Wednesday, January 25, 2012

a book has been read

Congratulate me!
I finished an actual book. Four years ago while I was in labor with Gladys, I started reading The Pickwick Papers and Last Night I finished it!

I imagine everyone reading this will fall into one of two camps.
Either you will think, 'that's amazing! What a huge book! How persistent she is! Would that I could also finish reading an actual book'
or you will think, 'are you kidding? FOUR years to read a book! I read 57 books in one month. What a looser! I'm never reading this blog again."

Either way I hope you will congratulate me and muffle your righteous disdain in your sleeve. I think for my next venture I will try to finish reading Black Lamb Gray Falcon which I started in 1998. By the time I finish it we will have all moved on from the internet to the next great thing and some of us will be living on the moon, or in caves beating each other with clubs, whichever turn civilization happens to take.

6 comments:

R said...

Hooray! You'll have absolutely no scorn from me on that one, I managed to read only Star Wars novels at 3 am while feeding the baby because I could just about figure out what was going on. I guess that doesn't say much for pulp fiction. Makes for a fantastic book count if you don't tell folks what you're reading. :D What was really funny was my m-i-l's comment about having time to read...had to say what on earth else was I going to do at 3 a.m.? Found it slightly better than obsessively losing at solitaire, although that was helpful when quizzed by the health visitors about nursing times: 'Well the timer on my solitaire game read...'

~R

MomCO3 said...

Or maybe by then the Baby will have a blog name. =)

Kat said...

I've read 3 books this week, but even I would never scoff at you about finishing anything by Dickens, other than maybe A Christmas Carol- even if you didn't have children, or other pressing responsibilities. Dickens uses a lot of words, and the stories are drawn out, as you'd expect of newspaper/magazine serials. I've made it to chapter 3 of A Tale of Two Cities at least 4 times, and never beyond.

Judith Lown said...

You inspired me and I sat down and finished Eric Metax's Bonhoeffer today. Been reading it on and off for at least 8 months. But the last few chapters are pretty rugged going, and, of course, one knows that it won't end happily. That said, I highly recommend it.

JimB said...

Thanks for your note (above.) What I said was "Congrats! Given your commitments, this is a real achievement and you should celebrate it."

FWIW
jimB

Dr. Alice said...

I'm currently working on a book I was supposed to have read for my medical group's Book Club; the meeting was held months ago. The book is "Emperor of All Maladies" and it's about the history of cancer research and treatment. It's about three inches thick and I am a third the way through it - and the only reason I'm that far is that I am on vacation! So you have company.