It Smells Like The Reading Room

A few years ago, a good friend of mine gave me a copy of Practical English And The Command Of Words, a faux-leather-bound three-ring binder of weekly English lessons for adults. The book is not actually the edition that link goes to; my copy was published in 1955, which makes it a year older than my dad. I've never gone through the lessons, although it has proven to be a valuable resource in proving that I'm right when Gabe wants to dispute my grammar.

The thing is, I know all of the rules, but I just don't follow them. I'm like an English teacher gone bad; I start sentences with coordinating conjunctions and end them with prepositions. I can remember the first time anybody had berated me for poor form. My first-grade teacher bitched me out for saying "me and Sara" instead of "Sara and I." Seventeen years later, and I still get a cheap thrill from doing it wrong. What was left for me to rebel against in my middle-class upbringing?

Anyway, I have this book, and it's in pretty amazing shape for being over fifty years old. It smells like an old library, and none of the worksheets are even filled out. I'm so bored lately that I'm thinking about going through it, taking the little lessons and maybe learning something. I've flipped through it, and it is absolutely fantastic. The whole thing seems to have this sexist slant, but hey, I'm not expecting a book published in the mid-50's to be The Vagina Monologues. Which sucked, by the way.