It was warm and misty and I had windows open yesterday afternoon, then the sun went down, the temperatures plummeted, the rain turned to ice, then snow and the wind kicked up. By ten o’clock, there was a full blown winter storm raging outside.
We awoke to our first real, snowy winter day. It was 35 degrees colder than it had been just 24 hours ago. I love the way the light bounces around the house when there’s snow on the ground. It’s one of the best parts of winter. But I don’t love it when there’s an inch thick sheet of ice below the skimpy half inch of snow on the ground and I really hate it when the wind is harsh, fierce and relentless, which it is today.
Jay had to get up and go early. He was gone when I got up, shortly after 7. I did a little bit of shoveling in the driveway, mostly I tried to break the ice on the garage door so it would open and I could go inside and find the ice scraper that goes in my car.
This afternoon, I pulled out the Christmas decorations. I’m just checking lights today. Three strings only half lit. Years ago, I would have tested new bulbs in them until I got them all working but these days I’d rather just chuck ‘em and buy new ones. My time and finger tips are worth a heck of a lot more than $3.99 a strand.
I got some wrapping done, some planning done, some shopping done and baked a batch of crinkle cookies. Whether any of those cookies make it out to the garage is anyone’s guess.
I’ve been reading The Anthill, by E.O. Wilson for about a week. Any book that takes me a week to read is not very good. I’m on page 78. This one got a Pulitzer Prize. Is that an award for dullness?
I’ve been burning through books like mad lately because I’ve been using the rule of 50. A book gets 50 pages to grab me. If I’m not hooked by then, I ditch it. If you are over the age of 50, which I am, you get to take away one page for each year. That means a book has 43 pages to hook me. I’m batting about .250. There are a lot of boring books. I don’t have a particular genre that I like best. I’ll read anything if it’s well written: sci-fi, history, biography, romance, mystery, suspense, fantasy… I don’t like sad fiction. Life is full of enough real sadness; I don’t need to go looking for it in my entertainment. I don’t mind sad non-fiction because there’s a point to that but I resent being made to feel awful about things that didn’t happen to people who never existed. Having read Night, The Winds of War and War and Remembrance a hundred million years ago, I was the only person I knew who didn’t love The Book Thief.
I feel the same way about movies.
When Josie was in school, a few years ago, she took a class in Science Fiction. I paid for all her books and just asked her to bring them home so I could read them. Some of them have been good but some are just awful. I tried one that was published back in the 60s and the blurbs on the book jacket compared it to The Lord of the Rings as a work in fantasy. It was gibberish. I gave up after 12 pages.
Then I tried Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, which is a classic and the movie BladeRunner is based on it. I got 15 pages in when I remembered why I hate that movie. It’s stupid and boring.
Then I picked up some book by William Gibson, and he’s supposed to be all that in Science Fiction but after the second chapter, I realized he’s probably the reason Sci-Fi is considered nerd-lit, for pimply faced guys who’ve never actually talked to a girl in their lives. For absolutely no reason at all, the hot chick had sex with the main character about a minute after they meet. NOPE.
There was a short little book that started out interesting but petered out so badly that I quit reading it with only about 50 pages left. It was called Herland, about a trio of explorers who discover an isolated country populated entirely by females. Sounds promising, right? Nope. Nothing happens. Well, maybe something happened at the very end but I quit caring enough to find out.
Finally, I picked up one called The Intern’s Handbook, which I could not put down! I finished it in 24 hours. That’s what I’m talking about! That’s what I want! Life is too short and I am too old to waste my time on books that I can put down and not miss. If I’d rather watch TV than read my book, I’m reading the wrong book.
I don’t think I’ll be finishing The Anthill.
Having said all that, I’d like to remind all my sisters to finish Speaker for the Dead. Yes, the beginning is super weird but Orson Scott Card is a master story teller and this one is absolutely worth the effort. All will make sense by the end. And you will cry. Because it’s beautiful. And what more could you want in a book?