Derik Badman's Journal

Started on the third book of the Nocilla Trilogy last night but, while the other two were disconnected short chapters, the first part of this one is what appears to be a really really really long run-on sentence, one of those stylistic traits I most hate reading, as I just can't stand the lack of any kind of periods or white space or breaks or pauses, as it always feels like a cheat because it's never really just one sentence it's a bunch of sentences that occasionally have a conjunction between them rather than a period and it's so tiring to read and it makes me think of a summer during college when I was working the circulation desk at the library and there was very little to do and they didn't care if I read on the job so I would just go back to the stacks in the literature section and pull out a book, read it at the desk, and put it back, one after another until the day was over, thus I went through a lot of books that summer, including all the works of Gabriel Garcia Marquez and the only one of his I started and did not finish is the one that is written in really really really really really long sentences (I think that's The General in His Labyrinth or there's another one I always confuse it with, it's been a long time) and instead of actually reading that book I found myself just turning pages looking for periods pages and pages and I still really just don't like that style of writing so I may not end up finishing this last nocilla book though I did page through it and was intrigued to discover there's a short section that looks like a photo comic and a longer section that ends the book which is a drawn comic, though I'm not sure if it's by the author or someone else as there's no one else clearly credited for the art so I must assume it's the author, though the drawing is good enough that I question that, as his bio mentions nothing about art rather that he was a scientist before becoming a novelist.

On my walk this morning, as I passed over the creek, I peered over the stone wall down to the water below, as I often do in case the ducks have returned, and I was surprised and delighted to see a blue heron! I've seen one fly overhead multiple times over the years and used to occasionally see one standing in a small pond next a road we'd drive by, but I've never seen one on the ground that close to me. As usual I got some not great photos. The heron knew I was there and was clearly very cautious as it barely moved a muscle the whole time I watched it.