Penguin Girl

Three books were completed this past week, and a few more will soon join the “read” list. However, I keep adding to the “to read” list at a pace which makes me wonder if I’ll ever make progress.

(1) The Mezzanine by Nicholson Baker. This was recommended to me by Melanie and I recommend it to you*.

(2) Here Comes Everybody by Clay Shirky. I feel best describing this as a mashup between The Social of Information and The Tipping Point to be read on an iPhone 3G. In all seriousnessm, it is a good overview of the current trends and how they came to be. It’s a quick and easy read, not bogged down by technical or insider jargon.

(3) The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang. This was a LibriVox recording, I didn’t read them. Some readers (and stories) were good, some left something to be desired. I need to do more research into the history of these tales but they were a fun escape. :)

This weekend we went to a certain large store which sells home improvement things (the blue one) and we brought home wood to complete two projects. First was to fix my mattress. A combination of an Ikea bedframe and mattress support plus the way I sat down made the mattress push the supports off the frame and I often slept in a crater. I’ve been dealing with it for years, but finally said “enough”. Last night I slept better than I have in years (at home, I sleep quite well in hotels). I feel like a new woman.

The second project’s bit of wood was to upgrade my desk to version 3.0. The first iteration saw the installation of my shelf and many coats of purple paint. Version two found wall paint rolled out along with the addition of a small carpet and improved shelving. This new release adds a shelf under the main surface of the desk to put my laptop when I want to use the desktop surface for something else, such as writing. Version four I hope to arrive at soon which will include (hopefully) a comfortable “natural” light and a supportive desk chair.

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* The novel, The Mezzanine, is a heavily footnoted running commentary of an afternoon in the narrator’s head. I laughed and enjoyed, I didn’t want to finish the super thin volume.. The prose is real, the narrator, though male, made me think of myself and I am looking anew at the quotidian life surrounding me, from my shoelaces to the bag my purchases are placed in (I frequently think of popcorn). If you ever wondered how my journal sometimes reads, unfocus this work and up the stream of consciousness a few notches and you’ll have a pretty good idea.

As can be deduced from my flickr set, I am a stationary store owner’s best friend. I used to save a certain catalogue when I was younger. I delight in paper and pens and all those wonderful things (and have strong preferences as to what I do and do not like to use). I can spend hours walking around those sorts of stores. While not as fun and enjoyable, I will enjoy some time in a “big box” version. This love is perhaps most apparent in my journal collection, pictured at right. Please note this photo does not include all of my journals or diaries (journal := written thoughts to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness among other things; diary := calendar/planner). I pulled most of these out the other day as I was trying to figure out what to do about my want for a common book. I definitely have strong long-term preferences (one of the composition books dates back some fifteen years) and one type where I seem to keep making the mistake over and over again, but I digress.

Most of the early journals contain short writing snippets. “Sketches”, you may want to call them. Bits and pieces of writing that I may later develop more fully or not. It is about this loss of sketching for which I will break out of my normal writing routine here and climb up on a small soap box to try to figure some things out. If I bother you and you came solely for the books I read this past week, please scroll down to the bottom of this post, you’ll find what you are looking for there. If you come because I don’t rant, you must be aware that here you see (for the most part) only what I care to show and tell you. My journal gained some 16 pages this past week mostly regarding this topic, whereas I normally average four to five pages for the week.

I don’t have answers.

I have more questions.

I recall before the ease of publication and distribution which we experience today (which is not all bad) a time when I would sketch out what I planned to write and then slowly fill in details and often rework it multiple times until there was a picture that told, as best as I was able, the story I wished to tell. These sketches exercised a part of my brain and let me doodle with words as I often doodled with lines. Rarely would they be anything I wanted to really share right away, but they existed as part of a longer process of writing.

I’m having a really difficult time doing that today. I want to rush and get it out and do not often take time to just sit and doodle. I want to share something immediately. I want to publish and show all that I’ve been doing, because if I don’t do all of that immediately then I might be a failure. (I do know that in reality this is not true).

While drafting the sketch and the first draft of this post, it took all my energy and a cup of wonderful tea not to sprint to my laptop and quick write down and publish whatever came out.

Are you finding sketching and drafting more difficult these days? Or have I created an imaginary universe for myself driven by the need to publish frequently or perish? Is my imaginary need to produce copious amounts of everything from many books read, to different meals cooked, to items knitted faster and more efficiently than before unique?

I fear that I am not alone.

The past few weeks find me attempting to disconnect, step back, and refocus. This could be dangerous given the industry I am currently employed within, but time will tell where this leads. I hope in time I will see improved work product and renewed personal interest.

I’m not quite sure why I have such a burning desire to write this post and publish it. I don’t think I’m trying to find excuses for why certain recent events have landed one way or the other. I just feel a very strong need to write it. This post has burnt holes in my journal for months as I’ve thought about if I should write it or not.

What will the future bring? Hopefully more sketching before I set down to seriously work on the writing process. I hope it will be true for my posts here and for other writing (both obligatory and for pleasure). I will continue to read when and what I want to and try not to beat myself up if I don’t finish several books each week. I expect in time you will enjoy faster email replies; I try to schedule my email checking to every hour or two. I’m still consolidating and rearranging emails, in the meantime feel free to use any known email address. I try to check each account at least once a day. What else? I’m not sure. I just hope that things improve for all of us.

One day I’ll figure out this balance, until then, I’ll keep trying.

This past week I completed:
Carlyle’s House and Other Sketches by Virginia Woolf

Make five. A few books were finished this past week while even more were started. I don’t have much to say about any of the ones I finished but that I finished them indicates they are worth something. I’m slowly regaining my brain cells, eyes that want to focus on words, and the energy to do everything I need to. I can say that my commonplace book is filling up with quotes and quips and I’m saddened by the cost of books which come both with pre-numbered pages and lines that don’t make me wish to gouge my eye out with a dull needle. In time I’ll figure it out. For now, the standard composition book (9¾" × 7½") is working well for me and seems to be my journal size, shape, and format of default preference. *sigh* Now to find one with narrow rule that is the same size so I can finally make covers. (yes I’m aware of these. I kinda like the marble cover. I’ll look at the office supply store tomorrow and see.)

1. The Situation and the Story: The Art of Personal Narrative by Vivian Gornick
2. The Coming Convergence: Surprising Ways Diverse Technologies Interact to Shape Our World and Change by Stanley Schmidt
3. The Complete Guide to Quilting Techniques by Pauline Brown
4. Dealing with Dragons: The Enchanted Forest Chronicles, Book One by Patricia Wrede
5. A Primer on Organizational Behavior by James L. Bowditch

My goals for the next few months are relatively simple: read, write, clean, knit, spin, crochet, sew, and catch up on client work so we’re all happy and I have money to do things I want to do both now and in the future.

A while back, Beverly wrote a post about being well read. I found the spreadsheet and discovered I’m not well read according to that list. I believe that there are some that should be included that aren’t. In my defense, I have a difficult time with any Man Booker prize winner (I have a hate-love relationship with The Life of Pi probably because I’m still bummed that it’s not a maths book like I thought!). It took me a while but I finally decided to sign up for the challenge.

Here’s my list, not really in any order. I think it will be a challenge as I didn’t exactly choose short reads:

1. Middlesex
2. Gravity’s Rainbow
3. The Golden Notebook (currently reading)
4. The Once and Future King
5. Lolita
6. The Magic Mountain
7. Middlemarch (after The Golden Notebook)
8. Walden
9. Pride and Prejudice
10. Émile; or, On Education

Can I finish all of these by 20090228? I think so. Unless I chose to read Émile en français. I hope it will help me balance the Fantasy and Science-Fiction bias I have.

This past week I finished a few books, including The Snow Queen by Mercedes Lackey. What is it with the rule of library book holds? They all come in at once at the worst possible time? I really enjoyed this one more. Perhaps it is because Godmother Elena had a small appearance and while parts of the story felt disjointed I enjoyed it much more than Fortune’s Fool. I’m back in love with the different fairy tales of the world and this was a wonderful bridge to some other stories I have listened to or read. My wonderful “enabler” LC (who just has to wait until I pay her back by shipping her and her daughter a box of knitting needles and fibre. bwah hah hah) informed me that there is a new Valdemar story coming out in early October! (Foundation (Valdemar: Collegium Chronicles, Book 1))

Listened? Yes. There are three podcasts I am kicking myself for not writing about recently. Escape Pod, Pod Castle, and my new addition FaeryKnitting.

Go, listen. Enjoy. I look forward to each episode and they are the “carrot” I bribe myself with throughout the week.

This past week I finished reading: (reviews will be linked in eventually. Because it’s not “reviewed” doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy it greatly and have nothing to say about it. I’m just trying to focus on one. Because I was harsh on Ms Lackey last week I felt a need to give my opinion on this one this week.)
Prisons We Choose to Live Inside by Dorris Lessing
A Thousand Words For Stranger (10th Anniversary Edition) by Julie E. Czerneda