After reading a very long introduction and play-by-play of a "game" of Eschaton -- the Infinite Jest tennis students' game that seems like a horribly nerdy combination of dungeons & dragons, Model UN, mathletes, and tennis drills -- I'll stick with Calvinball.
It seems like as appropriate a time as any to bring up the other personal reading challenges I have inspired. I've soundly outread my mom the last two years (this year I was awarded a handsome monkey bookmark for my victory) so when I explained my project to her she had to think of a personal challenge of her own. She decided, quite appropriately for a fourth grade teacher, that she would finish four of the series of children's books that she's begun but never finished: A Series of Unfortunate Events, Harry Potter, Little House on the Prairie, and The Chronicles of Narnia. I made her add the slim, totally readable, Michael Chabon book that I gave her a few years ago. Never wanting to be left out and desperate to reintegrate to Continental US Society after a year in Alaska, my sister has pledged to read 100 books, at least 45 of which will be sad lady books. I'm like the Johnny Appleseed of stupid, self-regulated, Jones family reading challenges.
