Now I have a better sense of what dopamine is. This stuff apparently “flows along these circuits in anticipation of the event itself.” Anticipating a pleasure can be more pleasurable than experiencing that pleasure itself - meaning part of happiness is having something to look forward to - and enjoying that inbetween time.

That is part of Eduardo Punset’s argument in The Happiness Trip: A Scientific Journey, a book that approaches the pursuit of happiness from a scientific perspective. Basically, Eduardo argues that much of what we pursue in our quest for happiness are not actually factors that’ll trigger feelings of happiness in our brains.

More of my review here.

This book’s a sort of surreal, absurdist collection of very short stories — A mother, bitten by a mosquito, slowly swells up and floats to the ceiling. Pirates break into a boy’s house — to steal his fathers’ vacation slides. My favorite is “Traitors”: A guy’s about to get hung for treason, and his mom couldn’t be more proud:

“I recognize my mother’s large, festive sun hat in the throng of bloodthirsty early-risers. A manicured hand waves enthusiastically to me. I acknowledge it in miserable embarrassment, wiggling my fingers in front of my thighs…. A bouquet of flowers arcs into the air and plops at my feet. “For Christ’s sake, mom!” I sputter.”

Would you separate wheat grains from rat shit in your quest to eat local? One couple gave it a try—until they found weevils hiding in the grains.

That couple’s Alisa Smith and J.B. Mackinnon, who’ve now detailed their year-long experiment to eat only stuff grown or raised within a 100-mile radius from their Vancouver home in Plenty: One Man, One Woman, and a Raucous Year of Eating Locally.

More of my review here.

Isn’t summer’s the perfect time to start an exciting DIY project? I may just think this because I’m on vacation, but check out A Slice of Organic Life, a new colorful book detailing over 90 stand-alone green-inspired projects, and you’ll likely get the DIY bug goo.

Full of gorgeous pictures, this coffee-table book’s organized in 3 sections, by size of yard — starting off with “No need for a yard” and moving to “Yard, community garden, or field.”

As an apartment gal, I of course found the beginning parts most manageable — especially the stuff I’ve already done….

The rest of my review’s here.

One of the more quick, straightforward books that Freud wrote.

Civilization and Its Discontents basically asks why people are so neurotic and unhappy, despite all the benefits civilization’s supposed to have brought us. Freud contends that civilization - with its emphasis on community structures and monogamous relationships - frustrates people’s basic desires to fuck lots of different people and treat others like shit.

Of course Freud stops short of putting a judgement value on civilization, though he does draw parallels between it and religious principles (i.e. “Do not commit adultery” and “Love your neighbor”), which he does condemn:

Its technique consists in depressing the value of life and distorting the icture of the real world in a delusional manner—which presuppposes an intimidation of the intelligence. At this price, by forcibly fixing them in a state of psychical infantilism and by drawing them into a mass-delusion, religion succeeds in sparing many people an individual neurosis. But hardly anything more.

I wonder if Freud’s popularity and legacy had more to do with a frustration with religious structures and rules than the value of his theories….

About a man who loses the last 24 years of his memory. Explores experience and memory and the idea of self.

A collection of short stories, some of which share characters. It has a few moments, but is overall unexciting. If you’re interested in Brat Pack stuff, I recommend you read Brett Easton Ellis instead.

A book of poems written by one of the members of my dissertation committee.

Food Not Lawns: How to Turn Your Yard Into a Garden and Your Neighborhood Into a Community isn’t just about growing food. In fact, the book’s vision is a much broader, far-ranging one about building communities and neighborhoods — and movements to benefit these new groups.

The gist is this: Grow organic gardens, and use that process to build a self-sustaining, more interactive and interrelational community that’ll help protect environment, individual health — as well as provide a whole slew of other interpersonal benefits.

The rest of my review’s here.

The little brochures about fair trade you get at tabling events probably won’t answer all your questions, but fair trade newbies usually aren’t ready to pick up Daniel Jaffee’s tome Brewing Justice either.

Now, a new book — Fair Trade: A Beginner’s Guide by Jacqueline Decarlo — that attempts to cover that in-between space will be published next month. Written by the former director of the Fair Trade Resource Network, Fair Trade’s designed to give you a relatively quick but more in-depth look at what the fair trade movement’s all about, and how you can take part in it.

The rest of my review’s here.