Some low hanging fruit for me is what I do in my “down” time. Work takes up most of my day. Add in being a parent and a boyfriend and you’d think I don’t have any free time, but I do. A little bit, anyway. Some of the things I do in that free time have not really added enrichment to my life. I’m talking particularly about television. I have several hobbies – I roast my own coffee and brew my own beer, I dabble on the harmonica and the drums, I like to work out and run, I cook. These things come and go as my interests change, but the thing that has remained pretty constant is the amount of time I waste watching television and movies.

I don’t think that I watch crap TV – none of that reality junk. I’ve watched stuff like The Wire, Dexter, The Shield, Sopranos, Californication and the like and I like movies like The Machinist, Memento, and Ingmar Bergman films to name a few. Most of those things are not art, by any means (the movies come much closer than the TV), but you’re at least afforded the opportunity to use your brain sometimes.

I won’t say that I’ll never watch a TV show or a movie again. I watched a TV show last night, and I’ll probably watch one tonight. But, I’m putting forth this goal: I will read something of quality for at least one hour, every day. I’m not putting a time frame on this goal, like “for one month” or “for six weeks”, because I’d like it to be ongoing. And, just as my son has to do his homework before he does anything else, so will I do my reading for the day before I watch any TV or movies. It only seems fair. I will also not say that there will never come a time where I won’t watch any TV or movies. It’s entirely possible and I’m open to the scenario.

Here, on this blog, I will primarily be writing about my experiences in reducing my entropy through better entertainment. I’ll be going through the books I’m reading, the things I’m doing as a parent to help the kids do the same, and anything else I see fit to write about. In the meantime, I’ve got a book to read.

The reason I chose to read “Flow” was because it purported to talk about finding happiness and enjoyment in life. Maybe it sounds a bit touchy-feely, but I like to be happy and enjoy what I’m doing. For the most part, I am and I do – but it’s easy to lose sight of that.

In the book, Csikszentmihalyi (I won’t even pretend to know how to say that) digs into what people are actually doing when they’re most and least happy. From these experiments arises the concepts of flow and entropy, respectively. People are happiest when they actively eliminate entropy and engage in flow inducing activities. “Flow” outlines many ways one can make many of life’s activities be flow-inducing, or at least not terribly chaotic.

My only real gripe with the book is that it’s a bit much with the examples and case studies – some of which seem repeated a number of times. It could probably be 50-100 pages shorter and still get all of its points across.

The Grand Design gives a quick historical overview of the progress of physics from ancient Greece, to Newton, Einsten, up to String Theory and M-Theory in modern physics. The goal of the book is to explain how and why M-Theory might lead to a grand theory of everything, and why that is an awesome thing.

Given my lack of knowledge in this area, I was concerned the book might be over my head. It is anything but. Hawking and Mlodinow do a fantastic job of presenting these topics to the layman. I’m now very interested in the subject and am looking forward to reading and learning more.