Finishing "Poplorica." Sort of.

This may be the first time I have ever accidentally finished a book. I was sitting there last night, Poplorica in hand, reading a really interesting chapter about product placement in movies. It might have been my favorite chapter in the book. The next chapter was about the invention of a certain golf club driver. I don't know if the chapter was as boring as it sounded, because I decided to skip it. The golf club chapter starts on page 225 of 284, so I thought I still had another chapter to read. Turns out those last 60 some pages are all chapter notes and index. I thought about going back to read the golf club chapter just so I could say I read the whole book, but the overwhelming boringness of golf persuaded me to just call it a day.

The boringness of golf leads me to the point I want to make about this book: your enjoyment of it is directly related to your interest level in the subject matter. As a Mad Men fan, I enjoyed the chapters about the birth of product-placement and market research. Reading how these now commonplace marketing strategies were started was really interesting. Also extremely interesting were the chapters about Night of the Living Dead, graphical user interfaces, and tabloids. Even the chapter about the slam dunk and how it shaped the NBA carried a certain amount of nostalgia. As a kid growing up in Chicagoland in the '90s when The Bulls were Gods, everyone liked basketball. That chapter brought back memories of watching games with my dad, watching Michael Jordan soar to the basket.

Other chapters were less interesting. Seriously, who cares about golf? (Yes, I know. Abby's husband golfs. He would probably like that chapter.) After reading Bonk, the chapter on Kinsey seemed really light. And I get where they were going with the chapter on pantyhose, but I think a chapter about bras would have been more interesting. How did we go from longline bras and girdles to modern bras? From custom-fit to ABCs? I also think discussing the invention of the birth control pill would have been fantastic. As it is the chapters that talk about women's liberation are the ones about frozen dinners, pantyhose, and disposable diapers. I know I'm biased, but I would have loved more chapters about women and society.

Overall it was a good book. It was easy to read and well researched. Definitely worth the $1 I paid for it.

Poplorica by Martin J. Smith and Patrick J. Kiger

I know it looks like I must have developed a life or something over the last few months, because I haven't posted any book reviews here since early November. I assure you this is not the case. I haven't actually finished reading anything recently, but since there's nothing I love more than procrastinating on finishing my grad school applications, I'm here tonight to post about the book I'm currently reading, Poplorica.

I picked up Poplorica for a dollar off a Borders clearance rack years ago. I had completely forgotten about it until I pulled it out of a big box of books I rescued from my old bedroom at my parents' house. I started reading it last week and so far I'm really enjoying it. It's got a great balance of history and humor. It's well-researched without being heavy and boring. I've finished the first four chapters, which were about front lawns, air conditioning, calorie counting, and Alfred Kinsey. The purpose of the book is to look at the small inventions or ideas that lead to bigger movements and are still influencing our society today. Like how a landscape design book from 1870 praising grass lawns lead to nearly every household in America having a lawn, despite the fact that most Americans hate yard work. How Alfred Kinsey's unsuccessful honeymoon lead to his research that helped fuel the sexual revolution. How the invention of air conditioning prompted a population boom in the more conservative Southern states, shifting the votes in the Electoral College for each state and therefor influencing national elections.

It's an interesting book, and the chapters are nice and short (about ten pages each). I'll let y'all know how the rest of the book was when I'm finished. The next chapter is "The Rise of Tacky Chic" and I am pumped. There's nothing I love more than a little tack mixed in with my chic.