[little cloud]

I don't have more than 200 books and I've read each at least twice, including a Time magazine entirely dedicated to astronauts and images of Earth from space and a 1-inch thick book of outer space pictures and tons of information about each. I love it!

Robinson Crusoe is great, too, if you can survive the first two chapters ( ).
And, yes, I read my textbooks. I'm desperate because I've read most of the books in our local library!!

[TeleMad]

Originally Posted by zadojla

I rarely play regular chess. I am most interested in chess variants. Check out www.chessvariants.org to see the kind of thing I'm talking about..

I've played a couple variations of chess, though I don't know their names and didn't care for them as much as I did the real game. The variation I liked best was just like normal chess, with 2 games being played between 4 players: the difference is that when a player captures an oponent's piece on one board, instead of its simply being out of play, s/he hands it to his partner on the other board, who can place it anywhere on his own board he wants when it's his move.

But like I said, I was more of a regular chess player. I made it to candidate master in correspondence chess - before computers could compete with humans - and also was in the top 10% of US chess players in OTB play. But that was years ago. Had to give chess up for an education: no on can serve two masters :-)

[zadojla]

Originally Posted by TeleMad

snip...the difference is that when a player captures an oponent's piece on one board, instead of its simply being out of play, s/he hands it to his partner on the other board, who can place it anywhere on his own board he wants when it's his move.

That's usually called Bughouse.

Originally Posted by TeleMad

But like I said, I was more of a regular chess player. I made it to candidate master in correspondence chess - before computers could compete with humans - and also was in the top 10% of US chess players in OTB play. But that was years ago. Had to give chess up for an education: no on can serve two masters :-)

I never achieved anything significant chess-wise. The cynic might say I like variants because I wasn't good at FIDE chess. I just never had the patience and drive to acquire the book learning.

[Amidala]

I'm reading a lovely book about/on the Irish: "The truth about the Irish" by Terry Eagleton. Beautifully written. And in the meantime re-re-re-reading "Dune" (including the prequels: "House Atreides" and "House Harkonnen", though i couldn't get hold of "House Corrino"). Frank Herbert's books are an inexhaustible source of "food for thought". Or is it the Sci-Fi fan in me talking?

[orbsycli]

i'm currently reading Your Mind. this book seems to never end! and i love how unpredictable it is.

[Tormod]

Originally Posted by Amidala[font=Verdana

]Or is it the Sci-Fi fan in me talking?[/font]

Of course it is!

Welcome to our forums!

[alxian]

just completed ender series by orson scott card.. AAA reading material very inspiring. they will be making a movie of it next year i think.

[Tormod]

Originally Posted by alxian

just completed ender series by orson scott card.. AAA reading material very inspiring. they will be making a movie of it next year i think.

I liked that series too, although I found it a bit tedious after about 5 books. I never finished the last one.

[dagaz]

Am currently reading Life:an unauthorised biography by Richard Fortey. Have picked it up twice before, but this time I've gotten hooked by it. The first chapter was a bit of a struggle to stay with it, but after that it becomes very informative and well-written.

[Tormod]

I have read Fortey's "The Earth" and also found it a bit tough to get into. He is an excellent writer but about halfway I started dropping out and never actually finished the book.

The parts where he explain how the Hawaiian volcanoes move was really educational stuff.