Wordy Birdie

I don't have much, but I figured I would at least do something.

1) insalubrious- Not sustaining or promoting health

2) faquir - a Muslim or Hindu mendicant monk who is regarded as a holy man

3) sahib- Used formerly as a form of respectful address for a European man in colonial India

Quote

Overwhelmed...

This is how I am feeling. A bit over my head with responsibility at home, school, and at work. Feeling like my head will explode. Decision made.

I am going to bed.

After all, as Scarlett said"Tomorrow is another day."- Gone With the Wind

Karen's Tuesday

Hey! It's me! I haven't been doing much reading lately, I'm at the tail end of Kim right now and then I think I'll start on the next circus book I have. I'll share about that on Monday if I do actually start it. I'm terrible at paying attention and keeping track of good quotes while I'm reading, so instead I will share a book that I have read that I really liked. I've read a lot this year but I think I will go with The Road by Cormac McCarthy. It is a post-apocalyptic book about a man and his son who are trying to survive the harsh weather as well as the people who you might say did not mentally survive the apocalypse and have become cannibalistic crazies who are also trying to survive and out to get whatever is in their way. It's sort of sad and disturbing and inspiring and moving all at once. It's not for everyone in terms of both content and writing style, but I really enjoyed it. There is actually a movie on it coming out this year. Well, that's my contribution for the day. I'll try to keep up this week.

Monday so soon?

Well, I have to, HAVE TO, finish Intuition. It is getting easier though. All the lab talk is becoming a mystery story, which is good for reading. The difficulty? SUNSHINE!

I had to talk myself into sitting at the patio table to read. I did pull out my "BackHome" magazine to brush up on how to lasagna garden. I created one of those. :) I have to say, I spent more time reading about landscaping with edible plants than I should have. But, hey, it was good reading. :)

I'll have no choice, but to have a finished Friday this week...

Spring Fever?

I didn't get much reading done last week. I'm finding it hard to concentrate. Spring Fever perhaps? I got out Julia Cameron's book "The Write Diet" and re-read a good portion of that. Also skimmed "The Creative Call" and a book about writing family history. (can't remember the name!)

Maybe I will get the Anne Lamott book read this week. Maybe. In the meantime, I'm checking in!

Christie's Manifest

There is nothing to my manifest this Monday. I have no book in mind for this week. I might even take the week off from daily reading to do some other things (Bible study, journaling, and so forth).

Hmm, in case I do that, Happy Reading until next Monday!

Christie's FINALLY finished!

I FINALLY finished Kim! And you know what, at the end I actually "got it." WOO! The end. :)

No top for me

Well, not a book anyway!

Ruth is still reading Wizard of Oz. We see the play on Saturday. Brian and I went last night it was awesome!
Ah, well, back to school.

Christie's Top 100

Hmm, let me guess, still reading Kim?

Wow, you got it!

Haha, I'm finishing it tonight by golly. Really I am!

HA! I have a treasure to share!

Well, a quote anyways. :)

From Intuition, page 137 :

From a description about the character, reading about a boy with photographic memory for mathematical facts:

"Feng had been much intrigued with this story, and ye he thought, how much more interesting it would be to have a photographic memory for faces or for landscapes. How much more valuable to possess perfect recall of the people you love or the most beautiful places you had been."

As I get older, I realize just how much I miss the days when I would remember the details forever....

WOW!

3 out of 5 of us have a post today! (not too late for Sparkie!)

Ruth is still reading the Wizard of Oz. She did reach her goal, and surpassed it last week. She also enjoyed Harry and the Deathly Hallows with me. :)

Me? Wellll, I have no choice. Intuitions is due by next week, and I am only half way through. I am up to my ears in textbook, and other school readings. My mind is boggled, but I will make it through. I do not currently have a 100 book, though I can jump in with Ruth on occasion.

Kathy's Monday Manifest

I don't know that I cracked a book last week. I did go through my pile of books to try and get inspired. I have probably 25 books unread in the bedroom. Not sure if I will ever read even five of them....

Friday night I bought Anne Lamott's book, Grace Eventually-Thoughts on Faith. I've read other books by her including Bird by Bird, which is about writing and Traveling Mercies which is a memoir. Both were really good. Anne Lamott is a professed Christian but has been through some really trying experiences in her life. She writes about it all with insight and a sense of humor. I'm looking forward to the read. It's not a difficult book and not especially long. I'll have it read this week.

Christie's Manifest

Um, I'm still reading Kim. I don't know why I'm struggling to get through it. I WILL finish it before the end of the week though. Then I'm planning on moving onto some non-list books. Not sure which ones yet; that will depend on what I can get at the library.

MIA

I have been soooo busy. It stinks. It means I haven't been reading much and also I haven't been posting. Not much to post anyway, I'm still reading Kim too. I am enjoying it and I am interested to see where it goes and how it ends up. A lot of it is over my head in terms of the cultural references but it is nice to read about such a different culture and learn more about it. I would catch up on the week, but I'm at work so I probably shouldn't. Hopefully next week I'll do better. Looks like I'm not the only one who's been busy anyway...Hope to hear from the rest of you soon too!

Christie's Top 100

I'm STILL reading Kim. Ugh, I really have to finish it up this weekend, this is ridiculous! I guess I've just been busy. But that's a stupid excuse. Reading is grand and I need to make time for it.

Ruth is reading

I just got to chapter 7 in the "Wizard of Oz". Today I am planning to read 2 more chapters. Yesterday I finished reading "The Tin woodman" and the "Cowardly Lion", those two are my favorite chapters so far. The Cowardly Lion is my favorite besides Toto.

CIndy's Manifest and Quote

I feel a little overwhelmed at this time, so many books so little time. :)
I have to, HAVE TO, read Intuition this week. I have about 100 pages of textbook reading to do as well. This is my required reading stuff.
On the side, I started "The Thirteenth Tale" and "Are you Ready?" I don't know how much time I will have to devote to these, but I hope to try. :)
In the CD player is still "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows". We only have about 5 of the 17 Cd's left to listen to. Ruth and I enjoyed the story in car on our road trip this past weekend. I know we will be going to the library today, so I will have to peruse for a follow up. I may just ask them to do an inter library loan for the other Harry stories on CD.

Oh, my quote:

"There is something about words. In expert hands, manipulated deftly, they take you prisoner. Wind themselves around your limbs like spider silk, and when you are so enthralled you cannot move, the pierce your skin, enter your blood, numb your thoughts.

Inside you they work their magic."

This speaks to me about my relationship with books. Through out my life, I have used them as others use drugs. The best books can pull my thoughts from my own life, and whisk me away to another place and time. They show me that others can be in worse shape than I am. I can envision my life without many things, but books are not on that list.

Christie's Manifest

I'm still reading Kim. Slowly but surely I'm making it through. I don't know why I'm struggling with this one... probably because I've been putting lots of other stuff on my plate and haven't given myself much reading time. Hopefully as I get my schedule/routine down better I'll find more time.

One Two Three or how to spend an entire morning at the car dealership

The week flew by. So did my resolve to post on this blog every day. However, today I finally opened "The Thirteenth Tale" and now I can't put it down!! It has already provided me with a quote for Tuesday and a word for Wednesday.

A quote:

"Politeness. Now there's a poor man's virtue if there ever was one. What's so admirable about inoffensiveness, I should like to know. After all it's easily achieved. One needs no particular talent to be polite. On the contrary, being nice is what's left after you've failed at everything else." ~Vida Winter in The Thirteen Tale

(I disagree with her. Of course, I come from a poor family........)

And, a wordie:

amanuesis: (I had never, ever seen this word before in my life) pl. a·man·u·en·ses (-sz) KEY
One who is employed to take dictation or to copy manuscript.

Top 100 Thursday? I am giving up "Where Angels Fear to Tread". Almost done but have to return the book tomorrow. It's already overdue.

Christie's Not Finished

Hello? Is there anyone else out there?

No, I know you all are busy and sometimes can't make it to the computer. But I hope you all have a fabulous holiday weekend... and if you can fit some reading in, then good for you!

I'm not done with Kim, but hopefully I'll get some reading done this afternoon as I have the day off.

Christie's Top 100

I am reading #95 on the Top 100 List, which is Kim by Rudyward Kipling. I think I'm up to Chapter 5. I'm still not as into it as I would like to be, but I am at least learning to ignore the end note indicators and just read through the story.

The main characters, the lama and his disciple (Kim), have been traveling for several days in search of the lama's sacred river. There have been interesting descriptions and lots of talk about a religion and way of life that is, of course, way different than my own. It's interesting and I'm sure as the book goes on it will present passages that are meaningful no matter your religion or your way of life... I just hope I'm paying attention when it does!

Christie's Wordies

From The Beautiful and Damned:

1. maelstrom(s) (237): whirlpool(s)
2. cupidity (238): extreme greed for material wealth
3. sinecure(s) (239): position(s) that require minimal work, but that still give payment
4. hoary (251): ancient; white or gray with age
5. pusillanimous (275): lacking in courage and manly strength and resolution

Christie's Treasure Trove

From Hope for Each Day, which is a daily devotional by Billy Graham:

"God's love did not begin at Calvary. Before the morning stars sang together, before the world was baptized with the first light, before the first blades of tender grass peeped out, God was love" (p. 112, April 5).

Karen's Manifest Monday

Hey y'all. I am technically in between books at the moment. But as of tonight I will be reading Kim by Rudyard Kipling. I just got it from the library today and will probably start it tonight when I go to bed, or if not, definitely tomorrow morning on the way to work.

Kathy's Manifest Monday

For those who follow, you know I am taking a break from Shocking Pink Thread. However, part of the reason is so that I can focus on the other blogs that mean something more to me right now, including this one!

I never started "The Thirteenth Tale" last week. I decided to read "Where Angels Fear to Tread" instead and I'm about halfway through. I expect to finish it today or tomorrow so my book for the next week (or two) will be "The Thirteenth Tale". Christie gave this book to Grama last year for Christmas and I wanted to read it then. It's taken me this long (more than a year!) to get to it.

Cindy asked last week what the book was about so I'm cheating. I went to Amazon and looked at the reviews. This one makes me even more excited to read the book since Gothic romance is one of my favorite genres:

"Vida Winter, England's most famous and reclusive writer, is nearing the end, and before she goes she wants her amazing life story to be recorded for posterity. For this, she engages a lonely young biographer, Margaret Lea, who has a few secrets of her own. When these two forceful women meet, the stage is set for an ever-mounting series of shocking surprises. I've always been a fan of the Gothic style of romantic mystery, and some of my favorite authors are the Brontës, Daphne du Maurier, Mary Stewart, and Robert Goddard. If you share my love of windswept moors, bleak houses and strange families, you're in for a real treat. THE THIRTEENTH TALE is a masterful, deliberately old-fashioned story of secrets, ghosts, sexual obsession, murder, madness--you name it, and it's here. This is a beautiful book. I'm going to give copies to a few friends, and I plan to read it again. The only other books I've actually read twice are GREAT EXPECTATIONS, WUTHERING HEIGHTS, and REBECCA. What else can I say? Enjoy. "

Christie's Manifest Monday

I have moved onto my next Top 100 Book, Kim by Rudyard Kipling. It is apparently about a young man who becomes the chela (disciple) of a Tibetan lama and they are to travel around India to the "Four Holy Places" of Buddhism- where Buddha's faith was created, where he delivered his first sermon, where he died, and where his relics are enshrined.

I had kind of a hard time with the first chapter. The version I have has end notes, and there were lots of end note indicators that I found distracting. I would actually prefer not to know what something is than have the end note thing just about every other word keeping me from being focused on the story. It got better towards the end of the chapter and I'm looking forward to seeing where the two main characters go and what they experience in the rest of the book.

Finished!

I finished Thunderstruck last weekend, just before I started the one I'm on now. It's the second of his books that I've read, and I must agree with Christie and say I liked Devil in the White City better. This one was good and I really like the way he sets up the story within the historical context, but the set-up took about two-thirds of the book before it got to the murder mystery part. It's really interesting how he incorporates the mystery into the history (sounds like a rap) and how the two interact and affect one another. Overall, I would suggest checking out this author, Erik Larson and recommend either of these books.

Christie's Finished

I finished The Beautiful and Damned this afternoon. Something that changed the repetitive nature of the story did happen, though overall it didn't really change the direction of the book. I have to say that this was probably my least favorite Top 100 Book so far and I'm not sure I like how it turned out in the end, although it did have a lot of great descriptive writing. It may have just been the culture of the main characters, which I thought was quite absurd and ridiculous.

I think Karen might read it next and I look forward to seeing what she thinks about it... and anyone else if they decide to read it.

I hope everyone has a fabulous weekend. Happy Reading!

Finished Friday- Cindy

So, I finished "Judge and Jury". I have to say that there were several scenes that were pretty disturbing. Overall, it was a typical James Patterson book. Nothing too special, but just enough to my my ride relaxed. :)

I have to say I have actually opened the other two books, and am not planning to send them back to the library quite yet. The Art of Ill Will is a great bathroom book, and I am surprised to find several drawings in there by none other than Dr. Seuss. I was shocked!
The other one is not really an "inviting" book, but it is at least, at this point, a pretty easy read.

I plan to read over the rainy weekend. I have the girls overnight tomorrow night, but I should find some time. I think I may add my own Top 100 to my list, but it will be an old favorite. Tune in on Monday to see if I do or not. :)

This is number 100!

Can you imagine? We've made it to 100 posts already?? Thank you Christie for administering this blog. I've enjoyed it so much.

Since it's Friday, I will say I FINALLY finished Rabbit, Run. I wanted to see if he would run home. I won't spoil it but what a sad story. The characters are so well written and I sympathized with many of them. At first I didn't understand why the book was a Top 100. By the end, I "got it".

The one thing I recognize as I read this blog is I am not as well educated as the rest so I find it difficult to expand my thoughts. Any pointers? It's been more than 3o years since I wrote a book report. LOL!

While I struggle with expressing my thoughts, I am so grateful for the opportunity to expand myself. It's a challenge and I thoroughly appreciate it. Maybe by next week, I will have a brilliant report on my next Top 100 book.

Karen's Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday

I'm going to post for the whole week because I don't like being a slacker.

TUESDAY:

There is a quote at the beginning of most of the chapters in the book I'm reading about the circus. I like this one:

"Tomorrow morning the circus will also leave the city, for the gipsy must ever wander on. The rain falls where he rests, the fragrant blossoms and the ozone of the sea woo him, he knows the charm of tender nights when the moon is full, and nights when the storm wind whistles. He knows river valleys and mountain chains, the song of the cuckoo and crickets chirp. Whether the grain be swaying in the breeze or the autumn mist pressing the leaves to the ground, the circus travels on through the world with man and beast, the big tent rises aloft with its steely song, and there is ntohing above the bliss of its roaming save the eternal tented roof of the stars."

WEDNESDAY

josser (n)- in circus slang, an outsider who enters this curiously private and familial world but is neither born nor bred into it
bung (v)- give as a present; make a gift of
enigmatic (adj)- Pertaining to an enigma; Mysterious; Defying description
eradicate (v)- To pull up by the roots; to uproot; To completely destroy; to put an end to; to extirpate

THURSDAY

I'm not reading any top 100 books. Probably next week, though!

Kathy's Top 100

I know, I know. I said I was returning my library books but when I saw how short "Where Angels Fear to Tread" was, I decided to try to sneak it in. I've read the first chapter and I must say, I'm enjoying it. Just the sort of book I like. I need to expand on that thought but no time presently. I do remember seeing the movie "Room with a View" based on another of Forster's novels. I'll let you know my final thoughts next week.

Christie's Top 100 Book

I'm still working on The Beautiful and Damned. I'm a bit over halfway through and I'm kind of ready for it to be over. It seems like a lot of the same stuff keeps happening, although I am definnitely more into it now that I've had time to sit down quietly and read without sleep beckoning me. I'm not really bored with the story line, but I just wish a wrench would get thrown in or something... although that may have just happened in my last bit of reading. We'll see where it goes from here!

And I must say, the way the people live in this book is crazy to me. They party all the time and barely anyone seems to work... and work is typically writing. Sounds like an easy life to me... though all that partying must be tiring and bad for your health. Ha! :)

This was in my Research Methods reading this week. It was part of a discussion about choosing types of research.

parsimony:
1
a: the quality of being careful with money or resources : thrift
b: the quality or state of being stingy
2:
economy in the use of means to an end ; especially : economy of explanation in conformity with Occam's razor

At this point, there are no other words that pop in my mind.

P.S.

I think I've run out of time for my library book. So, I'm going to start "The Thirteenth Tale".

I want to.......really........

I don't know where my head has been lately but I've found it difficult to put my thoughts into words.

I love this blog. I read it every day. I do wish we commented more on each other's posts but I'm not good at it either.

I don't have a word for Wednesday. I do have a report for Finished Friday. I will save it for then!

Cindy and Ruth, I mentioned I loved the Wizard of Oz books when I was growing up. A few years ago, I bought a set of them at a yard sale. If you would like to read another one (one that hasn't been a movie......yet........) please let me know and I will be sure to give them to you to borrow at Easter. Or, at least, look at them.

Christie and Karen--did you read R.L. Stine books?

Christie's Wordies

From The Beautiful and Damned:

1. atavistic (61): habitual or ingrained; tendency to revert to ancestral type; a trait presumed to be that of an ancestor

2. infelicitous (63): inappropriate in application; unhappy or unfortunate

3. mawkish (95): insincerely emotional

4. mountebank (115): a flamboyant deceiver

5. dross (143): impurity; worthless or ordinary