does everyone do this?

I almost never listen to the radio. When I do, it's almost always NPR. I used to be a good NPR listener, back when I was a commuter; I drove at least an hour a day, just enough to keep up on what my local station thought I should know. Now I walk or bike almost everywhere I go, and as a result, the radio has almost completely left my life. When I do drive, I usually listen to cds.

Except when I go visit my parents.

The minute I get behind the wheel of my dad's truck, I'm all over the radio, and in a way that diverges completely from my usual habits. Everything I'd usually avoid becomes immediately desirable: the country station, the classic rock station, the "hot hits of the '80s, '90s, and today." I've attributed this before to the ridiculousness of my dad's truck, but yesterday I got a text message from a friend that's making me rethink the question. She's home visiting her parents, and she was driving around in her mom's car, listening to christian rock.

It's not a form of regression, because these aren't the stations we loved as teenagers, they're the ones we rejected. So what is it? And why is it so pleasurable?

the bittersweet

the sweet, first: Maud Newton used the little blurb I wrote for her about Casco Bay Books, despite the fact that I totally failed to make good on my plans to write something longer and better, as well as my plans to ask her to link to me here if she was going to link to me anywhere.

the bitter: For the first time in years, my vacation to Maine was so whirlwind that I didn't make it to the store. Turns out, though, that I would have been even more sad if I had gotten there. Apparently, my favorite book store in the world is no more.

in french, the word for vacation is always plural

What I read on my summer vacation:

Oh, man, do I have a crush on Scarlett Thomas. I've already blogged about reading PopCo, and I plan to write something soon about The End of Mr. Y, but for vacation, I turned to her genre fiction. Dead Clever was perfect airplane reading, almost good enough to make up for being stuck in the middle seat on a red eye.

Originally published under the pseudonym of Sally Mara, We Always Treat Women Too Well isn't one of Queneau's more famous books, but I had been wanting to read it for a while. Every bit as smutty and violent as the pulp novels it satirizes, it's also ridiculously funny, and at times startlingly disgusting. In short, awesome.

Lots of Josephine Tey: Brat Farrar, The Man in the Queue, and To Love and Be Wise. As I told my mom, I only read mysteries when I'm on vacation. In response, she handed me a pile of these old paperbacks, culled from yard sales and sidewalk book stalls. She's a good mom.

Amazon has been recommending Snow, by Orhan Pamuk, to me for months. They were kind of right. I can't deny that it's a good book, smart, beautifully written and thought provoking, but, all the same, it's not really my thing.

Reading mysteries on vacation is all very well, but reading mysteries in French makes you look so much smarter. Plus, having a glossary in the back makes it easier. Hence, my dad's old copy of Tournants Dangereux, by Georges Simenon.

Last but not least, Shelley Jackson's Half Life made the plane ride back feel almost short. I saw her read from it a few months ago, and have been wanting to read it ever since. Thanks to a late birthday present, I finally go to. Now I want to read it again. Her writing is so dense and vivid and weird and wonderful; it's the kind of thing you just want to immerse yourself in.

(Next up, books I got on my summer vacation, but haven't yet read.)