If a Tree Falls in the Forest ....

I'm sure we have all heard that age old question before, well I have a a new question for the technological ages: In the land of a million blogs if you have a blog and nobody reads it, is it still considered a blog?

I vote yes. It is my own fault no one reads what I write here. I haven't told any of my friends about it and I don't post the address anywhere. I sort of enjoy the vague, veiled anonymity of it all. I've always been a paranoid diary writer because I have a younger brother, and I had a roommate who once confessed to reading my journal. I don't know about you, but paranoia stilts my candor! For once I can write about things that I do and do not like, or the things that bother me and not worry about what people are going to say. It is funny that this lesson has been learned in such an actually quite public forum, but hey that's life!

Make Believe or Denial? It's a Fine Line.

I have nine days left until my Capstone project is due and grad school is over, and yes I am nowhere near done. Once I get my diploma I will have two new letters to list on my resume, an additional S41,000 in student loan debt, and absolutely no job prospects. This alone is scary enough, but it joins the jumble of work stress, family stress, and money woes, and enough has finally been enough this week. Fortunately Netflix is trying to distract me. Flipped arrived yesterday.

Flipped by Wendelin Van Draannen is one of the best books I ever read while running the Children's and YA section of a bookstore. Sometimes when you work at a bookstore if you see a book on enough lists you decide you will never read it (see Eat, Pray, Love). Fortunately repeatedly looking at those fuzzy chicks didn't put me off like it did one of my friends. The story is sweet, simple yet complex, and timeless all wrapped into one. It never fails to make me cry and feel hopeful at the same time, because I choose to believe that the ambiguous future ends brightly for Bryce and Juli, probably because I want to believe that the magic of falling in love for the first time can sometimes end happily. Imagine my surprise when I found out last year that Rob Reiner had turned it into a movie! Imagine my dismay when I found out that Flipped wasn't being released anywhere near my area!!

Time got away from me and Flipped came out on video. I put it on my Netflix list, but it kept getting lost in the jumble of other releases that were added to the queue. Until yesterday ...

As I type this the movie is quickly coming to an end. I still do not know if Rob Reiner added a more definite ending to the story, but right now I can definitely say the story is still magical. I'm just left wondering how fine is the line between make believe and denial really?

Closed for Renovations!

So it seems I am really a failure at blog writing. I haven't written a single thing since June because life has been too hectic so I made a New Year's promise to myself that I will start over again come April first when I am officially DONE with grad school :)

Dear Rush, Time Really Doesn't Stand Still No Matter How Much You Want It To!

Spring sprang and major leaks (some might even say floods) appeared in my life. My mom got sicker and between looking after her, housework, homework, actual work, and such I basically forgot what fun was. Don't let the Rush reference fool you, this entry is about books. There hadn't been much recreational reading going on in my life until last week. My recent genre of choice, you may ask? The cozy mystery. I normally go on "cozy" binges during the fall and winter, but they just seemed to fit my mood right now.

Mystery devouring was going along swimmingly, I had read 5 or 6 in a row, when I suddenly had a thought ... "cozy" mysteries are odd if you really take the time to dissect them. In most cases the author creates a charming small town or village that we the readers would love to move to. The people are interesting, the hobbies relaxing, the architecture soothing; all in all the world is indeed cozy ... that is until you remember that the death rate in these towns are HIGH! Come on, think about it, there I was finishing up the newest Seaside Knitters book, Moon Spinners by Sally Goldenbaum, and I found myself thinking that I would move to Sea Harbor in a heartbeat. It has everything I'm looking for in a hometown: a. the ocean, b. a really great LYS (local yarn store to you non knitters out there), c. a bookstore, and d. nice people including single rugged fisherman and single handsome artists/ musicians ... and a lot of murders. Hmmmm. Maybe I need to rethink how I would decorate my fictional Sea Harbor cottage .... or maybe not. It's possible that I could learn to overlook the danger because of all of the above mentioned benefits. Anyway, this realization isn't enough to get me to stop reading "cozies", after all I have a lunch appointment at a little tea shop in Charleston scheduled for tomorrow and it would be bad manners to cancel at this late of a date.

Should've Known Better ...

I tempted fate by complaining about yesterday, Today we discovered our entire basement is flooded. The water that covers the floor is 7 inches deep. How did we find out the basement was flooded you may ask? Well see the power blew in the dining room and half of the kitchen. While on a breaker and fuse hunt in the dark we stepped off of the stairs right into it. Surprise!

so now ,
floods: 1 us: zero
no electricity: 1 1/2 us: zero

Currently I am mainlining Girl Scout cookies and gatherings flashlights and batteries in preparation for the apocalypse.

Seesaw or Merry-Go-Round?

I can't decide if my life is more like a seesaw or more like a merry-go-round spinning out of control ... either way it doesn't feel anything like a picnic.

The Highlights from My Day:

6:40 am - Woke up to cat projectile vomiting a hairball on to my quilt ... the quilt that had just recently been laundered to remove the evidence of the last hairball attack. Cleaned quilt to the best of my ability and tossed and turned until 7:30 am.

11:30 am - Was attacked by various office supplies ... this actually happened a few times today. The hole-puncher and I have a re-match scheduled for tomorrow. I'm pretty sure the printer is taking bets.

2:40 pm - Received phone call explaining that my ride .... aka my mother (car ownership & my driving issues are a WHOLE other story) ... will be late because of a Cold Case episode.

3:20 pm - 3:45 pm - Received additional phone call, this one from a hysterically sobbing mother, explaining that she had fallen and couldn't get up. No she's not like the woman in the commercial. She's only 61, but she has M.S. and is awaiting a hip replacement, so mobility is not her strong suit. Am having heart palpitations thinking about the fact that she is home alone, when kind boss whisks me home quickly & I play Mission Extricate Mom From The Spot Where She Is Wedged ... final tip: tank tops work well as the basis for a leverage system ... and the ending of Cold Case was apparently predictable.

add in grocery store excursions, homework, cooking, money woes, bill paying, and other various good daughter activities ... plus the stuff I'm unwilling to bore you with/fess up to ... and you basically have every day of my life lately. Sure there are many, many people who are worse off, but man somethings got to give soon!

sheesh and it isn't even May yet!

Books, Books, Books

Grad school has put a serious cramp on my recreational reading. I miss fun reading. For me a day without reading for fun is basically a day where I'm cranky and grumpy. I've been cranky and grumpy A LOT lately. I decided to put an end to this ... partly because I was starting to fear for the lives of the innocents around me. I learned how to read quickly but asides from a love affair with The Baby Sitters Club books, Sweet Valley books, The Little House books, The Anne of Green Gables series, The Chronicles of Narnia, and the works of Beverly Cleary, Marguerite Henry, Madeleine L'Engle and picking up books here and there, I started reading adult books early on and rarely looked back. It wasn't until I was running the Children's & Young Adult sections of a bookstore that I finally realized how much I had missed. Don't get me wrong, it turns out I had read more than I remembered, but man the stuff I had missed!

In the interest of saving my overworked brain cells I have decided to devote 2010 to reading the Children's and Young Adult titles that I missed along the way ... with old favorites thrown into the mix. The first two series I jumped into were the Mary Poppins books by P.L. Travers and the Paddington books by Michael Bond. Both very enjoyable and oh, so British that I wished I was back in London curled up in my bed in my old terrible flat (REALLY TERRIBLE, but great duvet) with some crumpets and tea happily reading away while the rain pattered on the window.

Next up is A Wrinkle in Time. This is one of my absolute favorite books of all time. It tops the "Books I Re-read Every Year" List, but that's another post entirely. Just reading the first sentence, "It was a dark and stormy night", takes me back to a million and one places and a million and one feelings. I have so many favorite lines and moments that I don't even know where to begin. Each time I re-read it I take something new away. I have read my way through four copies and I will own a copy until the day I die. I often feel as lost as Meg and I'm still looking for my Calvin O'Keefe ... someone to tell me I have "dreamboat eyes" and who will love me prickles and all. In the words of Mrs. Whatsit, "wild nights are my glory" ... A storm is blowing like mad outside and I'm ready to hop into bed and dip into Chapter Three a cat by my side. Sheer bliss!