I have, on and off, pondered what it would be like to have my own flock of cute, adorable, woolly sheep. I've always known it would be rather a more serious undertaking than having a dog or a cat (a herbivorous ruminant just isn't the kind of animal you can housebreak), but I never quite knew exactly what it would be like. This book gives amazing detail on the life of a beginning shepherd, going through the details of how to pick the breed of sheep, how to set up your pasture for sheep, what to do when sheep get sick, routine maintenance that can be done to keep sheep healthy, and big events like lambing, shearing, and (gulp) slaughter.
While I don't think I'll be getting my own sheep anytime soon, this is a great reference to have if you're even not-so-seriously pondering it -- or if you happen to love sheep (the book is FULL of cute, adorable, wonderful pictures of sheep). I definitely love sheep, and I'm very happy to have read this book!
Tags: reading, yay sheep!
This is one I picked up for a class that I ended up being unable to take due to scheduling. It's short and sweet, and full of information about Deaf culture (note the capital D).
Books about Deaf culture are often very defensive in tone. To hearing people, Deaf people are "disabled", "disadvantaged", missing an integral part of a hearing person's life. To Deaf people, they're just people--people who have their own distinct language and culture. And both the language and the culture have been downplayed, belittled, and criticized, for as long as they've been around.
This would be a great place to start for anyone who hasn't read a bunch of books on Deaf culture; you'll get to find out a number of things that might surprise you about the Deaf community. But for someone who's read several books on Deaf culture already, it seems like it doesn't have a lot of depth to it, it's preaching to the choir, and it leaves out a lot of really interesting details. It seems like it was written for hearing people, as a way of getting a Deaf foot in the door, so to speak. I'd only recommend it to people who need to get started reading about Deaf culture.
Tags: deaf culture, reading