when the humans read books

One day the lieutenant made the observation that human beings who read large numbers of books tended to taste better than humans who didn't. This intrigued the commander: "I'm listening, Lieutenant."

"Sir, when the humans read books, it gives them a sense of individuality, a sense of being unique - a sense that something about their existence is special or, as they like to say, 'magical.' Reading seems to generate microproteins in their bloodstreams, and those eons give them that extra-juicy flavour."

-- Generation A by Douglas Coupland

BookCrossing: Getting Rid of Matthew

As part of our 4-year wedding anniversary celebrations, my beautiful wife and I went to see The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee - an Arts Club production on Granville Island. It was an incredibly entertaining show. Before we entered the venue, I released Getting Rid of Matthew on a bench by the water just outside the entrance. When we got home later that night, I was going to make release notes for the book but was excited to discover that there was already a journal entry catch! The catcher was short and brief and to the point:

Still to be read

masturbation of the brain

"Jeez, Harj, could you be any more depressing?"

"Zack, to create a happy ending for its own sake is no different than masturbation of the brain."

!!!

Okay.

Sometimes you're travelling along through this wacky thing we call life, when you're assaulted by an idea so potent that it obliterates all other forms of stimulus. The notion of neuromasturbation was precisely one of those ideas.

Harj and the others kept on talking, but I'll never know about what. I was trying to figure out what would be the brain's equivalent of lube or movies of Croatian nurses engaged in fourgies.

-- Generation A by Douglas Coupland

BookCrossing: Yang the Second and Her Secret Admirers

After the Granville Island catch of The Gammage Cup on the evening of July 8, the second catch of the three books I released mid-day on July 8, 2010, was for Yang the Second and Her Secret Admirers. That catch came in at 6:35 p.m. on July 9 (despite the entry's date-stamp saying July 10). The catch:

I found this book at Granville Island yesterday!! When i go to Seattle ill leave the book somewhere. im too lazy to read it though, sorry.

BookCrossing: The Gammage Cup

On July 8 I biked from home in Coquitlam to Granville Island in Vancouver to meet my mom and brother and bro's girlfriend. Our meeting point was the Trans Canada Trail display that is near False Creek Community Centre, and the plan was to then bike to my place along said trail. However, an unfortunate mishap occurred and the bike ride back was made by just my mom and me. She did amazingly well, especially considering it was - at that point - the hottest day of the year, and we were biking during the hottest part of the day. I did manage to release three books at the display, and two of them were caught within 24 hours! The first one -for The Gammage Cup - hit my inbox at 11:55 p.m. that same day, 12 and a half hours after the release (so please ignore the July 9 date-stamp on the catch's entry; it should read July 8). The catch:

Hello! I captured this book at about 1:20 on July 8, 2010 at the bridge by False Creek Racing Canoe Club on my way to dragon boat. Where will you go next little book?

pennies into the blowholes of dolphins

Q)
He sounds like a character.
A)
He is. When I was a kid, he took me to SeaWorld in San Diego, and he got a four-week suspended sentence for trying to throw pennies into the blowholes of dolphins. Now he's found God and he's not as much fun.

-- Generation A by Douglas Coupland

That sounds like someone I know, though we never did anything quite like that. We've both always been fond of animals and never intentionally harmed them.

BookCrossing: Return to Wuthering Heights

I'm a few catches behind; in the past couple of weeks I've been lucky with several quick catches, and my release/caught percentage is sitting pretty at 13.708260105448156. Breaking 14% would be great. I released Return to Wuthering Heights in Burnaby on April 30, 2010, (or April 29 - I'd really like to know why BookCrossing release notes are no longer date/time specific, but no one's answering my posts on the matter) and a catch came in on June 26! The emailed journal entry says that the catch came "from New York City, New York USA" (and it's a shame that that info is no longer included in the actual journal entries). The catch:

A classic I havent read....Thanks!! Very excited to see where this one goes and plan to add a few myself...

BookCrossing: Poseidon's Gold

I released Poseidon's Gold at Bellis Fair in Bellingham, WA, in late May and it spent just 11 days in the wild before being caught. The journal entry by AnonymousFinder is amusingly blunt:

Definitely not going to read this thing..

I was helping a friend move out of her dorm at Western Washington University, and we found this lonely book thrown on the ground in front of the elevator. Not really sure how it made it here from BC, but...

'Several cheers' indeed.

Excellent question.

Thing is, I'd taken a slice of boring white bread from its bakery bag and had slapped it onto a small patch of yellow sandy dirt. I was standing up to photograph the slice of bread using my mobile phone. Why would you have been doing this? I hear you wonder. Excellent question. I was making an "Earth sandwich."

-- Generation A by Douglas Coupland

I love love love where this takes place. Douglas Coupland is one of my favourite authors, and the discovery of this one of the five important locations was tremendously exciting for me.