Impulse

I'm probably not the best person to buy a book for as a gift. It isn't that I don't love to read — I have endless shelves lined with books, boxes full of them, too. But if you've bought me a book, even if I'm sure I will enjoy it, if it doesn't immediately grab my interest, it may end up sitting on a shelf or on my nightstand for some time. That even happens with books that I've bought — I'll start to read them, but my interest wanders away to something else, and they're left unread.

I have two books next to my bed at the moment — a biography of cartoonist Charles Schulz (I started reading that several months ago), and Physics of the Impossible. Both are books I've been looking forward to reading (though if I had known it would take me this long to read the Charles Schulz book, I might have waited for the paperback, which is due early next month), but today I was excited by The Perfect Thing about the development of the iPod. Very likely what will happen is I'll spend the rest of the day and most of the evening devouring this book, and it will be finished before the dust that has accumulated on any other books I have is even disturbed.

I adore books — but I'm not the person to buy them for as a gift. Perhaps a gift certificate is a better idea.