January...and My Reading Challenges...

I am super late to the party. I meant to get my 2024 reading challenges post up a month ago...And January just got away from me.

We have had some really weird weather but I think everyone has been having their own weird weather. Biting cold in early January and then warmish torrential rains...Part of my job I am outside for an hour or so and I have had to invest in warmer boots, socks, and a huge umbrella!

Moving to our new house has included making friends with some of the local cats! A neighbor a street over has three cats that roam the neighborhood and come to say hi from time to time. Duke is  a big fluffy grey kitty. He is so friendly and chill. My cats aren't ecstatic about his presence but surprisingly they are very tolerant! When it's really stormy he whines at our door and we let him in to dry off, warm up, get a few cuddles, and some treats. He's just a big sweetheart. I feel like we are the grandparents who can love on the kitty and then send him off when he gets too whiny!

Here are my two boys shoveling hard during our winter snowstorm!

We also hosted a housewarming party with some friends during the winter break. It helped so much to welcome in friends and finally break in our new house. We also purchased a brand new fridge; we've been wanting to since we realized what a crapshoot the previous owners left the fridge in!

I have made a renewed effort in bullet journaling. I found someone who had some really fun yet simple pages and I'm rolling with it and seeing how they work for me. I've put all of my reading challenges in there and hoping it'll help me keep track a bit better this year.

I also attended the Sundance Film Festival, online anyway. I watched 4 films. 

Black Box Diaries: This is a documentary focuses on Shiori, a journalist and a victim of rape. She fights for her right to get justice after the local police department shuts down the investigation once they hear that the perpetrator is a close friend of then prime minister Shinzo Abe. It's an amazing piece of journalism and she also documents her grief and trauma from this brutal attack. And how hard it is to get justice in Japan's legal system.

Never Look Away: This is a documentary by Lucy Lawless. She looks into New Zealand war journalist Margaret Moth. Fascinating story. I felt Lawless presented Moth in all her glory and many of her picadilloes. She interviewed old boyfriends and had them share their sides of the tale. They were very contradictory. I really enjoyed learning more about Moth and utterly reckless she was with not only herself but with those she truly cared about.

Handling of the Undead: This was a book to movie adaptation of John Ajvide Lindqvist's book of the same name. He wrote Let the Right One in which took on a very different vampire theme. This one takes on the zombie genre and grief. Lights flicker and go out and things stop working but people soon realize their loved ones that recently died have been resurrected. We never find out why or how. But we follow a few families and how they deal with their loved ones coming back. It was probably a bit slow for my taste. But there are some good themes on grief and letting our loved ones go that I enjoyed.

Thelma: This movie was an absolute delight! Thelma is a 93 year-old woman is watched by her family like she's four. When she is scammed out of $10,000 it's up to her and an old friend to track the thieves down and get her money back. It's like a Mission: Impossible but if they were 93 instead. It's funny and touching all at once. I highly recommend seeing this one once it gets wider release.

I finished 3 books in January!

• Slow Horses by Mark Herron. I first heard of this series from Apple TV+ with the TV adaptation of the same name starring Gary Oldman. He is the best thing about the whole series. The adaptation is phenomenal. And after reading the first book, I am even more impressed by the series. It truly captures the book and adds to it. I highly recommend this one.
• To the Bright Edge of the World by Eowyn Ivey. I loved Ivey's The Snow Child, which I also read last winter. This one had been sitting on my shelves since a library boos sale a couple of years ago. This one did not disappoint. Fascinating history brought to life through her vivid settings and lively characters. And once again she adds a hint of the mystical throughout. Part of my read through history challenge.
• The Canceling of the American Mind by Greg Lukianoff and Rikki Schlott. Lukianoff and Schlott break down the various areas of cancel culture from both sides of the aisle and how this stifles diverse conversation and stymies real-world solutions.

I'm hoping to get longer reviews out soon.

I am currently reading...

• Making It So by Patrick Stewart. I'm listening to this one on Everland/Scribd. I am loving this! He reads it himself and his stories are fantastic. I have followed him since his TNG days. It's been a fantastic way to get through the January winter blues.
• Snow by Ronald Malfi. This is part of my I Read Horror Year-Round challenge...Malfi is one of my new favorite horror authors. Fantastic storylines that are creepy and well done. This book takes on the zombie genre but different and I've read and watched quite a few zombie stories. I am over halfway through and I have not been disappointed.
• Mansfield Park by Jane Austen. I have started twice but have never finished this classic. I've watched all of the BBC adaptations! I am determined this time to finish. I am about halfway through. I am also reading an annotated edition with very interesting tidbits, which is really helping me get through this one.
• Moonstone by Wilkie Collins. Another classic. This one is part of my 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die challenge. This is basically the first mystery book. It definitely has an Agatha Christie feel without the murder. It's also a lot longer than your typical mystery. I am enjoying it so far.
• Lone Women by Victor LaValle. I just started this one and so far so good. I have enjoyed all his books! He's a fantastic horroresque author!

Reading Challenges 2024

I always try to do Michelle's I Read Horror Year-Round challenge! She switches up the horror themes each year. I love horror books so it is a great way to read them with friends. When I finish Snow and Lone Women I'll be two down with ten more to go!

Her second challenge I try to do each year is the 1000 Book challenge from the book 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die: A Life-Changing List by David Mustich. I've read Les Miserables andThe Count of Monte Cristo through her challenge. This year is Moonstone by Wilkie Collins and Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens. So far Moonstone has been a very pleasant surprise!

The next challenge is from Emily Cook. She created her own secular homeschooling program called Build Your Library. She has had great ideas for books to read with my son for years. Every year she issues a reading challenge based on educational themes. This year is Read Through History. She has 40 categories and you just plug through as many as you can. I don't think I'll get through so many but it's always fun to try!

This weekend is my son's birthday! He's 15! I can't believe it. We've been running about having fun. He's got a friend coming over tonight. 

It's also the Super Bowl Sunday. I've got some snacks planned out. I absolutely do not care who wins. I just want it to be a close game and I hope the ads are funny and interesting and that the halftime show doesn't bomb!

All of my books have been hits so far this year and it's really helping my winter blues! 

I'm joining up with Deb from Readerbuzz for her Sunday Salon.

Week-in-Review: March Madness...

OK, not really madness but I couldn't think of anything else to title it! The weather has been madness, though. Just when we think spring is around the corner, we get snow! Or nice temps in the 60s and then the next few days back to the 40s. I did get a quick gardening session in yesterday before the wind and the storms set in. All the weeds are pulled and ready for flowers in a few weeks! My crocuses, hyacinths, and tulips are coming up! I need to take a pic this week for next time.

We celebrated DH's birthday last week! It was just us. Quaint and homey. It's usually a big affair with lots of friends but of course, it is the year of pandemic birthdays. We got a good one in last year. It was literally the weekend before everything closed down and the schools closed and we all locked down. It was a surreal year and this one was the anniversary of that. So weird again. I'm hoping next year will be a little more normal! 

I made cupcakes, we ordered in Mexican food, and I made frozen daquiris. DH then spent the evening with his Dungeons and Dragons group online and overall, he couldn't complain.

I also made beef stew and brown soda bread for St. Patrick's Day. I picked up some Guinness as well and we drank those with the stew and bread and it was lovely! I wish I'd taken a picture of the bread because it is delicious and so easy to make. I think this will be my go-to bread from now on. Me and yeast don't do so well together and soda bread does not require it! And just to be silly I bought butter from Ireland and some cheddar. 

And DH got his first vaccine jab! He'll be getting his second jab in three weeks. My state is opening it up for everyone next week. I tried to get an appointment but no luck. But soon, very soon! Our mask mandate will end April 10th so I'm hoping to get an appointment before then, if not I'll be picking up my groceries from my online orders...I do not trust the people in my state to do the right thing without a lot of compulsion, unfortunately.

We also learned some troubling news about my husband's company...big changes ahead but we don't know much yet. More stress. But we should be OK no matter where we end up. It's just stressful.

Reading Life:

I started listening to Behind Her Eyes by Sarah Pinborough after all the hubbub behind that ENDING!!!! I thought I should listen/read first and then watch and compare and contrast but I have found listening to it is making me anxious...like I keep thinking of the most awful and horrible twists to this story after each new nugget of information and I started giving myself nightmares...So I think I'm just going to watch it and not worry about the book. Lol. 

I've been listening to Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer slowly and deliberately for the last few months now. Gorgeous essays that really make you think about all living things and planet Earth and our place as humans amongst it all. A love story to the Earth. I should finish in early April.  

I'm still reading The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas for my 1000 Books Project: French Edition. By the end of them month I will be halfway through. It's highly entertaining. Quite the little French soap opera of revenge! And I am still reading Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. But I have plans on finishing it by the first week of April. It's really good and I just need to sit down and finish.

I'm about 30% done with The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir. I'm reading it with my friend for virtual philosophy book club and also for my Back to the Classics 2021 challenge for the 20th century classic prompt. I'm also almost done with Go Tell it on the Mountain by James Baldwin. One chapter left! This is also for my Back to the Classics challenge for the classic by a BIPOC author prompt. It's a short book but it's a tough one. Lots of layers and lots of unlikeable characters so it's been a lot harder for me to pick up and have "fun" reading it.

And I just started Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo. I'm enjoying it so far!

I finished off Samantha Irby's essay collection Wow, No Thank You. Astronauts: Women on the Final Frontier by Jim Ottaviani, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat and Other Clinical Tales by Oliver Sacks, and The Desolations of Devil's Acre by Ransom Riggs (The sixth and final book the Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children series).

I've also been listening to quite a few Great Courses lecture series: Myths, Lies, and Half-truths of Language Usage and Language A to Z both by John McWhorter, and The Life and Works of Jane Austen by Devoney Looser. I can't recommend her series enough! I have renewed interest in rereading her works and reading her other lesser known works as well. I'm on fire for Austen again!

Watching Life:

I'm a huge Utah Jazz fan so I've been watching a lot of their games. March NCAA basketball is also happening. I'll be catching a few games here and there as well.

I just watched A Promising Young Woman which has been nominated for a bunch of Academy Awards and it is worth it! It blew my mind and it was so well done. Plus if you are a Veronica Mars fan there are at least three actors from that series in this movie. I bet there's a connection there somewhere...

And I've been on a Star Trek kick lately so I watched a few of the original series movies with the DH. And then started watching the TNG first season. DH bought me the remastered Blu Ray whole series a couple of Christmases ago and I hadn't started them yet! What was a I thinking? It looks gorgeous in HD. They even have a little documentary on how hard it was to do this. Thank you, TNG team, for tackling this immensely difficult task!

Looking forward to:

Well, today is the official first day of Spring. We are getting the cold and rain. I usually try to do some little thing for the Spring Equinox. I'll probably make a little egg based treat, make a fun spring item and read a spring story. The story of Persephone/Kore is always a good one for this time of year.

Planning:

Spring cleaning is in the air! I've been trying to clean all the things in the kitchen. I reorganized the pantry, and am now cleaning out the kitchen drawers and cabinets. We have so much junk in there! Random cups from Denny's when Gabe was 3...So more of that this week.

Joining in with Readerbuzz's Sunday Salon

Where Did June Go?

I live in a state where the numbers are rising and outbreaks are happening. It's not good. At all. June has been a huge ball of stress. I mean all the months have been since March but..I turned 40 a couple of weeks ago. I had plans to celebrate it right before the pandemic hit. So I'll admit it was tough to turn 40 this year. I'm hoping I can really celebrate my introduction into my 4th decade right next year... Maybe? Fingers are crossed.

Everyone has stayed healthy. G did two online space camps in June. It was one too many. But he survived and ended up having a great time overall. Despite the one or two breakdowns...

I celebrated my birthday going out to eat. I wanted to get sushi from my fave sushi place but they are still not allowing sit-in dining. So we headed over to a brewery nearby called Straptank. It was a pleasant evening and the staff there was super friendly. We tipped extra big since I know times are tough and they're risking their health and the health of their families to work at a restaurant which probably does not pay extremely well. It was disheartening to hear, though, while we were waiting outside for a table, a group of friends/family walked out complaining that they had never been treated so horribly...the restaurant asked them to leave after they had been there for an hour (the restaurants are trying to keep the virus from spreading and they have 50% decrease in capacity so family groups can social distance from other patrons...so they want to get people into their seats...I don't think an hour is bad to ask people to leave. We are in the middle of a pandemic!) It was very disheartening to hear people say stuff like that. I'm venting.

Image Source

We also have fires popping up all over Utah. There were evacuation alerts for the area about 5 miles from us. We're keeping an eye. Yikes. We had rain and cooler temps last night, so I'm hoping that curbs some of the current fires.

Wear your masks in public! Fight the spread and take care of your neighbors.

Monthly Pics:

Here's my bday and G enjoying his online camps and a hike! My friends even dropped off a fun margarita birthday basket. And a couple of friends from out of state sent a box of Crumbl cookies and birthday quarantine box. Friends are fabulous!

G made a model Mars science habitat, we attended a Black Lives Matter protest, and enjoyed a socially distanced picnic for Father's Day with my parents.

G and I got out for a hike with our neighbors, who also practice great social distancing and mask-wearing while in public. So we both felt very safe doing this hike together.

And we finished the hardest puzzle ever! DH did most of it while I did the easy parts! Ha! And Nala and Shadow being cute and doing their kitty things.

Reading:

I finished 4 books this month. Not my best, but 4 isn't terrible! All Boys Aren't Blue: A Memoir-Manifesto by George M. Johnson, New Kid by Jerry Craft, A Wolf Called Wander by Rosanne Perry, and Dawn by Octavia Butler.

I'm reading What Language Is: And What It Isn't and What It Could Be by John McWhorter, How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi, Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X. Kendi (reading this one out loud with G; we are having some great discussions), Stamped From the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Ibram X. Kendi.

There is also a read-along happening online for Stamped and Stamped From the Beginning.

I'm listening to Our Time Is Now: Power, Purpose, and the Fight for a Fair America by Stacey Abrams. I am loving this. I'm gaining new insights into voter suppression laws, the census, gerrymandering, etc. Sometimes I have to take breaks but I love Stacey Abrams. She has my vote.

I'm planning on starting Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson, the second book in Butler's Xenogenesis trilogy, The End of Policing by Alex S. Vitale, and Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin over the next week or so.

Watching: 

For movies I saw the documentary Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am you can watch either on Hulu or PBS. Fantastic documentary on Morrison. So much I didn't know about her and her life and how the literary community accepted her work and books as they were published. I can't wait to read through all of her books and writings.

We also watched Artemis Fowl on Disney+... Wow, that was a terrible movie. Terrible! Even my DH who is less critical of movies in general found it rather nauseating and silly.

Disappearance at Clifton Hill on Hulu. This was an interesting mystery indie noir. Also, if you are a fan of body horror like Videocrome and Scanners David Cronenberg stars as well.

Swiss Family Robinson on Disney+... The animal abuse in that movie... wow. I had a hard time watching that one. Overall, one of the better old Disney movies but I will never watch that one again.

DH and I watched Rocketman finally last week. It was really well done! I could see Elton John's story becoming a Broadway musical one day. That's how this movie felt. I really enjoyed how they pulled his songs into his biography. And I had no idea he had long-time friend who is his lyricist. Fantastic story and movie.

And last night I watched Lost Child on Amazon Prime about a young woman who has come back from Afghanistan to her childhood home in the Ozarks. She's trying to deal with her PTSD and trying to reconcile with her brother. And all the while she finds a boy in the woods who seems almost supernatural. She must separate fact from local myth and folklore to find out who the boy is and ultimately find herself. I really liked this one. 

For TV I finally finished up to the third season of The Good Place on Netflix with DH. I was surprised at what a funny and smart show it is. I love a whole show on moral philosophy and ethics for the little gal. And done in such a way to make sense and be entertaining!

Never Have I Ever on Netflix was a great teen show about an Indian American dealing with the death of her father, getting along with her mother, and figuring out life as a teenager. Poignant and funny. Can't wait for the next season.

This week: Just looking forward to picking up our fruits and veggies, getting some library books, and some family time. DH has taken some time off this week and we plan on doing some game nights and a hike this week. And hopefully we will get some things done around the house like washing the windows, and cleaning up the basement, and donating some books and clothes to our local second-hand store. I'm also still working on our coronavirus quarantine time capsule and a blanket for my great-niece.

Oh, and this weekend I finally planted the rest of my flowers til Fall and laid down the rest of the mulch! Whew. Gardening is tough work.

Looking forward to relaxing a little more this week and enjoying some extra family time!

I hope you all enjoy a wonderful week and holiday this weekend!

Joining in with Readerbuzz's Sunday Salon