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New Book: Dad is Fat by Jim Gaffigan
About a week ago, I finished reading Do Not Sell At Any Price: The Wild, Obsessive Hunt for the World's Rarest 78rpm Records by Amanda Petrusich, which is about collecting 78s, a type of record that hasn't been made in many decades. As I mentioned before, the book details both the people who collect the records, as well as some of the artists and record companies that were making 78s. Petrusich kind of immerses herself in the 78 collecting culture, hanging out with collectors and even going so far as to go scuba diving in a river in Grafton, Wisconsin to see if she could find any lost 78s possibly thrown into the river decades ago by employees of the Paramount Record Company that used to be there. Overall, the book was just okay. The writing was fine, but I found myself not really caring what happened, except for the scuba diving incident. I was actually really hoping she would find some records in the river bed. The book would probably have been more interesting if I was into 78s or more into the genres of music often found on 78s. If anything, the book completely discouraged me from ever attempting to collect 78s, since it appears that all of the 78s of value are already owned by collectors, and almost none of them is willing to part ways with his or her 78s. I do like some of the music that was discussed in the book (prewar blues, in particular), and I think perhaps the best legacy some of these 78 collectors have left is that they have lent their collections to record companies to release music that otherwise would never be heard again.
From there, I have moved on to Dad is Fat by Jim Gaffigan. It's a book about parenting written by one of my favorite stand-up comedians. That's pretty much all I needed to know.
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