Jeeves and the Song of Songs, by P.D. Wodehouse

This audio collection takes it title from the first story read by Alexander Spencer, and also includes the following:

The Inferiority Complex of Old Sippy (Bertie "helps" old school chum get rid of unwanted writer, and acquire a fiancee)
The Kid Clementina (Bertie "helps" to smuggle a boarding school student back in to school)
Indian Summer of an Uncle (Bertie "helps"--see a pattern?-- uncle avoid a "disastrous" marriage to young woman)
The Impending Doom (Bertie tries to save an old school chum's job, avoids getting his own unwanted job)
The Yuletide Spirit (Bertie tries to avenge a prank, avoids a romantic entanglement
(in Song of Songs, Bertie tries to break up a couple, fails according to plan, but succeeds anyway)


The basics:
setting- 1930's England
characters- Bertie Wooster (of "family", untitled)
- Jeeves, his "gentleman's gentleman"
- several other relatives, chums, and romantic objects
conflict- Bertie gets into scrapes and situations, Jeeves bails him (and/or friends) out

* #'s 4-9 read for the 100 Shots of Short Reading Challenge, master post here

I Feel Bad About My Neck, Nora Ephron (audio)

Ephron touches on several topics in this collection of essays: physical and mental aging, housing in New York, death, gourmet cooking, and JFK are a few. Her brand of humor is of the depressive sort, and some of the topics probably don’t garner much empathy from less-privleged[sp?] For example, she has to have her roots and highlights dome every 4 weeks? Oy, cry me a river, says I, who hasn’t had scissors nor hair color touch my locks for over 2 years now. These essays show a descriptive slice of life of the moderately rich-and-famous, so it’s perfect for those who like their celebrities intellectual.

As this was an audio “read,” I wasn’t able to jot down any worthy or especially funny quotes. Maybe when I’m old enough to better appreciate her angst, I’ll find a hard copy and give it a re-read. I suppose this book would also be good for those who can read it and feel grateful for not being in Ephron’s stage of life.

[finished 12/11/07]

#34--Bad Dog, by R.D. Rosen, et al

I found this at a garage sale last month, and hadn’t really planned to read it anytime soon, but last night, I had an itch that couldn’t be relieved with anything that I should be reading.

“278 outspoken, indecent, and overdressed dogs” grace these pages, and several of them made me laugh out loud. Some are in store-bought/ready-made costumes, others in adapted human-wear, and others are simply “in” whatever they got into (like toothpaste). Each dog’s hobby is also included; none of them seem to match their costume, and include:

admiring rock gardens
barking in tongues
designing rubber toys
Motown historian
belly dancing
scrimshaw

From the back cover:
“Mans best friend? Think again. Behind those loving eyes and wagging tail lurks a very different dog. A dog with a dark side. A bad dog.
Here, in all their glory, are hundreds of bad dogs, with bad tempers and bad breath.
Smart-asses, stoners, thugs, cranks, lechers, hellions… makes you wonder what your pet’s really burying in the backyard.”