Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 6/28/25

Hello!  Thanks for stopping by my Saturday Reading Wrap-up!  I hope you find something fun or at least interesting while you're here.  Unfortunately, it wasn't a banner week for finishing books.  

I picked up 8 ebooks this week - all free, of course.  In there are 2 SF, 3 UF, 2 thrillers, and a YA action/adventure.  Should be some fun reading in there somewhere... I hope.  No new hardcopies. 

Books Read:

26) Sweet Harmony by Noel Bailey (6/25/25) - magical romance*# - 4 stars.  New to me and underappreciated.  Found this for free off the Kindle Freebies I found Today Facebook group.
Review: "This was a fun story. I loved the premise and, being a former band nerd, the heroine's problem raising money for the music program. But I wasn't 100% keen on the hero's dilemma. I mean, he took care of it, but I think he needed to be more forceful with his father. Be the hero his lady needed him to be. Right then and there. :shrug: It's probably just me."
Additional note: This was a 'magical romance', but there was very little magic or mention of magic in it.

DNFs:

6/25/25 - post apocalyptic - free.  It jumped from 2055 with one MC to 2075 with another MC with no clear connection and then to yet another MC.  Too much in too short a time made it really confusing.  Like I need more confusion in my life. LOL

6/24/25 - suspense - free.  I really wanted to like this.  I'd read several things by this author before and I was thrilled to see this one offered for free on his Facebook page.  Sadly, it read like he either didn't bother to edit it or he ignored his editor's suggestions this time.  I tried, but after a while, I couldn't take it anymore.

6/23/25 - suspense - free.  A suspense is supposed to be quick and... well... suspenseful.  This?  It seemed like the author put every sentence through the 'quotable sentence' generator.  For good story telling, snappy sentences should be sprinkled throughout, not poured on like hot fudge.  (I like hot fudge, so it's over EVERYTHING.)  I gave up after a few pages of slogging through that.

Currently reading... I'm in the middle of Murder on the Orient Express in that Poirot Omnibus I'm reading.  When I finish it, I'll hit the ebooks again.

What was on your reading plate this week?  Yummy things or brussels sprouts?  ;o)

Thursday This n That

Now that I have a phone substitute on its way here, the landline is working.  Like 5 days in a row now, which hasn't happened since like March.  Turds.  I'm waiting until I make sure the new device arrives and works before I cancel the old stuff.

I stopped by the old office yesterday.  They're in the same building as a company that provides us a service, so I stop to pay that bill.  Anyway, I saw one of the guys, which was awesome.  The other guy I wanted to see had the day off.  Bummer.  I spent some time talking to the gal who basically replaced my supervisor.  Nice gal.  I gave her a tip on how to keep the Epson working... it's temperamental and a brat, but it was my baby... and she's going to try that. I also chided her on using after market ink.  That stuff is horrible and can really f-up your printer.  But it wasn't my place to say that.  Not anymore.  Hell, it wasn't my place then.  :shrug:  I have a tendency to take over like the bull I am.  (Taurus, doncha know.)  I spent two years reining the bull in, and now that I don't work there anymore, the bull wants to run through that china shop.  LOL

The roadside blackberries are almost ready.  When I drove by them yesterday, they looked pretty red.  Once they turn black, I can have at them.  As long as no one else gets there first, and the birds leave them alone, and the deer don't find them.  Also, the elderberry plants are about done flowering and they're starting to grow berries.  I'm not sure if I can reach those over the barbed wire fence, but I'm going to try.

Speaking of roadside berries, I belong to a FB page about Missouri backroads and some gal on there was talking about picking roadside blackberries where she lives.  So, see?  I'm not the only weirdo who does that.  ROFL

I did the Wallyworld thing yesterday.  Man, it's hot here and I was all sweaty spaghetti by the time I got home.  But I got everything we needed and some things we didn't need.  My Wallyworld is carrying frozen yogurt, so I picked up one 'half-gallon' of vanilla and one of chocolate.  Yum.  All the yumminess of ice cream with less fat.

Speaking of half-gallons of ice cream... The damn things aren't actually half-gallons anymore and haven't been for a while now, but it still pisses me off when I think about it.  I think Blue Bell still does a full half-gallon, but who can afford that?  Last time I bought Blue Bell, it was like $8 for a half gallon.  Yeowch.  Don't get me started on all the other things that are smaller now but cost more.  Grrrr.

Anyway, it's creeping up on time to call Ma, so I'll leave you with that last thought.  What kinds of thoughts are you having today?

What I Did

Despite the risk of jinxing this, I'm going to tell y'all what I did yesterday.

I wrote words.  1558 of them to be exact.  Which puts Duke Noble #3 at just over 3000 words.  It's a start.  No promises.  No judging.  Just write the words.  Every day.

I also exercised.  Not walked... exercised.  5 minutes dancing (which freaked the cats out... like 'eek! hide! mama's having a spastic fit' or something), 4 minutes doing regular exercises, 4 minutes more dancing and then walking around the house to get my heart rate back to normal*.

I told you all I just needed to give myself a good talking to.

Now, I just have to keep it up.  I'm shooting for 1500 words a day but any words will do.  And I'm aiming at ramping up the exercising until I'm back to my old stamina - walk = 1.6 miles 3 or 4 times a week, exercise = 20/10/20 on the days I'm not walking.

No excuses.  I need this for both my mental and my physical health.  Lord knows, I'm not getting any younger.  If I don't want to end up as an old lady sitting in a chair watching the world go by, or drooling on myself in a corner, I have to do something to make that not happen.  This is it.  

Join me, if you're able.  

*Safer than just stopping on the exercise.  You've got to ease your heart up and then ease it back down again.  

No Marketing Monday

As you can guess from the subject of this post, there's no marketing today.  I need to regroup, reassess, and reanimate.  I'll try to take this week to walk through everything in my head, pull myself out of the quicksand, and get on more solid ground.  We'll see what July brings and what I can make happen.  

That's all for now.  Go on about your day and make it a good one, if you can.  :hugs:

Sunday Update - 2025 Week 25

I'm not exactly sure it is Week 25, but it follows last week, and I'm not inclined to go check, so there you are.  

I thought about writing this week.  I really wanted to be able to say that I wrote something when I did my update, but alas, I can't.  I also thought about giving up on writing this week, cuz it's not like I'm actually doing it and haven't done it for a long time.  But I'm a mule, so I guess we'll all just sit here and wait for me to write some stuff.  Or I'll sit here while what few followers I have left wander away.  I need to take a walk and give myself a good talking to all the way around.

Marketing was done.  I'm still hampered in my efforts, which isn't helping with the whole malaise, but I moved 83 books.  And someone somewhere is reading WIOH, so that's $$.  Not sure what this week will bring for sales or marketing.  Stay tunes.

Reading went slow this week.  I finished one book and then started on an omnibus of Hercule Poirot stories.  Not sure why I started this behemoth, but there it is.  I'll probably pause between stories to read something else.

On the activity front, I did stuff 4 out of 7 days - 3 walks for 3.35 miles, cleaning, and weeding.  Then it got hot and I retreated into my shadowy lair.  We won't talk about weight this week.  The heat is making me fluffy.  Yeah, yeah... that's the ticket.

Speaking of hot, no baking this week.  I meant to make cookies or cake or something, but meh.

Big news this week.  After eons of trouble with Brightspeed, I finally took the first steps to kick those assholes to the curb.  I'm going with a VoIP - Voice over Internet Protocol - service.  VoIP uses a widget that connects to our Starlink via wifi so we can use our regular phone over the internet to make calls like anyone else.  I researched it and found a company out of Edmund, OK that seems stable.  The device will be shipping to us and once I have it, I'll start the process to port our phone number from BS to our new provider.  Once that's done, I'll call BS and tell them to pound sand.  Woot. Steppin' into the 21st century like a boss.  

Okay, I think I've about updated myself out.  Have a great day wherever you are.  

Saturday Reading Wrap-up - 6/21/25

Well, hello there.  It's that time again.  Let's see if I have anything interest to impart today.

I picked up one new ebook this week.  It's a magical romance of some sort that I saw on one of the FB groups I post to.  We'll see how it goes.

Books Read:

25) The Danger by Dick Francis (6/15/25) - thriller - 5 stars. Neither new to me nor underappreciated.  I picked this one up at a thrift store for a quarter.
Review: "Wow. This is an excellent read. Everything I love about Dick Francis with a twist of the likes of Fleming's or McLean's knack for international intrigue thrown in. Definitely more thriller than mystery. And totally awesome as a result."

No DNFs this week.

Currently reading... I started an omnibus of Hercule Poirot stories.  I might read one and then read something else, so a bit of back and forth until it's finished.  Which reminds me... I still haven't finished that HG Wells anthology.  :shrug:  Sometimes life is that way.  I'm currently 7 books behind on my reading goal, so I better get some stuff finished, I guess.

What was on your reading list this week?

Friday This n That

 Yeah, I've been brainfart central all week.  No reasons. No excuses. Just brainfart.  Or slug.  The result is the same.  I lay around doing not much of anything, babbling and drooling.  (Okay, the drooling is perhaps a mite dramatic.  It's figurative. Or something.)

The family drama is like 90% done.  We're mostly out of it, aside from the worrying - which we shouldn't do because there's nothing we can do about it, but we're not the kind of people who just stop worrying, so there ya are.

I have things coming up in my flat where I planted pepper seeds.  One pepper seed per dirt cup.  The problem is that I have more than one thing growing in several of the cups.  I did leave the flat thing out on the deck for a while, so who knows what might taken root.  And I had originally planted redbud seeds in those, so maybe something made the freakin' redbud seeds wake up and grow.  :shrug:  We'll see when the seedlings get a bit bigger.  

My tomato plants are HUGE.  They're monstrosities.  And they're only now starting to get the beginnings of flowers.  Turds.  I want tomatoes, damn it.

Finn is Camo-Kitty.  Sometimes, I can be looking right at him and not see him because he blends in.  But he's just a tiger-stripe, so I'm not sure how his camo works.  Maybe he's like the Predator and bends light around himself to hide more efficiently.

I just paused doing this to reload my freakin' phone and then renew my freakin' health insurance, which jacked up again.  :headdesk on repeat:

I have nothing else to add.  I'm gonna go for a walk and talk myself down from wanting to go screamin' chicken on the whole insurance industry.

*for the uninitiated, 'screamin' chicken' is when you fly into somewhere flapping your arms and squawking up a storm. My oldest sister coined the term decades ago and it stuck with me.