A  note to myself:

Books I own that I need to either finish or read:

King Kelson's Bride
In the King's Service
Both by Katherine Kurtz set in her Deryni universe. Have meant to read them for ages and find out what happens to all my favourite characters.

Mr. Norell and Dr. Strange
I keep trying to read this, but I get bogged down as it reads very much like a Victorian Novel and is too reminiscent of university days.

The Foundation Trilogy - Azimov
Really enjoyed the first two parts of this book, but put it down for some reason and haven't returned to it yet.

Fugitive Pieces
Christmas present from Matthew. Beautiful, very lyrical, but I found it a bit slow. Probably because I've spent too much time reading scifi/fantasy which reads faster. 

Books belonging to other people I also need to read:

The Wonder Spot (on loan from Erin)
Caves of Steel (on loan fromKarina)
A Short History of Nearly Everything (belongs to Dad)
Mystery books Mom leant me
Dune (Matt's book)
Love in the Time of Cholera (Matthew leant this to me years ago, and still haven't read it!!)

Books that I've always wanted to read:

Catcher in the Rye
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz
Something by John Irving
and other classics

Sort of forgot about this journal... so lets start up again with some quick notes:


Books I'm reading:

Watership Down  by Richard Adams - I've always had a thing about rabbits, yet never read this book. I remember seeing parts of the cartoon way back when, but I have visions of it beeing frightening and sad - couldn't stand to see the rabbits get hurt.  As an adult now though, am loving the book!

The Wonder Spot  by Melissa Banks - my friend Erin lent this to me to read. I loved both of the other books she leant me (The Lovely Bones, and Memoirs of a Geisha) so I trusted that I would like this one too. So far so good!  

A Short History of Nearly Everything  by Bill Bryson - slowly working my way through this one. I am enjoying it, but I can only read little bits of it at a time.

Alexander the Great  by Robin Lane Fox - fascinating read written by an Oxford scholar when he was only 20 years old!  Quite the juxaposition when you consider that most of Alexander's claim to fame was because of youthful genius.

I've also just signed up for a local Science Fiction Book Club. Am looking forward to it. Figured that it would expose me to new authors and books, while getting me out of the house and meeting new people. First meeting isn't until the end of October, and no book has been set. But we'll see!

Movies I've recently watched:

Little Miss Sunshine - loved this movie. Saw it with Erin and we both laughed the whole way through. One of those movies which really grabs a hold of your emotions - nothing like laughing and crying at the same scene.

Superman Returns - saw it twice, second time in3D at the IMAX. I enjoyed it - had just the right amount of cheese to it. Not much point to the 3D though, it didn't add much. Funny though how John William's music score still gets the heart going even after all these years

Haven't done this for awhile. Partially because the initial rush of interest faded away, but mostly because I have a third roommate now who spends a great deal of time using MSN Messenger. Although I do not get near the computer as often, I admit it is amusing seeing all the obscure user names popping up as they sign in: tiffy_31, ohdarkone, sexybeckham, along with the occasional obscene message such as "I wanna f*ck all u girls brainless". Sometimes I wonder what the actual personality behind such messages is like, but its probably better that I don't!

In keeping with my pursuit of a better vocabulary, I have taken up the pastime of doing crossword puzzles. My clever roommate Wendie has done them for as long as I've known her, and being the English Major that I am, assumed that I too would have no trouble. Well, guess again. I sucked. I mean really truly sucked at doing them - I couldn't even finish one by cheating and peeking at the answers in the back of the book! How pathetic is that? Granted they were "expert" puzzles... So, in order to soothe my ego, I went out and bought a book of "Favourite Easy Crosswords" to work on. and you know what? I still suck. But I am improving. There is a certain satisfaction in knowing the answer right away, followed by the tiny feeling of glee as I sort out a difficult clue by working around it. Its the small pleasures in life right?

One aspect of these puzzles I want to comment on, and I am NOT trying to excuse my inadequacy, is the inaneness of some of the clues and answers. S's are added onto words that should never have them, letters are spelled out phonetically, and others are incredibly generic like "flowering bush". Hell, there are hundreds of those! There, that is my vent for the day.

Extra stuff:

Still reading Notes from a Small Island. Got distracted by re-reading "Cagebird" by the oh so wonderful Karin Lowachee ( karinlowachee.com ) and the arrival of my Amazon.ca purchase "Pippa Funnell: The Autobiography". For those not in the know, Pippa is the current number one Three Day Event rider in the world.

Latest movies: Kingdom of Heaven and Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, both of which I bought on DVD. The first mostly because of Orlando Bloom and my passion for epic movies, and the 2nd because it makes me laugh really hard. Especially the part about the whale...

This is harder then I thought. When I sat down to write my first journal entry, I at least was starting something, so beginning seemed natural. But Blog #2 here is anything but that. Forget about finding my vocabular, I need to first find my mind!

Its just after 9pm on Wednesday night. But its not just any Wednesday - its the night that countless (maybe umpteen?) Canadians have been waiting for: the first Hockey Night in Canada for a year.  My hockey-fiend roomate Wendie is ensconced upon the couch, cheeks in high colour, vocal chords primed to let out a year's worth of supressed cheers while I am hiding at the computer, mourning all the hours of extra TV I've enjoyed in said hockey-free year. I am not a sports fan at all, but I did try to like hockey. Really I did. I even pride myself on having sat through the entire Gold Medal game between Canada and the US at the last Winter Olympics - and I cheered!  But I just can't seem to get into it otherwise. Wendie even patiently explained all the rules and nuances of the game to me (on more then one occasion), causing me to at least sit beside her on the couch while she watched (out of guilt for her patience really). I think I sat through maybe a game before I started making sure I had reading material nearby to keep me entertained during commercials, and breaks, and soon enough, the game itself.

Not to completely knock myself though - I do have a sports passion in my past. For about a year I was a huge Toronto Blue Jays' fan, beginning with the runup to their 1992 World Series Championship and through their second one the following year. During that period I knew the entire starting line up, drooled over Paul Molitor and was even tolerably familar with individual's batting averages. Not sure what happened after that, but I lost interest and drifted on to something else.

Passions are a funny thing that way - they take a hold of you, sometimes consumingly, leading you to unexpected places, often to leave you barren at the end.

This journal came into being over lattes and steamed almond milk at Starbucks one late Wednesday night following a night at the movies. I was having a conversation with my brother, who upon hearing my complaint that I no longer seemed able to remember big words, said "you should start writing". I half jokingly said I'd set up a livejournal and start blogging, but then I went hmmm. The more I thought about it, the more I liked it. So here I am. I really have no idea what I am doing. But I'll try. Perhaps I should give some background. I come from a family of voracious readers - all my life I have been surrounded by books; fiction, or non, mystery, fantasy, historical or scifi. I had parents that read and two older brothers who also read anything and everything. Books are a part of our family (most noticeable every time we moved and had to carry the liquor boxes full of them up and down stairs and into moving trucks). Note to readers: boxes of books are heavy. Use small boxes.

First book I remember wanting to read was one of the blue covered Hardy Boys - only because my brothers were reading them and I wanted to be like them. That was when I was about 4 I think (will have to check stats with my mother). But I do remember for sure that once I hit Grade 1 I was reading my way so fast through all the little primer books that I was the first in my class allowed to go to the library on my own to get more to read. This pattern continued through Jr and Sr. High all the way to University where I earned my Bachelor of Arts in English Literature.

A bit of a mistake that. 4 Years of English Lit effectively crushed my desire and ability to read anything longer then a magazine article for many, many years... For someone who loves reading as much as I do, being forced to read 3 books and dozens of poems a week got sour very quick. It came to the point where I wrote a final exam on a book I never read... I still remember it: Middlemarch by George Elliott. Of course, within a year or two of that, the BBC released a top class miniseries based on it. :-/ I so could have used that.

I am happy to say that I have now recaptured my passion for reading, and although I have not returned to the 2 or 3 books a week of my earlier years, I am still avidly plowing my way through good novels. But it also brings me to this live journal. As a result of all my reading as a child, I used to have an extensive vocabulary - I knew words that the average person didn't. Lately though, I find myself struggling to even think of simple synonyms!  So the goal of my journal here is to help myself find the lost words of my youth. May they find their way back!

I'll leave with a list of my current books on the go:

Notes from a Small Island - Bill Bryson

Fire from Heaven  - Mary Renault

Downbelow Station - C.J. Cherryh