First and Foremost. People. I'm not sure if you realize this, but today the New York Times online reports a *new* problem with American teenagers. It's not that each one sends and receives an average of over 2,000 text messages every month (holy cow that is mind-boggling to me though, I must be getting all old!), nor is it that they're bringing guns to school and involved in gang violence and so on (that was soo last decade). No no, this article highlights a new, harmful activity they're involved in. What is it, you ask? Hugging. Yes, that's right, adults today are concerned that teenagers have started hugging way too much. They say it's girls hugging girls, girls hugging boys, and boys hugging boys, they say there's just hugging all over the place. Not romantic hugging, no no, just incessant, friendly hugging. They say it's clogging up the hallways in the high schools and it must be stopped. I mean, all those principals and administrators who begged kids to stop shooting each other several years ago never expected it to come to *this*! It's just awful. That's why they're totally banning hugging in some schools now. Jake suggests that the high schools just tell the kids to go back to gang violence like in the '90s, anything to stop all this hugging! Here's the article. If anyone wants to host an anti-anti-hugging campaign, let me know.

Second, I came across an article in the Atlantic Monthly about how we think of ourselves. It suggests that each one of us is not a single, constant, personality, but rather a confluence of many different personalities, depending on what situation we're in and who we're with. It goes on to suggest that we even think of ourselves as different people in difference situations -- that's why it's hard for young people to save for retirement (because the old guy who will get the money 40 years from now seems like a totally different person from *me*) and why we act to discipline our future selves. This also explains to me why I can never remember my clever Internet passwords for various websites -- I was a different version of me when I thought them up than I am now! There are some other interesting tidbits thrown in too, like did you know that memory is situation-dependent? According to the article, "Students do better when they are tested in the room in which they learned the material; someone who learned something while he was angry is better at remembering that information when he is angry again...". Who knew! Even though I read this a few weeks ago, it's left quite an impression on me and I keep on thinking about it, so I thought I'd share. It's a little long'ish, but you can check it out here if you're curious.

And last, a few weeks ago I invested in a Kindle -- Amazon's electronic reading device which you can use to download and read newspapers, magazines, and books. And I think it's about to change my life. Not because it's so slick (it's not), but because it's so liberating! I wasn't excited to give up books (I love bookstores! and book-buying! and gifting and receiving books!). But now I feel like a much freer reader: I don't have to choose my next book days or hours before I'm ready to read it. I can decide *right now* what it's gonna be, and start reading immediately. If I go somewhere (dentist's office, beach, vacation), I know I'll have more reading than I could ever manage on this smaller-than-a-clipboard device that fits in my purse. I love that having a lot of books at my fingertips no longer necessitates having so_much_stuff. Not to mention price (apparently publications are much cheaper without printing and binding costs). This is a paradigm shift for me, and it's exciting. But it's hard to explain to my friends and family, so I keep reading articles about the Kindle, in hopes that someone else will describe it better. And today I found this one, where the author envisions what the future might hold for readers.

So that's that! A whole lot of words describing my recent notable reads outside the book realm. If you're feeling lonely for photos, not to worry, there will be many, many to come in future posts :)