find me on
 
twitter del.icio.us
linkedin flickr
goodreads flixster
facebook aim
dopplr stackoverflow
tweets
 
del.icio.us
 
recent posts
 
history
 
July 2008
M T W T F S S
    Aug »
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031  
 
jason.prado (@) gmail.com real tangible
 
Twitter Updates for 2008-07-21
 
  • el buen sabor. as good as always. #
  • got up for a minute and when I came back the chair I was sitting on on the sidewalk was gone. <3 mission. #
  • flight delayed. got two hours to kill in sfo now. airports need wiis. or integrated brothels. #
  • these kids keep screaming at the top of their lungs. this dude is awakened and just starts yelling at them. crowd cheers. #
  • I won’t land until nearly 4am, no buses left. is it acceptable to ask a crowd for a ride into Seattle? seriously, is that okay? #
  • definitely asked a crowd of strangers for a ride. no dice. #
  • found a dude going right to my neighborhood, splitting a cab back. #
  • @truebethegreat @mlygng @dmacdougall nope, my bad. i forgot to pay for the hosting. can you believe it, we started the wiki 2 years ago? #
Rabbit at Rest
 

A few weeks ago I finished the Rabbit novels by John Updike. I’d started reading them summer after freshman year and I’ve had volumes 3 and 4 on my bookshelf for almost two years now.

I don’t mean to write a review, but I want to mention that Rabbit at Rest might be the best book I’ve ever read. It capstoned the series so perfectly. I was amazed at how much new and unexpected it brought to the series while staying perfectly true to the characters Updike created decades earlier. It also did a great job of depicting a changing America and one middle American’s place in it. I must admit that much of my familiarity with American history over the past few decades comes from reading Updike.

The part of the series that will always stick with me the most, though, is Janice’s frustration over seeing Rabbit change from the young hero, destined for great things, to just another mediocre commoner. Each step of Rabbit’s degradation resulted from his merely making the easiest choice he could, and the reader see where that road inevitably ends: mediocrity.

Since finishing Rabbit I’ve read The Legend of Colton H. Bryant, The Road, and now I’m on The Kite Runner. I could seriously, seriously use an uplifting read if anyone has any recommendations.