Communities

For some reason, I’ve always had this impression that all collections — essays, magazine writing, short stories, you name it — were all about the same. All of the entries would fall on a sort of bell curve — a few would be terrible and a few would be stellar, but most would fall somewhere between mediocre and pretty good. It didn’t matter what the theme of the collection was or who was in charge of putting it together, it was just a natural part of a collection and how different pieces appeal to different readers.

I’ve had two quite busy and stressful weeks at work, which has cut into the brain power I have for reading and blogging. I just haven’t been able to write any reviews lately, and I’ve been struggling to get into some of the nonfiction I’ve got on my plate right now.

I skipped my weekly morning writing session at a coffee shop yesterday morning — it was really, really cold, and I just wanted to spend the morning in my pajamas reading Raised Right by Alissa Harris — so I’m feeling a little behind starting up today. I actually was really lazy yesterday, so I have the bulk of my weekend project list to finish today… going grocery shopping, making chicken noodle soup, doing laundry, writing our BAND discussion for February, catching up on reviews, and completing my first day of week four of Couch to 5K. It’s going to be a busy day!

Happy Sunday everyone! I’m feeling rather random today, so I think I’m going to just go with it.

I’ve been addicted to the library lately. Every time I go in to the library to return or pick up one book, I end up leaving with three more. In the last couple weeks I’ve brought home The Art of Eating In by Cathy Erway, Burning Down the House: Essays on Fiction by Charles Baxter, My Fair Lazy by Jen Lancaster, Physics of the Future by Michio Kaku, Safe from the Sea by Peter Geye and Zahra’s Paradise by Amir and Kahlil. I haven’t read any of them yet, but soon I hope.

Doing book stats is one of my favorite things. It’s always interesting to me to compare what I thought I read over the year to what I actually read. Often, I find out that my impressions of my reading are pretty different from the reality. But anyway, onward!

It is amazing what a full weekend at home can do for making life seem more manageable.

Earlier this week I felt totally overwhelmed by… everything. After more than three weeks of not having an entire day at home to myself, I was just feeling worn down. I wasn’t reading, I wasn’t writing, I just didn’t feel like me.

And then Saturday came, and all seemed to improve. Instead of spending yesterday at home in my pajamas like I originally planned, I forced myself out of the house to a local coffee shop to get some blogging done. I managed to write first drafts of six reviews, which gets me caught up with reviews from 2011 (joy!).

Lately, I haven’t joined any reading challenges. I used to sign up for quite a few, but I never managed to complete any. It seemed that once I put together a book list for a challenge, the books on the list took on some sort of virus that made them entirely uninteresting. I wish I had a name for the phenomenon… suggestions?

Although the Sunday Salon is supposed to be all about reading, I’m afraid I’m not planning much reading time today. Instead, I’m hoping to spend today getting caught up on blogging — comments, reviews, and end of the year posts — so I can spend the read of the month actually reading and working on my Christmas craft projects.

Earlier this month I made a tentative plan to spend the rest of the year trying to read books I already have — review copies or bought copies — and limit books from the library to try and make a dent on the piles and piles of books that are starting to weigh on me.

Of course, I wasn’t going to pull myself off the lists of holds I’m on at the library, which foiled my plans: Both The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides and The Magician King by Lev Grossman arrived for me on Tuesday. Curses, effective library system! (I kid, I kid!).