Kids who have books in their home tend to score better on reading tests (not necessarily that their parents read to them). This from Amazon blog commenting on Freakonomics.

Please give to RIF or other favorite literacy organization.

This past month or so they've been giving our building an upgrade. I work in one of the older building on campus so all I can say is, "It is about darn time!" Nothing says multi-billion dollar company than a conference room with mismatched chairs and an old Ms. Pacman video machine stuffed in a corner behind abandoned monitors and cables. Did I mention the popcorn machine in the kitchen that probably hasn't been cleaned in a few years?

As part of the process we all received new carpeting in our offices and a choice of one of four colors for a painted wall. You would not believe how much thought people put into their color choice. I know because I was in one of the first offices to be painted and everyone stopped by to gawk at my choice. I wish I had been down a bit on the list because I chose the "red" which turned out to be more like burnt orange. I have this wonderful window with lots of light but the orange wall is dark and has darkened my office significantly. That is lthe last thing you need in Redmond. 

Blech, boring, yuk. But no more! Thanks to Blik. These are completely removable wall decals. They are also easy to put up and I can pull them down when I move. This set happens to be from the Matthew Haggett collection. I want to get a couple more or something higher on my desk to balance the wall out. You can see some more here. They make me happy just looking at them.

Why yes, I am about to go on vacation. How did you know?

Our colleague Ben left us for O'Reilly's TOC conference last week so we decided to decorate his office. About a year ago we all took personality tests which gave a detailed profile and included information on how to work best with the individual.  Ben's report stated, "Do not comment on his clothing." Which of course means every chance we get we comment on his shirts--Ben likes Hawaiian shirts.

So while he was away we gave his office a Luau makeover. 

Ben has also had a problem with books disappearing out of his office and we now suspect Jimmy Buffet is the real culprit.

I'm still waiting to discover my guilty beach read this summer. In the meantime I read Charles Baxter's a Feast of Love which was a finalist for the 2000 National Book Award. It was a bit too dark in my mind to count as a summer beach read, but still an excellent novel and definitely worth a read. I read that Baxter is well-known for his short stories, and you can catch that with how this novel is constructed. The story or stories about love are told through several characters who meet, mingle, intersect over time including a man who can't seem to find love, a pair of young lovers, and an older man hoping for the love of a lost son. Baxter used A Midsummer Night's Dream as inspiration.

This book was first published in 2001, and I noticed that Amazon is now showing a new edition coming out from Vintage Contemporaries.

New York Magazine has had some really great articles lately. Here is an awesome profile of Steve Jobs, iPhone, iPod, and the future via fimoculous.com.

I caught this little quote I found interesting as a music "subscriber."

MusicNet’s McGlade, whose products compete with iTunes, agrees. “The issue with download purchases is that every time you want to hear a track, you’ve got to make a buying decision,” he says. “I gotta tell you, once you put people on a subscription service, they can’t go back.”

I would agree--there is no going back.

Interesting experiment today announced by Tim O'Reilly. You will be able to purchase indvidual chapters from books for $3.99.

Microsoft Press tried this a few years back and it never took off.

Via Joe Wikert's blog an interesting article by Michael S. Hyatt of Thomas Nelson about imprints. Read both Hyatt's article and Joe's response.

Awesome take on Video Killed the Radio Star by the Wrong Trousers and via Good Magazine. Too cute and inventive!

And kudos to their influences listed on mySpace:

Alfred Lord Tennyson, Joseph Campbell, Joni Mitchell, Salvadore Dali, Neil Innes, Thomas Jefferson, Matta and mom & dad

One more via Fimoculous.com. A NY Times article on author Philip K. Dick.

Not familiar with Dick? If you've seen BladeRunner, Minority Report, or Total Recall--all films based on Phillip K. Dick stories.

I had a professor who described real-life Dick as a bit off-the-deep end.  

Also via Fimoculous.com, interesting NY Times article on software usage by writers.

Via Fimoculous.com a link to New Yorker Magazine profile on Tufte. I get so tired of his rant against PowerPoint, but I will buy his new book Beautiful Evidence.

As an antidote to PowerPoint is evil, check out Beyond Bullet Points by Cliff Atkinson.

20 Questions for your next book club meeting from Steve Clifford at Crosscut.com.

Great little Star Trek parody--the silent movie! Via Amazon blog.

I love this, the Brits have created a theme park based on the books by Charles Dickens. Check out the photos in this Newsweek story.

Amazon's blog linked to a story in the NY Times about children's menus in restaurants.

I have to say that going on road trips with my little one--every single restaurant offers those darn chicken fingers and fries.

It's that crazy time of year here at Microsoft--fiscal year end and the start of the annual performance review process. I'm thinking about this since we just found on Friday that we have to have our reviews finished by this Friday.

Now's the time to email my boss and tell her what a great job I've been doing.

This Friday also marks my ninth anniversary at Microsoft. I cannot believe that. Nine years. I've been here  nine years. NINE YEARS! That is 39% of my entire career spent here.

This morning I went to put my latest expense report in an inter-office envelope. I grabbed an envelope from the supply room and noted that the last time that particular envelope had been routed was in 1998--the year I started. That envelope had been sitting in that supply room for as long as I've been working here.

Washington Post had a story about Zune nearing one million in sales. Not bad for having just released in fall. I know, I know iPod owns this market. I've had my Zune a couple of months now, and here is what I think:

• I love this thing, at work, in the car and cleaning my house I am always plugged in
• Zune Marketplace--still love my subscription. $20 a month and I have access to thousands of songs. Some people have complained that you are "renting" the music. I have gone ahead and purchased stuff I know I want to keep, and renting (like the library) is allowing me the opportunity to test-drive a lot of artists. And seriously, if I really want to keep something I'll still buy the CD. Only bad thing, I just upgraded my PC, and had one wiped hard-drive which meant I had to "start over" because I was too lazy to find away to port all my files. Oh, well, sometimes it is good to start over.
• Sharing--one coworker and I shared some songs. Josh could transfer songs to me, but I couldn't because what I wanted to share was from Zune Marketplace. Then the songs he sent me were "expired" before I got around to listening to them. Well, then I just downloaded the album from marketplace.
• Audible.com--what do you mean I can't load audible files on this thing? What the heck? Please fix this!
• FM Tuner--I'm glad it has it, but I don't really use it, I hate all radio except NPR

5 Random Songs on my Zune right now:

1. (Only) Halfway to Everywhere by the Black Crowes
2. Bolero (Unknown Artist)
3. Wake Up Alone by Amy Winehouse
4. De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da by the Police
5. Following the Sun by Enigma

Article about bears in the Seattle area from Crosscut.com.

I suppose they could catch me with a bait of Krispy Kremes too.

Their biannual 50% off Hanna sale started today. I just bought a ton of cute clothes for the little one. I bought her the opposite dot dress, the poet's skirt and a bunch of other stuff including some cute sunglasses.

I love their stuff. She outgrows them before they get outworn and they wash beautifully.

NY Times article about BookExpo, "Waxing Philosophical, Booksellers Face the Digital."

According to the article, Chris Anderson author of the Long Tail is preparing to release his next book for free on the web and paid for with advertisements. Is this a new potential model for book content? I think not. 

This model works great for magazines and increasingly for the web. Seriously. I think it will be a fun experiment that may work for Chris, but won't be a functioning model for other authors and publishers.

If I had advertising budget would I want to advertise in Chris' book? Sure. Would I want to advertise in books by other authors? Probably not. Then you get into a whole tiered situation. A 4/c full page ad in Vanity Fair is much more expensive then a 4/C full page ad in Quilter's Newsletter. How much would a midlist author make selling advertisement vs. the book itself?

I suppose I should reserve judgement until I see Chris' book, and how the ads are mingled. I suppose having keywords like Google ads may be interesting.

Speaking of Vanity Fair, in the article the former editor Tina Brown weighs in. Tina has been in both book and magazine world so I trust her judgement on this:

“Giving an author’s book away for nothing on the Web as a way to market books seems a mirage to me,” Ms. Brown wrote in an e-mail message after the lunch. “All it does is feed the hungry angles of journalists and bloggers who plunder it without any of the author’s context or nuance and makes the reader feel there is nothing new to learn from the genuine article when it finally limps on its weary way to a book shop.”