We segued within a few faxes

And so it began. Faxes back and forth, a long-distance correspondence with a woman I'd never met. What began oddly became progressively more odd. The pace of conversation was outrageously slow, and this suited us both - neither of us was in any hurry. But the enormous geographical distance also led us to quickly let down our guard. We segued within a few faxes from innocent flirting to innermost secrets. Within a few days our faxes took on a tone of fondness, then intimacy. I felt as if I were going steady with this woman I'd never met or spoken to.

-- Open by Andre Agassi

BookCrossing: Tuesdays with Morrie

One afternoon in July 2012 I executed the best themed release of all time. The idea came to me during a moment of clarity (those usually occur as I sit cross legged, eating a grilled cheese sandwich) and it took a great deal of planning to pull off. I am immensely proud and have been riding a delicious wave of self-satisfaction ever since. You must now be very curious, and I don't blame you - this buildup of anticipation must be torturous. With your well-being in mind, here's the juice: I released Tuesdays with Morrie on a Tuesday! Yes yes, I know I know. Please calm yourselves and sit back down. We don't have all day.

It was a beautiful summer's day and my walk through the park was very calming, except for the small fact that my heart was beating exceptionally fast, for I knew even then that I was about to perform an extraordinary act that would no doubt alter the course of the universe. Sorry, butterflies. I saw an empty bench ahead of me and I knew what needed to be done. After a slight hesitation (could I really go through with this? am I the right person for this role?) I placed the book on the bench and breathed a huge sigh of relief. What was done was done.

A journal entry came in later that same day:

Just picked up this book on a local park bench while I was out walking with my 11 month old son. Look forward to reading it and sending it on its way!

serving them through glass windows

She tells me that when I was still in the crib, my father hung a mobile of tennis balls above my head and encouraged me to slap at them with a ping-pong paddle he'd taped to my hand. When I was three he gave me a sawed-off racket and told me to hit whatever I wanted. I specialized in salt shakers. I liked serving them through glass windows. I aced the dog. My father never got mad. He got mad about many things, but never about hitting something hard with a racket.

-- Open by Andre Agassi

BookCrossing: The Telling of Lies

I released a few books in Town Centre Park last summer (now you know what I did then), and had some success with catches. One such release and catch was with The Telling of Lies, which I released next to Lafarge Lake on the Trans Canada Trail. A very important characteristic of this particular catch is that it was my 100th catch from all my wild releases! Woohoo! The release photo is pretty sweet, and I am not biased at all. TToL had been in the wild for a mere five days when I received this exhaustive journal entry on July 11, 2012:

it has been moving

BookCrossing: Silence Speaks for Love

I'm so behind on these caught-book posts! My BookCrossing activity the past couple of years has been very minimal, which means I haven't released many books, which means I haven't had many catches, which means the trigger to post here about earlier catches doesn't occur, which means the catches for books that happened in June 2012 have yet to be posted! I released Silence Speaks for Love in November 2009 at Coquitlam Centre and a journal entry came in on June 18, 2012:

Found in the return bin of the New Westminster Public Library.

mutter to themselves, of course

Tennis is the sport in which you talk to yourself. No athletes talk to themselves like tennis players. Pitchers, golfers, goalkeepers, they mutter to themselves, of course, but tennis players talk to themselves - and answer. ... Why? Because tennis is so damned lonely. Only boxers can understand the loneliness of tennis players - and yet boxers have their corner men and managers. Even a boxer's opponent provides a kind of companionship, someone he can grapple with and grunt at. ... People sometimes mention the track-and-field runner as a comparably lonely figure, but I have to laugh. At least the runner can feel and smell his opponents. They're inches away. In tennis you're on an island. Of all the games men and women play, tennis is the closest to solitary confinement, which inevitably leads to self-talk.

-- Open by Andre Agassi

BookCrossing: Fear The Worst

In mid-August of 2011 (August 15, to be exact) I was at the Seattle Premium Outlets, located just north of Seattle in Tulalip. While there I released Fear The Worst. A week later - a journal entry by a new member!

I am at Cultus Lake BC sitting in the sun and reading the book. I can't wait to finish the book and pass it on. This is a great idea.

The book followed me back to Canada. A few days later release notes were made for the book's release on a bench at Cultus Lake's main beach. And then, two months later, another journal entry by another new member!

Found book at Main Beach, Cultus lake, B.C.

Took it home to Delta, B.C.
I really enjoyed it and I am happy to pass it on.

I left this book at the Ladner Leisure Centre in Ladner B.C. on Oct
31,2011.

Prank Night by David Robbins

I read Prank Night around Halloween last year. So I'm a little behind on this blog. Waddaya gonna do 'bout it, hey? Make me quit? Cuz I just might do that with or without your help, fool. Anyway, Prank Night got me scared, but not for the right reasons. There were so many errors! Aaaaaaaaaah! To see the errors I detected, click here.

[After posting this, I learned that I actually finished Prank Night in November of 2010! For real?! That was not last year. Holy smokes.]

took life much more seriously than life warranted being taken

Seeing Ben again had sparked hope in her breast. He still cared for her, she could tell. And even though he still took life much more seriously than life warranted being taken, she saw that as a plus, not an evil. Ben Shields was the kind of man who would never take her love for granted. He would honor and respect her all the days they were together.

-- Prank Night by David Robbins

After the nimbus faded

Jimmy saw it or thought he did. But it was gone so fast he couldn't be positive. After the nimbus faded there were no more brilliant displays. He had been enthralled by the dazzling show but he was grateful it had ended.

-- Prank Night by David Robbins

BookCrossing: Death du Jour

On June 22, 2011, I was in Las Vegas and released Death du Jour during the Fremont Street Experience. On July 24, 2011, my inbox received an email alerting me to the fact that the book was caught! In fact, two journal entries were made on that same day. The first:

i am about half-way through the book, and like it so far

The second:

the book is now in Anaconda Montana

The Peep Diaries by Hal Niedzviecki

There are a lot of errors in The Peep Diaries. It was an interesting read, don't get me wrong, but it definitely could have used a competent editor to go over it a final time before publishing. The errors were really distracting from the topic of how much the average person puts out there for anyone to see and at what cost. After I finished it, I adjusted my privacy settings on several websites. To see the errors I detected, click here.

BookCrossing: Don't Cry Now

I'm waaaay behind! Welcome to Slackville, population me! Over a year ago I was in Las Vegas and during my time in Sin City I did some releasin'. Some *wild* releasin'! One book that was left to fend for itself was Don't Cry Now - it was released right next to the lion habitat in MGM Grand on June 23, 2011. Mere days later, on June 29, 2011, I was notified of a journal entry. Here is that journal entry, in all its long-winded glory:

Will be reading soon

whole messy quid pro quo of friendship

We'd rather be at home peering at each other online than putting ourselves out there for friendship, messy emotional connection, and all the responsibilities and frustrations that come with forming attachments to others. We're tired, we're stressed, and we're conditioned now to get home from our daily labors and lose ourselves in virtual environments, whether they be TV, video games, other people's profiles and blogs, or our own.

This puts the success of something like PostSecret in a whole new light. It's not just that we use PostSecret to anonymously get things off our chest and get insight into what other people are struggling with. It's that we actually prefer it that way - why get into the whole messy quid pro quo of friendship, the whole I'll-listen-to-you-if-you-listen-to-me burden of the thing, when we can do it online, no mess, no fuss, no one calling you up next week and saying, "Listen, I need help, can I borrow a hundred bucks?"

-- The Peep Diaries by Hal Niedzviecki