Just as I am over my no good horrible very bad cold, Bookman has decided it looked like such fun he’d give it a try. Only he has discovered it is no fun at all. Whereas it took me a week to progress from feeling mildly under the weather to feeling bad and two days after that to make it to horrible, he is wasting no time. He began at bad for one day and then moved right to horrible the next. While I am sorry he is ill and has a dreadfully sore throat and no voice, I must admit it is refreshing to be able to babble on and not be interrupted. It’s marvelous to be able to babble at all. Bookman is quite the yakker and it is often difficult for me to get a word in. But now, now he can do nothing but listen. Granted, he is zonked out on cold medicine so I might as well be talking to a wall, but since the wall looks remarkably like Bookman, I can delight in being The Voice in the House.
It is also a good thing Bookman hasn’t been very hungry. While this girl can make a production in the kitchen for Solstice, when it comes to every day cooking, she is a fish out of water. Canned soup is a blessing. So is cereal. In two moments of lucidity Bookman did manage to make waffles for breakfast today and pizza for lunch, but I think it was because he was desperate for something besides cereal and soup.
Between his naps this weekend he managed to read Christopher Moore’s The Stupidest Angel. Through gesturing, he assures me it is funny and he laughed a lot even if it wasn’t out loud because his throat hurt too much. He decided to read the book because he needed something light and because he found out it is coming out as movie in November of this year. He has now passed the book over to me and indicated I had to read it as soon as possible.
Unfortunately, I am in the middle of too many other books to start that one at the moment. One of the downsides of having as many books on the go at once as I do is sometimes I find myself in the middle of all of them and nowhere near the end of any of them. While I don’t read in order to check books off a list or tot up the numbers, there is a certain satisfaction in finishing a book. When I find myself stuck in the middle of everything I am reading I get a bit of the doldrums. There is no excitement of starting something new and no pleasure in completion. This doesn’t happen very often, thank goodness, but when it does it is a bit of a downer even when I am enjoying what I am in the middle of. The book I am closest to finishing is The Canon by Natalie Angier and I still have about 150 or so pages until the end. I am liking it very much but hope to have it done by the end of the week or sooner.
Other things I read this weekend include the novel Testing the Current by William McPherson which is all kinds of good but slow reading. And I read some of How We Became Posthuman by N. Katherine Hayles. That book too requires slow and careful reading because it’s a thinking sort of book. I also read some good essays and reviews in both the London Review of Books and the New York Review of Books. On these both I am woefully behind the rate of their arrival. I was all caught up at the beginning of the year but have now slipped so I am two issues behind the current one for them both. I’m feeling like I need a nice long vacation just to catch up on my reading! I have to remember to buy a lottery ticket once it gets up to an obscene jackpot amount. If you recall, one of goals for 2013 is to win the lottery so I can quit my job and read all the time. I am aiming to achieve this in early April for the best birthday present ever. Don’t scoff. It could happen.
Ok, I have to cut the rambling short this evening. I need to go make myself a lunch for tomorrow because I can’t count on Bookman being able to make it for me in the morning. Then I have to set the coffee pot timer and generally get all my ducks in a row so I can get out the door on time sans assistance. After that I should be able to read for a bit before going to sleep.
I LOVED this post. It made me laugh
I hope Bookman is feeling better soon!!! xo
Helen, thanks, glad you enjoyed it
Bookman is feeling a bit better but staying home from work today in order to keep the recovery going.
Hope he’s better soon. There’s some killer colds going around this season- my kids and I were down with it last week and the week prior. It was hideous, but went thru us pretty fast. Lots of soup! Soup is good.
Jeane, thanks! There have been some terrible colds going around. It seems all my coworkers at one time or another this season has come down with some yucky bug. Yes, soup is very good!
Hope Bookman is feeling better. I know exactly how you feel. I suffered for about three weeks with cold and viral, but my guy decided let’s just do it all in a head rush and was horribly sick through the weekend, after coming down with the cold early Saturday morning. However I have no pleasure of blabbing ….his throat is still functional and he insists on leading all conversation. I hope you win the lottery….maybe I will be inspired again. I think all of us book readers, want to quit our jobs and spend the rest of lives reading. That’s my retirement plan….only I feel I will be so exhausted by my job by then, that half the charm will be lost!
I hope that Bookman recovers soon. I don’t like that feeling of being bogged down in a book – I guess that is the downside of the mostly rather excellent habit of having more than one book on the go. That is a good reason for being a little wary of long novels because after a couple of hundred pages I feel that it has to be finished and so reading becomes a sort of fulfilling targts- which can’t be right. Just about to start Stefan Zweig’s The World Of Yesterday which is a memoir I have long wanted to read = hope I’m not dissapointed!
Ian, thanks! He is on the mend. Some long books are so good you don’t get that bogged down feeling. I’m usually pretty good at mixing long and short but somehow this time I messed that up. Oh well. I didn’t realize Zweig had a memoir. He is/was an interesting writing with a sad story. I hope the book is good and you aren’t disappointed.
Zweig wrote the book soon before his death. So far it is a wonderfully evocative picture of Vienna pre-1914 and its richly creative life – am really enjoying it so far.
Yay! That’s good news
cirtnecce, thanks! He is on the mend but staying home today to continue resting so he doesn’t relapse. I think colds are worse than flu and norovirus. Everyone takes those seriously but you tell someone you have a bad cold and they think you are a wimp if you stay home and rest. I hope your guy is feeling better! I worry not that I will be too tired to read when I retire but that I’ll never get to retire! The lottery will let me retire early and I will be able to read in exotic locations
Oh! I know what you mean…I mean I barely make enough to pay for food and rent and whatever I save goes on — Books! Big Surprise there! So I want to retire because I want to read, but I cannot retire because I read!!!!!
I joke with my financial adviser that my books are my retirement savings. She is not amused. I will keep my fingers crossed that we both win the lottery jackpot sometime!
Amen to that!!!!
I know exactly what you mean about being in the middle fo everything. I used to find myself doing that all the time and nothing ever got finished because I just got stuck. Very frustrating and gloopy, like being caugt in a marsh or something.
Oh and good luck with your winning the lottery achievement. I believe you can do it! I won £10 the other day, so dreams can come true
Bookgazing, gloopy and caught in a marsh is exactly how it feels. Everything is a trudge even when it is good and I am enjoying it. And thank you for the good luck wishes. I will need more than £10 to retire but it is a start, right? It must have been fun to win your £10, that’s a new book!
Ah, best wishes to bookman for a speedy recovery. And thanks for a post that made me smile all the way through.
Cath, Bookman is recovering faster than I did but of course it is not fast enough for him. Glad you enjoyed the post and got a smile from it
I always thought that when I retired I would be able to read all day but somehow it ain’t worked out like that. I know it’s a cliche but how did I ever find time to go to work. Of course, it helped that my work involved reading. If someone came into my office and found me in the middle of a good book it was no more than they expected. I’m glad you’re over your cold and hope Bookman is soon. You won’t be surprised to hear that The Bears recommend honey and lots of it.
I know what you mean, Alex. I’m essentially retired after a very busy work life. I do read a lot, but I can manage to nickel and dime the day away with a 15-minute chore here, a 10-minute chore there. I often wonder how I managed to go to a 9 to 5 job, maintain the house, have a social life, and still read a load of classics and modern books when I was younger. I think, in my case, I’ve lost my ability to concentrate, to lose myself in a book, as I did when I was young.
Joan, between you and Alex you two are scaring me!
Alex, don’t tell me that! I dream of a lazy book-filled retirement and you are bursting my fantasy bubble!
No Comment!
I love you Bookman
We are in exactly the same position health wise, I got over the cold in 5 days, but Jack had to get antibiotics from the doctor today as it has gone to his chest. That’s men for you!
Pining, oh no! I hope Jack is on the mend!
Poor Bookman! I am catching up here, so I hope very much that he is feeling brighter. Ugh! Horrid colds. Break out the high dose Vitamin C. I know just what you mean about being in the middle of too many books. I do like to see the end in sight somewhere or other, and it only takes two slow middle sections to make one feel like a diver wading along the bottom of the ocean!
Litlove, Bookman is starting to feel better. I think he is over the worst of it, thank goodness. Which means I had better get all my words in before his voice comes back all the way! I will be finishing a book this weekend at last so I am starting to not feel so caught up in the middle.
Sorry to hear the Bookman was under the weather but hopefully he is on the mend now! I personally am happy eating cereal and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches myself, but an occasional proper meal is not a bad thing at all! At least the Bookman got in a little reading time! We are very much alike in our reading habits–I am midway through a number of books myself–totally love the McPherson, but it is solid print and even if I spend a nice little chunk of time with it, I don’t seem to notice that bookmark getting any closer to the back of the book. It is definitely one that demands time and attention, so I’ll just keep reading and enjoying. I think I will finish something tomorrow–or at least by the end of the weekend. I would say yay–that means I can start a new book, but since I start new books without any sort of excuse at all, it’s all the same whether I finish something or not (but I do like that feeling of accomplishment). Have a great weekend and hope you don’t get too much snow (we are only expecting about 4″ at most–more than enough on top of what we just got!).
Danielle, Bookman is on the mend. Still coughing but functional and back to work. We are so much alike in our reading habits it is sometimes scary. Reading twins? Separated at birth? I just know that whenever I start to wonder if I am the only one with 8 books on the go or who suffers from mid-book doldrums, or what have you, I think, “Oh Danielle does the same thing” and I feel instantly better
I hope he feels better!! Yuck. We just got back from a very long trip (longer than expected), which wasn’t fun for many reasons, but I did get to make good progress on my current book, Shogun, which I am now completely in love with. Love love love it. The writing could be better, but the story is fascinating!
wherethereisjoy, he is feeling better. It was a long week of getting there though. sorry to hear you had a longer than expected trip that wasn’t fun. Shogun, 1970s blockbuster doorstop! I never read it but I remember it being a big deal. Wasn’t there a TV mini series or something?
Sorry to hear you were both under the weather. My sweetie is the cook in my house also and boy do I miss him when he travels for work. The meals I put together pale in comparison to what he puts on the plate! I think if he stayed away for a month I would probably lose 10 pounds!
Boarding, thanks, we are both feeling better now but it was a bad spell. I know if Bookman stopped doing the cooking I’d probably lose 10 pounds too!