The number of titles of books I read this year seems a little light, 30 books in 2013, only 18 in 2014. Looking over the list though, I feel a little better about my reading last year, there were some big books on the list.

Non-Fiction Politics and Theology (always a dangerous combination): A Farewell to Mars - An Evangelical Pastor’s Journey Toward the Biblical Gospel of Peace by Brian Zahnd. One could criticize it for being cavalier at times, but it’s covering a lot of ground in small book. It was much more then just an overview for me though, there were several new ideas, new metaphors and even some history that was new to me.

Time for this year’s Christmas Playlist. If this isn’t enough Christmas Music, you can always go back to previous years (2013, 2012, 2011, 2010).

Most of the music is available on Amazon. A lot of it you can listen to for free if you have Amazon Prime. I’ve also made a GrooveShark playlist of most of the songs.

1. Ho Ho Ho - Liz Phair - Ho Ho Ho
2. Carry Me Home - Hey Rosetta! - A Cup Of Kindness Yet
3. We Need A Little Christmas - AgesandAges - Holidays Rule
4. Ah Holy Jesus (with reed organ) - Sufjan Stevens - Silver & Gold
5. Xmas Time Is Here Again - My Morning Jacket - Does Xmas Fiasco Style
6. Winter Wonderland - Rosie Thomas - A Very Rosie Christmas
7. I’ll Stay ‘Til After Christmas - Blitzen Trapper - I’ll Stay ‘Til After Christmas
8. Joel the Lump of Coal - The Killers (feat. Jimmy Kimmel)
9. Frosty the Snowman - Fiona Apple - I’ll Be Home For Christmas
10. Christmas for Cowboys - John Denver - The Classic Christmas Album
11. Children Go Where I Send Thee - Smalltown Poets - Christmas Time Again
12. No Christmas In Kentucky - Phil Ochs - A Toast To Those Who Are Gone
13. Up On The Housetop - Pomplamoose - Pomplamoose Christmas
14. Happy Xmas (War Is Over) Yoko Ono and Flaming Lips
15. O Holy Night Brandi Carlile - O Holy Night
16. Christmas Must Be Tonight - Bahamas - This Warm December, A Brushfire Holiday Vol. 2
17. Goodbye England (Covered In Snow) - LauraMarling - I Speak Because I Can
18. Under Any Limb - Ruby The RabbitFoot - Under Any Limb
19. Christmas Alone - Current Swell - Isn’t This World Enough?? A Nettwerk Christmas
20. Wonderful Christmastime - Laura Gibson - Wonderful Christmastime
21. I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas - Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas
22. Christmas In Heaven - Monty Python - Monty Python Sings
23. What Are You Doing New Years Eve - Natalia Zukerman - What Are You Doing New Years Eve

Here are a couple bonuses.

When I tell people about bitcoin and I want to give an example of something bitcoins are good for today I usually use the example of international money transfers. Recently I successfully transferred some money to my sister (about $50), who is currently living in South Korea. It was not exactly the smoothest experience ever but I think it demonstrates a real opportunity.

Here’s how we did it.

About a month and half ago I asked my sister if she’d be willing to give this a try. Using CoinMap.org I found a bitcoin ATM in Seoul. It was kinda far away from where she lived but she said she goes to that part of the city every so often. We figured it was worth a shot.

It’s been over a year since I last write about my experiences with bit coins. I have not been able to explore the world of crypto currency as much as I would have liked but I have managed a few things.

Overall though, it’s been very interesting to see how Bitcoin is becoming more and more mainstream all the time. If you watch closely it seems super slow but if you take a step back, it’s pretty amazing how fast it’s been.

The Zombie Translator is back and better than ever. Not only does it “work” but there are now more example phrases not to mention vast improvements to the zombie linguistic engine.

My brother Derek is also involved as a writer.

There’s also a “social” element to the Zombie Translator. You can follow it on Twitter @ZTranslator, Tumblr and Google+. There you will find useful phrases to memorize. Some phrases are things you might like to communicate to a zombie and others are things zombies might be trying to tell you.

I think I’m going to start writing an annual blog post about my favorite books every year. Here’s this years run down. In case you are wondering I don’t actually have a memory capable of remembering all the books I’ve read this year and what I thought of them, but I’ve been logging my reading at GoodReads.com and that makes it easy.

Here they are in no particular order. I’m probably going to try to stick to one book per category.

It’s getting to be Christmas time again. That means a lot of awful annoying music that might have been fun at some point but after while just feels soul crushing, but also some that’s actually kinda good. Once again me and Erin have tried to assemble some of the better music (some new some old) to improve everyone’s holidays.

We just try not to repeat any exact tracks from previous years. I’m not sure we’ll be able to keep that up forever, but we managed to do it again this year. Some of our favorite Christmas songs are on previous year’s list, so you should check those out too (2012, 2011, 2010). If you listen to all 4 plays lists back to back, that’s over 4 hours of Christmas music.

Here’s a CD’s worth of Christmas music that Erin and I will be listening to this year. Merry Christmas!:)

1. Weezer - Hark! the Herald Angels Sing

   From the Christmas With Weezer album, one of my favorite Christmas albums and one of my favorite Christmas songs.

2. We Wish You a Merry Christmas - John Denver and the Muppets

   From the A Christmas Together album. We (me and Erin) really like the Muppets but I’m afraid I was unfamiliar with their “Christmas together” with John Denver until Erin showed me the light. It’s good stuff. Erin says that for this song’s full effect you need to see it, I can’t find a video of it though. If I find one, I’ll put a link here.

My girlfriend Erin and I have put together a Christmas Playlist for 2011 of better than average to pretty good Christmas music.

1. Crash Test Dummies - Good King Wenceslas - Jingle All the Way

2. Guster - Tiny Tree Christmas - The Christmas Gig: Two Thousand Ten

3. Julian Casablancas - Christmas Treat

4. Low - Just Like Christmas - Christmas

5. The Killers - Joseph, Better You Than Me (feat. Elton John, Neil Tennant) - (RED) Christmas - EP

So, while I was on my road trip (almost 6 months ago now) I took some video (mostly while I was driving). Maybe not the safest thing in the world, but I had some time to kill. I figured I would edit it all together when I get home. Put it to the tune of Mr Space Man. The hi-light of course, being the shuttle launch. Alas, no shuttle launch, at least while I was there, so I kinda lost some of my motivation to finish putting the movie together. I finally made my self finish it though. Nothing amazing, but hopefully it will help me remember how much fun I had (making it sure did).