Caves of Steel by Isaac Asimov

Asimov's Caves of Steel is reported to be one of the first cross over science fiction detective stories.

The story takes place thousands of years in the future. But I'd swear I was reading a novelized episode of The Andy Griffith Show. Elijah Baily talks and acts just like Barney Fife. He's prone to wild emotional outbursts and totally irrational accusations. The robot, Daneel Olivaw responds to Baily exactly the way Sheriff Andy Taylor responded to Deputy Fife, with calm rational arguments that do nothing to persuade the irrational detective. The dialog between Baily and his wife was unbelievably ridiculous.

And we were more than 100 pages into the novel before they even started investigating the crime. 200 pages in, and I still haven't seen any empirical evidence pointing to the murderer.

If you're interested in the history of science fiction, you might find this novel interesting. But if you're looking for an entertaining story skip it. 

Two Spanish Language Learning Programs

I've been trying to teach myself Spanish with a couple of computer based training programs. The first program I tried, Transparent Spanish. This program has been pretty good for helping me build reading a vocabulary. But I had a very difficult time listening to the recorded speech. The parts of the program devoted to helping you develop listening and speaking skills lack instruction.

This second program, Pronounce It Perfectly explained why I had difficulty discerning words while listening. Apparently in Spanish not every syllable is pronounced. If a word ends in a vowel and the following word starts with the same vowel, the words are run together and only one syllable is pronounced. Sure that makes pronunciation easier, but that makes it much harder for people like me to develop listening skills.

My one complaint with Pronounce It Perfectly, is the timing. After listening to a phrase, the program asks you to repeat it. But half the time, the program doesn't give you enough time to say the whole phrase before it moves to the next one.

I wouldn't recommend relying solely on either of these programs. But both have their strengths and weaknesses. Using them together I'm building at least a little skill.

 

Update Feb 2023: Neither of the programs mentioned above held my attention very long. In Aug 2022 I started using duolingo, and that has held my attention longer than any other language learning program.

Royal Classics

I've been using the Royal Classics Recital guitar strings for about 4 months. I absolutely love them. These strings give my guitar a beautifully rounded sound.

But these strings do have their down side. The G-string is a little tinny when open (though it sounds fine when fingered). The strings are more sensitive to the weather than the D'Addario. With the D'Addarios, I only had to retune the strings daily for the first couple of weeks. After that, they stabilized. I've been using the Royal Classics for several months now and I still have to retune them almost daily.

Also lately, I've been playing several songs with drop D tuning. Going back and forth between the D and E tuning makes the sixth string lose it's tune even more often. But it's worth it to get the beautiful sound.

You are your own Gym

I picked up You are Your Own Gym because I have only a 110 barbell set.

The good: lots of different exercises you can do with just your body and stuff around the house, like chairs, towels, phone books, etc.  Lauren shows how to exercise nearly every muscle group, and how to vary the intensity for beginners to more advanced fitness levels. I've only tried a couple of the exercises so far, but they do seem to be challenging.

The bad: Lauren's statements about aerobic exercise and nutrition are totally wrong. Lauren states you don't need aerobic exercise to burn fat, just increase your lean muscle mass. Most people probably need to do both. Lauren also states that you need 2 g of protein for every lb of your target body weight. That's only true for competitive bodybuilders. The average person does fine with 0.8-1.2 g of protein for target body weight.

Using Lauren's exercises may help improve your fitness. But make sure to include some aerobic exercises, and get your nutrition information from a better source.

 

Update Feb 2023: Recent studies have  shown that walking within the first hour after eating lowers blood sugar, which is essential for burning fat and maintaining a healthy weight. So Lauren's assertion that  you don't need aerobic exercise to burn fat has again been proven wrong.

Lightning, A poor beginning

I've  started reading blogs about writing. One of the blogs I read said that the purpose of the first chapter is not to start the plot, but to help the reader become invested in the main character; get them curious or interested in what happens to this character.

Also this week, I start reading Dean Koontz's Lightning. I see that the first few pages are from the POV of a throw-away character. We need to get to the second chapter before the main character is even old enough to have a point of view. This was very annoying to me, and managed to hammer in the point of the blog I just read. I almost put the book down. But a lot of people like Koontz, so I'll try and read a little further to see if there is anything else I can learn from him.