BOOKS!1! Also TJ & Dave. Also Promissory Notes.

So: in the last several months, I have read a lot of books. Primarily fiction, but with some other things thrown in too.
I love books. The printed word is one of my favorite media. There's something about turning pages that just jives with my jabbers, and you know, reading is great too. Anyway, to start, here's a near-comprehensive list of the things I've read since, perhaps, May, in no order:

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
The Moviegoer by Walker Percy
Home by Marilynne Robinson
Whose Community? Which Interpretation? by Merold Westphal
Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann
The Unlikely Disciple by Kevin Roose
Wittgenstein's Poker by David Edmonds & John Eidinow
The Mysteries of Pittsburgh by Michael Chabon
The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
the curious incident of the dog in the nighttime by Mark Haddon
Brooklyn by Colm Toibin
The End of Memory by Miroslav Volf
Confessions of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins
Nine Stories by J.D. Salinger
i told me so by Gregg A. Ten Elshof
Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan
Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
Scott Pilgrim Series 1-6 by Bryan Lee O'Malley

I also read a bunch of poetry books and plays but they're for some other post.
This is what I would like to do: write up sparkly little blurbs for most of these in the next couple of weeks. I adored them almost without exception, and would like to give thoughtful recommendations with specific reasons why they would be worth your time.

FURTHERMORE

Wednesday night I got to see my favorite performing duo, TJ and Dave, at the usual time and place, and afterward went to a little all-night coffee shop to catch up with some friends. It was very late. Dave walked in after we arrived and used the bathroom there! Then he came out! THEN I mustered my courage! AND THEN I approached him, told him how much I admired his work and have been influenced by it, and he shook my hand and said, "thanks!" All in all, it was a wonderful night. 

Here is a picture of TJ and Dave. They are by far my favorite improvisers, and are more or less why I am still interested in improv at this point in my life. I love them. If you see them some Wednesday night in Chicago, you will understand why. I intend to write a lot about them in the future. 

Dave is actually on the left, TJ on the right. They are in a typical pose.





FURTHERMORE

From now on, readers may expect at least one non-sequitur per post. Like "jives with my jabbers." Well, either a non-sequitur, or plain old-fashioned gibberish, I guess, but yeah.