It's not a competition

A month or so ago, a friend sent me an invitation to join Shelfari.com, a lightweight social networking site that basically allows you to build your "bookshelf" from works you've read. Book-cover jpegs are supplied by Amazon; it is a clever and satisfying way of gathering and remembering the books I've spent special time with. Of course, if I want to continue to play the Amazon way, I can check out the lists of other folks (who either read far more than I, or have much better memories) with whom I share a special fondness for a particular book or author.

So a few weeks ago I realized my work friends and I were seeing more than our fair share of arts events around town, and thought it might be fun to see what we're each choosing, compare reactions to shared (but separate) experiences, encourage each other to see more work that is outside of our regular choices, and then maybe, just maybe, compare totals at the end of each month. But I can forsee potential spats about the definition of an "arts experience" just to get the numbers up.

At any rate, by Wednesday morning of each week, I will post my previous week's cultural consumption with comments and recommendations as they apply.