Notes from Ambien. And from Walt:

Of the endless trains of the faithless, of cities fill’d with the
foollish
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish
than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light, of the objects mean, of the
struggle ever renew’d.
Of the poor results of all, of all the plodding and sordid crowds I
see around me
Of the emtpy and useless years of the rest, with the rest me
intertwined

…What good amid these, O me, O life?

I finished up Reefer Madness some time ago. JP informed me Schlosser’s previous book, Fast Food Nation, is largely centered on Colorado Springs. Being there (past) presently, I couldn’t resist. I finished it yesterday.

My parting purchase from Poor Richard’s, following the Everest lunch buffet, just before driving to the airport, was a decent (but obviously read) copy of Mandelbaum’s new Metamorphoses translation. I’ve been reading a few pages each night before turning in.

At a random moment, I decided to see which book was hidden behind the molding at the edge of my oak shelf. It turned out to be Armstrong’s The Battle for God, which I was digging but for some reason let slide. Providence speaks: it’s time to finish it.

I’m pretty sure I bought that book at McKenzie & White, the little bookstore down the street from my former (and sometimes current) employer, which went out of business, to my lament. From Fast Food Nation:

Downtown Colorado Springs has an old-fashioned, independent spirit… The Chinook Bookshop, toward the north end, is as fiercely independent as they come–the sort of literate and civilized bookstore going out of business nationwide.

The Chinook Bookshop is now out of business.

Homecoming in exile day 9. This room wouldn’t be so bad if it had a decent desk chair. My spine laments.

I acquired Nabokov’s Pale Fire at Poor Richard’s. It is exquisite. It may very will rekindle my interest in poetry. A few years ago I read some Seamus Heaney, after seeing him read at Colorado College, but I wearied of potatoes. (I also read his Beowulf, but that doesn’t count.)