This weekend the ABL undertook a pilgrimage to Portland, Oregon, home of the mecca known as Powell's, into whose holy waters I had not yet been steeped. Since we were in town, we also stopped by the wedding of Andy and Stacey Olstad (nee Olson, Thonstad respectively). The ceremony, like the principals and their relationship, was sweet and enjoyable to behold.

I got 46 books for $331.91, or an average of $7/book. Besides a pile of SF from Fritz Lieber, Melissa Scott, Ken MacLeod, John Brunner, and so forth, I found a number of interesting NF books, such as Against The Gods, A Random Walk Down Wall Street, Nonzero, To Mock a Mockingbird, The Sovereign Individual, Economics in One Lesson, Butterfly Economics, A Primer On Drug Action, The Cambridge Quintet, Natural Capitalism, BuckyWorks, and selections from Casanova's memoirs, which my dad has been recommending for quite some time. As usual with books, I feel as though the selection (risk, money, evbio, math, libertarianism, econ, drugs, and sex) reflects my interests quite well. More on the books, perhaps, when I've actually read them

Although, having bought them yesterday, naturally I've finished one already - an SF novel by Ken MacLeod, who weaves anarcho-capitalism into his speculative universes. It was quite enjoyable, nice to have somewhere other than The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress to see such ideas played with. While not amazingly well written (he's no Bujold), he certainly had interesting ideas and the sense of intellectual kinship made it more fun. The first section was entitled Machinery Of Freedom, presumably after a certain book.

The idea I found most interesting was the nuclear retaliation contract, where a number of regions (or states) contract with a nuclear power for return strikes if they are ever attacked. He suggests that defense has an economic advantage over offense because many regions can contract for defense from a small number of nuclear weapons (as it is the threat, not the actual use, that they are mostly paying for). However offense (using the weapons for a first strike) requires purchasing a monopoly on them and using them up, and thus will cost far more.

<< Olive Oil Diet, Day 1 (07/14/03) << || >> Twink (07/11/03) >>