Ah, vacation.
It actually began at 4:00 on Friday last week but it hasn’t felt like vacation until today. That’s because somehow I’ve been pretty busy. There was regular grocery shopping and Solstice ingredient shopping. There was cooking. There was the dentist. Other things I can’t seem to remember but that sucked up time. Oh and the library. To pick up books I did not expect to be getting until next year. Which means my vacation reading plans have been all messed up because these books can’t be renewed. Story of my life!
The books? How to Be Both by Ali Smith and Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay. These are okay things to have mess up my reading plans. I began reading Smith today and am really liking the book a lot. I have not read Smith before, have always meant to, but you know how it goes. Now, of course, I find myself wondering why I didn’t read her sooner! The good part is she has lots of books I haven’t read.
Vacation reading also includes Dirty Chick, which is proving to be hilarious, Proust, which is not hilarious, and finishing The Magicians by Lev Grossman. Oh there are plenty of other books on hand but these are the ones I will be focusing on.
I am also wallowing in the pleasures of seed catalogs. Man, do I need some acreage!
Also on this vacation time, I am playing catch up with my book database. I have been pretty good all year at keeping my Books Read page updated but not so much my personal database that allows me to track books at a glance across the years. I spent a couple hours today entering books and I am only up through July. Halfway, right? It appears I have had a personal record breaking reading year. But more on that later.
Other events this vacation will include: a trip to a bookstore or two and a viewing of the final Hobbit movie. The movies have been pretty good, but I am so glad this is the last one. There is absolutely no reason they had to take this mediocre book and turn it into three movies. Oh wait, there is a reason: money. And I couldn’t help but give them some of mine. Sigh.
It will be light posting through the New Year. I’ll pop by with books I finish and an end-of-year roundup, but blogland gets quiet this time of year anyway and I’d like to take a mini-vacation from my computer. So in case I don’t manage to get round in the next day or two, I hope all of you celebrating Christmas out there have a wonderful day filled with love and good food and lots of new books!
Thank you, Stefanie. Enjoy your holiday. And
thanks for that bit of snow—we won’t see any
this year–sniff, sniff.
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No snow? That’s a shame. After our brown Christmas we now have about four inches of snow on the ground. It looks quite nice out at the moment.
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Enjoy the holidays, Stefanie. This eerie quietness in blogland offers a great opportunity to do a little planning and to get 2015 off to a roaring start. I’m trying to do a little regrouping in hopes of staying ahead of the curve for a change. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours.
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Have a lovely holiday, Stefanie and I hope Bookman and the cats enjoy it too. Enjoyed the comment about The Hobbit!
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Thanks Sam! Yes, regrouping is a good way to put it!
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Have a wonderful winter break, Stefanie, enjoy all your reads and hope you won’t get too exhausted just by watching the battle of five armies. 😉
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Thanks Arti! The movie went by fast but I can’t say I thought it was that good. Oh well.
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Hope you are enjoying the holiday and I can’t wait to hear all about the record breaking reading year! Enjoy the movie and have fun at the bookshops.
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Thanks Iliana!
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There’s nothing quite as exciting to a reader as the promise of days and days of reading. Have fun!
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Isn’t that the truth Joan! Sadly, so much time is also easy to fritter away.
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Lots of food? Yeah, there was plenty of that and now am ready to get back to my normal routine. If I don’t see another Christmas cookie until next Dec it will be too soon! I have had the worst reading year since I started blogging…..sigh. Oh well, what can you do? It happens sometimes, right? I’m glad yours was good! Something for me to improve upon next year. Hope you are having a great break with lots of books and visits to bookstores!
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Danielle, as long as you enjoyed what you did read that’s what really matters. I am surprised by how much I have read this year especially since I remember thinking in March that it was going to be not very good for amount or quality. I’m sure 2015 will see things turn around for you!
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Our vacations plans are SOOOOOO similar, minus the seed catalogue! I did see The Hobbit #3, on the very first eve of my vacation. Movie is good, book I agree is Ok and yes, we all have just made Peter Jackson and friends richer!! Sigh!
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cirtnecce, that’s pretty funny. I ended up not much liking the movie. Oh it was visually stunning but it was kind of boring I thought. At least next year we won’t feel compelled to go watch another Hobbit movie!
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Ooh, I love Ali Smith and am really looking forward to reading How to Be Both – I highly recommend There But For The. And oh, I should read Bad Feminist, too – I keep hearing good things about it. And yay Lev Grossman – I really liked the whole Magicians trilogy, and just put a hold on his first book, Codex, which my boyfriend is currently reading and enjoying.
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plangently, I’ve heard The But for the is really good. I finished How to Be Both and loved it. Will be writing more about it soon.
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Mediocre? I have loved that book! but then, I was introduced to it at a young age- maybe that makes a big difference. I’m almost afraid to revisit. But I agree- they didn’t need to make three films out of it. One long one would have sufficed.
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Jeane, I have read and enjoyed The Hobbit a number of times but I have never loved it. It’s the Lord of the Rings that I love and The Hobbit just sort of sets that up.
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I hope you enjoyed your min-vacation Stefanie. I know what you mean about keeping up your personal database. Each time I finish a book there’s the review, the Author index page on the blog, my personal database and LibraryThing for books I own. I found yesterday day that I’d missed about 4 this year on the author index page, and I know I’m behind in LibraryThing. Will check that in a day or two.
Did you enjoy The Hobbit? I don’t think we’ll see it. We saw the first one and couldn’t believe they’d decided to make it into three. We just weren’t interested enough to watch the others.
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whisperinggums, my vacation is winding down to a close now and I am very sad because I have been enjoying it very much. I could use another couple of weeks! I’m glad I’m not the only one who has a hard time keeping up with the book tracking. I’ve thought for a few years I should make an index page of some sort for my blog but as time passes it just becomes more daunting and well, you know.
The Hobbit movie was so-so. All the last one amounts to really is 2 1/2 hours of battles with short breaks. Of course the effects are stunning and the scenery of New Zealand is gorgeous, but the movie was a bit disappointing.
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I guess the good thing is that your expectations were low!
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