Recent arrivals:
- The Matchmaker's Lonely Heart by Nancy Campbell Allen - from Shadow Mountain for book tour
- Island: The Complete Stories by Alistair MacLeod - purchased
- What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver - purchased
Yes, I'm still on a book-buying ban. No, I didn't mean to buy those two (although they were in my "save for later" pile). It's embarrassing. I don't want to talk about it. But, if you're going to accidentally purchase books, it's great to get titles you'd hoped to eventually buy anyway.
Books finished since last Malarkey:
- The Merchant and the Rogue by Sarah M. Eden
- Wish by Barbara O'Connor
- Pastoralia by George Saunders
OK, I've only actually finished one book, as I type on Friday (I know, pitiful, but at least I was really, really busy). But, I'm presuming I'll finish the other two because a) they're both pretty short and b) unplugged-for-storms-or-power-outage time is great for reading.
UPDATE: Hurricane Ida is coming ashore, at the moment, and up here we just have a few dark clouds rotating through, as they do. We've had little spits of rain from the outer bands since yesterday and it's now Sunday, 11:16 AM. I finished Wish, last night, and I'm sure I'll finish Pastoralia tonight or in the morning because we're cleaning madly before the storm and there won't be much left to do but read, once we're all prepared for the tropical storm that we anticipate eventually arriving.
Currently reading:
No idea! But, I'll update this if the storm fizzles. If not, you'll find out what I read in the next Malarkey post!
Posts since last Malarkey:
- Aven Green Baking Machine (Aven Green #2) by Dusti Bowling and Gina Perry (book review)
- The Invisible Woman by Erika Robuck (book review)
- Fiona Friday - Was it something I said? (cat photo)
- The Merchant and the Rogue (The Dread Penny Society #3) by Sarah M. Eden (book review)
- Cover reveal: Bloomsbury Girls by Natalie Jenner (cover reveal)
- Fiona Friday - Hey, this is cool! (cat photo)
In other news:
I'm afraid very little has been happening otherwise because my focus has been reading, writing, editing, pondering, and attending the writing workshop I've been taking but I'm still watching Season 1 of Chuck, again (while I eat lunch . . . it's a lunch thing, always). It's been interesting going back to the beginning and comparing it to how the series finished. It changed pretty dramatically toward the end. My husband said, "You mean the last two seasons sucked." Actually, I enjoyed them. I was expecting the series to go downhill so it didn't bother me when the characters' job and romantic statuses changed, although I did find the ending sad (yet hopeful).
The only other thing we've watched is Blake's 7 a British series that we viewed way back in a decade I don't even want to mention. I was so surprised when I saw that it's on one of the British TV channels (not sure if it's Acorn or BritBox; we have both). I know how it ends. But, it's been such a long time since we've seen it that I remember little beyond the ending. I'm really enjoying it.
Apart from TV and writing workshop, we've been pretty sluggish due to the heat and not going anywhere we don't absolutely have to because of the resurgence of the pandemic (blah). Yes, we've been fully vaccinated. Yes, we wear our masks. But, you may have heard we are actually experiencing the worst numbers since the pandemic began and our governor is refusing to mandate mask-wearing. So, while the number of positive cases has stabilized a bit (maybe plateaued; it's hard to say, yet), it likely won't go down significantly for a while. We're still under 40% fully vaccinated in Mississippi. We are totally over feeling like we have to stay home and, man, the freedom during those months after we were fully vaccinated was the best! But, we're also kind of . . . getting old? So, it just feels like sticking close to home is the right thing to do, even if it stinks.
One last update before bed. It looks like Hurricane Ida will likely fizzle and she's tracking a bit farther east than expected, which should place us on the west or "dry" side. If so, that means Ida will have a lot less impact on us than we originally expected. And, we have a very clean house because we were preparing for a power outage (which could still happen but is looking much less likely). Wahoo for cleanliness!
My thoughts are with the people in Louisiana who won't be able to see this post because of flooding, damage, and power outages.
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I hope the impact of Hurricane Ida on you isn't bad. It looks like you've done all you can do to stay safe.
ReplyDeleteIda had weakened by the time she got to us. We just got some gusty wind and it rained for two days. It cooled off so it was really quite pleasant. Yeah, not much you can do in our area besides stock up on water and dry/canned foods, fill the tub with water (for flushing toilets) in case the water goes out, and make sure you have plenty of fresh batteries in your flashlights. We had most of that (filled the tubs at the last minute and then didn't need the water) but mostly spent our efforts cleaning house/doing laundry in case of lengthy power outage because I've found that there's nothing worse than a gritty floor, messy kitchen, and/or too much dirty laundry staring at you when you can't do a thing about them. So, Ida fizzled and we got a nice clean house out of it!!!
DeleteI hope that all went well for you during this awful storm that built in the Gulf so rapidly.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Debbie. We were fine, here. Ida took an eastward jog that put us on the so-called "dry" side, so she cooled us off and brought some heavy wind and rain but nothing hazardous. It was quite pleasant. My son in New Jersey's basement got a couple inches of water from the remnants of Ida, last night, so he got it much worse than we did.
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