After last week's post on Audible, I realized I had many further stray thoughts about the audio book experience in general. I've had no problem integrating Audible into my normal listening routine at work or in the car, and in general I'm satisfied with the experience.

But I can't help this nagging feeling that it somehow doesn't count -- that I'm not actually reading the books I'm listening to. And this sensation is really dependent on the content of the book in question. I felt no qualms whatsoever about Yes, Please or Not That Kind of Girl, perhaps because the respective tones were funny and personable, and maybe because they were read by the authors themselves, which somehow seems to legitimize them?

When it comes to books, I am very much a traditionalist; being a librarian helps. As does studying art history, because I've taken no fewer than four classes in which I had to study the history of books and printing. I own far more books than is necessary, and I always have a stack of at least two or three library books at a time (that doesn't count cookbooks). That said, I am not one of those people who complains about technology moving too fast and whatnot. As much as librarians tends to love books, they have to love computers even more, because that is what the job requires these days. I have an iPhone, it is with me always, and I use it for almost everything, so it seemed time to embrace the audio book, especially since I have a job that is conducive to headphones.