James – Page 4 – James M. Day

Bookface Friday

If you are a librarian into social media, you may have seen Bookface Friday posts. If not, I’ll briefly explain what a “bookface” is. A bookface is a photograph of a book jacket—usually the front cover but not always—lined up with a background in real life. Often the cover is a person’s face, but it could also be any body part. Sometimes they are not humans at all but rather animals, bookshelves, food, plants, and landscapes. We once used an airplane.

Bookface Friday was reportedly started in August 2014 by Morgan Holzer at the New York Public Library. Soon after, other librarians started posting their own images and the trend took off. They are usually posted to Instagram and Twitter on Fridays, thus the hashtag #BookfaceFriday.

Hunt Library where I work has been making bookfaces since 2016. They are created by our Social Media Team of which I am a member. Since 2018, I have appeared in four of these and worked behind the scenes on several others. They are fun to create.

Best of Chris Harris 1

If you are a car enthusiast, you know about Chris Harris. If not, I’ll give you a brief biography. Harris is a race driver, automotive writer, and reviewer of cars. He has written for sites including Autocar, evo, and Jalopnik. He’s better known for his video reviews from THE DRIVE and then his own channel Chris Harris on Cars. He’s currently a presenter on the UK Top Gear, but still produces extra videos in his Chris Harris Drives series.

First, Harris is a great driver. He’s known for his drifting ability—which the kids love but I find a bit ridiculous—seen in all of his videos. But he can apex, as well. He’s a Porsche enthusiast and the car of his he talks about most is his 911 GT3.

He’s also a good writer. He’s knowledgeable and witty, using his cracking good British vocabulary and sense of humor. Once you’ve watched a few of his videos, you’ll begin to read his articles in his distinctive style. Am I enjoying it? Yes, I am.

My First Porsche Service

Since last December, my Porsche has been warning me to get an “Interm. Service Now” every time turned the key. I wanted to have its first service done at the dealership, Porsche South Orlando, where I bought the car. It took several weeks before I found time to make the trip to Orlando.

The dealership makes it very easy to schedule a service appointment. Earlier in the week, I simply went to their website, entered my car information, and picked a day and exact time for my appointment. I didn’t need to speak to anyone.

Never certain what the highway construction and traffic will be like in Orlando, I left home early. The day was sunny and cool and there were no major delays, so I arrived about an hour early for my one o’clock appointment. No problem, they took me right away. Tony in Service was very friendly and helpful, answering several questions I had saved up since I bought the Boxster last June (2019).

How to De-Google

I have used many Google products in the past. Of course, nearly everyone uses the Google search engine. In the beginning that seemed harmless. But more recently we have seen how Google uses your search history to build a profile of you. Search for a product and soon you see ads on your favorite websites trying to sell you that item. (Although Google doesn’t seem to be able to figure out when you’ve purchased the item but continues to try to sell it to you.)

Many people’s first indication that Google might not be not-evil was after the launch of Gmail. Google announced that they would scan email messages to provided targeted ads. While no humans were allegedly reading your email, it still seemed wrong for a company to systematically scan the contents of your messages. But still, most people continued to use the service. I used it to send large files and to sign up up for a few online services. I have had email accounts with my personal domain since the 1990s which I use for most of my email communication.

In the last few years, Google has really started to adopt questionable practices. They manipulate search results. They help censor the Web in countries like China. Their YouTube service censors and demonetizes videos that go against its political leanings. Google has clearly abandoned free speech and unbiased access to information. For these reasons, I decided to stop using Google products wherever possible.

2020 Rolex 24 at Daytona

Porsche competes in the GTLM and GTD classes of the Rolex 24 at Daytona so I joined my fellow Porsche Club of America members to cheer them on. Unfortunately, I signed up too late to park in the Porsche car corral inside the track, so I found a fellow Porsche to park with in Lot 4. The day was sunny and cool, prefect for racing.

I entered through the tunnel under Turn 4. Immediately upon emerging I saw the Corvette car corral, the only other brand besides Porsche that had one. The new Corvette C8 would compete against Porsche in the GTLM class.

Steve Berry at The BookMark

The title of this post should really be “Joseph Finder and Steve Berry at The BookMark” but Steve Berry was the person I went to The BookMark bookstore to see although he was not the reason for the event. But I didn’t know that until the day of the book signing. The event was a stop on the book tour of Joseph Finder, a writer I was not familiar with before this night.

I started reading Steve Berry novels after finding one while browsing the Leisure Books collection at Hunt Library. I didn’t know who he was, but the title The Patriot Threat and its story involving a conspiracy surrounding a painting of George Washington and the 16th Amendment intrigued me. I really enjoyed the fast-paced story interspersed with historical facts and conspiracies. After reading, I learned that this novel was the tenth book in the Cotton Malone Series. I decided to start reading the series from the beginning and soon bought The Templar Legacy. I have read and enjoyed all of the Cotton Malone novels and short stories.

Website Recommendation: BookBub

Generally I prefer to buy print books rather than ebooks. However, I own a NOOK ebook reader and I do buy ebooks, especially when I can find them at a low price. For discounted ebooks I use BookBub.

BookBub finds heavily discounted ebooks, audiobooks, and even print books. While I buy all my ebooks from Barnes & Noble, BookBub links to ebooks from all major retailers: Amazon, Apple, B&N, Google, and Kobo. In the BookBub settings, you can choose the formats you want and also the retailer(s).

Best of KEXP 3

KEXP is an independent radio station in Seattle which streams live and also hosts musical artists playing in their in-house studio. The station makes these live performances available on YouTube. I have discovered many new bands by following KEXP’s YouTube channel. Here are some of my favorite live performances. See also Best of KEXP 1 and Best of KEXP 2.

We Were Promised Jetpacks (2019)

Neil Peart (1952-2020)

On Friday evening, January 10, 2020, we got the shocking news that Neil Peart, drummer for the band Rush, had died. He had died the previous Tuesday, January 7, but the announcement came days later. Like many people, I consider Peart to be the greatest drummer of all time.

My cousin Mark introduced me to Rush in 1980 after the release of Moving Pictures. Even at the age of 12, I could tell this band was composed of amazing musicians. I don’t play an instrument myself, but have always been drawn to the drums. And Neil was the best.

My Website from 1996 to 2020

For 2020 I redesigned my website homepage and freshened up the site. It had been virtually unchanged for about four years. During the redesign, I had a look back to all of my previous websites; I have kept an archive of all major updates since 1996. Here are 20 screenshots of the homepage for my website covering 24 years. We’ll start at the present and go backwards in Web time.

2020

Here is the new homepage launched on 1/1/2010. It has a rotating image gallery corresponding to the eight main pages.