Still plugging along

Well I haven't yet put the list together of all the books I still need to read from my collection but I do intend to read at least half of them this year. That's the plan anyway. I'm still plugging along with North and South. It's such a fantastic book and I'm surprised that I had forgotten a lot of it from the first time I read it. I'm over halfway finished so maybe only another two weeks or so. I only read it when I'm on the bus so maybe an hour a day which is why it's a little slow going.

In any case, my new books have arrived so I'm very excited about that and want to rip into them already! I picked up All He Ever Wanted by Anita Shreve, Nights of Rain and Stars by Maeve Binchy and The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler. Other than the fact that they were all on a good sale, I had specific reasons for buying each one. I had read The Pilot's Wife by Anita Shreve previously, as well as saw the TV movie, and I quite enjoyed it. I figured it was about time to read another of her books. Maeve Binchy is one of my favourite authors and I had been wanting to read this newer book of hers for a while now so when I saw the sale, I couldn't resist any longer. Finally, I'm a big fan of Jane Austen and figured that a book about a book club surrounding her works would be interesting. Plus I'd heard a bit about this book by Karen Joy Fowler and thought I was bound to like it.

I'm a big proponent of reading reviews before buying books or going to see movies for that matter. I like to know what others think so that I can decide for myself whether I will like the book/movie. I've found that going in without any idea usually results in me feeling like I wasted my time and money. Obviously, surprises don't go over too well with me.

While I'm eating breakfast, I like to keep up-to-date on the community news by reading our weekly Neighbours paper and the monthly newsletter, which comes much too late in the month to be of much use unfortunately. This morning, I read an article about an older gentleman who plans to cross-country ski to Disneyland from here. It always fascinates me that people are willing to do things like this. The second article I managed to squeeze in was about this new type of "exercise" that involves getting your mind and your insides in the proper space so that traditional exercise would be more beneficial. Again, very interesting!

Guess that's enough for today. Hopefully, I'll get back to this soon.