i can barely take care of myself by Jen Kirkman

"You'll Change Your Mind."

That’s what everyone says to Jen Kirkman— and countless women like her—when she confesses she doesn’t plan to have children. But you know what? It’s hard enough to be an adult. You have to dress yourself and pay bills and remember to buy birthday gifts. You have to drive and get annual physicals and tip for good service. Some adults take on the added burden of caring for a tiny human being with no language skills or bladder control. Parenthood can be very rewarding, but let’s face it, so are margaritas at the adults-only pool.

Jen’s stand-up routine includes lots of jokes about not having kids (and some about masturbation and Johnny Depp), after which complete strangers constantly approach her and ask, “But who will take care of you when you’re old?” (Servants!) Some insist, “You’d be such a great mom!” (Really? You know me so well!)

Whether living rent-free in her childhood bedroom while trying to break into comedy (the best free birth control around, she says), or taking the stage at major clubs and joining a hit TV show— and along the way getting married, divorced, and attending excruciating afternoon birthday parties for her parent friends—Jen is completely happy and fulfilled by her decision not to procreate.

I Can Barely Take Care of Myself is a beacon of hilarious hope for anyone whose major life decisions have been questioned by friends, family, and strangers in a comedy club bathroom. And it should satisfy everyone who wonders if Jen will ever know true love without looking into the eyes of her child.
~~

This book started out pretty well but petered off into something I consider amusing but not laugh out loud funny. It's probably not complimentary to Ms. Kirkman but I can't help but compare this to Jenny Lawson's Let's Pretend This Never Happened. I don't read enough humorous nonfiction to have much else to compare it to and I think it's the best example of why I didn't connect to this book more: personal connection. 

Kirkman spends a lot of time showcasing different scenarios of how her friends/family put her on the spot regarding her decision to not have children, but once the humorous part of the story ends not much else seems to happen. She gets married and gets divorced - both with almost not back story - and doesn't ever seem to come to grips with her own decision. Maybe my confusion comes about from being a bit more bitchy about the whole thing, but by the end I just wanted to tell her to get a grip, it's your life, live it as you want.

Shrug. It's ok - but check it out from the library.

Overall Feeling - B-

Series - None

Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg

Thirty years after women became 50 percent of the college graduates in the United States, men still hold the vast majority of leadership positions in government and industry. This means that women’s voices are still not heard equally in the decisions that most affect our lives. In Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg examines why women’s progress in achieving leadership roles has stalled, explains the root causes, and offers compelling, commonsense solutions that can empower women to achieve their full potential.

Sandberg is the chief operating officer of Facebook and is ranked on Fortune’s list of the 50 Most Powerful Women in Business and as one of Time’s 100 Most Influential People in the World. In 2010, she gave an electrifying TEDTalk in which she described how women unintentionally hold themselves back in their careers. Her talk, which became a phenomenon and has been viewed more than two million times, encouraged women to “sit at the table,” seek challenges, take risks, and pursue their goals with gusto.

In Lean In, Sandberg digs deeper into these issues, combining personal anecdotes, hard data, and compelling research to cut through the layers of ambiguity and bias surrounding the lives and choices of working women. She recounts her own decisions, mistakes, and daily struggles to make the right choices for herself, her career, and her family. She provides practical advice on negotiation techniques, mentorship, and building a satisfying career, urging women to set boundaries and to abandon the myth of “having it all.”  She describes specific steps women can take to combine professional achievement with personal fulfillment and demonstrates how men can benefit by supporting women in the workplace and at home.

Written with both humor and wisdom, Sandberg’s book is an inspiring call to action and a blueprint for individual growth. Lean In is destined to change the conversation from what women can’t do to what they can.
~~

Let me start by saying that I'm aware that this is a white/upper class look at Feminism in the workplace. I don't say that as a criticism and Sandberg makes it clear herself that she can only speak from her own experiences, but I recognize that minorities of all kinds might not have the opportunity to apply some of the recommendations she makes here due to circumstances.

Personally I found the book incredibly interesting, even as someone who's not sure just how high up the corporate ladder she wants to climb (or if I want to climb at all). At the heart of Sandberg's book is the fact that if we as women are not aware of the subtleties of sexism, of the ways in which other people and ourselves can act as deterrents to our own success, then we can never overcome them. Ultimately the freedom of choice is only present if we're knowledgeable and willing to negotiate with what is initially presented to us. I'm not the best negotiator and have the tendency to downplay skills that other people value, personally and professionally, so this book served as the kick in the butt I needed to remind me that even if no one else sees it I need to be proud of what I can do and what I bring to the table at work and at home.

I highly recommend this book to women of any age and even though the copy I read is from the library I'm definitely going to be purchasing this for my personal bookshelf.

"When Gloria Steinem marched in the streets to fight for the opportunities so many of us now take for granted, she quoted Susan B. Anthony, who marched in the streets before her and concluded, "Our job is not to make young women  grateful. It is to make them ungrateful so they keep going." The sentiment remains true today. We need to be grateful for what we have but dissatisfied with the status quo. This dissatisfaction spurs the charge for change. We must keep going." --pg 172

Overall Feeling - B+/A

Series - None

Teaser Tuesdays (5/22)

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

* Grab your current read
* Open to a random page
* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

"Since Victor was in New York, and Hailey was in school, I had the house to myself, which was good, because there would have been no way to maintain the sensual mystery of womanhood if anyone had heard the noises coming from that bathroom."

--pg 204-205, Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

The Gaithersburg Book Festival feat. The Bloggess!

In case you couldn't tell from my review of her new book, I'm a huge fan of Jenny Lawson. I think she's incredibly funny and yet at the same time speaks with sincerity to the crazy person in each of us. When I heard she was going to be vising Gaithersburg on the second leg of her book tour I knew I had to go - especially when I figured out that it was reachable through public transportation. 

Though I arrived hours before her scheduled time I really recommend the festival to people in the area. It was a beautiful day and the whole set up was fantastic. There were various tents set up for author talks & readings, in addition to the winding rows of publishing houses and smaller authors showcasing their own work. With food trucks on top of that and a park in the middle of a huge children's area, the event was family friendly in the very best way possible.

Now as any good event stalker will tell you, to get a good seat you have to get there early. As in I claimed a seat after the speaker before the speaker before the Bloggess. Yes this means I sat around for 45+min listening to people I had never heard of but hey - when Ms. Lawson walked out (escorted by the first cops I'd seen all day) I didn't have to do anything but sit there and enjoy. 

She started with a reading of Let's Pretend This Never Happened and then moved to a short Q & A session. I would have loved it if she'd been available longer but not only was she was one of the last speakers of the day, her autograph line was EPIC. Very much Dragon*Con proportions, as it went down a hill, wrapped around, and then went back up the hill. (Does anyone else wonder what other authors think when they see this kind of thing? Like are they happy for their peer's success, or jealous that their line had 5 people in it but they still have to sit in the sun for a while?)

I tried to balance both video and pictures so I couldn't get her whole chapter reading. I got a good half of it though and it makes me more than a little interested in purchasing the audio book (and since in general I never want to buy audio books, this says a lot). If you click over to the full video on YouTube I also included the questions (as I mostly remember them) from the Q&A. Happy Monday!

YES!

Mini Me: Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

When Jenny Lawson was little, all she ever wanted was to fit in. That dream was cut short by her fantastically unbalanced father (a professional taxidermist who created dead-animal hand puppets) and a childhood of wearing winter shoes made out of used bread sacks. It did, however, open up an opportunity for Lawson to find the humor in the strange shame spiral that is her life, and we are all the better for it.

Lawson’s long-suffering husband and sweet daughter are the perfect comedic foils to her absurdities, and help her to uncover the surprising discovery that the most terribly human moments-the ones we want to pretend never happened-are the very same moments that make us the people we are today.

Let’s Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir is a poignantly disturbing, yet darkly hysterical tome for every intellectual misfit who thought they were the only ones to think the things that Lawson dares to say out loud. Like laughing at a funeral, this book is both irreverent and impossible to hold back once you get started.
~~

I loved this book. I speak as someone who loves TheBloggess already, but this novel spoke to me on many levels. It's reassuring to find someone who's trying to be normal in the midst of being crazy. The kind of crazy that hides pretty well and yet leaves you feeling alone even when you're surrounded by people. Reading Lawson's book makes you think about how hard it can be just to go to work every day. Her words made me laugh out loud and cry a little, somewhat of rarity for me these days, and it's my new favorite book to recommend to people.

Teaser Tuesdays (4/24)

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

* Grab your current read
* Open to a random page
* Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
* BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
* Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

"She looked doubtful. I considered telling her I have lots of Asian friends, but I was pretty sure that would make it worse. The sad truth is I couldn't tell any of the white women apart either. In fact, at that point I'd had way too much to drink and I wasn't even sure who I was. I dimly hoped I was Evany Thomas. I love that girl."

--pg 178, Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

Old Dogs are the best dogs by Gene Weingarten

Anyone who has ever loved an old dog will love Old Dogs. In this collection of profiles and photographs, Weingarten and Williamson document the unique appeal of man's best friend in his or her last, and best, years.

This book is a tribute to every dog who has made it to that time of life when the hearing and eyesight begin to go, when the step becomes uncertain, but when other, richer traits ripen and coalesce. It is when a dog attains a special sort of dignity and a charm all his own.

If you've known a favorite old dog, you'll find him or her on these pages. Your dog might go by a different name and have a different shape, but you'll recognize him or her by the look in an eye or the contours of a life story. There is the dog who thinks he is a house cat; the herder, the fetcher, the punk and the peacock, the escape artist, the demolition artist, the patrician, the lovable lout, the amiable dope, the laughable clown, the schemer, the singer, the daredevil, the diplomat, the politician, the gourmand, and the thief. Plus, as a special bonus, you will find the first Latvian elkhounds ever photographed.

Old Dogs is a glorious gift book and a fitting tribute to that one dog you can't ever forget.

I bought this book last year when I still worked at Barnes & Nobles and I love it. I don't usually go in for the mini picture story type release, but this one spoke to me. Weingarten does a tremendous job at using just a few words with a candid black and white shot to connect the reader to the dog. Some are sadder than others (this book is about old dogs), but each story is almost sickeningly heart warming and I love having this book on my nightstand because I can read a few pages and relax into sleep with no problem.

Overall Feeling - Thumbs up.

Series - None

bonk by Mary Roach

The study of sexual physiology—what happens, and why, and how to make it happen better—has been going on for centuries, behind the closed doors of laboratories, brothels, Alfred Kinsey's attic, and, more recently, MRI centers, pig farms, and sex-toy R&D labs. I spent two years wheedling and conniving my way behind those doors to bring you the answers to the questions Dr. Ruth never asked. Is your penis three inches longer than you think? Is vaginal orgasm a myth? Can a dead man get an erection? Why doesn't Viagra help women—or, for that matter, pandas?

This was a roommate recommendation and while not one of my usuals, I'm really glad I gave it a try. I think with all the romances and erotica that I read I don't give a lot of thought to the inner workings between all that bumping and grinding. Roach on the other hand has gone out of her way to investigate not only the why of sex but the why of sex researchers. In my experience people don't really go around thinking about how doctors know the answers to sexual function questions. I certainly didn't, so reading this book was a big wake up call to that whole arena.

On the writing end I have to say that Roach has a very approachable style for what is basically a really long research paper. She doesn't use too many big words (where they're not necessary) and the dumb questions she asks people are usually the dumb questions I would ask. She's very witty and add into that some very funny footnotes (tangent city let me tell you) and you've got a collection of tales and personal stories that are a breeze to get through. I read bonk as I do anything else, something to be read straight through until you're finished, but it would also work well as a bedside table book, where you only read a few chapters before you go to bed.

And just to give you a clue, one of the very memorable things I learned from this book? Women chimpanzees are definitely getting the short end of the stick because while they can have orgasms they're only going to happen if there's a REALLY committed grad student around. A grad student with gloves. And lube.

Overall Feeling - Thumbs up. It's filled with all of this random but incredibly interesting information that I'm not sure if I ever wanted to know, but I think I benefit from knowing now.

Series - None, but you can check out more information about her other novels on her website, here.