distraction and pressure
My University books are due June 1st. Oh wait, I take that back. I hadn’t tried to renew them assuming that I couldn’t. They are now due at the end of September. I therefore no longer have extreme pressure to finish them all in the next few days and have deleted half this post. If I end up with a request to return them before the autumn I’ll bring them up to Morningside Heights but for now I will believe the renewal system. Already I feel that this takes away the distraction and pressure I’ve felt. For the past two weeks I’ve been reading everything but the five books I still have out from the University. I should probably change this category from “books” to reading as it discriminates against all the short stories and magazines I’ve been reading or listening to. I don’t know why I don’t write about them. Anyway I’m much relieved and hope that now I will read these books instead of just picking them up, opening them, and closing them at least once a day. WOO HOO!
My theme this summer will be reading the classics I’ve missed and reading everything I can get my hands on about the railroad and the industrial revolution — both fiction and fact. I have a few on my shelf but am open to recommendations.
Vintage Baby Knits: More Than 40 Heirloom Patterns from the 1920s to the 1950s
by Kristen Rengren
While I’ve not yet made anything in this book it receives 5 stars for the general information and inspiration it provides. For example there is advice as to what size to make and a nice chart of “average” (hah) baby sizes, including head circumference. Another factor that sold me on this book is that it doesn’t stop at 12 month, but many of the patterns are sized up to 18-24 months. The photography is divine, but I often felt– perhaps this is going along with the ‘vintage theme’ that all the babies were blond haired and blue eyed (they’re not, but that was my impression). There are nice little short essays on life in the time period of this book — including a short explanation as to pink for boys and blue for girls. Hopefully soon I’ll cast on a project or two and can provide a review as to the technical details but for inspiration? This book is really great.
Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
I picked this up to reread first because (a) my library had an audio book version (b) in honour of a close friend’s daughter’s first birthday (long story) and (c) because of the railroad. Wait. Make reason “c” the first reason. I love the descriptions of the rail and the Terminal and love the inner workings that are described. That is what I love about Atlas Shrugged. I’m not going to get into a debate about Objectivism here. Ok? Thanks. I listened to a portion of this and read the rest. I really wish my dog-eared, flagged, scribbled in (yes I do write in MY books), well thumbed copy had a picture of a train engine on the cover. Oh well.
We’ll see what I finish reading by next week. Shavout always leads to interesting reading, not that I’m sure why.