Paul's Down-Home Page

I love reading about science in all its forms, but I find many science articles in the mass media to be dumbed down or poorly written and thus uninteresting. During a recent trip to the library, I happened upon this collection and decided to give it a try. My experiment was well-rewarded, as this is a superb collection of fascinating and well-written stories. Some standouts in this collection include Atul Gawande’s “The Score“, which traces the industrialization of childbirth (though I would argue that improvements in anesthesiology have made almost as big an impact); Lawrence Altman’s “The Man on the Table Devised the Surgery“, about Michael E. DeBakey’s very unusual surgery in 2006, and Jerome Groopman’s “Being There“. This last was especially poignant for me, as it discusses the pros and cons of allowing family members to be present during resuscitation attempts for trauma victims. I will carry to my grave the sounds and sights of Dad’s visit to the Albany Medical Center emergency department, and I still am not able to decide if it was good or bad that I saw those things.
Anyway, I highly recommend this book, and I’ll be on the hunt for the 2008 edition when it’s published.

I’d never even heard of Cinerama before watching the Blu-Ray edition of How the West Was Won with John and Amy. Cinerama Adventure is a fascinating look at the then-revolutionary Cinerama system. Think of it as a predecessor to IMAX, except that it provided better peripheral views at the expense of requiring three separate cameras and projectors. If you’re at all interested in 1950s pop culture, film and video technology, film-making, or flying a camera-equipped B-25 into an active volcano, you’ll find plenty of things to interest you here. My favorite part might have been the discussion of how the movie industry targeted Cinerama to help counter the television-induced drop in movie theater attendance. I wonder if there’s a parallel with the current theater industry… maybe they could try something innovative instead of whining so much.

Sometimes I read a book on some topic that inspires me to think of myself doing something with that topic– a book on aircraft design might make me wonder how I would fare as an aerospace engineer. Other books I read help me appreciate a topic or activity without necessarily wanting to do it myself (cf. A Blistered Kind of Love).

Winterdance did neither of these. It made me say, repeatedly and often aloud, that this guy is flat-out crazy. The Iditarod is one of the most grueling events in the world, and this guy wanted to run it. The story of his preparation for the races made me alternately wince (mostly for his wife, poor soul) and cringe. Imagine: sleeping with your dog team in its kennel, in your yard; letting fifteen sled dogs pull you on a bicycle then having to walk fifteen-plus miles home after they run off and leave you; getting sprayed by half a dozen skunks. The race itself is no better. I found myself unable to stop reading and concurrently wishing the book would end on the next page. I can’t really recommend it, but it was definitely an experience that will alter how I see future books. In fact, perhaps that’s the best summary I can come up with: the book is like the Iditarod in that respect.