My tendency to become somewhat obsessed with a topic is probably about to become more evident. This is my second consecutive Steven Rinella read and it's likely that at least two more will appear here before I move on. At the moment I'm fairly obsessed with hunting and the outdoors. Rinella's writing is one of the few writers on the topic that satisfy this obsession. This book, in particular, is a type of hunting literature that is rare. It aims to be a complete guide explaining everything one would need to know to transform from non-hunter to one who is serving guests an elk shank Osso Bucco while entertaining them with the stories of calling in bugling elk during the peak rut. The fact that the vast majority of hunters begin as children, probably explains why so few complete guides exist on the subject. I've read that it remains rare for those who did not grow up around hunting to pick up the hobby in adulthood. The popularity of Rinella's book suggests that lack of interest may not have been the limiting factor here. I picked up hunting at a very early age from my father and my grandfather, so I definitely fall into the majority. But for over 2 decades, I did not hunt at all. As my interest in hunting has returned over the last few years, I've started to realize the extent of expertise that I sacrificed in taking such a long absence. I also realized that the bulk of my hunting knowledge is through the eyes of a child and isn't particularly focused on independence. The last time I hunted, for instance, field dressing a deer wasn't something I would have to deal with by myself. I saw it done by others countless times and lended a helping hand on many occasions, but had no real reason to learn to do it myself. But now I do and that's why I think I enjoyed the complete guide format as much as I did.

Rinella's voice and writing are energetic and smart and his hunting expertise is deep. The material is well organized and the depth of coverage is extensive but not exhausting. I'm certain that I will soon read volume 2 that covers small game hunting. And by soon, I mean that I will probably read it next. Then I'll likely read Rinella's new fish and game cookbook. Then maybe I'll move on.

In the days after Hurricane Florence displaced us from our home, I was exhausted and my daily routine seemed like a distant memory. I would wander back to whichever house we were occupying for the night, spend several hours helping my children adapt to “attending” online school, and then try to enjoy the 30-45 minutes that remained in the day before bed. The situation had rekindled the minimalist in me. I was living out of a single bag and not really feeling that the things from our house, that were currently unavailable, would contribute any more to my happiness. With this mindset, I sat down to try to make productive use of those 30-45 minutes before bed. I was too exhausted to read or study, so I reached for the Roku remote and started plundering through someone else's Netflix recommendations. The show Meat Eater immediately caught my eye and I started watching. It became a nightly routine for the next few weeks. The shows were short enough to fit in my brief pre-bed window and as more time later became available, I was able to watch 2 or 3 episodes. Steven Rinella's philosophy of hunting and eating was remarkably similar to my own and the production of the show was engaging. In trying to describe it to others, I would say “it's kind of like if Anthony Bourdain made a show about hunting.” I mean Rinella's poetics are a little bit cornier and Meat Eater is forced to replace the cultural explorations with historical narratives, but it's an amazing show. After just a few episodes, I would end up researching Rinella. I was curious how I had missed out on his work so far. I would later realize that I hadn't. I had bumped into his work in the past but never realized the recurring name. I immediately grabbed this book from Amazon and put several more into my Wishlist so they would be easy to find later. Not only does the book share a title with the show, it presents the same romantic view of a hunter's life and adventures and an ethics and philosophy of the modern hunter-gatherer. Rinella is a solid writer and while at times I have to admit that he dips hard into the sentimentality, it moves me. It makes me want to grab a rifle, pull my truck to the side of a wood-lined road and walk into the woods in search of food and adventure.

A concentrated effort to build some comfort writing code in Rust has long been on my TODO list. Like many software engineers, I've done a number of tutorials and banged away at some excercisms but I've never committed to the depth of learning required to actually use the language to solve real problems. Having now looked a little deeper, I realize the feeling of having not committed enough time to the depth is a feeling that will be hard to shake in Rust. Rust is complex and, as with the design of C++, there seems to have been no hesitation at all to increase that complexity in the name of either efficiency or type safety. That's not to say that I don't like the language and environment; I just suspect I'll have to struggle a lot longer before I feel the comfort that is required to use it on a daily basis. I do have to admit, though, there is an appeal to using rust more frequently. Despite the complexity, it's a clever but practical choice for building software.

As for the book, it far exceeds the many tutorials that I found online. I'm not sure Rust is a language that lends itself well to a “by example” approach to learning. With lifetime, in particular, it's easy to write some straight-forward code that pleases the borrow checker only to make a seemingly insignificant change that requires a deeper understanding of lifecycles. Without understanding the lifetime elision rules, these sparring matches with the compiler generally do not end well. I was pleased with the deeper dive into the nuances of the language and I felt like the extra time spent paid off.

I was originally drawn to this book in a roundabout way because the current political atmosphere was toying with a debate over the proper balance between individual rights and the protection of the collective. The debate lingered with me for days. I started to ponder if any of the cultural figures of the sixties and seventies could have escaped complete demonization if they had been magically transported into the current environment. Coincidently, YouTube soon suggested a video, Hunter S. Thompson's America, in which Thompson exchanges gun fire with his neighbor at Owl Farm. Later that week, I watched Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson and the next day I continued the impulse and bought this book. I expected the usual collection of facts strung out into a narrative arc covering the author's life, but instead the book is many voices written independently and then later reassembled chronologically. The format was enjoyable, though I often lost track of the current voice and had to flip back to regain my bearings. The stories of Hunter S. Thompson were amazing. Reading these types of biographies has a tendency to start endearing one to great man theories before one is fully aware of the implications. The stories alone make this worth the read and if there is an American hero, it's Thompson's liver. That said, I struggle feeling admiration for cultural heroes. It's hard to separate their individual contributions from the halo effect that seems to grown non-linearly around them once they reach a certain level of fame. With Thompson, in particular, it's hard to ignore his utter lack of autonomy. The personalities in the book, most of them successful themselves, all consistently described Thompson as powerful and free, yet, freely admitted that he was chid in a man's body unable to function without the admiration and awe of others. I have to admit, though, his commitment to controlling his own public persona and legacy was admirable. When your life becomes a part of your work of art, I guess the tendency is to push it as far as you can and it has to be hard to pack it up when football season is over.

I was feeling burned out and wanted to learn something low-level and didn't care at all about the utility of the thing I learned. ARM seemed intriguing and I do have a number of raspberry pis scattered about the house. I bought a copy and started reading on my laptop. It was enjoyable stopping to work through the examples, though the quality was mixed. I'm still angry that I never got the vector LEN and STRIDE example to work, but it seems nobody else on the internet did either. It didn't take long to finish the book and though I never expect to write another line of ARM assembly, it was a good way to spend a few nights.