Sunday Update - 2026 Week 34

So, here we are again at the Sunday Update.  It wasn't a banner week for productivity, but life's that way sometimes.

I only wrote a couple thousand words.  I blame a combination of being too damn tired to stay up and write and a slight case of the 'this book is stupid and no one will want to buy it'.  The latter may also be part of the being tired thing.  I need to remind myself that I'm writing this book for myself and I enjoy it, and snap for anyone who doesn't like it.

Marketing was done and books ordered numbers were limp.  I moved 12 copies of RHI.  :sad trombone:  On a happier note, I did sell a book - AD.  Of course, that one is only 99c, so I made 35c.  Woot.  My total $$ for the month of August is sitting at $3.22.  

I'm still not reading much, but I stopped at the thrift store in town and bought another 8 books.  Some of those were NF and meant for our shelves - John Stuart Mill, TH Huxley, Living Free - but I also got a Louis L'Amour, a Dick Francis, and a couple of fantasies and a SF from authors I'd never heard of.  I'm calling it a win.  So far this year, I've spent $2.65 on books, which reflects how much money I'm making at writing.

I tried a different chocolate-chip cookie recipe.  This one has coconut.  The recipe said it made 48 cookies, but looking at the ingredient list made me think the batch was going to be huge - I mean, 2 CUPS of butter? Really? - so I halved it.  I still ended up with 48 cookies.  They're okay.  

On the activity front, I did stuff this week.  I watered the greenhouse 3 times, repotted some stuff, fell through the deck, did some cleaning, did groceries, ran errands.  It was a busy week.  Weight: 181.4 - so no, I was active, but not burning enough calories to offset the intake.  Blerg.

Speaking of greenhouse stuff, like I said, I repotted some stuff - two of the tomatoes and a couple of the trees.  The 'maters were looking peaky, so I figured it couldn't hurt.  If they die from the repotting, I'm not really losing anything, and they could come back and fruit this fall.  The trees had to be repotted, but after I crushed the pot they were in it was more crucial.  The beefsteak tomato is okay, but not producing flowers yet.  The bell peppers are all looking amazing, but no flowers yet either.  I have two potato little potato plants that appear to be thriving.  The carrots? I'm not holding out hope for those, but they aren't dead yet.

Oh, yeah, the 'fell through the deck' thing.  I bet you thought I wasn't going to talk about that.  It was embarrassing, after all.  Well, you see, the greenhouse was strategically placed over a couple of already roached deck boards.  I've been really good about not stepping on those boards when I'm in the greenhouse, but I was repotting tomatoes and when I carried the grape tomatoes in their new pot for placement in the greenhouse, I wasn't paying attention to where my feet were going.  I heard the board start to crack and managed to set the tomato pot down, but then my foot went through and I fell back.  I ended up on my ass with one leg dangling through the hole up to my knee.  I got myself out and upright, and finished my chores.  I'm bruised, but nothing's broken - at least not on me.  When I went down, I crushed the plastic pot holding my buckthorns and one little sycamore.  I also bent one of the struts on the greenhouse.  Derp.  Just call me Gracie.  

Okay, time to refill my coffee and get on with the day.  Have a great one, wherever you are.  :hugs:

Sunday Update - 2026 Week 22

Here we are again at another Sunday.  It's the last day of May, which is my favorite month, but all good things must come to an end, eh?

Writing went well this week.  I wrote every day Monday-Friday and added 4758 words to my manuscript.  I think I'm finally in a place where I can tell you what I'm working on... :drumroll: The next book in the Shroudlands series.  It's up to 32240 words now, so yay.  I'm not laying out a whole shit-ton of words each day, but it's enough.  No clue when it'll be finished.  The point here is that I am writing again.  And once I get comfortable with being a writer again, I might finally get back to editing Duke Noble #3.  

Marketing occurred.  Not a lot of it, but it happened.  I moved 29 copies of Early Grave and someone bought a copy of Fertile Ground, so yay me.  May wasn't the best month this year, but it was better than nothing.

Reading... don't ask.  Despite my reading slump, I bought 8 new-to-me books last week, because I am a book-buying addict.  I picked up some NF books we didn't have and a Ken Follett I haven't read before.  Woot.

On the activity front, I wasn't too awfully active, but I did get some stuff done.  I vacuumed and dusted the whole house - 1700 sq ft worth - so go me.  I also did some gardening stuff.  And yesterday, we took a walk.  Weight: 178.6 - which isn't as low as I'd like, but better than I feared it would be when I stepped on the scale.

As for gardening, we planted two of my redbud trees in the ground - Randy and Rudy.  By the next morning, Randy was gone.  I haven't checked Rudy today but I am not holding out hope for his continued survival.  (Yes, I could surround him with wire, but if a critter REALLY wants to eat him, they'll get to him no matter what I do.)  Inside the greenhouse, everything seems to be thriving.  I need to repot some green peppers, now that I have two vacant bigger pots.  I still only have two tomatoes, but there's hope.  The potatoes have taken over.  

In exciting news, we've seen the first fawns of the year!  Brand new, still wet off the factory floor, baby deer.  New deer are so tiny!  (Of course.  They have a small door to go through when they first enter the world, so that have to be tiny.)  They grow fast, though, so we've already seen one that's less tiny.  Some of the deer were still pregnant as of last night, so there's more to come.  

I think that's it for me today.  Other things happened, but nothing of note.  Have a great day out there and a wonderful week.  :hugs:

Pre-Thursday This n That

Since Thursday this week is a holiday, I thought I'd do this a day early.

Yesterday, as I was coming home from errands, I came over a rise in the road to discover a car parked right in my lane.  No flashers.  No turn signal.  Just at a dead stop.  I hit the brakes and stopped in time to not hit her.  Then she moved forward a little and I thought okay, off we go.  But no.  She putted along, so as a snail, until she reached a driveway and put on her turn signal.  I thought she was lost and had finally found where she was going.  But no.  She didn't turn into the driveway, she just moved over a little and stopped again.  Now only half of her car was in my lane.  Unfortunately, this new place she'd chosen to stop was before a downhill with a curve, and I couldn't see shit coming from the other direction in the lane I would have to share in order to pass her.  I swore loudly and said some very unkind things as I eased past her.  Thankfully no cars were coming.  The driver?  A chick about my age who looked like a spinster from Little House on the Prairie.  And no, I don't think she was having car trouble.  I think she was lost and brainless.

Anyway, I went to the store yesterday because I forgot to buy whipped cream for the cheesecake I'll be making today.  Pumpkin cheesecake with a dollop of whipped cream is to die for.  Well, almost... LOL

I also stopped at the thrift store.  And happy coincidence, they were having a sale on books.  Paperbacks for 10c and hardcovers for a quarter.  I got 7 books for $1.30.  Woot.  And one of them was an autographed copy of a Robert Parker Spenser for Hire hardcover.  Double woot.  I haven't actually read any of those, so now might be a good time to start, eh?

Unfortunately, they didn't really have a whole lot of books I loved.  I picked up stuff that looked interesting, but nothing for my collections.  :sigh:  I can usually count on that store to have at least one or two Christies or hard-boiled crime paperbacks.  (I prefer to read old crime novels in paperback.  It's a quirk.)

I did my first order with Tractor Supply.  I'm getting a deer-dragging sled and a snow shovel.  The sled's for dragging logs.  I joked on FB about the shovel is for killing deer.  I'm so funny.  LOL

Does placing an order with Tractor Supply mean I've finally gone full redneck?

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving.  Hubs will be making the turkey, as usual.  All I have to do is make the cheesecake.  Yay.  I also have to figure out what to do for dinner tonight.  Pizza?  Burgers?  What do you have the day before the big eating day?

And that's enough out of me.  Have a great day and an awesome holiday.  :hugs:

Thursday This n That

May day!  May day!  (Heh, I like doing that every May 1st, but I'm weird.)

Reposted from yesterday's FB status update: So, I just got back from the thrift store.  I picked out two books to buy - a paperback and a hardcover.  When I get to the register, the chick there tries to tell me the paperback is $5. When I balked at that, she said 'well, it was printed in the '40s, so it's vintage.  I told her no and that was the original print date.  She tried to tell me it was the only print date in there, so I opened it to the copyright page, scanned it briefly, and then pointed to where it said 20th printing 1975.  She backed down and only charged me $1, but she was kinda snotty about it.  Kids these days.  She's probably never opened a damn book in her life.  

It's bad enough that this thrift store jacked the prices of their books up from 5 for $1 to 4 for $1 to $1 each for paperbacks, from 50c to $2 for hardcovers, and $5 for anything older than 1970 (vintage to them).  The other two nearby stores charges 25c ea for paperbacks.  Last time I get books at today's place, lemme tell ya.  I can handle the price, but dealing with snotty little twits just ruins the experience for me.  =o\

This morning, Hubs looked out the window and saw what he thought were several deer, then he realized one of them was actually the neighbor's dog, Copper.  (He's an old red-bone coonhound, so deer colored and about the same size.)  Well, ol' Copper was just sniffing around he own yard and the deer were standing there watching him - no more than 10-12 feet away.  They'd advance a step and then back up a step while Copper continued sniffing and not paying attention to them.  Finally, he wandered over to sniff another part of the yard and the deer walked away.  It was pretty funny, but I guess you had to be there.

I want cinnamon rolls, but I'm too lazy and I'm trying to cut back on the baked goods anyway.

Right now, there are all sorts of birds twittering away in the trees every morning.  I'm pretty good at identifying birds by their songs usually, but I'm hearing some stuff I've never heard before.  Fun.

We had a big ol' rat snake in the yard the other day.  Hubs and I went out to encourage it to leave, and it was going pretty well until the snake decided to turn and confront us.  I took the rake and got the tines up under it and flung it into the woods.  It was last seen headed down the hill and away from the yard.  No snakes were harmed in that encounter.  It better not come back, though.  Our courtesy only extends so far with snakes - harmless or not.  

Okay, that's about it for me.  Have a great day, wherever you are.  :hugs:

Sunday Update - Week 1

Well, hello there.  The first week of 2023 is in the can.  Onward and upward.

No, I'm still not writing.  I'm not sure if I can while I'm working.  It feels like the entirety of my brain space is taken up with the job and my creativity has curled into the fetal position in a corner. Every once in a while it mumbles something to itself and I try to write that down, but I'm not getting more than a whisper of an idea here and there.  It's been a while since I even got that.  I think it's comatose now.  It's funny (in a warped-sense-of-humor way) that before I went back to work, I had scads of time and no money. Now I have money but no time.

Anyway, I'm working 40 hour weeks with 2.5 hrs of lunch.  Bills are getting paid, the fridge is full, and that's all that matters.  Downtime is for decompressing.

I am reading in my downtime.  I've already completed two books for 2023.  I set my goal for 50 this year.  I should be able to do that even if I find myself too tired to read here or there.  I hit St Vinnys yesterday and came home with 8 books for $6 - a Vince Flynn I didn't already have, a couple of Phyllis Whitneys, a couple Victoria Holts, an Anne Rice, a Rex Stout, and a Ngaio Marsh.  Yay.  I'm reading the Flynn now.

In baking news, for New Years, I made a chocolate cake with strawberry frosting, and I substituted wine for some of the water needed to make the cake.  It turned out a little denser, but was pretty tasty.  I also made beef bourgignon for dinner that day.  (Someone gave me a bottle of Pinot Noir, and since I don't drink, I figured I'd better cook with it.)  It was super yummy.  

As for weight, I clocked in the year at 165.2.  Then I made a pig of myself all week.  (Pizza and donuts at work, cake at home.)  I'm a bit afraid to step on the scale today LOL.  No activity to speak of.  Hubs and I did take a walk early in the week, which was good.  I need to up the activity level before my arteries clog and I give myself a coronary.  

I'm currently doing genealogy again.  Yesterday, I discovered my great-great grandpa had a middle name.  I found his wedding certificate - in German - and using both an online translator and a print-out of German characters as they equate to English, I parsed it out.  Yep, Adam August was my 2x grandfather and just plain Adam was my 3x grandfather.  Genealogy is like working a puzzle combined with solving a mystery.  Right up my alley.  I found out another grandfather had fought in the War of 1812.  And I got one branch of the tree all the way back to a man who was born in 1475 and his sons all have Sir in front of their names.  

Yes, I could be using that time to write, but refer back to the creative portion of my brain being comatose.  I'm all analytical now, so this pastime suits me.

Oh, and I got a new-to-me wool dress coat yesterday.  It's a Larry Levin, or something - which run like $150 and I got it for $8, so woohoo.  Mid-thigh with a cross-button thing.  All I care about is that it's warm and that it goes with my dressier work clothes - for those days when I can't wear my leather jacket.  (My leather has never seen the rain/snow and I don't want it to.)

Well, this update thing turned out way longer than I meant it to, but I wanted to address some things and I'm feeling chatty.  But I think I'm done now.  Have a great week wherever you are.  :hugs:

Saturday Reading Wrap-up: 2022

 It's the last day of the year and since I didn't finish any books this past week, and I'm not likely to finish the book I'm reading today, I thought I'd just go ahead and wrap-up my Year in Reading.  

I started the year with a goal to read 75 books.  I missed it by 3.  Which actually isn't that bad, considering that when I started the year I had no clue that I would be spending the last 6 months of the year working full time.  

If you want to browse through the books I read in 2022, go here: 2022 - Books Read.  (And there's always a link to all my years' Books Read posts on the left side of this blog, underneath my book links.)

Nothing really surprising in the list.  What's surprising to me is how few of the books on my list I actually remember reading.  I mean, I totally forgot that I read The Three Musketeers this year, but it's on the list, so it must be true.  (Wait, I think I remember reading it now.  Derp.  It was read on the Kindle.)

Toward the end of the year, I read a lot of hardcopy books.  Since I was working again, I had the extra scratch to feed my used-book habit.  Loads of unread books on the shelves and it takes less time to grab one of those than sort through ebook listings to find books I want to read.  

I ended the year with two unread ebooks and an unread e-short story sitting on my Kindle.  Maybe I'll start the new year with those.  

In book buying, I picked up 109 new books in 2022.  80 of those were ebooks, leaving 29 hardcopies.  I read or attempted to read most of them.  There are 6 I haven't touched yet and one I don't intend to read because it's for my collection of old writing books (English Grammar and Composition, c1963). Two of those I might not read any time soon - a Hemingway and a book about Frederick Douglass.  I bought those for my collection of literature.

On the 'attempted to read' side, I DNF'd 31 ebooks and 7 hardcopies.  3 hardcopies are going back to thrift stores - 2 because I either had another copy of the title and one because I decided I didn't want to read it.  (Having already DNF'd the first book, I did not want to start the second.)

I could go through and sort all the genres I read, like I've done in the past, but I don't want to.  Suffice it to say, there's a ton of mystery, crime, suspense, etc.  Feels like I read more SF and literature than usual. 

And that's about it.  I'm not sure what 2023 will bring in reading.  Maybe I'll set it for 50 this year and hope for reading a book a week.  We'll see.

How was your reading year?  Did you reach your goals?  

Sunday Update - Week Somethin' Or Other

 I'm too lazy to look up the week # this morning.  

Anyway, it was a week.  Not much different from the week before.  

I did a fair bit of reading, all things considered.  I inhaled a book yesterday and finished it last night.  Woohoo.  I also hit another thrift store and came home with 7 books for a dollar.  Most of them for the shelves and not strictly for reading, but hey, a book is a book.  I have a little collection of old books on how to write, and I found another one of those.  Not super old - like 1955 - but it looks good sitting with the others.

I made Hubs' granola bars before work one morning and that's it for the baking.

On the activity front, we took a walk last Sunday.  Just under a mile.  Which puts me at a measly 32.3 miles for the year.  On the other hand, my weight is still inching down.  As of yesterday... Weight: 166.4.  That's 15 pounds down since I started work and 15.8 down since the start of the year.  I can almost fit into those slightly too-small pants I bought last month.  They fit awesome when I'm standing up but they still cut into my stomach sitting down and since I spend most of my day sitting, they're going to have to remain int he closet.

My wrist is not exactly 100%, but I've gotten to the point where it only really bothers me first thing in the morning.  Both of the braces I bought are duds, as far as I'm concerned.  I wore the new one at work for about a half hour before it started to irritate me.  This reminds me of the time I broke my foot.  I wore the 'cast' thingie for about a day at home, then I had to not wear it to work because I couldn't drive with it.  I bought a pair of crutches to use instead and dumped those at the end of the first day because they were bothering my arms.  I spent the rest of my recovery limping around the plant.  :shrug:  I don't got time for no medical impedances.

Earlier in the week, the leaky spot on our roof from a ways back started leaking again.  We woke up to a puddle in the smoking room.  Yesterday, I picked up two gallons of roof repair, and then it spent most of the day raining.  Not a single drop came through.  Near as I can figure it, that last puddle was created because we got 3.5 inches of rain and it was really windy, so the wind drove the rain up under a loose shingle.  Hubs will still paint the roof with the repair gunk, but it's not as critical anymore.

Work is still work.  Not much changed about that.  The only problem I can see is that I am now comfortable in my position.  (Or as comfortable as anyone can be in a busy environment.)  This is a problem because when I'm comfortable, the little voice in my head that reminds me 'don't say that' starts to goof off.  I'm an opinionated person... yeah, stating the obvious to people who stop here regularly... and when those opinions start dropping out of my face at work, it's a problem.  Need to rein that in.  I need to keep those thoughts for when I'm talking to Hubs or Mom, or in private emails to a certain friend of mine.

One awesome thing about working, my mom and I are connecting on a whole new level.  She understands what I go through at work because it's similar to what she did for years, and I better understand what she went through for all those years many years ago when I was too wrapped up in my own junk to listen to what she needed to talk about.  Dad was not a great listener.  Anyway, I've been close to Mom most of my life, but I feel closer now.  Which is awesome.

I wish I had that kind of relationship with my daughter, but I think Owl has written me off.  =o(

Anyway...

The birds are migrating.  The deer are doing their things.  We haven't seen Sebastian the fox in a while.  A few mornings this past week, there has been a hawk sitting in the same place when I'm on my way to work, and the time I leave puts it so the first rays of the sun are hitting the hawk as I drive by.  It's pretty cool.  I'd stop and take a picture, but I have a feeling if I stopped the car, it would startle him and he'd fly away.  I think it's a red-shouldered hawk.  So pretty.

And that's about it for me.  How went your week?

My Life is So Exciting

It's Wednesday??  Blerg.  Not that Wednesday is necessarily bad.  I just feel like a turd because I missed Monday and Tuesday.  Sorry about that.  Not that you really missed anything.  I spent Monday working and I had yesterday off with much decompression happening.  (Code for total vegetation.) 

I did hit the thrift store yesterday.  Picked up 5 old books, 3 of which I already had.  I can never remember which Vince Flynns are in my library, so I keep picking up the same ones over and over.  At least some good comes of this folly.  If the new copy is better, I trade it out for the worse copy.  Aside from the VF novels, I got a copy of The House of the Seven Gables (paperback) which I didn't have.  And an Alfred Hitchcock anthology in hardcover.  I love those things.  They're about the only anthologies I really enjoy.  I also found two gorgeous coats for cheap  ($9 total).  One is waterproof and lined so its toasty warm.  No more slogging out in wet snow and getting soaked.  Yay.  The other is also nice and warm and lovely.  Lined with faux fur.  

I also hit the bank and then drove over and paid the trash bill.  I don't mail that bill because the company's office are right on my way to damn near everything.  Just park and throw the bill in the handy-dandy box they have for that purpose.  

My life is so exciting.  

Thursday This n That

I probably shouldn't be allowed on FB at 2 o'clock in the morning,  My urge to argue with people overrides my need to ignore them.  I probably shouldn't play poker either.  LOL

I spent the previous two days shifting around heavy stuff.  Boxes of books?  No sweat.  I can throw those around like they're pillows.  (Okay, not really. but they're not too big a deal.)  We took a carload of stuff to St. Vinny's yesterday.  I would've sworn that box of encyclopedias wasn't half as heavy when I put it into the trunk on Wednesday as it was when I took it out of the trunk on Thursday.  Blerg.

Thank you, St. Vinny's for accepting that set of encyclopedias.  I wonder if anyone actually uses those anymore.  If they'd been an older vintage I might've taken them myself, but 1985 wasn't old enough to warrant bringing them home.  I have a 1957 set I won custody of when my parents moved out of my childhood home.  

If you don't know what St. Vinny's is, it's St Vincent de Paul thrift store.  They were awesome for me when I was in college and needed things for my apartment.  I give to them here when I can and I love shopping there.  Or at least I did before the 'rona hit.  Now that I see the workers aren't wearing masks anymore maybe I'll go back to shopping there, too.  So many awesome books.  

One of the worst things about getting older is eating.  I used to be able to eat whatever I wanted, whenever and wherever, without worrying how it would affect my digestive system (or my general poundage).  I ate at a freakin' restaurant yesterday and my stomach is staging a revolt.  Which is why I got up at 2am.  I spent hours throwing around boxes and lumber and whatnot.  I was feeling pretty awesome about it all.  Look at me look at me, I'm young and vibrant!  Then I get sucker punched by damn restaurant food and I'm feeling every bit of those 51 years.  Not sure if it was the super yummy burger with its awesome bun.  Or the cheesy spinach and artichoke dip.  Or the yummy chips.  Blerg.  If you asked me earlier, I would've said it was all worth it.  Now?  Not so much.  So, here I sit, drinking baking soda water and hoping to maybe go back to bed and catch another couple hours.  

By the way, the food was so good, after lunch, I ordered takeout from there for dinner.  A grilled chicken sandwich for me and a bacon burger for Hubs.  So yummy.  Screw you, stomach.

Also, by the way, we tried a new restaurant.  (Well, not new since the waitress told us they'd been there 6 years, but neither of us had ever noticed it before, so new to us.)  One thing I learned when I was a road warrior was to eat at places where worker dudes eat.  If there are worker dudes having lunch there, it's good food.  Those dudes know.  They don't have time or patience to eat crappy food on their lunch breaks.  This place had lots of worker dudes.  Some people think 'eat where the locals eat', but that's not always the case.  You have no idea what the locals are used to.  Worker dudes?  They know.

Worker dudes = UPS drivers, construction guys, salesmen, etc.  They travel around enough to know where to eat and where not to eat.  When I was on the road, I could've pointed out both in my sales territory.  Trust me, when you're in the middle of a job and miles from home, you do not want to eat at a bad restaurant.  And all apologies to that poor gas station on Woodward Avenue that I had to stop at after eating in a bad restaurant back in 1999.  

Okay, I should probably try going back to bed now.  See y'all later.

Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 5/15/21

 Hey there!  It's the Saturday Reading Wrap-up with your host, B.E. Sanderson.  :cue cheesy theme music:

I finally picked up some new ebooks this week.  Which was good because I didn't have any left to read.  I got a romantic suspense (which I'm reading now), a mystery, a paranormal mystery, and a paranormal romance.  No new hardcopies.

Books Read:

33) That Night by CJ Grayson (5/12/21) - Suspense*# - 5 stars.  New to me and underappreciated.  I picked this one up for free after hearing about it in a FB group I belong to.  
Review: "A twisty, turny suspense that kept me hooked. I wasn't sure the author would be able to pull all the threads together, but everything was wrapped up by the end. And I totally didn't see it all coming down the way it did. "

32) The Virginian by Owen Wister (5/9/21) - Western/Literature - 5 stars.  New to me, but old enough that it's got plenty of reviews.  Still underappreciated, in my opinion, though.  Picked this up at a thrift store for 50c.
Review: "This book is too awesome for words. If you haven't read it, you should."

DNFs:

5//10/21 - free - This billed itself as paranormal women's fiction but read like cozy paranormal mystery.  It was written by a 'known, trad-pub name' in UF, but it had issues in it my own editor and proofreaders would've kicked my ass for.  I probably would've weathered on for an indie, but I expected better and disappointment made me stop reading.

Currently reading... like I said above, I'm reading a romantic suspense.  I had it listed as a cozy mystery.  Boy, was that wrong.  I mean it started out kind of like a cute cozy, but it became pretty suspenseful.  I think it was the title that turned me in the wrong direction - Honeymoon Cottage.  :shrug:  I'm really enjoying it, so it's no biggie for me.

What were you reading this week?  

Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 4/10/21

 Hello again!  It was a good reading week here.

I picked up one new ebook - a suspense.  And I received 9 old paperbacks from a friend who was weeding down her collection - 3 Agatha Christies, 4 Rex Stouts, and 2 Piers Anthony.  Squee.

Books Read:

24) Elephants Can Remember by Agatha Christie (4/9/21) - Mystery - 5 stars.  Neither new to me nor underappreciated.  Paid a box lot price which included shipping.
Review: "Ooo, that was a good one."

23) Ogre, Ogre by Piers Anthony (4/7/21) - Fantasy - 5 stars.  Neither new to me nor underappreciated.  Paid a box lot price which included shipping.
Review: "I repeatedly read this way way back when I was a teenager. I haven't read it since, until now. While some of the puns weren't quite as funny as when I was younger, it's still a pretty awesome book. And it now has a treasured place on my bookshelf."

22) The Case of the Perambulating Hatrack by Cedar Sanderson (4/3/21) - Paranormal Noir Mystery* - 5 stars.  Not new to me, but a new release so probably underappreciated at this moment.  Paid full price when Cedar let it be known that it was live on Amazon.
Review: "So much fun! A perfect blend of old P.I. noir and new urban fantasy. If Spillane and Butcher had a love-child, it would be Solly. Who would've guessed I could fall in love with an orc? Oh, I loved all the other characters, too. (Nettle was my favorite after Solly.) I loved the plot and the mystery. I thoroughly enjoyed the world-building. Definitely different in a totally good way. I can't wait to read another one of these."

No DNFs.

Currently reading...  Not sure what I'll pick up next.  Maybe the NF title I one-clicked by accident.  Maybe a Rex Stout.  Tune in next week to find out.  ;o)

What was on your reading list for last week?

Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 4/6/21

Hello again!  It was an interesting reading week here, so let's get started.

I only picked up one new ebook, and I'm reading it now.  As for hardcopies, I should have a box of old paperbacks in the mail.  I'll talk about those after they get here.

Books Read:

21) Death by Chocolate by Sally Berneathy (4/2/21) - Mystery/Suspense* - 5 stars.  New to me, but not underappreciated.  Free after seeing it on a friend's FB page.
Review: "Wow. That was an awesome read. I loved the characters, the plot, the cat... and the suspense was delicious. Plus, there are recipes in the back. So much fun!"

20) Northern Affair by DK Findlay (3/31/21) - Adventure - 5 stars.  New to me and underappreciated as far as I know, probably because it's so old.  50c at the thrift store.
Review: "I found this old paperback in a thrift store stuck in amongst the Westerns. It's definitely not a Western. It's a story of survival and adventure in the arctic. Definitely enthralling and very interesting. And it ends well. It's going on my keeper shelf."

19) Hot Under the Collar by Roxanne St. Claire (3/28/21) - Romance* - 5 stars.  Neither new to me nor underappreciated.  Free after seeing it on Roxanne's FB page.
Review: "What a fun romance! And a great start to this spin-off series!"

DNFs:

4/1/21 - mystery.  Free.  It didn't take long to realize I didn't like the main character, and the author was trying too hard to make the MC witty.  It seemed like every sentence was a zippy quip.  You gotta sprinkle those judiciously, man.

Currently reading... a paranormal noir mystery.  It's pretty good so far.

What did you read last week?

Sunday Update - Week 13

What a week...  and I'm late again, but at least it's Sunday and not Monday this time...

Monday, I pushed Duke Noble, P.I.: Rumor Has It out into the world.  The initials reviews are good, so yay.  I haven't finished the post-publication checklist on that yet, but I did format it for paperback and I'm waiting on the proof of that so I can make it live, too.  My first paperback through Amazon - not Createspace - so we'll see how it looks.  The process wasn't too bad.

Other than posting about the release, I haven't done any marketing.  We'll see what happens in the coming days.

It was a nice reading week.  It's always easier to read when I don't have writerly stuff going on.  Yesterday, a friend of mine, who was purging her book collection, posted about the books she was letting go and offered them up for basically the cost of shipping.  I picked out 8 - 3 Agatha Christies, 3 Rex Stouts, and two Piers Anthony.  Here's hoping the mail doesn't lose them.  :fingers crossed:  I know Piers Anthony doesn't seem like my usual fare, but I love his Xanth books (well, the early ones anyway) and I hope to start a collection of those.  If you're not familiar with Rex Stout, he writes the Nero Wolfe mysteries.  Anyway, I haz a happy.

In baking news, I did French bread pizza, frittatas, and granola bars last week.  Nothing exciting, but necessary.  I was also going to do a coffee cake, but I ran out of walnuts when I did the granola bars, so those will have to wait.

Guess what?  We went fishing!  Didn't catch anything and only got one bite, but it was fishing.  I had heard weeks ago that they were redoing the place where I fish, and yup, they did.  The parking lot is awesome and so is the boat ramp.  Unfortunately, the took huge chunky rocks and lined the river with them, so it's kind of hard for me to bank fish there.  So, maybe a third of my regular spots are messed up, but in that third is one of my most productive areas.  Drat.  Eh, when the water level goes down, I'll be able to walk around the rocks.  

As for other activities, I did something active 5 days out of 7, with 4 of those days having two activities.  Loads of gardening, yard work, and cleaning.  Yesterday, I was a cleaning fool.  I'd let so much stuff slide, my to-do list is hefty hefty hefty.  I didn't weigh myself at all, though.  

Speaking of gardening, I still haven't started my container garden.  Whoops.  That's on the to-do list for this week.  In other garden news, the peonies, the lilies, the columbines, and the lilies of the valley are all poking their heads up.  The lilac is covered in little green leaves and the beginnings of loads of flower drupes.  The hydrangeas are working on it.  The last remaining azalea has this season to get its act together or it'll be on the wood pile and I'll put a peony in its place.  Let's just say it ain't looking good for that one.

Well, I supposed I ought to get my buns in gear and start the day.  How are things in your neck of the woods?  

Space for Books

I don't know about all y'all, but I am running out of space for books.  Okay, so I cleared off an entire shelf  of reference books for Kira's shrine, but that's beside the point.  (Those got moved to the now mostly-full bookcase next to it.  I think there's room on that entire case now for maybe two-three more books.) 

Even if you ignore the non-fiction cases entirely, I'm close to being full just about everywhere else.  The SF/F case - one of which is already full of books stacked horizontally instead of vertically - has room for maybe ten more paperbacks.   Same for the suspense/thriller/mystery case.  The literature case might take another fifteen.  Less if they're meaty novels.  

It didn't help that yesterday I hit the thrift store and came home with ten more books - most of them Westerns.  I didn't even have a spot allotted for Westerns.  The few I had were stuck in with the literature.  They're all moved into the spare room now, on top of the shelf with my own proof copies, my Phyllis Whitney collection, and books by friends of mine.  

I could glean down again.  I mean, do I really need that many dictionaries and thesauruses - especially when I use the internet for that stuff now?  Are we ever going to use those old textbooks again?  Is there really a reason to keep The Writer's Market from 2005?  I mean other than nostalgia?  (Notice I'm talking about gleaning NF and not fiction here. I've already culled out most of the fiction I wasn't planning on keeping.)

Hubs, being the great and wonderful man he is, suggested that maybe it was time to get some more bookshelves.  Except neither of us know where we would put them. The office is out of wall space.  I could, I suppose, moved some things around and stick a shelf or two more in the spare room.  And there's one more spot in the living room for a shelf.  

Ooo, the book on food remedies can go on the kitchen shelf with the cookbooks.  There's one new spot available!

Yes, it's a sickness.  No, I don't want a cure.  What I want is more space for books.

What about you?  Do you have loads of hardcopy books?  Or are you like my mom and get books from the library instead of keeping books of your own?

Updated 7:05am:  After I wrote this post, I spent some time shuffling things around and I have room again.  Of course, now the one non-fiction case is totally full and the other now has three out of five shelves with literature on them.  One is reserved for Kira and the last shelf is a mix of NF and F by the same author with a few other NF's to fill the remaining space.  And now there are books on top of the dresser in the spare room.  LOL.  On a bright note, Agatha Christie now has her own shelf.  She's gonna need it.

Thursday This n That

Last night while I was making dinner, I went to shift the Foreman Grill and grabbed it in the wrong place.  Yep, burned my fingers.  Derp.  I won't be leaving accurate fingerprints with those for a while.  

On a happier note, look who I found in the Christmas clearance area of the DG:

They're Ralph the Elf and Kris Moose.  (Kris got two pics, so you can see his little sign and his face.)  They gave me a happy, so they came home with me.  And they were 50% off, so I got them both for $7.50.  Cha Ching.  They've already more than paid for themselves in the joy they've brought me.

You were looking at the titles on my books, weren't you?  Heh, caught ya.  I do it, too.  If I see books in the backgrounds of pics, I always read the titles.  (To help out, Ralph is sitting next to Henry V in its box and original oil skin, Don Quixote also in its box, and a volume of Jack London stories.)  That bookcase is for my collectibles and special stuffs.  Here's how it looked before I rearranged it:

Sorry you can't read the titles.  I'll help you out there, but we'd be here all day. 

Tonight is New Year's Eve.  I'm holding out hope next year will be a better year.  For us all.

I spent a large part of yesterday working on spreadsheets.  The morning was for my own stuff.  In the afternoon, I got stuffs from the payjob and spent the rest of the day working on that.  By the time I was done, I was too pooped to write.  I'll rectify that today.

Hubs always warns me before he turns on the overhead light in here.  And I invariably look at him, which means I get a blast of light in the face when he hits the switch.  Derp.  I really need to stop doing that.  :blink blink:

Tomorrow, I should be taking down the Christmas decor.  We'll see if I have the gumption and whether I want the house to go back to being non-cheery.  I might leave Ralph and Kris out year 'round.  I definitely need to take down the tree and get my dining room table back. 

Here's wishing you the happiest New Year possible.  Hang in there.  :hugs:

Thursday This n That

Carrots wait for no one, so I pick them now, before they are eaten by some slobby cow.  If you sang it in your head, your childhood was awesome.  (It's Bugs Bunny, by the way.)

I stopped by the thrift store on Tuesday.  Snagged 12 books for $4 - 8 paperbacks and 4 hardcovers.  Yay.  I got an Alastair MacLean I didn't have.  And an Agatha Christie I needed.  I found a Michael Crichton I hadn't even heard of.  Oh, and a Phyllis Whitney for the collection.  I picked up a couple new-to-me authors and some old favorites, too.  I love thrift store day.  I also got the third book in a trilogy where I already own the second book.  The hunt for the first book is ongoing.  When I have them all, I'll read them.  Yes, I could just order the damn first book, but that's not the point.

To date, I have acquired 103 books this year and spent $22.70.  (The majority of which were free ebooks, by the way.)  Thus proving you don't have to spend a lot of money to read.  Ahem, yes, there are libraries, but I don't use them.  I don't like returning books.  I also don't like the fact that our libraries have become more internet cafes (minus the beverage) and daycare centers than actual places to revel in books.  But that's me.  If I want to read a book, I'll own the damn book.  If I like it, I get to keep it.  If I don't, I donate it to one of the local thrift stores so someone else can enjoy it. 

The mulching and bagging of leaves was a success.  Hubs plans to continue it throughout the leaf season.

This new blogger thingy is a pain in my ass.  It automatically puts a line between paragraphs, so I have to now adjust myself and stop putting in a line.  Which also means when I'm typing stuff elsewhere I have to adjust to put the line IN after I've typed something here where I don't have to put a line in.  Stupid.  Gah, why won't people just leave shit alone?

By the way, I still put two spaces between sentences in my writing.  Period, space space.  It's how I type.  Changing back to one space now would be a serious pain in my ass.  I fix this in my writing by having Word find the double space and change it to one space (Find: space space, Replace With: space) when I'm formatting my books for publication.  

We had another buck in the yard yesterday.  A spike.  I missed seeing him, but Hubs told me all about it.  Apparently, his spikes go straight up.  Pokey head.

Today's the last day for wearing my favorite t-shirt.  It's become so ratty, it needs to retire.  =o(  Sad how just when a shirt becomes the most comfortable, it's time to shift it to the dustrag bag.  

Okay, your turn.  This n that to your heart's content.

Collecting Books

Okay, so I watch game shows on occasion and one of my favorites is America Says.  It's a show where the contestants have to guess how America would fill in the blanks to a variety of statements.  Recently, I watched one where the question was something like 'The first things I collected were ______.'  And they give seven blanks for the top seven answers.  I don't remember them all, but they were like stamps, rocks, stuffed animals, etc.

Books was not one of the top seven answers.  =o\

I've been collecting books since I was old enough to hoard anything.  I had a whole slew of these tiny fat paperbacks (not sure where those went... must ask Mom) and a collection of Sweet Pickle books (I sold those).  In my teens, I started gathering old books by classic authors.  Whenever I had a little extra money and I was in a place where there were old books, I'd pick up what I could. 

My father was a great one for flea markets and even when I wasn't with him, if he saw an old book at a reasonable price, he'd buy it for me.  I still have most of those - including a few by authors I've never heard of or authors I have heard of but this was an unheard of title.  Dad wasn't picky about the books he bought for me.  If it was old and inexpensive, he bought it.

In college, I would haunt the used book store in town.  I snagged a lot of great finds in there, hiding in the bins no one wanted, where they were either free or 25c.  I found a brilliant - if poor quality - near first edition of The Fountainhead in there with the original owner's name and military information written in the front cover.  He was in a bomber group over the Pacific.  That one is my favorite, I think.

Anyway...  These days it's really hard to find those kinds of books for cheap.  In the age of the internet, anyone can go online and find out what a book is 'worth' and mark it up accordingly.  I haven't found a really impressive hardcover in years.  Nothing like my Tennyson from the 1800s anyway.  (The book that shall never be opened because it's disintegrating.)  Or the leather bound softcover of The Complete Works of Shakespeare from the 1930s who pages are so thin and soft and silky.  Or the late 19th century copy of The Rubyiat of Omar Khayyam.

These days, I collect old crime novels.  I can still find those at thrift stores and usually don't have to pay more than 50c a piece.  I'm working on Mickey Spillane, but really any old crime novel will work - MacLean, MacDonald, Pendleton, Ellery Queen, Sax Rohmer when I can find him, Erle Stanley Gardner, Rex Stout, etc.  I'm in the process of acquiring all the Agatha Christie novels, in as old an edition as I can find.  And I recently discovered Helen MacInnes, so I'm snapping her up, too. 

I also collect Phyllis Whitney novels.  Again.  I had a collection of her that I started when I was a teenager, but during one of my many moves, I let her go for some stupid and unremembered reason.  I'm rectifying that. 

And I collect Vince Flynn novels.  I only have three of his original works left to acquire.  (I'm eschewing the ones written after his death which he had no part in other than they're about his character and the publisher is slapping his name on them - above the smaller name of the guy who actually wrote the books.)

Oh, yeah, and I also do collect SF.  I have a collection of Andre Norton paperbacks I bought as a box lot. I'm working on Bradbury and Heinlein, but SF is harder to find around here.  I used to have a lot more, but when I was packing to move to MO, one box got unintentionally donated to somebody somewhere.  =o(  Lucky I managed to move another box that had a couple rare, old SF novels in it.

Anyway, I totally geek out about my books, as you can probably tell from reading this far.

I have paper printouts of certain of these authors' books, so I can check off what I have and what I've read of them.  This is one of the rare times I wish I had a smartphone, so I could carry the lists with me.  I can't tell you how many times I've bought books and discovered I already had them.  In those cases, I keep the better copy (or older, rarer copy) and cycle the other one back into the thrift store system.  I win, St. Vinny's wins.  It's all good.  If it's really a special book, I'll keep both copies. 

So, you can see why I talked about needing more shelves. 

What about you?  Do you collect books?  Do you collect anything?  What would be on your top seven collectables list?

For the record, I'm not sure if any of the books I collect are really worth anything to anyone but me.  But that's not the point.  At least it's not for me.  Maybe the Kid will find out if they're worth anything when she inherits them all someday.  Hell, maybe by then, they really will be worth something.  LOL