Sailing and One and Two Thirds Book Reviews

The weather this last weekend here in Vancouver was wonderful. It was still a bit (a lot) chilly on the water, but when we dropped anchor somewhere it was toasty warm. Funny thing was, there was almost nobody out on the water ... kinda spooky. This is from our first night anchoring at Wallace Island - almost postcard perfect. Thanks again to Andrew M for allowing this incompetent "can't read a tide chart if his life depended on it" sailor to go with him.

And now on to the reading list this week. I've got several books on the go - one I've finished, two I'd like to comment on, and then a whole bunch more that need no comment (at this point anyways).

1. Abundance - The Future Is Better Than You Think. For the longest time I've been a "cup is half empty" person when it came to the world's problems. Global Weirding, Water Shortages, The Financial Crisis - it's a long list. After Harry W's suggestion last year I read "The Rational Optimist", thinking that it might change my mind about all this - but it didn't. This time, even though the authors of Abundance refer to The Rational Optimist all the time, something finally stuck. In example after example, the authors show how we've (the human race) repeatedly pulled back from the fire, avoided catastrophe, and moved on. And this time, we really have technology on our side. Maybe it was the repeated references to technology that got me on board this time, but whatever it was, I'm now a "cup is half full" person. But my money is still in T-Bills.
2. Religion for Atheists. This book was brought back from London for me by Dave K, who thought that I'd enjoy the read. I'm only at the first part of this book, but I can already tell that it will cause me to think in a different way about religion. The premise is to throw out all the standard theology arguments and dogma (free will, suffering children, hurricanes and tsunamis, etc), and concentrate instead on what religions of all sorts have brought to the party. If you take God out of religion, it becomes interesting and and the whole a force for good. Fascinating stuff. More later.
3. The Four Hour Body. This is the second best-seller by a blogger/human experimenter that I follow - Tim Ferris. Andrew's wife, Cheryl, lent me the book while we were off sailing and I read through most of the parts that interested me - but it's encyclopedic in length, so it should serve more as a reference book that you have on your shelf. This morning when I got to my desk, the first thing I did was some research on what the Paleo community said about this book. Tim talks a lot about diet, among a lot of other things, and although I follow much of what he says there's a lot that I don't. The best interpretation of the diet part of this book is that it's a fantastic transition from the SAD (Standard American Diet) to a more Ancient, Whole-Foods Diet (Paleo or, as I prefer, Archevore). He has things like "cheat days" where you eat whatever you want for one day a week, but the comments about this I read were "it takes you a week to recover from the cheat" - and Laura and I can confirm this after an over-the-top meal for our anniversary. He eschews processed foods and "anything white", and I think that may just be the single biggest thing you can do to improve your health. Ferris also has several other sections on exercise and sexual health that are quite enlightening. I'll probably get this book for my Kindle and use it as a reference!