In most of the developed countries around the world, we take for granted that we will always have clean drinking water. All we need to do is turn on the faucet to get a drink. In developing countries, getting water is a struggle. A new device called the Desolenator promises to make it cheap and easy for people in places … Continue reading
Like any gathering of people, book clubs can be tough to sustain. They depend on the entire group’s ability to play by the rules and honor the mission of their club. Nonetheless, most readers dream of having a lively, intellectually enriching book club — if they don’t already have one, of course. There’s just something comforting about getting together with like-minded people to share a love of words and stories.
The pitfalls to book club success are many — too much wine, too little commitment, internal dissension over reading materials, and so on. You can’t fix an irretrievably flawed club, of course, but you can make sure that you are the best possible member you can be, doing your own small part to sustain the health of your little literary community. We here at HuffPost Books haven’t always been book club all-stars ourselves, but our failures have enlightened us as to the keys to success.
If you want to be the twin-set-rocking, universally beloved Taylor Swift of your book club, it seems pretty simple: read the books, play nice, and follow these 19 easy rules:
If you are invited to join a book club, pretend you like everyone.
You may think your friend’s boyfriend’s sister spends too much time sharing pictures of her dog or that her coworker constantly dominates the conversation, but don’t make waves.
Don’t invite others to join the klatch without going through the full bureaucratic process.
Respect the democratic rule of the club. Just because you’ve been invited doesn’t mean your roommate is also invited; in fact, if they didn’t invite her themselves, there might be a good reason. Like her tendency to bogart the wine.
Accept each book picked with grace.
Book clubs may select books in a number of ways — voting, following Oprah’s picks, taking turns to make the choice, picking Ping-Pong balls out of an old-school lottery machine, etc. Whichever method is used, go along with it.
In fact, accept each book picked with enthusiasm (feigned if necessary).
Do not complain or make passive-aggressive comments about the book chosen because it’s nonfiction. Or fiction. Or by Nicholas Sparks. Complaining makes others in the club feel bad about their reading choices, and that’s not what book club is about. If you want to make people feel bad about what they read, consider writing a thinkpiece for Salon.
On the other hand, if you are selecting the next book, don’t choose a newly published $30 hardcover tome that your mom got you for Christmas anyway.
Seriously, dude?
If you don’t feel like reading the whole book in time for the meeting, resist the urge to make up a legitimate-sounding excuse to skip it, like your dog’s birthday party or a terminal illness.
Don’t be sneaky. Go to the meeting like you promised.
Do not ask to push back the meeting so you can procrastinate even longer on those last 32.5 pages.
Pushing back the meetings causes confusion and chaos, and it will be your fault. Just finish the book, okay? Book club is a commitment, like marriage or a mortgage.
If the gathering is at someone’s home, bring a baked good, fancy cheese, or classy beverage (Diet Pepsi does not count, sorry) as an offering to the book club party gods.
A Good Book Club Member helps sustain clubmates physically through the hours of intense literary philosophizing ahead. We recommend baking lemon bars.
Come prepared with a few themes or topics you’d like to discuss in case the conversation needs a jumpstart.
You may print out suggested discussion guides from the Internet, but please make sure the guides are for the correct book, or at least a very similar one (for example, they both have boats in them).
Do not start the discussion with “This book sucked.”
Also, do not start the discussion with “Who was more horrible, the main character or her best friend?” Or “Next time, can we read something better? Like maybe something by Stephen King?” Or “Ooh, can we try to find Jen some cute Tinder matches for once? Jen, let us see your phone!” (This is a club for book discussion, not for reliving your single days vicariously through Jen.)
Don’t be that guy who keeps trying to direct the conversation back to the first 20 pages of the book.
At least pretend you read the whole thing. If you must, simply nod wisely and enigmatically in response to other members’ points about the book, and occasionally interject with something uncontroversial like “Exactly” or “I had a similar reaction” or “Really Kafkaesque, don’t you agree?” (No one is entirely sure what Kafkaesque means, anyway.)
Don’t be that guy who confidently brings up plot points for discussion after seeing them in the movie adaptation.
You will get caught.
Arrive having read the whole book!
Despite all the wine and cheese plates lying around, the point of a book club (we think) is to encourage you to read more so you can enjoy fun, intellectually stimulating literary discussions with your coworker’s college roommates, or whoever is in your book club.
Don’t dominate the discussion.
If people stop even trying to interrupt you over the course of your long monologue on the book, it’s probably not because they’re enthralled by your encyclopedic knowledge of the Western canon. You’ve broken their spirit.
Endeavor to keep discussion about the book, which you’ve definitely read in its entirety, on track.
Keeping things on track is a team effort. Be part of that team.
If conversation goes off-track nonetheless, as wine-fueled book club discussions tend to do, do not become frustrated and burst out hysterically, “Can everyone just shut up?? UGH, what was the point of even reading this?!?”
A Good Book Club Member remains calm and collected.
Remember that book club is for respectful, enjoyable conversation.
Even when you strongly disagree with a member’s take on the book, refrain from bandying about words like “idiotic,” “absurd,” or “pseudo-intellectual.”
When the night is over, do not insist on taking the rest of the lemon bars you provided.
Those belong to your long-suffering book club host now. Leave them for her to enjoy as she scrubs wine stains and pen marks out of her upholstery.
Offer to host next time.
Then you get to eat all the leftover lemon bars. Which is the whole point of joining a book club.
The names that come to mind at the mention of the Italian Renaissance are the likes of Medici, Da Vinci, and Galileo. Few, however, know the name Bartolomeo Cristofori, an accomplished craftsman who lived and worked during that era. You may not know his name, but you do know his greatest invention- the “harpsichord with loud and soft,” better known today as the piano.
The Nexus 6 is incredibly large and also amazingly good . But as your fingers slide around that monstrous screen, there’s one thing that’s missing: finger print recognition. And that, apparently, is Apple’s fault.
Since October 2014, Tesco has done all it can to rid itself of its loss-making digital download service Blinkbox. TalkTalk came to its rescue, picking up Blinkbox Movies and its broadband services earlier this month, but the fate of its Music and Boo…
Ford wants you to know that it’s more than just trucks and cars. It wants to be seen as a technology innovator too. Of course, the Detroit automaker has long had a friendly relationship with technology, what with its Sync infotainment platform, its s…
Sometimes purchasing games from non-authorized retailers could cause some problems, which is what some Far Cry 4 gamers are experiencing at the moment. According to the complaints, some gamers are claiming that their digital copies of Far Cry 4 have been deleted from their Uplay accounts.
However it turns out that the gamers affected by this are the ones who bought the game from storefronts like G2Play and G2A. To make things worse, it seems that Ubisoft wants nothing to do with the issue at hand and have asked gamers to contact the original seller, as opposed to offering a refund or credit or some kind of solution.
This isn’t the first time that purchasing games from G2Play has caused problems. Devolver Digital, the publisher for titles such as the Serious Sam franchise, have stated publicly that they do not support titles purchased from G2Play, going as far as claiming that games bought from there aren’t legitimate and are not guaranteed or supported.
So what can gamers do? Well if you bought your game from G2Play and have had it deleted from your Uplay account, we guess the only thing to do now is try to contact them and see if you can get some kind of refund, or at least credit towards your next purchase which hopefully won’t fail on you either.
G2Play-Bought Far Cry 4 Digital Copies Deleted From Uplay Accounts , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
Let’s face it, we’ve all received calls from people that we wish we could block, and while that might be a feature available on other VoIP apps, unfortunately such a feature was not available for Viber users on the Windows Phone platform, but the good news is that the app has been recently updated with some new features, and call blocking is one of them.
Viber for Windows Phone has been bumped to version 4.4.0.0 and it will allow users of the app to block any number the wish, so if you have that annoying friend or ex that just can’t let go, well we suppose blocking them on Viber is one remedy, although there’s no guarantee that they won’t try to contact you via different channels!
The update will also bring about in-chat notifications when you receive new messages. It will also introduce new emoticons and has also improved the app in general. We haven’t tried out the latest update for ourselves so we can’t speak to how big of an improvement has been made, but if you’re a Windows Phone user, you can always head on over to the Windows Phone Store for the free download/update.
Viber For Windows Phone Updated With Number Blocking And More , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
We’re sure many World of Warcraft gamers are looking forward to getting their hands on Patch 6.1, and why is this? Well for starters Patch 6.1 will finally introduce the updated Blood Elf models which is one of the last races in the game to receive its updated textures and animation. The patch is also expected to introduce an Heirloom tab and also a new method of purchasing Heirlooms in the game.
However what makes Patch 6.1 interesting, or rather novel, is that Blizzard will be introducing a selfie camera to the game. Yes, you read that right, and no it is not one of Blizzard’s April Fools jokes, this is the real deal. The selfie camera is basically an item that will let you snap selfies in the game. To obtain it, gamers will need to complete a Follower Mission which is about 4 hours long and costs 20 Garrison Resources.
Upon the mission’s successful completion, which is apparently 100%, players will receive a S.E.L.F.I.E. Camera. Launching the camera is the same like how you would use an item and it will also bring up a special menu to allow gamers to snap photos of themselves. The camera will also cause your character to make some special faces.
There is even an option to upgrade your camera which is another mission, after which you will receive some filters such as Sketch Filter, Black and White filter, and the Death filter. It’s a pretty novel feature but hey, if we’re not going to get the dance studio, we guess we’ll settle for selfies!
Patch 6.1 For World Of Warcraft Lets Players Take Selfies , original content from Ubergizmo. Read our Copyrights and terms of use.
As of this week, I’m the mother of a 20-year-old. This is also the week when my oldest heads off to Amsterdam, where he’ll attend a new (very small) university. After a year at a very large university in Boston, he decided theater-style lecture halls packed with hundreds of students weren’t for him.
Just as I did when he went off to college the first time, I find myself trying to conjure up memories of my son’s first steps, first words, how hard he laughed that time I fell out of the kayak, how he played the theme song from “Toy Story” incessantly on the piano to unwind, and how he alone never failed to ask me about my day when I walked in the door from work.
The sad reality is — it’s all a bit fuzzy.
As I’ve often said, you think you’ll remember every key moment of your kids’ lives — but you won’t. Oddly enough, I can recall the theme song to “Gilligan’s Island” but I find it nearly impossible to draw out of cold storage a memory of my oldest kid’s first bike ride. Didn’t he used to hate eggs? I don’t know. I really can’t remember.
And that’s why I’ve decided to put forth a bit of advice from parents who’ve already raised their kids to those who are still in the trenches. The first piece of advice is mine (I have three kids) and the rest is from good friends with grown children. Have anything to add? Please do so in comments.
1. In addition to marking down your child’s first words, record the first conversations you had with them about whether or not there’s a Santa Claus — or a God.
Often we’re so busy obsessively recording every milestone during our child’s baby and toddler years that we forget to take video of a typical family dinner, with everyone doing nothing but laughing — or arguing. Think you will remember what your kid’s bedroom looked like when they were SEVEN? You might. I don’t. Believe me when I say this: These every day moments are really what you will want to remember after your kids fly the coop.
2. The older the children get, the more you realize how precious the time is.
“When they are little you feel they will be that way forever! Therefore, take as many family vacations together as possible. They make lasting memories of real quality time spent together. Once they go to college and have their own responsibilities, it just gets more complicated.” — S.W.
3. Get to know their friends.
“Encourage them to have their friends to your house. You learn more about your kids from whom they befriend than anything else. Be non-judgmental and open to discussion about anything so when they are away they won’t feel like anything is off limits to discuss with you if they need to.” — L.S.
4. Have family dinners often and make them a priority.
“The dinner table is a place for sharing all that’s important with unconditional love, respect and openness to discussing ideas. Make it a safe place to be heard and not judged.” — J.C.
5. At the end of every year, sit down with your child and write down their memories of the past 12 months.
“When they turn 18, get those pieces of paper out and look back on all that’s happened.” — K.P.
6. Go to every play, sporting event, or awards assembly you possibly can.
“You never want to be that parent who had to work and, therefore, just couldn’t be there for your child.” — A.G.
7. Listen from the front seat when they sit in the back.
“Don’t comment. You will learn more about their daily lives when you are chauffeuring them back and forth to activities than you can imagine.” — A.T.
8. If your kid tells you a secret, and asks you not to tell anyone, don’t.
“If you tell your girlfriends, it will get back to them. It really will.” — K.L.
9. Unplug when you’re with your kids.
“When your kid talks to you, PLEASE turn off the cell phone and the computer. You can check email after they go to bed.” — E.K.
10. Help your kids figure out their strengths and interests.
“Try to help your child discover things they are truly passionate about, and then nurture those interests.” — S.W.
11. Be affectionate — always.
“When your child hugs you, never be the first one to let go.” — M.M.
Earlier on Huff/Post50:
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
