Getting old. Getting cool stuff.

So I made a haul on good books this year for my birthday. My father sent me The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes (all three volumes as edited by Leslie Klinger). They virtually glow. I started reading Volume 1 on my trip last weekend. I don't think I've read several of these stories since Dad read them too me. I have a distinct memory of have The Dancing Men read to me on the bus.

Dad also sent me The Refiner's Fire, by John Lee Brooke, a history of the making of Mormom Cosmology from 1644 to 1844 published by Cambridge Press. I'm about half way through this one. Beyond his dispassionate but keenly interested account of the many influences culminating in Joseph Smith's "visions," it's a lovely marriage of good, thorough academic research combined with graceful writing, craftsmanship that can be appreciated for its own sake. I've had an interest in this subject ever since visiting my brother in Salt Lake and going to see the startlingly bizarre and fascinating Gilgal Sculpture Garden.

Amy surprised me with the Library of America three-volume set of Phillip K. Dick novels. Most people probably know him best for Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, on which Blade Runner was based. The only novel I've read by him was Confessions of a Crap Artist, not a sci fi novel but one I liked very much. He's been an author I've been saving for a good period. Now that the election is over, I'd say I've hit that period.

A little earlier this week, Amy and I went to the Museum of Science and Industry to see the Muppet Exhibit. The Muppet exhibit was not what I'd hoped, though they had several drawings and posters by a young Jim Henson. I loved those. I realized that I knew very little about him. I was hoping for more actual puppet exhibits. I adore Muppets. I actually had more fun seeing museum's standing exhibits like the train above.