2011 Book Two - Good Omen

Yep, I'm finally getting caught up on some of my reading. The second book that I've completed this year is Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman's book Good Omens: The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch. Synopsis:

The world will end on Saturday. Next Saturday. Just before dinner, according to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch, the world's only completely accurate book of prophecies written in 1655. The armies of Good and Evil are amassing and everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan. Except that a somewhat fussy angel and a fast-living demon are not actually looking forward to the coming Rapture. And someone seems to have misplaced the Antichrist.

I noticed this book on the shelf at my local Barnes and Noble many years ago (because often times I will buy a book based solely on what the cover looks like so editors out there need to know that the cover art is very important), but it wasn't until it showed up in a buy 1 get 1 50% off stack that I broke down and purchased the book.

In my opinion, this is a fantastic book. It is a la Christopher Moore's books and there were times when I laughed out loud. However, I do have that warped sense of humor and I understand that a number of people out there would not appreciate this book. I think one of the things that really appreciated about this book is that there are two authors (two authors that I've now been introduced to and who I may need to check out their other books) who collaborated to first come up with the idea and then to flesh it out into a fantastic, funny, full-fledged book.

I give this book a woo hoo and a bwahaha.

2011 Book One - The Lost Symbol

Yes, I'm posting about the books I've made it through this week. The first book to discuss this year in Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. Normally, at this point I would normally document the brief synopsis from the back of the book I cannot on this one because I do not actually have the book. To be completely honest, I did NOT read this one.... I listened to the book after downloading it from Audible.com. I realized that I can mark many, many more books off my list if I listen to them while I'm working on quilts.

So back to The Lost Symbol..... Didn't really like it. I'm finding Dan Brown's character Robert Landon stilted and one dimensional. The story line is pretty formulaic and I think Dan Brown has lost the spark of his writing talent. I LOVED The Da Vinci Code and I liked Angels and Demons (actually the first Robert Landon book), but this one was a snoozer and just really didn't grab me (oh and was even more unrealistic than the other books).

However, I did enjoy actually listening to the book and being able to do other things with the story playing the background is just the way to take it.

I would not recommend this book.

Where's ABBA Been....

So, I was called out by the Blog Police for not posting anything in the past two weeks, so I guess I need to at a minimum let you all know that I am still alive.

I started back to work at my "old" company last week, on Valentine's Day. I walked in the door and my boss met me with flowers.... turns out he sent them to all the females on his team. The wacky thing was that I still had my old computer and much of my log-ins were quickly reinstated so I pretty much got right to work....including addressing the 300+ emails that I received during the 5 weeks that I wasn't around. Ah well.....

There really hasn't been a lot of excitement or blog-worthy events going on in my life, ergo MIA ABBA.

I did dog-sit at the Castle last weekend, which is always fun as there is nothing like 3 sets of eyes staring at you while you eat or fighting over who gets to sit on your lap.

I brought a large Brita water pitcher to the office to force myself to drink more water and since I'm trying really REALLY hard to cut out artificial sweeteners (as well as processed sugars in general) I'm forgoing flavoring my water with Crystal Light. However, I'm not a big fan of the non-taste of just plain water, so I've been experimenting with different fruits.... I had oranges for 3 days, but they tend to get bitter towards the end of the day. Yesterday, I tried lemon slices, which was better. Today, I've got lime slices floating around and I have to say that I think lime is my favorite, but I'll have to see how things are at the end of the day...

I also did receive a package in the mail from The Champ. She sent me a beautiful wall calendar of Alaskan Quilts that she picked up for me on her cruise. Thanks, Kim!! I love it!!

I know that I'm approaching the first quarter reporting period of my resolutions, so I guess I should probably start working on them....

What I Did During the Blizzard of '11

N - O - T - H - I - N - G!!!

Okay, so that isn't 100% true, but I really didn't do much. I set up my printer that I purchased in mid-December. I set up my new home phones that I purchased in like September (and in all honesty, this was done this morning and not during the blizzard...and well, to be totally honest I set the printer up yesterday while watching all the snow melt away....)

I did finish a quilt top and spreadsheeted (just made up that word) all of my quilt projects including the steps that are remaining for each (e.g., piece, quilt, bind) and whether there is something that I need to get for them (e.g., backing fabric, Steam-a-Seam).

I broke down and called a couple of people just so I could hear a human voice that wasn't coming from the radio or television...although I still haven't had a face-to-face conversation with another human being (I did go to Walmart today, but did self-checkout just to avoid speaking with somebody)....Oh, wait!!! I did talk to a person at Walmart.... the lady getting into/out of the car parked next to me. She was wandering around her car opening a door and doing something and doing something at another door while I was loading my groceries into my car. After I put my basket into the basket corral she went and got it out. I apologized (don't really know why) saying that I would have handed it to her but I thought she was getting in....I guess she had a wee one in the backseat that she was going to load into the cart and take in with her. She didn't speak English, so I'm not certain she understood me and I think I scared the be-jeezus out of her...but oh well.

Hmmm, what else did I do.....I went through two boxes of magazines from my mom and flagged interesting articles and quilt projects that I'm now going to scan with my fancy-dancy new printer/scanner and store them away and never do anything with. I stared at (and screamed at) my work computer. I accepted my old job back. I did laundry. I talked to my mom a couple of times.

Sheesh, this Blizzard/Hermit time was REALLY boring..... We are in for another front and possibly more bad weather this week. I bought some kitty litter to spread on my front stoop if it ices over again. Hopefully, I'll be able to convince myself to get off the couch a little more it the weather does turn nasty again....or even if it doesn't turn nasty, I really need to figure out how to disconnect the ass-magnet that is keeping me stuck on the couch...