, too. Quite a hoot, this book.

Hmm, the first time I had it – when I was 4. It was from a can. I was living in Puerto Rico at the time. Rubbery and salty, but I didn’t hate it.

Second time: in a seafood salad at a Greek restaurant in Toronto. Wowza! This was from a much bigger octopus, I believe. They knew how to do it right. Not one bit rubbery. Delicious meaty flavor. The suckers were crunchy and kind of fun.

Third/fourth times: whole baby octopi, marinated in kinda an Asian barbecue sauce, at a sushi restaurant. Divine if you don’t think about squishing their little heads.

I may have to give up eating octopi because I just learned that they’re pretty smart. Then again…nope. They taste good. They’re an animal. I’m not going to base my eating on my gut reaction as to how sentient a particular species is. Although I would have a hard time eating primate, probably.

I’m pretty sure an octopus would eat ME, if it could or was disposed to doing so.

Okay, it’s flawed, definitely. I think there’s a lot that could’ve been done to make this movie better.

I disagree with some earlier entries written about it. I think there was plenty of character development, given that you can’t really make a character-driven movie that is plotted this way – unless you make it a miniseries. It was a bit hard to notice because the plot was foremost, but it was obvious to me that the main sympathetic characters were not just “stock”. Some of them had (at least) conflicting interests, internal warring, etc.

I did not feel that the movie gave the impression that the rich and powerful are all to blame. Rather, I really felt convicted as a relatively ignorant consumer of oil. Certainly, I was appalled at the amount of power and money being thrown around. But I felt that the implicit point (not explicitly stated in the movie, that I remember) was that we as consumers simply do not know what is involved with procuring and ensuring the supply of the petroleum that we’ve come to depend on – and that we would rather not know. Because it’s a complicated, painful, dirty business. Maybe not as dirty as the movie suggests. I don’t doubt it’s exaggerated – the movie does have an agenda after all. But it makes me wonder – how DOES the oil industry work, then? And why don’t I know anything about it? And given the amount of money involved, can we really trust people in power to tell the truth about what actually happens in the course of procuring and distributing oil?

The American consumer don’t appear in the movie, but it would have been a good thing to put us in there, somehow. Throwing out bushels of plastic containers, wasting fuel by driving 2 blocks to pick up fast food…too bad they couldn’t come up with a subplot involving the consumer. Because where the hell else is all of that oil going?

What I really got from this movie: the sense that the average American really does not get it (what our relationship to the Mideast truly is), or chooses not to get it. Because it’s dry, boring, hard to understand, etc. Difficult to sum up in a 2 minute TV news bit. Painful to contemplate.

Watch it. You might not get it, so watch it again. You don’t have to agree with it by any means, but at least let it raise some questions for you…

It felt too much like your standard indie with no budget. A little too purposefully edgy.

But it gets steadily more interesting! I’m definitely going to have to watch it at least one more time before I send it back to Netflix, because I think I missed some bits. But that’s awesome. It’s rare that a movie is interesting enough to lose me, EVER. So when one does, I am captivated.

Need to watch it with an engineer friend or two. I’m sure they would get a kick out of it.

I am drawn to autobiographies of people who are ill, or who work with people who are ill. Mental illness, especially, I find fascinating – mainly because of the mysteries associated with it. Illness that should be treated as such (like any other), and yet it raises questions about the human condition. In many cases, it seems a pathological exacerbation of commonly occuring human traits. I myself have been and probably will be, at times, depressed, anxious, obsessed, compulsive, deluded, compartmentalized, manic, moody, etc. It’s just that I have a brain chemistry that bounces back from these moments, and coping skills to keep them from ruining my life.

Anyhow, what I appreciate about this book especially is the humanity in it. The patients Slater sees are strange in their behavior, but she finds a way to make them human and comprehensible to the reader. I was especially moved by a scene in which she leads a group therapy session with a bunch of chronic schizophrenics. In frustration, instead of focusing on behavioral normalization, Slater gets the group to “join” one of the individuals in his delusion, and in that process, they seem to actually connect on an emotional level. I understood suddenly how isolating it must be to have delusions that no one else can experience, and to not be able to control one’s behavior.

I was saddened/gladdened/overwhelmed by another chapter that dealt with a patient (formerly an Ivy League student) who was compelled to write but could not produce recognizable thoughts, at least on his own, and was aware of his loss. Slater acted as an editor, picking out the themes in his writings and editing them into poems. The patient was given back (in some ways) coherent images of his past, coherent speech.

I cried over this chapter (can’t remember the last time I cried over a book). I thought immediately of an undergraduate classmate and friend of mine, a smart and loving guy, whose poetry was almost unintelligible (yet beautiful) to me when I was in workshop with him. I later learned that he suffered a major psychotic break a year later (after I had left school). I recognized him in the story Slater told, although it is not about him – I don’t know where he is now. I hope and pray that he can find someone to sort out his jumbled creative thoughts for him, even as they help him remember to bathe and tie his shoes (if that’s what he needs now).

I work in human services. So often, we are concerned with meeting people’s physical needs – food, clothing, shelter. This book made me question Maslow’s hierarchy (as does Slater in the book). Just because people lack self-care skills or even the ability to communicate does not mean they don’t also long for connection, transcendence, love.

I haven’t read any of Cherryh stuff (except Cyteen, which I liked), so thought I would try this one. It’s OK. Nothing too novel, although I like atevi as a fictional species. I’ve heard all the “human but not” implications many times before. Not a big fan of the style of this book – too much of it is the main character’s internal dialogue. That gets really tiresome, although it makes sense given the plot of the book (he’s in the dark a lot of the time, and trying desperately to figure things out on his own). But I found it interesting enough that I’ll definitely read more Cherryh, although probably not anything in the Foreigner series for awhile.

Really, pretty common-sense stuff, although it’s presented in a “hippy-dippy” fashion. Learn how meditating, drinking more water, eating healthy foods, exercising, socializing, and cultivating your spiritual life can improve your energy levels. Interesting insights into how fear of all kinds can rob you of energy.

I’ve been trying a few strategies from this book, and they seem to be working. One insight that I’ve really taken to heart is the statement that all of the items above serve as “food” for life – I find it easy to feed myself with food, but often forget that the other items are also vital fuel for living.

More Ellen Gilchrist. The best story (at least I think so) in this book is the title story, in which the psychiatrist of a group of wealthy, messed-up, well-connected, suppressed individuals has a breakdown and goes nuts himself. Better than I would have expected.

Again, I am loving the way Gilchrist makes characters human – I suspect if I met some of these people in real life, I would dislike them. But through the magic of fiction, I am able to see their vulnerability. And I am touched.

Plus there are some very slyly funny bits throughout, even in the darkest tales.

Gilchrist is really tempting me to move to the South.

So, I spent 2 years in San Juan as a small child – my parents were teaching school. I remember Puerto Rico, but I only remember stuff that I child would recall – colors, sounds, etc.

Strange to read this book – written about a San Juan many years before I got there – including all of the sordid bits I never would have witnessed as a child. I don’t know how to evaluate the truthfulness of this novel. I feel there must be some truth to it, as it reads like a novel written by a journalist – albeit a fantastical one. I can’t speak for the sordid parts, but Thompson gets the FEEL, the sounds, smells, and physical FEELING of the place – this, at least, rings true for me.

Enjoyable – not as fun as reading about Dr. Gonzo, but it had its moments.

Kingsolver is good as always. Some really sad bits in this book, but not depressing, exactly. So many different settings for these stories. I think the author must be a well-travelled woman, to write with such clarity about so many different places.