I just finished multi-task writing while listening to Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir. The Martian was his first book, a best seller that was made into a movie and I loved the movie as much as the book. His second book---Artemisis---doesn't have the science driven plot that his first one had and I haven’t read it. But this third book had me tuning in whenever I could. One night I fell asleep listening to it and it was still going in the morning and I had to back it up to a place where I remembered what was going on. It’s a wonder my brain didn’t bust open, filling it full of seven hours worth of back-to-back science. That’s when I learned how to use the sleep timer on my Kindle. Only had the thing for a decade.
I love Andy's way of creating protagonists with self-deprecating humor and this book delivered on that, especially when he teams up with an alien life form that looks like a German shepherd sized spider. The science goes so far over my head and if I had tired to read it rather than listen to the book I’d quit before the plot setup was finished, but it’s so well explained that I can pretend I almost get it.
The synopsis for Project Hail Mary on Amazon reads: “Ryland Grace is the sole survivor on a desperate, last-chance mission - and if he fails, humanity and the Earth itself will perish. Except that right now, he doesn't know that. He can't even remember his own name, let alone the nature of his assignment or how to complete it….a ‘propulsive’ thriller full of suspense, humor, and fantasizing science.” The alien is also on a mission to save his planet from the same enemy that is causing the sun to die.
I sometimes get a little too big for my britches and I think I’m making good use of my brain then I read a book like one of Andy’s and I realize that I have the brain power of a flea especially compared to the astrophysicists and math nerds that work for the space programs around the world. (Heck, I couldn't even keep up with the science at the local sewage treatment plant that turns our toilet wastes into safe drinking water when I toured the place. Or maybe it was the fact that I decided some things we're better off not knowing about.)
I know it’s fiction but the way Grace and Rocky (the alien) developed a language using math as a starting point really does sound doable. And if someone had told me I could fall in deep like for a spider-like creature I wouldn’t have believed it in a hundred years but here I am a fan of a creature who speaks in musical sound waves that a newly written-by-Grace computer program can translate it into English and vise versa. For such a smart “spider” he has a sweet innocents to him that made him adorable. I absolutely want to give you a spoiler on how this book ends but if I did there’d be a few wiser people out there in blogger land who’d admonish me for spreading the joy I felt at the surprising conclusion of the book.
Change of topic: I don’t want to say this too loudly but it feels like fall. The nights are getting cooler, the hydrangeas outside my window are changing color and the stores are full of back to school supplies and Christmas stuff next to the Halloween decor. In my old neighborhood by now I’d be hearing the marching band from the near-by high school practicing. In the house I lived in before that one I not only heard the marching band but I saw it in the street in front of my house. This will be the first year in my entire life when I won’t have a marching band to help usher in the changing of the season.
People here are talking about football. I’ve never followed or liked the sport but I suppose it will be my new marker for the beginning of fall. They even fly college flags to support the University of Michigan or Michigan State. I won’t be able to ignore the game like I’ve done in the past---too many alumni here who follow it as if college football is the Pied Piper to happiness. And I suppose it is for those few hours when they can watch a game and relive their time on the field or at the parties around the bonfires afterward. I suspect our resident cheerleader who married (and later divorced) the college quarterback made her first baby at one of those bonfires. She’s my age and can still wear her old cheeerleader's uniform. She acquired two or three more husbands after her first and she could get another if now if she wanted to; she's one of those perky little things that men love and women envy. But she's a genuinely nice, compassionate person so her character breaks the shallow-headed cheerleader stereotype.
I couldn't wear anything from my college days---not even my shoes. If I could wish my life away I’d wish to be thin and not the hard way by catching cancer. It’s my only real shame in life...that I’m not the weight I should be and haven't been for 50% of my life. No need to body shame me, I'm good at that DIY project all on my own.
We have one of those gas fireplaces out on our piazza. It’s about twelve feet long and covered in blue stones with glass walls all around it. All summer long it’s where we gathered after dinner a couple of nights a week. We still do but lately we’ve been turning the fireplace timer on…another sign of fall coming our way. I’m not ready. Are you? ©
* Meme is of Rocky's speech pattern when he asks questions.
