Tag: Morning Meanderings

Where oh where has the nice weather gone?

The days of heavy overcast gray skies are already wearing on me.  The current temperature is 42 degrees and I and Coffee Cup are feeling a little rough this morning with the cold and sinus bug that is going around.  I really could have just stayed in bed this morning if it was not for having to deliver Chance to school by 8 am.

It is probably a good thing I did have a commitment as now I am up and have already made two appointments into my day – I love making appointments before people are int he office.  That way I can give details of what I need and the right person usually calls me back with the right info and a date and time instead of being put on hold and waiting forever to get to the right person who then ponders over a schedule for 10 minutes….  LOL.  Yes I even micro manage my time to make appointments.  🙂

Anyway… as I ramble on, has anyone seen this book?  Novel Destinations?  I think it looks wonderful.  I have seen bloggers have opportunities to go to wonderfully bookish sites and I think I wouldn’t even know where to start.  For all I know I could have been in areas where great books were written and land marks are just a few steps away and totally unaware…. (oblivious seems harsh right?) I wander my own way.

For the new breed of vacationer who craves meaningful trips and unusual locales, the combination of reading and travel can be a heady mix—especially if you happen to be checking into Hemingway’s favorite hotel in Sun Valley, or strolling about Bath’s Royal Crescent while entertaining fantasies of Lizzie Bennett and her Mr. Darcy! Cue National Geographic’s Novel Destinations—a guide for bibliophiles to more than 500 literary sites across the United States and Europe.

I just love book on books.  I have one that lists the top 100 books that I should be reading.  Uh yeah… good luck with that when all these new ones keep calling me like shiny new cars….

One I use frequently is The Book Club Companion.  This one was a life saver as my book club grew large and I was struggling to figure out how to run a successful meeting.  This book gives not only great reads to discuss… but fun themes for the group, recipes to try, questions to ask, what to do if there is no leader.. etc.  LOVE this book.

Apparently I am in a very Bookie mood this morning.  I need to do some research today on how to run an online book club…. haven’t done that before, but with a group already created (Word Shakers) and a plan to review The Help.  I had best get a good grasp on how to do this.  Any advice?  🙂

Listen.

Hear that?

Mmmm hmmm.  Silence.  Glorious silence.

Chance stayed at a buddies home last night, Al got up early to go to an auction.  I am in the house alone except for Coffee Cup who never has to much to say anyway.  😉

These moments lately are far too few and far between in our household.  I am usually up and running around by this time, taking Chance to school, or going into the office… but not today.  Today I am looking at the books I had wanted to read this week and I am thrilled to say that I am on the last few pages of the last one out of this group, VIOLA In Reel Life by Adriana Trigiani.  I am enjoying this read and earlier this week over at Book Club Girl’s we had a live chat with this author.

Listen to this first paragraph:

I’m marooned.  Abandoned.  Left to rot in boarding school in the dust bowl of Indiana like the potato we found in the cupboard in our Kitchen in Brooklyn after months of searching for it.  It was only when the entire kitchen began to smell like a root cellar from Pilgrim days that we figured out why – and when we finally found the poatato it was soft, rotten. and breeding itself with white barnacles with totally disgusting green tips.

Don’t you just love that?  By the time I finished those words I could clearly smell the potato that had seen better days and the description of the white barnacles… very visual.  I cant wait to review this book.

My plan today is to complete the book, clean the house a bit, maybe depending on when Chance gets home – maybe take in a movie this afternoon and tonight Al and I have a retirement party to go to for a guy he used to work with at UPS.

Current status for me?  I am up but stil in the p.j.’s…  and may stay that way for at least another hour… 🙂  Coffee Cup and I are on our 2nd cup, the weather is cool and the sky is overcast.  Perfect reading weather.

Read on my friends!  Enjoy your Saturday wherever you may be!

7 a.m. here in Minnesota and it is DARK.  Spooky dark.  The change in the seasons happened quickly and we went from a couple weeks of really beautiful 80 degree weather to the now wake up to 40 degrees and top out your day at 53 degrees.  Yup… to me, that’s the downside of where I live.

However – the cold weather does keep me inside a lot more and my reading time does increase.  Get a good major snow storm and I can have my own personal snow day and cuddle in a thick soft blanket surrounded by a couple great reads and a never ending pot of coffee, tea, or cocoa.

And fall also brings out the game board addict in me.  I love board games.  In fact we have a whole double wide closet dedicated to board games.  Balderdash and Beyond Balderdash, Scruples, Cribbage, Pictionary, puzzles, Blurt, I think currently we have about 5 different versions of monopoly (Vikings monopoly, Disney monopoly, millennium monopoly, Star Wars monopoly…) and more.

Yesterday I was reading on a bookish website (I know… how different for me!) and discovered this little gem:

I know, right?  How super cool is that?  Bookopoly is available at Amazon.  They also had banned book bracelets and Literati Challenge for the wordies out there!

How about you… any fall favorite things?  How about a favorite board game?

Rainy cold morning in Minnesota.  I drove Chance to school hurried to the office and realized that I must have left my keys on the filing cabinet yesterday as I am keyless….

Locked out.  No entry.  Nada.

No one else comes in until 9 and since I work in a building that has many other businesses I am sitting in the foyer at a little round table, Coffee Cup in one hand and writing this post with the other until someone else comes in. And of course I have the book with me that I was going to write my review for this morning, Sir Dalton and the Shadow Heart by Chuck Black.

Lap top.  Coffee Cup.  Book.  … things could be much worse.  🙂

Today I am kind of nostalgic…. maybe it is the music being piped in through these halls.  Mariah Carey is singing a Hero comes Along and I am actually tearing up.  What’s with that?

And now I’m Too Sexy For My Shirt is playing by Right Said Fred… the nostalgic spell is broken.  Now my eyes are rolling…  LOL

Have a great morning everyone.  Any favorite rainy day reads out there?

I am up and active and I even have Coffee Put with me (YES!!!)!  Chance has a bus pass! 

Pause for gratuitous dance in my living room…

It may not seem like a big deal but it has earned me about an hour of free time between the running to school and going back at 3:15 to pick him up.

This morning, I want to talk about a set of books that have been on my mind lately….over at J Kaye’s Blog I had read about the 39 Clues by Patrick Carman.  I believe I have seen these or at least one of them on another blog prior to this, but something about the way J Kaye talked about these books made me really dig into what she was saying.  I think these would be books that Chance and I could enjoy together.  There are currently 5 books out and J Kaye reports that the series will end with a total of 10 in 2010.

I encourage you to go visit J Kayes Blog (it is a ROCKING blog by the way)… read about the books and see if they peek your interest.  They have mine and are on my wish list tab now.

*Stay tune as in a couple hours my Wednesday Book Club Feature is making what could possibly be its final showing here.  I hope not, but that will be up to all of you my wonderful readers and especially those of you in books clubs.

Ever have one of those mornings that you meander no further than your email box?  I just did….  woke up and prepped for my day out the door 30 minutes later with Chance to school and now I am in the office using the 15 minutes I have before I officially “go to work”.

So with Coffee Cup now in hand… I have opened my email to discover this list of the current New York Times top 10 List.  What a great list!  I really want to read The Lost Symbol (currently #1!),

The Last Song by Sparks (#2) I would like to read – but it is not a must read for me.

#3 I am really excited about – The Help is going to be our first online book club read and is currently waiting on my shelf!  (Still time to join in on this group read!)

#4… I actually prefer the movies in this case to the actual Alex Cross books by Patterson….

#5- I have never read Pat Conroy or #6 Clive Cussler

#7… I covet.  It’s true.  I have entered contests for this book and have not won…. I will have this book!  🙂  I must read this book!

#8  Charlaine Harris is an author I want to read as I have heard so much about these books – but as of this date, I have not read her.

#9 I have heard a bit about by reading blogs… not sure if it is a fit for me or not

and #10… I don’t think I have heard of this one.

How about you?  Any must reads or have read on this list?  Any other books that should be on this list?

	“The Lost Symbol” by Dan Brown Read more “The Last Song” by Nicholas Sparks Read more “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett Read more “Alex Cross’s TRIAL” by James Patterson Read more “South of Broad” by Pat Conroy Read more “Spartan Gold” by Clive Cussler Read more “The White Queen” by Philippa Gregory Read more “Dead and Gone” by Charlaine Harris Read more “The Girl Who Played with Fire” by Stieg Larsson Read more “A Gate at the Stairs” by Lorrie Moore Read more

We are back and I think I am rested and ready to get back on track.  Sunday morning we left to join my cousin and his wife and baby at the Vikings Game.  Al, Chance, and I had never been to a Vikings game before so jumped to say “yes” when it was offered.  I am not a football fan but it is always different when you are actually there and I thought maybe... just maybe… this could be the event that changes my heart.

I loved the atmosphere – we had great seats to a sold out event.  Over 60,300 people is what they announced. If you are a football fan you may have already heard about this game.  12 seconds left and the Vikings are down by by 4 points.  Vikings fans are walking out of the game and I am thinking what that must feel like to the players…  the fans already taking a defeat that has not been been established yet.  Then….  Favre throws the winning touchdown that is complete with 2 seconds on the clock!  2 seconds!  The crowd goes wild and I am thinking about those people who left early who are now half way to their cars…  and their friends who knew they went to the game calling them and saying “WOW!!!!  So cool that you were there for that amazing play!  I am so jealous!”

and they didn’t even see it….

Oh…. my…. I sound like a football fan.  🙂

My pics:

I’ll be back later today….  have to get in my Its Monday… what am I Reading post and a review.  🙂

Saturday!

I am actually blogging from bed!  No huge commitments today and as I look out the window it is a dreary fall day here in central Minnesota.  I am having visions of making sloppy jo’s for lunch for Al and Chance and in a weird fall mood that I think includes baking pumpkin bars or some fall treat like that.  I am anticipating that delicious scent in the house.

This morning, Coffee Cup and I have been on Book Blogs on the forums which I hardly ever have time to do any more – yet hope I can get back on there.  I love to help new bloggers with their questions and have been assisting one with her blog.

The BIG plan today is to finish up the housekeeping project which mainly now is the giveaways.  I have some to close up – and a couple new ones to add.  Oh, and I am helping Chance today start a blog and write his first review.  That should be fun too!

Tomorrow Al, I, and Chance have been invited to go to the Vikings Game by my cousin.  We will leave here around 7:30 am to get there by 11 am to hopefully get field tickets for Chance.  This should be a blast and you know there will be pictures!

I have mentioned before how while morning blog hopping a blog can lead to a blog that leads to yet another blog….  (don’t pretend you don’t know what I mean…LOL)

A few days ago I was popping in to see a few of my favs and I was over at a A Few Minutes With Michael catching up on what is going on in his life when I linked to another blog from a post on his.  The blog is called Serendipity.  I think it was partly the  layout…. part header (what a great header)… and most definitely the book review that popped up on top…. but I was suddenly amazed that I had not seen this blog before.

The review that I seen was for a book I had never heard of, Flyte by Angie Sage.  It has YA Fantasy all over it and while this is a pretty new genre for me… I seen to have recently embraced a few books that have come my way that have fallen in this category (Bran Hambric for one…) .  I red her review to discover this wasnt even the first book in this series.  It is actually book two and she links to the review of the first one which again… I suddenly felt that all to familiar feeling that this was a must read for me.

I highly encourage you to take a minute or two today to go see Vivienne’s blog Serendipity.  I have been back to her blog several times over the past few days and see other book and reviews that I have enjoyed.

I was so excited to get this post up this morning before I took off for my new morning routine of “delivery person” to the school that I totally left Coffee Cup out of this post today…. in fact – even out of my hand as I am up and typing and then off to get ready – all pre coffee.  Amazing!  I am totally caffeine free and typing…..  it is a miracle!  LOL

Morning all.  I have Coffee Cup in hand so this is a safe zone for all to enter.  The crabbiness has passed.  🙂  Justin (college son) is coming back for the weekend so we are doing dinner tonight!  YAY!!!  I don’t know if I am cooking or if we are going out – but it is just great to have him here for a bit!

I should be finished with The Sister Pact today and I was up late last night as it was driving right into a huge last 40 pages or so climax and ….

I just couldn’t keep my eyes open.

How sad is that?  The book is great and it had nothing to do with the book – I was just so tired.

So – review should be up this afternoon or tonight as well as the Carpet Boy review.

Chance is reading The Invisible Wall by Harry Bernstein and has shown an interest in reviewing it  (pause for huge smile on my face here!).

I will help him with that when he is done with the book – either a review here or I will help him start him own review spot on wordpress.

Have to run and get Chance to school and me to work…. Lots more to say… even a great new blog I discovered – but I will have to save the suspense for later…

Oh and yes, there will be Word verification Balderdash…. oh yes, my friends – there will be balderdash later.  🙂