Sunday, 23 March 2014

Sunday Sundries: Reading like a Crazy Reading MACHINE

Happy Sunday, one and all!
Nothing excessively exciting has happened to me this week, but I feel like it's been a pretty ok one nonetheless. Oh wait, one exciting thing- I got to work a morning this week! I realise this isn't that amazing (after all, it's still work) but as a reluctant part-time worker (reluctant as in, I'd rather work full time, rather than I'm a reluctant worker) I have to tell you that the time of day you work makes a big difference. For me, working afternoons means that I completely spunk my day away because I do this:
Mornings: I don't have enough time to do this thing so I'm just going to dick around on the internet and do nothing.
Afternoons: Work
Evenings: I am tired from working. I sleep now. No things are more important than sleep.

Working in the morning does this for me:
Morning: Work
Afternoon and Evening: I don't even remember working this morning so I can now be a well functioning member of society. Yay!

I have to admit that I didn't exactly make the most of my first free afternoon for a million years, but I did feel totally well rested and just more friendly towards having to go to work again the next day, so that's a bonus in itself. And this week I resolve to do more with my afternoon. *nods definitively*.

NOW. About that subtitle. I have finished THREE books this week. THREE. Admittedly one of those was Bleak House, which I've been working on for, oh, you know, seven weeks, and one of them may have been a graphic novel which I read in about an hour yesterday while I was waiting for my friend, but that is NOT the point because I can't even remember the last time I finished three books in a week. I don't know if it's the weather, or the books I'm choosing, or just that I apparently really want to read at the moment, but I'm feeling especially good about books right now.

I'll bet that's just shocking to everyone...
What I really need to do now is get to blogging like a crazy blogging machine. This hasn't really been my forte this year, for various reasons, and I'm not really upset about it, but I want to make slightly more of an effort than no effort at all. I feel like I've said that before already this year, but hey, maybe this time it'll stick! I wrote a review of NOS4R2 last night anyway, so that's one down, three to go... No biggie.

Let's see, what else... OOH, well I accepted my first ever review copies this week, and I'm very excited about it. I haven't really accepted them in the past, just because they're not usually things I'm interested in, or because I just have ENOUGH DAMN BOOKS already; but there were a couple of emails in the same week for books that both sounded really interesting to me, so I thought, why not indeed?! One of them has arrived already, in a manuscript form, no less, so even if it's not a great book, at the very least I've impressed my housemates with it!
And that... Is pretty much it. I found a new library yesterday while I was waiting for my friend to come and meet me in Richmond (we had cupcakes, it was good!) and managed to check out four books, which is probably not the best thing to do because, you know, READ THE BOOKS YOU OWN, ME, but at the same time, new libraryyyyyy. It was pretty great and they had Marjane Satrapi graphic novels and that basically never happens! I can't even tell how jealous you must be of my life right now. It's SO jealous, right? I knew it.
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10 comments:

  1. Sam (Tiny Library)23 March 2014 at 13:32

    There must be something in the air, I have also been a bit of a reading machine lately. Long may it continue :)
    I like review copies but I tend to get carried away if I don't watch myself carefully- I'm restricting to just bookbridgr now.

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    1. Laura23 March 2014 at 20:46

      I think it's spring waking me up in the mornings early so I have this ever stretching day to reaaad in. I'm kind of pissed about the waking up early, but not about the reading :)

      I... don't even know what bookbridgr is! (Although now I am intrigued). I basically just wait for people to email me and then generally ignore them, but literally in a week there are two books I was interested in, so I thought 'why not?!' They might suck, but also they might now- *fingers crossed*

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  2. Red23 March 2014 at 15:32

    AGREED about working in the morning vs the afternoon.

    YAY for all the reading! And being done with Bleak House. Man, that one is going to help my stats a lot. Which it should, cos I sort of blame it for tanking them last month.

    Good luck with the review copies! I have been burned by some bad ones so I have been accepting less and less. I hope you have better taste than me when accepting!

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    1. Laura23 March 2014 at 20:50

      Afternoon working is the absolute WORST and once I leave this job, I vow never to do it again! (The very worst thing ever was in uni where, on a Monday I had one lecture at FIVE PM. Literally wasted every. Single. Monday.)

      Yaaaaaay for the reading indeed! I'm not quite as happy as you for being done with Bleak House, but but but definitely agreeee that it's going to make our reading stats SO GOOD. Obvs I don't actually do stats (other than end of year ones) but I do track my reading on a spreadsheet and for February I was like 'really, me? You suck!' So yeah.

      GAH, don't scare meeee! Haha, I'm fully aware that the majority of books offered for free are going to suck, I just... figure I'm under no obligation to finish them? (WAIT, am I?!) But yeah, these are my first acceptees so I'm still in the sort-of-excited phase haha.

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  3. Katie Edwards23 March 2014 at 19:01

    YAAAAY BOOKS!
    I totally agree with you about working mornings being so much better than working afternoons. If you work mornings it feels like you get two days in one: morning: WORK! Afternoon: DO THINGS! Whereas I find I can't enjoy a morning off if I'm always keeping an eye on the clock, and also have to have a ridiculously early lunch. I'm reluctantly-part-time at the moment, but at least I work full 8-hour days, just fewer of them.

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    1. Laura23 March 2014 at 20:53

      Working mornings DOES feel like having two days in one! Literally by about 2pm (I finish at 1.30) I've forgotten that I've even been to work, whereas YES mornings suck because you either feel like you're waiting around OR you have to rush. I actually try to be a tiny bit kinder to myself these days so that I actually feel ok about doing things (going shopping or whatever) before work, but it still sucks to be watching the time alllll the time.

      TBH, I would probably prefer to do a few full days and then have more days off BUT I actually wouldn't like to do that with my job because working full days is like BRAIN DEATH. So horrible.

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  4. Aarti24 March 2014 at 02:42

    3 books in one week is a fantastic accomplishment to me! And I agree about libraries - they are so exciting to visit and browse and think about "What is different here than the branch by me?" I have been a bit overindulgent on the library books this year but, hey, they are free, so who cares?

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  5. Jimjamjenny24 March 2014 at 03:03

    I have also been reading like a crazy person recently! I finished 6 books last week!!! INSANE! Okay, so two of them were graphic novels, and one of them was super short, but still! Hehe. Thank you 3 day weekend in which I had pretty much no plans (but left the house enough to stop me from aimlessly doing crap on the internet and actually make the most of my time at home).

    You are doing much better at blogging than I am.. Oh well...

    And I completely agree with you about the morning thing! I used to work at a school teaching English where I was allowed to leave if I didn't have any lessons, so I would quite often go in for just a couple of hours and then leave, but the difference between those lessons being in the morning and in the afternoon was pretty immense. I also suck at working in the afternoons, hehe.

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  6. As the Crowe Flies and Reads24 March 2014 at 18:13

    You've been oustandingly productive this week. Well done, you!

    I've noticed an upswing in my reading this month and I swear it has everything to do with Daylight Savings. Cheers to our collective excitement about books.

    And yes, I'm incredibly jealous. So please stop rubbing it in. :-)

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  7. Ellie12 April 2014 at 12:43

    I agree about the whole afternoon working thing. When I had two terms off uni and worked part-time at the mini Sainsbury's up the road, my 2-7pm shifts were the LAZIEST DAYS EVER. I basically just lounged around in bed all morning, ate dinner while watching TV, went to work, came home and did nothing. EVERY TIME.

    I also agree that ARCs in manuscript form make you feel dead important. I've only had... two?... in the past, but when I was reading them I felt like a frickin' PUBLISHING WIZARD. Very cool. :)

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