Happy Hanukkah!

Hanukkah begins at sunset on Wednesday, December 1, 2010. Its celebration continues on Thursday, December 2, 2010, and finishes at nightfall on Thursday, December 9, 2010.

Holiday Fun

I always enjoy the array of events offered in Albuquerque during the month of December. From the River of Lights at the Botanic Garden to the Nob Hill Shop & Stroll (this year-free parking behind O'Niell's & free shuttle!), this month I plan to be thoroughly entertained.

ABQ Biopark Events Calendar

Historic Nob Hill (includes information about the Shop & Stroll on December 2nd)

Old Town New Fun (includes details of the Holiday Stroll on December 3rd)

First Friday Artscrawl (December 3rd)

Twinkle Light Parade (December 4th)

Albuquerque Toy Run Ride (December 5th)

Grand Menorah Lighting at Civic Plaza

Sunday, December 5th at 4 p.m.
-Fantastic Chanukah celebration will follow inside the Convention Center!

Roadrunner Food Bank Holiday Virtual Food Drive

Nutcracker on the Rocks

A Mariachi Christmas

Winter Solstice: Music of the Season @ the Juan Tabo Library
December 15th at 6:30 p.m.
-Celebrate the season with harpist Linda Kennedy and flautist Victoria Beatty. The duo will perform traditional music from northern Europe and the British Isles.

Feast of Guadelupe Celebration & Concert

You can already buy tickets for the Luminaria Tour!

Also visit the City of Albuquerque Events page! There's a upcoming Holiday Adoptathon Extravaganza by Animal Welfare, Sunport Serenades, the Nutcracker playing at the KiMo, & the Mayor & First Lady's Dog Ball to look forward to as well.

Science Corner

Recommended Reads from a retired engineer-books that are good reading & good science!

One of our customers came up with this booklist for us-comments after the title are the customer's. If you have a list of recommended reads on any subject that you'd like to share, let us know!

Science and Pseudoscience

Michael Shermer, Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of our Time.

Carefully examines why we are so easily misled into believing things that are not real.

John Brignell, The Epidemiologists: Have They Got Scares For You!

Traces the history of epidemiology from its proud beginnings in stopping the cholera epidemic at the Broad Street Pump, to its current position as a purveyor of unscientific scares based upon fallacious statistics.

John Brignell, Sorry, Wrong Number: The Abuse of Measurement.*

Misuse of numbers and measurements by government, environmentalists, and single-issue fanatics to mislead us into believing and acting on false conclusions

Alan Sokal, Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science.

Builds on his—hoax--article, published in Social Text (“a journal at the forefront of cultural theory”) that gravity is not real, but only a social construct. Fun reading.

Joel Best, Damned Lies and Statistics: Untangling Numbers from the Media, Politicians, and Activists.

Title says it all. Debunks the worst social statistic ever published.

Joel Best, More Damned Lies and Statistics: How Numbers Confuse Public Issues.

Expands on the earlier book and gives tools for critically examining claims and counterclaims.

Victor J. Stenger, Physics and Psychics: The Search for a World Beyond the Senses.

Critically examines evidence for theories of a transcendent reality, and shows that no replicable data exists to support them.

Terence Hines, Pseudoscience and the Paranormal.

Readable debunking of popularized non-science.

Human Behavior

Steven Pinker, The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature.

Pinker’s best book to date. A balanced approach to how heredity and environment influence behavior.

Steven Pinker, How the Mind Works.

Best explanation I’ve yet read on how and why we think the way we do.

Richard Herrnstein and Charles Murray, The Bell Curve: Intelligence and Class Structure in American Life.

An honest and surprisingly compassionate treatment of how mental capability affects our lives.

Jared Diamond, The Third Chimpanzee: The Evolution and Future of the Human Animal.

How we got here and why we act the way we do.

Jared Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies.

A “history of everyone” for the last 11,000 years. His thesis is narrow but the book is fun to read.

Robert Wright, The Moral Animal: Why We Are the Way We Are.*

Uses Charles Darwin as a vehicle to explain morality.

Robert Wright, Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny.*

Gives an intriguing explanation of how human relationships might have developed.

Biology

Richard Dawkins, Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder. Excellent book on how science enhances, rather than destroys, poetry and beauty.

Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene.

Don’t be put off by the title.

Richard Dawkins, River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life.

Very readable account of our ancestry.

Edward O. Wilson, Sociobiology. *

The book that launched the field of evolutionary psychology.

Edward O. Wilson, Biophilia. *

Readable account of species.

Edward O. Wilson, On Human Nature.

Nice explanation of the biological aspects of human behavior.

Lynn Margulis and Dorian Sagan, Acquiring Genomes: A Theory of the Origins of Species.

Intriguing thesis that large organisms are formed by symbiotic assemblies of well-functioning smaller units.

Martin Jones, The Molecule Hunt: Archaeology and the Search for Ancient DNA.

Physics, Engineering, and Math

James E. Gordon, The Science of Structures and Materials. *

James E. Gordon, Structures, or Why Things Don’t Fall Down. *

Both of this title & the one above are the most readable treatments of structural mechanics I have ever seen. Considers animal as well as inanimate structures.

James E. Gordon, The New Science of Strong Materials, or, Why You Don’t Fall through the Floor. *

Gordon is the only author I’ve ever read who makes the mechanical behavior of materials both interesting and understandable to the non-practitioner.

Amir Aczel, Pendulum: Leon Foucault and the Triumph of Science.

About an amazing and ingenious French scientist.

Amir Aczel, Chance: A Guide to Gambling, Love, the Stock Market and Just About Everything Else.

An excellent practical introduction to using probability in ordinary life.

Steven Vogel, Prime Mover: A Natural History of Muscle.

Steven Vogel, Cats’ Paws and Catapults: Mechanical Worlds of Nature and People.

Morris Kline, Mathematics and the Search or Knowledge.

Readable account of mathematics as the language of physics.

Graham Farmelo (editor), It Must be Beautiful: Great Equations of Modern Science.

Len Fisher, How to Dunk a Doughnut: The Science of Everyday Life.

Jennifer Ouellette, The Calculus Diaries-How Math Can Help You Lose Weight, Win in Vegas, and Survive a Zombie Catastrophe.

Title says it all.

Bill Bryson, A Short History of Nearly Everything.

Good introductory science treatment

*Not in the ABC Libraries catalog.

Happy Thanksgiving from ABC Libraries!

All ABC Libraries will be closed for the holiday on Thursday, November 25th & Friday, November 26th.

Cherry Hills Library will reopen on Saturday, November 27th at 10 a.m. For a list of other libraries open on Saturday, check here.

Living French

I am wellnigh obsessed with France. I like to read about France, watch French movies, & listen to French music. If only I spoke French, my life would be complete. (Someday, maybe I'll actually take a class at Alliance Française d'Albuquerque.) In the meantime, here are some of the France-related items that have helped me maintain my joie de vivre.



Books about France
Almost French: Love And A New Life In Paris by Sarah Turnbull

Entre Nous: A Woman's Guide to Finding Her Inner French Girl by Debra Ollivier

C'est La Vie: An American Conquers the City of Light, Begins a New Life, and Becomes-Zut Alors!-Almost French by Suzy Gershman

Bringing Home the Birkin: My Life in Hot Pursuit of the World's Most Coveted Handbag by Michael Tonello (technically not about France, but the Birkin bag is by Hermès, a French high fashion house)

Sixty Million Frenchmen Can't be Wrong: (Why We Love France but Not the French) by Jean-Benoît Nadeau and Julie Barlow

French by Heart: An American Family's Adventures in La Belle France by Rebecca S. Ramsey



Books by the French
French Women Don't Get Fat byMireille Guiliano

The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

I Wish Someone were Waiting for Me Somewhere by Anna Gavalda

Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky

French movies
Summer Hours

Man on Wire

Séraphine

Paris

I've Loved You So Long

Tell No One

Persepolis

Paris, Je T'Aime

La Vie en Rose

2 Days in Paris

The Page Turner

Avenue Montaigne

French music
One Step Forward by Les Nubians

Comic Strip by Serge Gainsbourg

Dimanche à Bamako by Amadou & Mariam (they are from Mali, but sing mostly in French)

For Kids of All Ages

Also consider the Asterix & Tintin graphic novels; both are translated from the French.

Books & Blogs

Last year my reading list was full of books written by bloggers. Here are some of my favorites! (Warning: most of these will be about food and/or France...both are kind of idée fixe with me.)

• A Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg, who blogs about food at Orangette



• Words in a French Life: Lessons in Love and Language from the South of France by Kristin Espinasse, who blogs at French-Word-a-Day



• Julie and Julia : 365 days, 524 recipes, 1 tiny Apartment Kitchen by Julie Powell (OK, technically I read the book before the blog, but don't you want to see what the original blog looked like?)



• Petite Anglaise by Catherine Sanderson, who blogs about life in Paris at Petite Anglaise



• The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl by Ree Drummond, who blogs about country life, food, photography & homeschooling at The Pioneer Woman (We recommend the "Black Heels to Tractor Wheels" section!)



• Chocolate & Zucchini: Daily Adventures in a Parisian Kitchen by Clotilde Dusoulier, a Parisian woman who shares her passion for all things food-related at Chocolate & Zucchini



• Notes from the Underwire: Adventures from My Awkward and Lovely life by Quinn Cummings, who blogs about life at The QC Report
  



• Confections of a Closet Master Baker: One Woman's Sweet Journey from Unhappy Hollywood Executive to Contented Country Baker by Gesine Bullock-Prado, who blogs mouthwateringly at Confections of a (Closet) Master Baker



• Sweater Quest: My Year of Knitting Dangerously by Adrienne Martini, who blogs on Martinimade



• The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook: 101 Asian Recipes Simple Enough for Tonight's Dinner by Jaden Hair, who blogs at Steamy Kitchen



• Make it Fast, Cook it Slow: The Big Book of Everyday Slow Cooking by Stephanie O'Dea, who blogs at A Year of Slowcooking



• Free-range Knitter: The Yarn Harlot Writes Again by Stephanie Pearl-McPhee, who blogs at Yarn Harlot



• Belle de Jour: Diary of an Unlikely Call Girl by Anonymous. Belle du Jour was the pen name of Brooke Magnanti, who blogged at Belle de Jour. This blog became a book which became a ShowtimeTV series!

Glass Castle Readalikes

Did you enjoy Jeannette Walls' The Glass Castle? Check out these similar titles!

Gal: A True Life by Ruthie Mae Bolton *

All Over But the Shoutin' by Rick Bragg

Running with Scissors by Augusten Burroughs

Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood by Alexandra Fuller

Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy

Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood by Julie Gregory

Ten Thousand Sorrows: The Extraordinary Journey of a Korean War Orphan
by Elizabeth Kim

There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in the Other America
by Alex Kotlowitz

Blackbird: A Childhood Lost and Found by Jennifer Lauck

All Souls: A Family Story from Southie by Michael Patrick MacDonald

Falling Leaves: The True Story of an Unwanted Chinese Daughter by Adeline Yen Mah

The Color of Water by James McBride

This Boy's Life by Tobias Wolff

Smashed: Story of a Drunken Girlhood by Koren Zailckas

Polite Lies: On Being a Woman Caught between Cultures by Kyoko Mori

Like this list? It's from the Morton Grove Public Library's Webrary. I found a link to it on a list called Nonfiction Readers’ Advisory Toolbox.


*not in the ABC Libraries catalog