just for you, Neal

Well, it looks like I'm giving up on my all-female reading list...finally!

I hit 10, then 50, and kept going...I didn't realize how many books by women I had on my to-read list! So I've been reading women almost exclusively for over a year now. I never thought I'd be able to stand even a few months, let alone an entire year! Well, maybe it was something I needed at the time....

However, I have recently been struggling with wanting to return to male authors, yet having such a difficult time deciding when and how. As in, should I wait until I hit a good round number, like 75 or 100? And what book should I start with? I felt like it should be something monumental, some work that was seminal in the development of literature, or else it wouldn't be such a poignant change. I considered Tolstoy, Proust, García Márquez. I felt like the decision was impossible to make. I want to read all of those, yes, and many more: but which first? Maybe it isn't even that important of a decision, but it feels like it is. I realize that I've been "cheating" a bit and reading some male authors, but for the most part I've been restricting that to book clubs or audiobooks. So I do feel like this is an important turning point for me.

So. I decided today, hell with it - why not my favorite author's new book? I know I'll enjoy it, it comes out today, and it's an easy decision to make. I don't want to wait on this new one like I've waited on others, because "a convenient time to read" this or that never actually happens, for me. I just have to pick it up and start reading. Which I'm eager to do - I do occasionally enjoy reading books that are à la mode so I can sometimes have conversations with people who aren't classics dorks like me, haha. (Not that I don't read other stuff...but usually I am at the very least a few years behind on whatever I read, largely because I tend to get books from PaperBackSwap...plus, I'd rather hear from people that a book is worth my time before picking it up, hah.)

Plus, I'm currently working on female-authored-books 68 and 69...and, after all, 69 ain't a bad number to end up on.... :)

And, buying it today gives me an excuse to visit Ant at work, which is an added bonus.

xo

Martha's 100 Reasons...to declutter

I came across this Martha Stewart article on Unclutterer today, and although it's from a year ago, it's still got some great references for those of you looking to thin out the stuff in your life. I don't agree with some of the items, but for the most part it's a pretty nifty & comprehensive little guide. I found the information on preserve to be of particular interest...granted, some places (Boston included) do recycle all types of plastic, but I know that many places don't, so this is a neat way to keep #5 plastic out of the trash. I did a bit of searching the website, however, and while I had hoped they would offer discounts on their products for mailing in materials for their use, they do not - but they do offer postage-paid mailing labels, at least. So really all you would have to provide (besides your time & energy) is a box. Not too bad, but they still are reaping the benefits financially...still, I suppose I'd rather see the plastic used than tossed. Maybe it's just (crazy) me.

Thanks, Mom, for raising three recycling-obsessed daughters! (Well, I suppose that it's better than us being trashy...in more ways than one, hah.)

xoxo

book meme

I saw this on Stariel's blog; I am changing the rules a bit because I don't have many books that I've started and not finished:

Instructions: Bold the ones you’ve read, italicize the ones you’ve started but haven’t finished you'd like to read someday, cross out the ones you hated, and underline the ones on your book shelf! Combine indicators as appropriate.

The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
The Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger
The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams
The Great Gatsby - F. Scott Fitzgerald
To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince - J. K. Rowling
Life of Pi - Yann Martel
Animal Farm: A Fairy Story - George Orwell
Catch-22 - Joseph Heller
The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
Lord of the Flies - William Golding
Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
1984 - George Orwell
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - J. K. Rowling
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel García Márquez
Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
Slaughterhouse 5 - Kurt Vonnegut
Angels and Demons - Dan Brown
Fight Club - Chuck Palahniuk
Neuromancer - William Gibson
Cryptonomicon - Neal Stephenson
The Secret History - Donna Tartt
A Clockwork Orange - Anthony Burgess
Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C. S. Lewis
Middlesex - Jeffrey Eugenides
Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Jane Eyre - Charlotte Brontë
Good Omens - Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman
Atonement - Ian McEwan
The Shadow Of The Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
The Old Man and the Sea - Ernest Hemingway
The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
Dune - Frank Herbert

This is a very curious mix of books...I wonder if they are all someone's favorites or something. Odd.

But, always glad to see my favorite book (Cryptonomicon) listed.

xo

p.s. I'm well aware that this is probably interesting to no one else but me...but I wanted to post it, I'm sorry. :)

Currently Reading:
	TITLE: The Bug AUTHOR: Ellen Ullman
	TITLE: Consuming Kids AUTHOR: Susan Linn
	TITLE: Bleak House AUTHOR: Charles Dickens

hilarious blog

After laughing out loud several times just today at posts on The "Blog" of "Unnecessary" Quotation Marks, I thought it high time to share this with my beloved blog readers.

I think what I love most are the terribly-amusing-but-oh-so-brief comments that the author adds to "clarify" (yes, quotation marks were necessary there, shush) the situation for her hapless readership, hah. Priceless.

I was up in Boston yesterday having a lovely time with Jeanette; I will try to get off my lazy arse and post about that sometime before 2010! :)

xo

(Oh, and credit goes to Bethany for pointing me in the direction of that blog. Thanks!)

Stephenson strikes again

Not that many people will care about this, but, yay, new from my favorite author!

Anathem

Now, if only I could stop the saving-the-best-for-last mentality I have about books (and many other things) and finally finish off his awesome Baroque Cycle trilogy....

xo

sunny day, chasing the clouds away...

Okay, has Sesame Street always been this awesome and I just failed to notice because I wasn't aware of celebrities when I was 5? Or is this a new thing, all of their cool guest stars? In the past month, I've seen Tina Fey (best EVER: "Read read read read / We're pirates who like to read!" - they were the Bookaneers), NPH (who played the Shoe Fairy!), and it looks like today features Will Arnett as a magician (not a far cry from his Arrested Development days, but hopefully he's more successful at it here than he was there...). This is the coolest thing. It makes me, as an adult, just as excited to watch Sesame Street as my 2-year-old housemate Kaelyn is. Awesome.

p.s. How cool is it that entering "NPH" into the IMDb.com search lands you directly on Neil Patrick Harris' page, instead of search results? Score one for Doogie.

Currently Reading:
	TITLE: The Bug AUTHOR: Ellen Ullman
	TITLE: Mating in Captivity AUTHOR: Esther Perel
	TITLE: Bleak House AUTHOR: Charles Dickens

hilarious.

So I recently signed up for YouMail, and I just love the service. It reminds me I have voicemails both via email and text message, which really helps me remember much better who I have to call back. Plus, I have an inbox where I can listen to or delete messages in any order, instead of having to worry about the linearity of normal phone voicemail systems or how quickly messages expire (they don't seem to on YouMail).

But what I am actually posting about is the transcription service they currently offer. When someone calls, they try to translate voice into text, and offer you that so you can scan the message if you can't immediately listen to it. However, voices are so diverse and voice recognition software is not quite yet up to par, so currently it's all just ridiculously amusing instead of all that accurate. But, I don't mind - I'm laughing my ass of in the meantime.

For instance, my sister Sarah called and left a message to call her back. I saw this: "Illuminating hey had a question for you mean column by. Do this."

My friend Kyle called (albeit, with laryngitis) and left a message that started off translated to: "Oh no no. Oh Regina. Shouldn't. Element lotus that's kind of." and ended with "A number isuzu for 6 it's ##### children to that. But producing but." (The number signs were actual numbers, but I didn't want to give away too much of his personal information!)

Yesterday, Ant and I tried to trick the voice recognition, but surprisingly his voice was one of the most recognizable. But we were highly amused when he tried "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" and it gave us "super cal fragile as the x-p-l Delicious" (complete with the capital "d"!). Now I can only say the phrase the latter way, haha.

There have been numerous others, but I won't bore you with them all, haha. (Especially because they are probably funnier when you know what was actually said!) But definitely I'd recommend signing up for this free service! It's been absolutely worth it for me. And not just because of the amusement factor. xo

crankypants

I feel really awful today because I'm being really bitchy, due to being extremely overtired. Which is ridiculous of me, because the reason for me being exhausted makes me really very happy. But unfortunately the happy didn't manage to cancel out the feeling I had of being walked all over by a friend. When I realized that I was overreacting, it was too late, the damage was done. Now, I just am feeling crappy for how I acted, because I realize it was really irrational and unfair. I think sometimes my social anxiety kicks into overdrive, and I lash out because I'm not sure how to be. I know I should be friendly & happy, especially to people I don't know well who have no idea why I'm in a lousy mood, but unfortunately sometimes I even take it out on them. And when I'm tired, I don't always have the energy to put on the requisite super-friendly act. I try always to do so when it comes to complete strangers - people in the service industry, for instance - but I think I can sometimes be terribly unfair to acquaintances who have never had to deal with an angry me before. Sometimes it comes out of left field and really throws people for a loop - because 90% of the time, I can be upbeat and cheerful as necessary. But when I'm off, I'm off - and unfortunately, people pay. I'm sorry.

I'm going to try to catch up on sleep tonight so hopefully I'm not quite so cranky tomorrow, but it'll be hard what with it being Tanya's birthday, and having a friend in from out of town for one night only! xo

Currently Reading:
	TITLE: The Brambles AUTHOR: Eliza Minot
	TITLE: Bleak House AUTHOR: Charles Dickens