Friday, June 13, 2014

finally giving in

Well, the World Cup started yesterday. Which means that my soccer widowhood has started. Luckily, your many helpful suggestions made my plight much easier to deal with and Operation World Cup Survival is off to a...well, magical...start.

World Cup: Night 1
It seems I've run out of excuses. After seventeen years of not getting around to reading Harry Potter...I'm getting around to it.


It should keep me plenty busy for the next month. And I know I'm missing two books here. Don't worry, I'll find them and read it all in order.

My friends Catherine and Mollyanne have been relentlessly pestering encouraging me to read the books for years now. They even plot schemes about how to get me to read them. So when I finally picked up the books and committed to giving them a try, I had to send them this picture. I'm guessing they're busy patting themselves on the back and high fiving for another convert or something.


So far I am 125 pages in and so far, so good! I stayed up later than I'd planned because I got sucked in, so I guess that's a good sign.

In other reading news, I finally finished Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. I'd listened to about 70% of it on the audiobook on road trips, but finally had to return the CDs and I just borrowed the book from the library to finish the story. Then I ended up starting back at the beginning of the book because I think I fell asleep a few times during the audiobook, so I wanted to be sure I got the whole story.

Here's the thing. If I hadn't started with the audiobook (and had just picked up the book as a BOOK or ebook)...I'm pretty sure I never would have finished. The author took some serious liberties with the writing/style/format of the book. L.I.B.E.R.T.I.E.S. It started out by feeling a little different, a little intriguing...and quickly devolved to being obnoxious and overkill. Weird for the sake of being weird. I liked the story enough (well, Oskar's story. The grandma/grandpa parallel story didn't do anything for me) to stick with it, hoping there would be a good payoff at the end. But really...there wasn't. I don't know. It just ended. One of those where you flip back and forth a few times, sure you missed a concluding chapter or epilogue or something...but no, it's just...done. Well, okay then.

So I'd give it maybe 3 stars. Or 2.5. But I also think that like 80% of people would be too annoyed by the weirdness of the written version to get more than a few chapters in.

Although I'm looking forward to blazing through the HP over the next month(s?) or so, I'm going to have to pause whenever my book for book club this month comes in. We're reading The Program and I'm looking forward to it...but as per usual, the library is taking its sweet time getting it to me. 

And that's about all. I finally beat Challenge 25 on 2048. I was stuck on it for like three days, so it was a triumphant moment. At my current trajectory, with each challenge taking longer and longer to beat...this could take me the rest of the year. But I'll press on because I am not a quitter, and I'm also not dumber than a phone game. So between my reading schedule and my 2048 schedule...whew, this is one busy summer! ;)

Have a great weekend!! 

20 comments:

  1. YAYAYAYAY! I'm so glad that you are reading Harry Potter. :] i'm obsessed && absolutely love the series. It is definitely the perfect way to pass the time and believe me, you will continue to keep getting sucked in. You should definitely update with you reading progress && thoughts, if not on your blog, on your facebook blog page. :] ENJOY!

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  2. I am kind of happy to read your thoughts on Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. I never finished it. I also never finished the Harry Potter series. But that was because college classes got in the way! Whew... that was a long time ago. Anyway.... ENJOY!!!

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  3. Excellent choice!! I was never interested in the Harry Potter series, but the summer the last book came out I decided to read the first one and I became hooked (and was glad that I didn't start any earlier, thereby having to wait for them to be released). They are one of my favorite summer reads!

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  4. Soooo excited you are enjoying HP! I read them later in life too (well after they were all published) and they are such a treat! Love them. I'm reading Whistling Past the Graveyard right now and it is realllllllllyyyyy good! I love Where'd You Go Bernadette too, I think you blogged about it a while ago.

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  5. LOVE 2048!

    I can't believe you're reading Harry Potter! Now I think I will be the last one standing who hasn't read it! :)

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    1. WHAT?!?! Aubrey, noooooooooo! Well, in your abundance of free time in between bottles and diapers, make sure this is your highest priority.

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  6. I'm still holding out on HP! haha My sister loved it also but I'm just afraid it's not my type of reading material I dunno.

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  7. How is it that you attract all of these people who have never read HP?!?!? I don't understand, you must be magnets to one another.

    Be prepared to lose a lot of sleep. It will not take you months... guaranteed. They are just too good. When you're up at 2am on book 4, you'll understand. ENJOY!!!!

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  8. I have never read of seen the movies!!! I really have no interest - weird, I know!

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  9. I'm so excited you're reading Harry Potter!!! I was in London, England when the seventh book came out so we got copies at midnight and then started reading them. And we were waiting for a bus at Tottenham Court Road when Ron, Harry, and Hermione were waiting for a bus at Tottenham Court Road in the middle of the night and it was like I was IN the book. It was cool.

    Until I got bus sick from reading on the horrible, windy roads on a bus in the middle of the night. But that is seriously the only bad memory I have of reading the whole Harry Potter series. So as long as you can avoid that one you should love it!

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  10. Love HP! I am little jealous that you get to be reading them for the first time. I have to admit that the first two books are a little slow and then it really gets going.
    I still need to find something to occupy my world cup widowhood.

    However, in other exciting news I forwarded your post about the world cup to my husband and he actually read the whole post and thought you were SOOO funny! He is all ... "I can see why you read all these blogs." I thought it was cute.

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  11. YAYAYAYAYAY!!!!!! That is all :)

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  12. Glad you found a time-consuming distraction!!

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  13. I always feel weird when there are books that most of the population likes and I just...don't. I feel like I'm missing something, or as if there's something wrong with me. There probably is.

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  14. Catherine forced, I mean encouraged, me to read HP too! I was pretty much a worthless wife while I blazed through them. You won't regret it!!!

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  15. Is it sad that I have no desire to read HP because oh my gosh they are SO LONG? Just looking at the thickness of those books overwhelms me. :) If I started now I might be 50 by the time I finished the series. I have faith in you though!!

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  16. What! You haven't read them yet? You're gonna have a lot of fun!

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  17. Um, when I saw this picture, my heart literally did a happy dance. This might be creepy, but I would love to watch you read them and then every time you smile or laugh, I would say "What did you just read?" and then make you tell me. I'm so jealous that you get to be a HP virgin. If only I could go back...

    This is a weird comment.

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  18. so glad you're reading HP! I love the series and wept throughout the last two books. SO GOOD!

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