I did something very scary today. I went to the library and signed out a copy of Atlas Shrugged. For starters, it's 1168 pages long (and I expect to read it and several other things over the next two weeks). More importantly, it's Ayn Rand. I'm really hoping that USADave of Brunching UBB fame and the good folks at AynRand.org are doing an exceptionally poor job of explaining and applying Objectivism. I don't think I can take 1000 pages of "a is a, which proves that my assumptions about things must necessarily be the Truth" and "all environmentalists want all people dead."

I also got Dante's Inferno and two books on New Zealand. Hopefully those will help me keep my sanity.