The Noble

---Once again this blog post doesn’t relate to tennis in any discernable way. Don’t worry, next week’s post will be all about the trips the team has taken over the past few weeks---

When I was a freshman in college, I took a grammar and composition class just like every single student at my school. However, this class was a little different from most composition classes in that my professor had us write memoir style papers in the creative nonfiction vein instead of boring literary essays. While the rest of the grammar and comp classes were enlarging the periods at the end of every sentence to reach their required page length over Walden’s Pond, we were penning papers about trying to light farts on fire while in high school (my professor would be so proud of the alliteration in that sentence). No joke, I wrote a paper about sitting around a campfire in high school where everyone was mesmerized by the act of flaming flatulence and setting a can of Easy Cheese on fire.

It explodes. Oh, it explodes

Of course, since I was a college student and paying for my education and getting a grade for these essays, I put very little effort into them. Now that I’m not paying tuition to write or getting a grade for any of my writing, I absolutely love writing these blog posts. I would love to go back and have a chance to be in a class like that again. If you’re fortunate enough to still be in college, here’s some advice for you: don’t take any of your classes for granted. It’s pretty rare to be in an environment where learning is the whole goal. I consider myself lucky that I have a job that allows me to write for fun over just about anything that comes to mind. Those opportunities are rare, just like the short time you have in college.

Now that I’ve done my good deed for the day and doled out sage wisdom, let’s get back to talking about what really matters. Me. If I were in a writing class I know my essays would be much more robust since I’m no longer an inexperienced, peasant freshman, but a well versed man in his mid-twenties. Okay, maybe I don’t have the life experiences of an old man – say my dad – but I’m more versed than that putrid idiot who started college at the age of 18 (my 

parents and friends call that idiot Brad).

He still won't wear pants

One particular assignment we had was a place piece where we would write about our favorite place and what it meant to us. I wrote something, something, something; it sucked. I would describe that paper like I would describe all of the ones I wrote that year. It was boring, boring, very very boring – just like that last sentence. With redemption in mind, I want to tell you about a place that I love.

This place can be found in most cities. It’s really a portal to anywhere you could want to go, and learn anything you could possibly want. I might not have come to Cedar Rapids if there wasn’t one here. I’m talking about Barnes and Noble.

My love affair with The Noble started back a few years ago. In the summer of 2009, I took a  Behavioral Health class that I absolutely hated. However, one day we watched a TED lecture by Dan Ariely that deeply interested me. After class was over I went out and bought Ariely’s book, Predictably Irrational. This seemingly innocuous event, coupled with my roommate’s own broad array of knowledge, eventually led me into a reading frenzy bordering on drug style addiction.

Try this Game of Thrones. It'll rock your world

Going to The Noble, for me, is like going to a candy store for a kid (or REI for Coach Rodgers). My last trip lasted a good two hours; two hours of euphoria. I love everything about bookstores: the intellectuals in the science section, the socially awkward people in the fantasy section, the tin-foil hat freaks in the New Age section, the old men in the history section. I can’t get enough of it, and I want to buy EVERYTHING. Most people would think I’m just using hyperbole here to make my point (once again my professor would be proud), but here are all the books currently in my queue.

Unbroken- Laura Hillenbrand

The Last Unicorn- Peter Beagle

Russia and the Russians- Geoffrey Hosking

The Vikings- Mark Harrison

All Quiet on the Western Front- Erich Maria Remarque

Song of Wrath- J.E. Lendon

Seven Summits- Bass and Wells

High Crimes- Michael Kodas

The Poison King- Adrienne Mayor

Scipio Africanus- B.H. Liddell Hart

Running on Empty- Lars Ulrich

Blind Descent- James Tabor

The Lucifer Principle- Howard Bloom

The Toaster Project- Thomas Thwaites

Cool, Calm, Contentious- Merrill Markoe

Why We Run- Bernd Heinrich

The Dictator’s Handbook- Bruce Bueno de Mesquita

American Machiavellie: Alexander Hamilton- John Harper

Stumbling on Happiness- Dan Gilbert

The Righteous Mind- Jonathan Haidt

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter- Seth Grahame-Smith

The Know-it-all- A.J. Jacobs

Eat and Run- Scott Jurek

Breasts- Florence Williams

How We Decide- Jonah Lehrer

Deep Survival- Laurence Gonzalez

Where They Stand- Bob Merry

The Survivor Personality- Al Siebert

Marcus Aurelius: A Life- Frank Mclynn

Soliders and Ghosts- J.E. Lendon

A Strange Wilderness- Amir Aczel

DNA USA- Bryan Sykes

The Rise of Rome- Anthony Everitt

Joseph Anton: A Memoir- Salman Rushdie

Yeah, I have a lot of reading to do. Perhaps if I medicate myself with caffeinated coffee I can stay up all night and have more time to read. I think you can understand that I enjoy me some Barnes and Noble, but my level of addiction is worse than you think. Here's a little example of my bookstore addiction. 

Last spring I took a girl on a date. I know that shocking in itself, but there's more to the story.  We had a nice dinner, and the conversation was lively and very enjoyable. After dinner was over we left the restaurant in my truck.

At this point you’re probably thinking, “No Brad. Tell me you didn’t take her to Barnes and Noble!” Oh, I did. Yes I did. In a fit of absolute nerdism we went to The Noble. By the time we left, I bought two books and she bought three. Oh great Noble she is worthy!

Also, how do you feel about marriage?

The reason for all this reading is because of a simple desire. It is a desire my roommate and I both share, and he summed it up pretty well when he told me, “there’s stuff out there that I don’t know yet, and I have to know it.” Pretty simple really, I want to know everything there is to know which is why bookstores have such an allure to me.

At bookstores you can learn and read about anything you want. Dan Ariely’s take on behavioral economics, Susan Casey’s scientific look at waves and the people who surf them, Bill Bryson’s hilarious travels around the world, George R. R. Martin’s epic tale A Song of Ice and Fire which is the absolute opus of the fantasy drama. My roommate and I were fully aware that we were making ourselves veritable jacks-of-all-trades and master’s of none. But that didn’t matter. There was information out there and we needed to know it.

I prefer the term polymath

Where does this quest end? Besides knowing everything, I also have an ulterior motive. One that is much less noble than the quest for knowledge. I want to have a room in my house that is my own library. Kind of like the library in Beauty in the Beast, but without all the talking house wares. Basically, I want to arrogantly show off all that I know. I realize this quest could put me on par with those smug coffee aficionados of which I have already established my hate for. At least in my own case, I will have earned that smug smirk that others will daydream about wiping off my face with their fists