What's on your nightstand?

[usgiorgi]

I sincerely hope you have no children in your family.

and not because I'm afraid they'll steal the keys to your car

No children. I'm just 21 years old and still in college. I have that gun because my apartment isn't in the nicest of neighborhoods... Yes, I'm moving next semester. Just a month ago while I was at a party at my friends, my neighbor called and said that she saw 2 men looking into my apartment window. Just because you don't like me from the other thread, doesn't mean I'm an incompetent when it comes to guns. All of my guns are locked up other than my carry pistol. No, I don't carry when I go to classes. It stays in my car. Yes, I love my 2nd amendment rights .

[TheCastro]

No children. I'm just 21 years old and still in college. I have that gun because my apartment isn't in the nicest of neighborhoods... Yes, I'm moving next semester. Just a month ago while I was at a party at my friends, my neighbor called and said that she saw 2 men looking into my apartment window. Just because you don't like me from the other thread, doesn't mean I'm an incompetent when it comes to guns. All of my guns are locked up other than my carry pistol. No, I don't carry when I go to classes. It stays in my car. Yes, I love my 2nd amendment rights .

You do need a license to carry loaded handgun in your vehicle.


Sent from the "truth hurts get over it" hater factory that is my mind

[adp]

No children. I'm just 21 years old and still in college. I have that gun because my apartment isn't in the nicest of neighborhoods... Yes, I'm moving next semester. Just a month ago while I was at a party at my friends, my neighbor called and said that she saw 2 men looking into my apartment window. Just because you don't like me from the other thread, doesn't mean I'm an incompetent when it comes to guns. All of my guns are locked up other than my carry pistol. No, I don't carry when I go to classes. It stays in my car. Yes, I love my 2nd amendment rights .

All good to hear (except About the guys looking in your window)

I don't dislike you. I think many of your ideas are naive. There's a big difference.

[urinalcake]

ou do need a license to carry loaded handgun in your vehicle.

Pretty sure this varies from state to state. Or are you citing some piece of fed legislation?

[1sttimevolvo]

Pretty sure this varies from state to state.

You're correct. Some states no permit is required to have in vehicle so long as it's not concealed. Some states define "under the seat" as concealed, but not so if stored in a glove box.

[gdill2]

Just started "The Way of the World " by Nicolas Bouvier (translation by Robyn Marsack from French).

A review from Amazon dot com...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Way of the World takes me back to when a generation traveled the world with backpacks, motorcycles and VW buses. It is a travel log set in the late fifties, of two casual travelers in their early twenties, who set off on a trip from Europe to India to explore the backroads and see life in its essence as lived by the local people. The book paints the pictures of gypsys, artists, mountain families and ancient cities with bazaars, using local color and the eye of an artist. Those who have traveled with similiar resources will enjoy the challenges of the innovative repair of an old Fiat in the middle of a desert, the capricousness of venturing into another country with only pocketchange, and the discovery that most people in the world do have a love of strangers.
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http://www.amazon.com/World-York-Rev...By=addFourStar


The introduction (2001) is by Patrick Leigh Fermor and I have now read all of his non-fiction travel stuff including these...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/66-9780719566851-0

http://www.powells.com/biblio/66-9780719561061-0

George Dill

[urinalcake]

You're correct. Some states no permit is required to have in vehicle so long as it's not concealed. Some states define "under the seat" as concealed, but not so if stored in a glove box.

Yeah I am pretty sure that in some states, you can have the handgun in the car but during a traffic stop you must either 1) place it on the dash in plain sight or 2) if you cant get to it without making the officer very nervous and/or trigger happy, you must immediately notify the officer that you have said firearm in the vehicle and then they will instruct you to get it while they watch you.

[gdill2]

Just started "Tales of the New World" by Sabina Murray...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780802170835-0

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Review:

"Most of PEN/Faulkner Award — winner Murray's new story collection (after her 2007 novel Forgery) delves into the psyches of historical explorers and adventurers, affording rare glimpses of vulnerability in those who appear invulnerable. In 'Translation,' wealthy 15th-century translator Antonio Pigafetta befriends Ferdinand Magellan on an expedition to the Indies and records sailors' atrocities; after reading his journal, Magellan asks him to embellish the truth and alter the course of history. 'The Solace of Monsters' imagines the chance meeting of Zimri Coffin, captain of the Dauphin, and Capts. Pollard and Ramsdell of the Essex, who Coffin rescues after their ship is 'stove in by a whale.' 'Balboa' concerns the discovery and naming of the South Sea by the famous Spanish conquistador ('Vasco Nunez de Balboa ascends the mountain alone. His one thousand Indians and two hundred Spaniards wait at the foot of the mountain as if they are Israelites and Balboa alone is off to speak with God'); standing on the side of a mountain with just his dog Leoncico for company, Balboa has a rare, and humorous, defenseless moment despite his ruthless reputation. Murray's spirited writing is rooted in humanity and creates a fine sense of the real behind the lore. (Nov.)" Publishers Weekly Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Synopsis:

In her first collection of stories since her PEN/Faulkner-winning The Caprices, Sabina Murray confronts the manipulation, compassion, ambition, and controversy surrounding some of the most intrepid and sadistic pioneers of the last four millennia.
Iconic explorers and settlers are made intimately human as they plow through the un-navigated boundaries of their worlds to give shape to modern geography, philosophy, and science. As Ferdinand Magellan sets out on his final voyage, he forms an unlikely friendship with a rich scholar who harbors feelings for the captain, but in the end cannot save Magellan from his own greed. Balboas peek at the South Sea may never have happened if it wasnt for his loyal and vicious dog, Leonico, and an unavoidable urge to relieve himself. And Captain Zimri Coffin is plagued by sleepless nights after reading Frankenstein, that is until his crew rescues two shipwrecked Englishmen who carry rumor of a giant and deadly white whale lurking in the depths of the ocean.

With her signature blend of sophistication and savagery, darkness and humor, Sabina Murray investigates the complexities of faith, the lure of the unknown, and the elusive mingling of history and legend.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Just finished "The Way of the World" bt Nicolas Bouvier (translated from French by Lady Robyn Marsack with an introduction by Patrick Leigh Fermor)...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/18-9781590173220-0

-------------------------------------------------------------------
In 1953, twenty-four-year old Nicolas Bouvier and his artist friend Thierry Vernet set out to make their way overland from their native Geneva to the Khyber Pass. They had a rattletrap Fiat and a little money, but above all they were equipped with the certainty that by hook or by crook they would reach their destination, and that there would be unanticipated adventures, curious companionship, and sudden illumination along the way. The Way of the World, which Bouvier fashioned over the course of many years from his journals, is an entrancing story of adventure, an extraordinary work of art, and a voyage of self-discovery on the order of Robert M. Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. As Bouvier writes, “You think you are making a trip, but soon it is making—or unmaking—you.”
------------------------------------------------------------------

George Dill

[gdill2]

Finished this...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9780802170835-0

...but now remember why I usually avoid "Best Sellers".

Finally wrapped up Volume One of Mark Twain's autobiography - worthy as any capable paper weight.

Just returned to "Native Universe - Voices of Indian America" - a coffee table tome with rare photographs and accurate historical descriptions of pole-to-pole American Indian life...

http://books.google.com/books?id=9LS...son%22&f=false

Speaking of avoiding best sellers - arriving soon in my snailmail is...

http://www.amazon.com/dp/037550494X/...60_cs_sce_dp_1

...yet another female's views on male-domination and human conflict. This one is 800+ pages.

George Dill

[gdill2]

Just wrapped up "A World on Fire: Britain's Crucial Role in the American Civil War" by Amanda Foreman.

From the www...
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Amanda Foreman's " World on Fire" twelve years in the making and over 900 pages long, is not for the faint-hearted. It is not "Gone with the Wind" or "War and Peace" as some reviewers have suggested. There are no page-turning romances and women are very minor characters. But for the hard-core history buff, "World on Fire" is in some ways better than these great classic novels. It's plot zigzags among 200 characters -- including farmers, soldiers, cartoonists, politicians and labor leaders. It is gritty, off-center, more alive and more disturbing than these broad ranging novels. Unsentimental and a take-no-prisoners, bracing writing style, "World on Fire" is a work of great richness and descriptive power, a complex treat for those with strong concentration powers who don't mind an often confusing and abruptly changing plot strewn with dozens and dozens of unknown characters.
-------------------------------------------------------------------

I don't usually seek details of humans killing humans but the book shows solid research and composition.

The reader may be left with the impression that we humans are the bottom-feeders of the natural world.

Next up is the latest version of "Democracy in America" by Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville, Harvey C. Mansfield (Translator) Delba Winthrop (Translator).

1831 was a good year to tour the USA as we had not yet lost a war.

From the www...
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
What Tocqueville finds is a unique nation. Unlike most other nascent states in history, the English who moved to America found a huge land, practically devoid of people (and in those cases where it was inhabited, they were easily killed), where everybody could be a landowner. This, plus the particular ethics of the Puritans, the glorifiaction of hard work, thrift and virtuosity, provided for a prosperous, practical people (not necessarily tolerant, especially in religious affairs). Far away from kings and emperors, Americans developed a communal democracy. So far so good, Tocquevill really admires the basic qualities of the US.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

George Dill

[adp]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...LVVT1M00T3.DTL

appropos to this thread

[gdill2]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/articl...LVVT1M00T3.DTL

appropos to this thread

I worry about the people that need a firearm. I love guns as they are beautiful machines, but have no desire to coddle one. Fear is usually warranted by undesirable aspects of ones personality.

George Dill

[gdill2]

Today's snailmail brought Tocqueville's "Democracy in America" and Jan Morris' "Coast to Coast" (written when she was James) - going with Jan first...

From: http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9781885211798-1

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Following the recent publication of Jan Morris’s final book, here is her very first. Fresh from her success reporting on the first Everest ascent in 1953, she spent a year journeying by car, train, ship, and aircraft across the United States. “I did not know it then, and nor did America, but chance had brought me across the Atlantic at the very apex of American happiness,” writes Morris in her new introduction. The author was then James Morris, and America’s identity was different then, too. In brilliant prose, Morris records with exuberance and wonder a time of innocence in America. “The prose sparkles, and everything [Morris] tells glitters.” — San Francisco Chronicle.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'll skip her book about James-to-Jan...
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Judy Crowe, April 21, 2010.

Jan Morris takes the reader not only to another place but through the transition to another gender—not showily, not heavy-handedly, but with mindfulness, respect, humor, and grace. This is an astonishing book by a wonderful writer.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

George Dill

[BlackC70]

My son got me a Kindle Fire for Christmas, and as we were going out of town right afterwards, I hurriedly downloaded the first two free books that I stumbled on, which turned out to be, "The Three Musketeers" by Alexandre Dumas, and "A Tale of Two Cities", by Dickens.

I'd read "The Three Musketeers" back in high school, but had forgotten how entertaining it was. And somehow I had gotten out of HS and college without ever having read "A Tale of Two Cities", which was actually better than I was expecting.

Obviously not too "cutting edge", but good reads, nonetheless!

If I ever get my hands on a time machine, and am tempted to go to France at some prior time period, remind me NOT to pick the late 1780's and early 1790's...... ("A Tale of Two Cities")

[adp]

My son got me a Kindle Fire for Christmas, and as we were going out of town right afterwards, I hurriedly downloaded the first two free books that I stumbled on

You are just like my mother-in-law with the free books. We gave her a Kindle, only to find that she REFUSED to buy any books (since she gets her new books from the local library). So we had to give her a gift certific iate to get her going. Plus my wife shares books with her on our account, so....

I know so many people who absolutely did not want a Kindle...then they got one and they are so addicted, now. Pretty funny. It's an amazing device. Not too sure about the Fire, as it isn't as easy on the eyes as the Kindle Fire. But it does more, of course.

Hopefully Amazon moves forward quickly with adding titles to the Libraries database. But the people who use libraries are dying off, so that won't be an issue for too long.....

On MY nightstand? The manual for a TOTO Washlet. Best invention ever. Better than ketchup. Almost.

I'm a little embarrassed that my kids bring their friends back to my bathroom and have them sit on my toilet, but....what're you gonna do? Kids are kids, and the washlet is a pretty goofy thing.

Excellent manual, by the way.

[BlackC70]

I'll buy content for my new Kindle (Fire), but was also happy to discover that our local library (Contra Costa County library system) has lots of content for download/loan. It goes away after 14 days, and there are limits to how many people can have a copy at the same time. But it's still pretty nice.

I'm not sure what you meant about the Fire not being as easy on the eyes as a regular Kindle. In terms of fonts, etc., I THINK it can be set up to duplicate the regular Kindle. I changed my default reading screen appearance over to the sepia look that has dark text on a tannish background, which I do find to be easier on the eyes than the black-on-white or white-on-black.

[adp]

I'll buy content for my new Kindle (Fire), but was also happy to discover that our local library (Contra Costa County library system) has lots of content for download/loan. It goes away after 14 days, and there are limits to how many people can have a copy at the same time. But it's still pretty nice.

I'm not sure what you meant about the Fire not being as easy on the eyes as a regular Kindle. In terms of fonts, etc., I THINK it can be set up to duplicate the regular Kindle. I changed my default reading screen appearance over to the sepia look that has dark text on a tannish background, which I do find to be easier on the eyes than the black-on-white or white-on-black.

I don't think the Fire uses the same "liquid ink" technology as the regular Kindle. It may look the same, but I don't think it IS the same. (but the regular Kindle can't handle color content, etc.)

re the library, I think there is a "national" library that you can use. You still use your local library, but you get access to more titles. Somethig like that. I'll ask my wife as she has figured it out.

But, yes, you still have like two weeks to read it and there are limited e-copies. But once your reading haboits stray from the mainstream, you'll need to start buying titles.

I think John Muir's Sierra book is free and a pretty good read, if you are into that sort of stuff.

[urinalcake]

I just googled "toto washlet"...

is it really that amazing? Do you use any TP at all?

[adp]

I just googled "toto washlet"...

is it really that amazing? Do you use any TP at all?

I did not get the washlet that blows hot air up my bum. I can get that for free, here.



so, yes, your bum is wet after the washlet does it's work, but then you just use a bit of TP to dry off. So, you probably use 1/4 of the tp you'd use otherwise.

So, eventually I will pay for the washlet with my tp savings!!!

(except that it does use a bit of electricity to warm the seat and warm the water)

I never thought I'd say this, since I actually shopped for a device that did not have a seat warmer, but the warm seat is pretty damned great. Amazing how much of an attitude-adjustment you get from it.

[gdill2]

Just wrapped up "Coast to Coast" (1956) by Jan Morris...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9781885211798-1

...and am deep into Tocqueville's "Democracy in America".

George Dill

[Crito]

I gave away my first copy to some shmuck with an MBA who thought we still lived in a free-market society.

http://www.amazon.com/Creature-Jekyl.../dp/0912986212

Book Description
Publication Date: May 1998

Where does money come from? Where does it go? Who makes it? The money magicians' secrets are unveiled. We get a close look at their mirrors and smoke machines, their pulleys, cogs, and wheels that create the grand illusion called money. A dry and boring subject? Just wait!

You'll be hooked in five minutes. Reads like a detective story - which it really is. But it's all true. This book is about the most blatant scam of all history. It's all here: the cause of wars, boom-bust cycles, inflation, depression, prosperity.

Creature from Jekyll Island is a "must read." Your world view will definitely change. You'll never trust a politician again - or a banker.

[gdill2]

Just for a break I'm letting DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA rest for a spell while I take up the pages of Thinking the Twentieth Century written by a dead guy and his live buddy...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9781594203237-2

George Dill

[BlackC70]

This may be old news to some, but I just read "Redbreast" by Jo Nesbo. It was originally published in Norway in around 2000, and first published in English in something like 2005. But I just got around to reading it in paperback. It's part of a series centered around detective Harry Hole. Not the first book in the series, but I believe it's the oldest one to have an English translation. Very well done crime fiction.

[gdill2]

Just for a break I'm letting DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA rest for a spell while I take up the pages of "Thinking the Twentieth Century" written by a dead guy and his live buddy...

http://www.powells.com/biblio/1-9781594203237-2

George Dill

"Thinking the Twentieth Century" is a must-read for those seeking the truth about how the world got into this mess...

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment...,6554862.story

George Dill

[gdill2]

My wife got a Nook Touch and bought those "The Girl Who..." books.

Just for grins I found a used Kindle Keyboard for $59 free 3G/Wi-Fi free cable/charger free ship.

Downloaded a bunch of free eBooks that most of y'all would never read - history, travel, etc.

After "Thinking the Twentieth Century" (above) I floated the Mississippi with Mark Twain, killed Indians with Zane Grey and am now deep into a Brits saga about living in a small USA town circa 1990.

This means that I may not live to see the ending of Clemens' autobiography or de Tocqueville's history.

George Dill

[gdill2]

I just finished "The Lost Symbol" another Dan Brown novel. Hard to put down.

...but not hard to set aside the Swedespeed Forums - can't really blame the guy.

No more used paperbacks for me - just the Kindle Keyboard and free ebooks with instant download.

Must buy a nightstand for the Kindle.

Finished reading these...

Rocky Mountains Exploring Expedition - John Parker - 1832.
The Last Trail - Zane Grey.
Life on the Mississippi - Mark Twain.
The Oregon Trail - Francis Parkman.
A Small Town America - Duncan Macian - 2010.
Texas - a Brief Account - 1826.

Now reading...

The Adventures of Captain Bonneville - St. Louis to Vancouver - early 1830's.

Roughing It - Mark Twain.

Up next...

Romance of the Colorado River - 1830.
Ox Team Days on the Oregon Trail.
The Frontier in America.
The War of Independence.
The Story of a Common Soldier of Army - Civil War.
Voyages of Samuel De Champlain.

George Dill

[RVAE34]

lol.. My glock

[Mad Dog Tannen]

lol.. My glock

Hehe... I prefer my XD45!

[Stormin Norman]

I just finished 'Day of Deceit' which describes the two year long campaign by the US to convince the Japanese that they must go to war with us, which lead to Pearl Harbor. P.H may have been a surprise to most on the island, but some new it was coming. Monitoring the Japanese fleet (which did not observe radio silence as the cover up claimed) Navy intel knew exactly where the fleet was before the attack.

Very well researched and documented, confirms what many have suspected for decades.

[gdill2]

This thread started with this post…

I just finished "The Lost Symbol" another Dan Brown novel. Hard to put down.

A few subsequent replies…

.45 semi-auto

1911 model

Loaded for bear...

…HK USP 45 w/ UTL and night sights
230g +P Hornady…

…taurus 40.cal

.38 revolver…

…Glock 29

I worry about the people that need a firearm. I love guns as they are beautiful machines, but have no desire to coddle one. Fear is usually warranted by undesirable aspects of one’s personality.

…SA 1911 MC Operator with 230 grain Federal HST's, and a Glock 17 (Gen 1 circa 1985) with some 147 grain Black Talons for the wife....

…Glock 22 with 2 mags loaded with Winchester SXT, and a Mossberg 500 Tactical loaded with OO Buck.

…Ruger SR40 (Fully loaded)…

lol.. My glock

Hehe... I prefer my XD45!

Just finished “The History of Western Europe” published in England in 1903 as a college text book. The author concluded that the powerful nations had developed such horrible weapons of mass destruction he was certain the leaders of the world would avoid global conflict in the future.

George Dill

[Mad Dog Tannen]

^ I just finished reading the user manual for my AR15.

Is that better? lol

[gdill2]

Just out...

"The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Volume 4" by Robert A Caro

...but the reviews said to read Volume One first so I did...

Years of Lyndon Johnson Volume 1: The Path to Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson, Vol. 1.

From the web...
----------------------------------------------------------------
Robert Allan Caro is a biographer most noted for his studies of United States political figures Robert Moses and Lyndon B. Johnson. He is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner.

Publisher Comments:

This is the story of the rise to national power of a desperately poor young man from the Texas Hill Country. The Path to Power reveals in extraordinary detail the genesis of the almost superhuman drive, energy, and ambition that set LBJ apart. It follows him from the Hill Country to New Deal Washington, from his boyhood through the years of the Depression to his debut as Congressman, his heartbreaking defeat in his first race for the Senate, and his attainment, nonetheless, at age 31, of the national power for which he hungered. In this book, we are brought as close as we have ever been to a true perception of political genius and the American political process.

A review.

This book, published in 1982, has already achieved a legendary status among history and political buffs. When it was released its' author, Robert Caro, won enormous acclaim for his unprecedented research and engrossing writing style - and plenty of criticism for his harsh and unsparing portrait of Lyndon Johnson. Caro literally spent years living in and interviewing people in the arid Texas Hill Country where Johnson was born and raised, and in the process he acquired a level of knowledge about his topic that few other biographers even approach. Like William Manchester's "Last Lion" biographies of Winston Churchill, "The Path to Power" is far more than a simple biography of the young Lyndon Johnson's desperate desire to escape the grinding poverty of rural Texas in the 1930's and achieve power in Washington. Caro writes unforgettably of the Johnson family, the culture and history of the Texas Hill Country, the incredibly corrupt political system in Texas at the time, and of how Johnson both brilliantly and cynically manipulated that system for his own purposes.
----------------------------------------------------------------

Few would have wanted LBJ as a friend.

Given that I have an intimate first-hand picture of the Texas Hill Country immediately following the years covered by Volume One and can connect with the people and places described in Caro's extraordinary biography of LBJ it appears that I will be about age 107 before I finish "Democracy in America" by Alexis-Charles-Henri Clérel de Tocqueville.

Fixinda' download Caro's Volume Two on my Kindle.

George Dill

ps: Finished reading a bunch of other stuff also but mostly free Kindle eBooks of limited interest.

[BlackC70]

Thia book has been out for a while, and is obviously well-known, but I just finished "Unbroken" by Laura Hillenbrand (also the author of "Seabiscuit"). Very good book about downed WWII aviator (and POW in Japan) Louie Zamperini, who was also a rising track star (and Olympian) prior to WWII.

It was of special interest because my wife's deceased father was also in a B-24 squadron in the Pacific (wounded, but never shot down).

Prior to reading "Unbroken", it took me forever to wade through both Part I and Part II of Cervantes' "Don Quixote", despite reading it in English translation. It was actually not bad, but it just seemed to go on and on..... It also motivated me to read a sort of "low-brow history" book on the development and role of knights and chivalry during the middle ages. One interesting little tidbit about William "the Conqueror", the Norman who conquered much of England following the battle of Hastings in 1066: Prior to acquiring the epithet of "the Conqueror", he was known as William "the Basta*d", basically because he was one... (His mother was his unmarried father's mistress.) I suppose it's still a better nickname than Pepin "the Short", or Charles "the Simple" (both real).....

[gdill2]

Now reading Caro's Volume II of his 4-volume LBJ biography...
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Publisher Comments:

Robert A. Caro's life of Lyndon Johnson, which began with the greatly acclaimed The Path to Power, also winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, continues — one of the richest, most intensive and most revealing examinations ever undertaken of an American President. In Means of Ascent the Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer/historian, chronicler also of Robert Moses in The Power Broker, carries Johnson through his service in World War II and the foundation of his long-concealed fortune and the facts behind the myths he created about it. But the explosive heart of the book is Caro's revelation of the true story of the fiercely contested 1948 senatorial election, for forty years shrouded in rumor, which Johnson had to win or face certain political death, and which he did win — by "the 87 votes that changed history." Caro makes us witness to a momentous turning point in American politics: the tragic last stand of the old politics versus the new — the politics of issue versus the politics of image, mass manipulation, money and electronic dazzle.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Also wrapped up a (yes, another) history of the USA published in 1921. These are fun reads as one gets a chuckle/tear concerning the predictions of (future) events.

George Dill

[adp]

just read The Night Curcus (fiction) - enjoyable. Well-written.

Reading a crappy Spellman novel. Meh.

Needed some downtime.