2015 & 2016 Reading Lists

2015 & 2016 Reading Lists

For a number of years I have selected books at the beginning of the year for my daily reading program.  During the year I keep a lookout for candidates at thrift stores and yard sales. By reading a page or two daily from each book I am able to increase the number of books I read each year. Generally in December, I select more books than I can possibly read and end up setting a few aside. I sometimes add books to the stack, beside the bed, during the year, especially if I discover a book at the county library that I want to read.

I maintain a yearly file of the books I'm reading using the CSVed program.

To recap the books read in 2015 and to list those I'm planning to read in 2016 I created two tables, using Google Docs.  I enjoyed the challenge of learning more about how to use the table options of Google Docs. It turned out to be much easier than I expected.

After I downloaded the Google Docs file in PDF format I uploaded it to my Box account.  If anyone is interested in the two lists you can view or download them from:

Dick's Reading Lists

Dick Henthorn

3 January 2016

You're Killin' Me

When we accept false and violent laws and submit to them, we can neither establish truth nor combat lies in this world. (Leo Tolstoy, A Calendar Of Wisdom, 22 December)

******

This morning I'm getting the books ready for my 2013 daily reading program.  I've selected twenty-five books.  I read part way through at least three of them in the past.  I create a 3x5 bookmark card for each book which I also use to note any pages of particular interest.  I also create a book catalog of the books I intend to read.  I use the freeware CSVed program for this.

Yesterday I finished a project to create a content index to 112 folders of royalty-free folders of some very nice photos on a PhotoHouse CD. This should help me to more easily find photos that I might want to use in my various postings.  Here's an example, a train ready to clear the track.

Mr. Dickie

26 December 2012

Closing The Year

For Auld Lang Syne - BBC Symphony

Closing The Year

This is the day on which another year closes.  It is a good time for a quiet, honest look at our personal progress.  Has it been a good year, better than those which came before?  Has following your day-by-day spiritual program brought you more serenity and acceptance of yourself, the unique individual you are?

If you have regrets for errors or omissions, review them quickly and dismiss them.  In the new year, which lies ahead, there will be no time for futile regrets.

Resolve to live the coming year, one day at a time.  Whatever comes, meet it with a serene mind.

"And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God."  (Romans)
(after One Day At A Time In Al-Anon, 31 December)

Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity 

to accept the things I cannot change; 

courage to change the things I can;

and wisdom to know the difference.

Living one day at a time; 

Enjoying one moment at a time; 

Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; 

Taking, as He did, this sinful world

as it is, not as I would have it; 

Trusting that He will make all things right 

if I surrender to His Will; 

That I may be reasonably happy in this life 

and supremely happy with Him 

Forever in the next. 

Amen.

Reinhold Niebuhr

2011 Reading Program

This morning I finished reading twelve books which were part of my 2011 daily reading program.  In all I read twenty-five books this year. There were four other books on my reading list that I set aside and didn't complete. I also skimmed a number of books on computer subjects, Windows 7 in particular, that I checked out of the county library.

I maintained two lists of the books I was reading.  I used the weRead application which I set up to work with Facebook.  On my own computer I created a file with the CSVed program.  Last night I extracted the following list of books read from the CSV file.  I also set the "Read It" switch for all twenty-five books on weRead and "tagged" each one with the tag "2011."  This was the first time I'd used tags with weRead.  I was pleased that it allowed me to easily find the books read in 2011.  I'm going to use LibraryThing to track the books I'm reading in 2012.  I've already selected the books and done some of the work to set up the two files I'll use to track my reading program.

1. Andrews, Andy - The Noticer
2. Anonymous - In God's Care
3. Anonymous - One Day At A Time In Al-Anon
4. Anonymous (Casey and Vanceburg) - The Promise of a New Day
5. Barclay, William - The Letters to the Galatians and Ephesians
6. Barclay, William - The Letters to Timothy, Titus and Philemon
7. Barclay, William - The Letter to the Hebrews
8. Case, Steve - Everything Counts
9. Copage, Eric V. - Black Pearls
10. Dyer, Wayne W. - Wisdom of the Ages
11. Franken, Al - Lies And The Lying Liars Who Tell Them
12. Graham, Billy - Hope For Each Day
13. Hughes, Selwyn  and Thomas Kinkade - Every Day Light
14. Kushner, Harold - To Life!
15. Larsen, Earnie and Carol Hegarty - Believing In Myself
16. Magee, Mike - A Book of Choices
17. Martin, Iain C. - Worthy of Their Esteem
18. O'Toole, Ph.D., Mary Ellen - Dangerous Instincts
19. Rice, Helen Steiner - A Collection of Blessings
20. Rice, Helen Steiner - From The Heart
21. Thoreau, Henry David - Walden
22. Tolle, Eckhart - A New Earth
23. Tolstoy, Leo - The Gospel In Brief
24. Various Authors - Daily Guideposts - 2009
25. Wiersbe, Warren W- Chapter-By-Chapter Bible Commentary

Mr. Dickie's Blog

Thanks to everyone who took an interest in Mr. Dickie's Blog in 2011 on NetworkedBlogs, Facebook or Google.  I hope that once in a while I posted something that caused you: 

• to think, 
• to smile, 
• to laugh.
• to learn.

It's my intention to continue posting to this blog and my Arrow Prayers blog on a daily basis in 2012.  I hope you'll find my efforts worthy of taking some of your time to see what's on my mind.

Happy New Year 

2012

Mr. Dickie

31 December 2011

Books and Reading

I quote others in order to better express my own self. (Montaigne in The Book of Choices by Mike Magee, Introduction page)

******

For a number of years I've pursued an annual reading program. The idea is to select a stack of books I want to read at the beginning of the year and then read a page each day from all of the books in the stack. This works particularly well when the books selected are designed for daily devotional or spiritual reading. All books with 365 pages are finished on the same day, December 31st. Shorter books are finished at various times during the year.

In 2010 I used a free program, CSVEd, to maintain a file of the books I planned to read and to record the completion date for each one. I'm going to use the same program again in 2011. Here's a list of the nineteen books, including a few carry-overs, I selected to read, output from the program.

• Andrews, Andy - The Noticer
• Anonymous - One Day At A Time In Al-Anon
• Barclay, William - The Letters to the Galatians and Ephesians
• Case, Steve - Everything Counts
• Graham, Billy - Hope For Each Day
• Hughes, Selwyn & Thomas Kinkade - Every Day Light
• Larsen, Earnie & Carol Hegarty - Believing In Myself
• Magee, Mike - A Book of Choices
• Rice, Helen Steiner - From The Heart
• Rice, Helen Steiner - A Collection of Blessings
• Schucman, Helen and William Thetford - A Course in Miracles
• Thoreau, Henry David - Walden
• Tolle, Eckhart A New Earth - Awakening to Your Life's Purpose
• Tolstoy, Leo - The Gospel In Brief
• Various Authors - The Upper Room Disciplines - 2003
• Various Authors - The Upper Room Disciplines - 2008
• Various Authors - Daily Guideposts - 2009
• Wiersbe, Warren W. - Chapter-By-Chapter Bible Commentary

I'm using the weRead application, in conjunction with Facebook, to record all of the books I've read over a period of years as well as the books I plan to read this year. When I post information about a book to weRead I can also have the information posted to my Facebook Wall.

I encourage all friends and relatives to spend some of your spare time this year exploring the wonderful experience of reading books.

Mr. Dickie
1/Jan/2011 13:47

Keep Walking

If enough of us shied away from conflict and confrontation, just imagine how much war we could eliminate. (Wayne Dyer, Staying on the Path, p. 18)

******

Melva and I went to the Langley Park thrift store yesterday. I forgot to take the 25% discount card into store. While Melva shopped I went back to the van to get the card. The amount of stuff being donated to these stores boggles the mind.

I'm working on an Email address file that can be viewed with my free CSVed program. Yesterday I added another field to each record because I want to keep track of the "group" a person belongs in. The reason I created my own file is to insure that I won't lose the information if something happens to my computer or to Google or AOL. I'll keep backup copies of the file elsewhere.

Yesterday I took a 35-minute walk in the neighborhood. I listened to music on my Oasis MP3/WMA player while I walked. Lately I've noticed a younger man out walking. He walks at a much faster pace than I do. It's unusual to see anyone else taking a walk in "the hood."

Mr. Dickie
14/May/2010 9:13

A New Day

Circular flowerbed in the center of the backyard
Shed with hanging birdfeeder in the background
May 2010

Only when we forget what we were taught do we start to have real knowledge. (Henry David Thoreau in A Calendar of Wisdom by Leo Tolstoy, 9 January)

******

Yesterday I walked for 45-minutes in the neighborhood. I stopped to look at the new double-wide concrete driveway that two of the Hispanics poured at the place where they live. They fixed a big mess. We are hopeful that there will soon be new neighbors living in the house next to them. There are no signs of renovation yet on the house on the other side of the the place with the new driveway. This house was rented for a long time has been vacant for months. I'll bet it's a mess inside. During my walk I noticed citation sitckers from the county on one house and one van. I'd hate to find one of those stickers on our property. You can't remove them from a piece of glass. The sticker shreds and leaves the adhesive on the glass.

My friend, Raj, and I talked on the phone last night. Several more folks will be retiring from The Library of Congress next month. I know some of them and worked with one of them.

Cyndi put in a hard week at work. She traveled to Kansas City, MO on Sunday and didn't arrive back at her apartment until after midnight last night.

Another one of my genealogy friends accepted my "friend request" on Facebook. I still have several more requests pending.

I made myself a little database of Email addresses just in case something goes wrong with my AOL or Gmail contact information. I used my CSV program to create the file and I printed out a one-page list of the information. Lately, several of my friends have lost Email addresses. In my list are friends at the computer club and former co-workers at The Library of Congress.

Mr. Dickie
13/May/2010 9:59

Spring Has Sprung

Spring has sprung,
The grass is riz,
Where last year's,
Careless driver is.
(Burma Shave)

It is sad when the new generation imitates the sins of the old generation. (Warren W. Wiersbe, Chapter-By-Chapter Bible Commentary, p. 34)

The secret is to substitute the positive for the negative. (One Day At A Time in Al-Anon, 25 January)

All it takes is one determined person who refuses to let the good times be forgotten. (Toni Sortor and Pamela McQuade, The Word On Life, 9 January)

******

First day of Spring yesterday. We went immediately from winter to summer. I turned on the air conditioner late in the afternoon. It was so warm Melva suggested we wash her car. I changed three of the CDs in her car player. We went to Bob Evans to eat an early supper.

I found a 2004 backup floppy of my music catalog. It was in the DBF format with over 2,100 records. I opened the file with Excel and converted it to a comma delimited file (CSV). The CSV file works with my CSVEd program. Once the file was working with CSVEd I keyed 87 new records for CDs I purchased in the last couple of years. There's still lots more work to do because I either lost many records or never created records for several hundred other CDs I created when I had a working CD recording machine.

I'm working on an Atkinson genealogy project. I'm gathering information about this family from several sources. The goal is to consolidate all of the information in one new RootsMagic file.

Mr. Dickie
21/Mar/2010 9:37

Year-End Inventory

If we do only what feels good and what is comfortable, we do not grow. If we do not stretch our minds, we vegetate intellectually. If we do not discipline our bodies, we become physically flabby and weak. If we do not exercise our good will, we stay emotionally immature. (Food For Thought, 6 December)

******

As part of my year-end inventory I'm compiling a list of the books I read. Because I no longer have a database program on my computer I couldn't keep track of the books in my book catalog. Instead I used a 3x5 card to take notes about each book I was reading and I recorded the books I read in the WeRead application on the Internet. I believe I forgot to remove the cards from some of the books I read. Since the list is only for my own enjoyment it really doesn't matter. I'm gathering the information in a comma delimited file that I'm building one line at a time. Maybe next year I'll use the CSVed program all year long to keep track of the books as I finish them. I noticed that there are quite a few cards for books I checked out of the library and never finished reading.

I watched parts of the football game between Nebraska and Texas last night. I wasn't impressed with either team. I suppose that's a tribute to their defensive units. I was watching at the end when Nebraska had the misfortune to lose the game when the other team kicked a field goal with one second left on the clock. Talk about "the agony of defeat."

Mr. Dickie

Year-End Inventory

As I look back over this year, I will consider calmly my actions and attitudes, just as though I were evaluating the progress of someone else. I will not make it an occasion for guilt and regret. I will blame no one else for anything that happened, for I have learned ... that I am not a judge of others. This day, and the days to come, will be filled with opportunities to make more of myself. (One Day at a Time in Al-Anon, 1 December)

******

The first two Christmas cards arrived yesterday. That always brings home that our Christmas letter hasn't been started and all of the Christmas decorations need to be brought down from the attic.

I used to maintain several Approach databases in the DBF format. During one of my many computer disasters I lost access to this program. It never occurred to me to make paper copies of my music and book catalogs. While I still have backup copies of them in the DBF format I don't have a program installed that can read or update that format. Recently I installed a free copy of a program called CSVed.

CSVed: (http://csved.sjfrancke.nl/index.html)

This, very powerful program, can read text files and display them in a table format, much like the database programs do. The neat thing is you can create the records using any text editor. Described simply, each field of information is separated from the next by a comma delimiter. Yesterday, to test the program, I created an Email address file to store the addresses of former co-workers and new friends at the Computer Club. If you have some information you'd like to store and display in an easy to read format you might want to take a look at his program.

Yesterday I bought a shrink wrapped copy of the CD, Sara Evans - Greatest Hits and a nice copy of the book, "As Bill Sees It" at the thrift store. You never know what you are going to find.

Mr. Dickie