Bump, bump! — dropping off the end of the pavement onto the abandoned dirt road. I could almost feel it as I read the words “Here ends Fitzgerald’s manuscript” and continued on through notes he had written about how he intended to finish The Last Tycoon. Up until then, I had enjoyed reading this final novel at least as much as any of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s other works. He was a master of character analysis told through action. It’s a pity that a sudden heart attack interrupted his work.

I have now read four of Fitzgerald’s five novels all in a row. The only reason why I omitted his second novel, The Beautiful And The Damned, is because I don’t own a copy. I received a set of only four novels among other books from my first wife when we separated. I could be making this up, but I think they had belonged to her parents who were Pentecostals and therefore disposed of the one book because of the word “damned” in the title. If they had read the other books, I’m sure they would have gotten rid of them, too.

Of all of Fitzgerald’s novels, my favorite turned out to be — not The Great Gatsby, but rather Tender Is The Night. This story bored me at first, but I stuck with it on the strength of the pleasure I derived from Fitzgerald’s earlier novels and my own stubbornness about finishing a book once I’ve started it. By the end of the first “book,” however, he had me hooked. This story penetrated me in ways that I can’t even talk about yet.

All in all, my journey with Fitzgerald delighted me. As with most popular notions, the picture of the dismal spokesman for The Lost Generation falls far short of the man it’s meant to portray. I’m only sorry he didn’t write more.

After about a year and a half, I’ve finished reading Shakespeare’s works.  I could have accomplished this more quickly, but I consciously slowed down to enjoy the experience.  At my age, I consider it unlikely that I will ever read all of Shakespeare again, so I wanted to get as much as I could out of every play or poem.

Of course, I had read many of these before, some of them multiple times.  One of my high school English classes was devoted entirely to Shakespeare.  One of my teachers gave me a copy of Shakespeare’s Sonnets, which I read at age 18.  Nevertheless, I discovered new wonders in both the familiar and the novel.

Interestingly, the group of works that I was most sorry to leave behind were the historical plays.  Of these, I had previously read only Richard III, and I had seen Henry V performed twice.  I found each of these plays most interesting, especially Shakespeare’s portrayal of the psychology of the kings.  He makes you feel that they’re very human, and that royalty weighs heavily even on those who desire it most.

Re-reading Hamlet for perhaps the fourth or fifth time confirmed again my high opinion of this play.  I’m always amazed by its depth of characters.  Polonius, who might have been a mere caricature of obsequiousness, displays some fine insights into life.  Even Claudius is not painted entirely in black – we’re given a glimpse of his struggles with his guilt that almost makes us pity him.

Once again I was surprised by how much I appreciated Romeo and Juliet.  If you just rattle off the the plot, it sounds ridiculously romantic.  But Shakespeare builds out both the strengths and weaknesses of his characters in such a believable fashion that you can’t help being taken by the story.

When I reached the Sonnets, I was surprised that in my earlier reading of them (more than thirty years ago) I entirely missed the homoerotic references in many of these poems.  Although some scholars interpret these as hyperbolic praise of a friend, I find it difficult to reconcile Shakespeare’s expressions of physical admiration and jealousy towards this young man as anything less than what he later expresses for the dark lady.  Perhaps Shakespeare wasn’t a practicing bisexual (in one sonnet, he wishes that the young man were a woman so he could make love to him), but he certainly didn’t keep his feelings in the closet.

In Venus and Adonis, Shakespeare gives his most graphic descriptions of sexual desire.  Venus desires Adonis, who is not interested in reciprocating.  Thus, it’s natural that the poem, which is almost told from Venus’ viewpoint, spends more time praising the beauty of Adonis than that of Venus.  Nevertheless, in light of the Sonnets I wonder if Shakespeare may have found Venus’ voice quite natural, especially in expressing her frustration of desire and eventual loss of Adonis, just as he apparently lost the love of the young man of the Sonnets.

Lest anyone think that I’m homophobic, I admire Shakespeare’s ambiguity on this point.  I don’t happen to share his apparent desire for a man, but I honor his honesty and ability to express it without explicitly “taking sides” on the issue.  Shakespeare is first and foremost a complete human – and he shows us all aspects of humanity as brilliantly as anyone ever has.

The wind of a passing semi blows the pages of my book into confusion, and I lose my place.  I look at my watch – a few more minutes until the Kitsap Transit bus should arrive.  Here comes one now – I squint to make out the “SORRY NOT IN SERVICE” on its marquee.  Two more like that one go by before the “90 POULSBO” bus pulls over to greet me.

It’s a big, smooth riding bus.  I settle into my window seat, find my place again, and resume reading The Art of the MetaObject Protocol.  Like all things Lisp, the simplicity, elegance, and completeness of this protocol impress me – though not as much as I was hoping they would.  There have been no moments of euphoric revelation for me in this book – it just makes perfect sense.  I start thinking about how this concept could be applied to Ruby, and wondering if someone already has.

Then it occurs to me to question why Lisp has defgeneric at all.  Isn’t there enough information in defmethod’s parameters to construct the generic case internally?  Defgeneric seems to roughly correspond to the methods of an abstract class in other languages – and while abstract classes are sometimes useful, they don’t always need to be expressed.  Sometimes statically typed languages require abstract classes in order to allow objects of any derived class to be passed as a parameter, but duck typing languages like Ruby relieve us of that requirement.  Why does Lisp need to define an abstract prototype of a method?

In Poulsbo, I transfer to a much smaller bus heading to Silverdale.  The first seat I take leans too far back and won’t come forward, so I move to another row.  When we get out onto the 60MPH highway, the little bus rattles as if it’s going to fall apart.  I find it impossible to read without a headache, so I patiently await our arrival at Kitsap Mall.  There, I step off the bus and walk through the mall – nothing open, it’s 8AM.  I proceed out the back door and down Silverdale Way, turning left on Ridgetop to head towards The Doctors Clinic.

It’s a beautiful morning, great for a walk.  I spot a little coffee stand up ahead, and decide to grab a triple grande breve since I’m early for my appointment.  I’ve been off coffee for about a month, but what the hell.  My wife and I have also been off alcohol for more than three months, except for one night on which we shared a bottle of wine.  The wine didn’t do that much for me, and I can honestly say I don’t miss drinking.  But when the barista hands me the cup and I take one sip – euphoria!  My entire body tingles all over, and my vision grows suddenly brighter.  I know it isn’t good for me, though, and I’ll stop again after this cup.

The doctor hears a murmur, and orders an echocardiogram.  Later in the lab, I’m lying on my side with my shirt off while the technician presses the greasy ultrasound sensor to my ribs.  Over my shoulder I can see the screen.

“Is that a valve?” I ask.  It looks just like the textbook pictures.

“Yes,” the tech replies.  She spends about forty minutes getting all sorts of views of both valves and recording the murmur, which sounds like a loud swoosh after every beat.  As I watch the screen, it occurs to me that I’m looking at my own heart.  Here’s this pump that’s been reliably doing its job 24/7 for more than fifty years (including duty in utero), yet this is the first time I’ve ever inspected it.  Keep on keepin’ on, old fella.

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Lately I’ve been reading Shakespeare with breakfast.  I’m almost done with the comedies, and I’ve been enjoying them immensely.  Shakespeare is the master of puns, as well as plot-related comedy.  He knows how to create humor by what a character doesn’t know, but the audience does.

But this morning, my wife and son were reading aloud together in the kitchen:  Henry and the Clubhouse, by Beverly Cleary.  She’s such an entertaining author that I just listened and laughed — I didn’t even miss my Shakespeare.  If he had been there, I bet he would’ve put down his quill and listened, too.

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Yesterday was the first anniversary of my first post on TechRepublic’s IT Consultant blog.  While they pay me enough to make it as worthy of my attention as any of my other clients, the real value for me has been demonstrated in the more general principle of “if you really want to learn something well, write about it for a public audience” — especially one that can respond immediately in comments.  I’ve learned a lot from my fellow consultants, along with the research and thought that go into writing each post.  It’s made me a better consultant.  I’m happier about the work I’m doing, and I’m making more money at it.  My thanks to Jason Hiner and Toni Bowers for hiring me after I lambasted TR.  And of course, much of the credit for the blog’s success goes to my excellent editor, Mary Weilage, without whom I would be likely to brazenly split infinitives, use phrases whose subject don’t agree with their verb, and leave prepositions dangling off.  Actually, she does much more than correct my grammar:  she includes relevant links, SEOs the titles, and organizes the posts.

Today I finished reading The Stars My Destination, by Alfred Bester.  Wow.  I don’t want to spoil anything for those who haven’t read it, but I’ll make one comment about the ending.  I like where Bester left it, because to go any further would almost be impossible by definition — so he leaves the sequel to your imagination instead.  Reading this story has rekindled my interest in Science Fiction — stories that start from a “What if?” but inevitably lead back to an examination of the human condition.  So, I decided to finish the anthology in which Bester’s story was included — which begins with Re-Birth, by John Wyndham.

Tomorrow my wife and I go on diets.  She’s going for an Atkinsesque low-carb ketosis induction, in contrast to our recent habits which she affectionately calls the “no carb left behind” diet.  I’m going back to a strict interpretation of the Blood Type Diet for myself.  It has worked for me long-term, but over the past year I’ve let some bad habits creep in.  For instance, as I write this I’m sipping my last cup of coffee for the foreseeable future.  It’s back to Green Tea for me tomorrow.  Fortunately, as a Type O my diet is pretty compatible with Atkins, so we won’t have to eat in separate rooms — except for when she wants to escape my stinky breakfast.

Extra points for connecting this post’s title and subject matter.

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