Archives for August 2008

Did I tell you I got an Amazon Kindle? I don’t think I did. I can tell you without reservation that I love it. I worried — I thought it would be too bulky (it’s not), or too first-generation (I don’t think so). I know that’s it’s too expensive, but it was my post-fire overtime-money splurge, and at no other time would we have been able to afford it, so I got one. I’m an early adopter, you know. Love to adopt early and often.

For those three of you who don’t know what a Kindle is — it’s an electronic reader. What I love about it is this: say you’re flipping through People magazine (Yes, People. If you read People and The New Yorker every week, you can speak to anyone at any party. And People’s book reviews are better than TNY, I swear), and say you see a book you want to read. You can either roll to your computer and send it to your Kindle and be reading it around thirty seconds, or you can go online wirelessly (for no charge) to search for and buy the book. That’s the kind of instant gratification I’ve been looking for for YEARS. You can even use it to go online, for free, no internet charge of any kind. But honestly, I haven’t really used it for that. It’s dial-up slow and black and white. What I love about it is always having a choice of reading in my purse. I’m a five book at a time kinda gal, and that gets heavy.

I’ve read four or five books now on the Kindle, and it’s awesome, particularly for knitters. No pages to fly open! Prop it up on your knee or make the font bigger and prop it a little further away, on the table, and you’ve got knitting nirvana. Sure, you have to punch the button to turn the page, but you’d have to turn the page anyway, right? It’s easy to read, low-glare, and I adore it. Seems somehow easier to read in bed (I lie on my side), also.

Reading now: The Lace Reader, Brunonia Barry (link to right). Lovely book so far. Echoes of Alice Hoffman, with an earthier feel. It’s feather-light on the romance — I’m enjoying watching which direction it will go. Also, the lace references are just made for us fiber-folk.

Read last: Garden Spells, Sarah Addison Allen. Oh, TRES Alice Hoffman. I’ll have to watch my own writing to keep magical-realism that I’ve been absorbing at bay. This is the younger, frothier, frappuccino niece of Practical Magic. Sister witches, a run from a bad man, finally using the power for good. But for all I raised my eyebrows at the similarities and its silliness, I kept reading, and I ended up liking it. I bought into the apple tree that threw its apples at people. Light and sweet.

Reading next: Who knows? Could be anything! (But will probably be Haruki Murakami’s What I Talk About When I Talk About Running. Love his writing, and REALLY need to get back into running.)

My old email (and a group of associated addresses) turned off a while ago when we switched providers, and because it worked for so long AFTER I turned if off, I never thought to tell everyone to update their address book. I hear that I’ve missed some emails. (Actually, I didn’t really care much until I found out that I missed one from beloved Janine, and lord knows I don’t want to miss one from her.) And of course I can’t get into that old email inbox, so I can’t send the appropriate notification. So if I haven’t responded to something you’ve sent, will you resend? To yarnagogo at gmail dot com? Thanks!

ETA – Lala and just discussed whose blog is more boring today. She thought hers was until I told her the content of mine. I win!

A lot of Clara running and doing her patented floating-rump bump, and some of Miss Idaho leaping, and not enough (never enough) of Harriet being short and CUTE! (And me backing up like a crazy person to make Miss Idaho dance.) Thanks to Lala for her mad video editing skillz.

From Merlin Mann’s twitter:

Looking for the real "Ultimate Writing Productivity Resource?" Here you
go: "Go write. Now. Then do it again tomorrow." There’s your "hack."

Nice.

John Edwards. You let me down, man. What were you THINKING?

I mean, come on. Let’s just say he’d won in the primaries. Let’s just imagine that he was campaigning right now against McCain. Edward’s admitted affair and alleged love-child would have been made public now. And he would have HANDED THE COUNTRY over to McCain. Just like that.

Me, I don’t care who sleeps with whom. Knock yourself out. Knock someone else up. Ain’t my business if you do. And it’s never been my style to make morality judgments, because in all honesty, I just don’t care. But dude, keep it in your pants! How difficult can that be, really?

Because even though I don’t care who he sleeps with, a whole hell of a lot of the country does. And he would have lost the election over it. Easy.

His wife’s illness is not at issue here, and again, not my business, but ew. Just ew.

Bonus gripe! Two for the price of one!  The ABC headline is Democrats Move Quick to Lessen Damage of John Edwards Affair. Really, if your headline is already that long, it’s QUICKLY. Democrats move quickly.

Or not at all. Sheesh.

After three months. Back to real life.

First there was family tragedy that I didn’t write about.
Then there was Mom being sick. Then she died. You know all about that.
Then I was really sad.
Then I went up north for a few weeks to work the fire siege.
Then I came home and went right on working.
Then my first weekend was FULL of four days of Romance Writers of America conference.
Then I worked another week.

Today, I have off. All the way off.

I’m at the cafe. I’ve done my work for the day. It feels so good, so right, to be back here, surrounded by the same faces. The coffee guy remembered my single latte in a double bowl with one raw sugar order without being told, even though I haven’t seen him in more than three months. I got the last pumpkin carrot muffin of the day. It’s foggy outside. I’ve decided that Rufus Wainwright is the best writing music in the whole world.

Now I’m going to pack up and take the dogs for a much-needed walk. Maybe I’ll go look at desk chairs: mine is a piece of crap diner chair that I’m finally sick of. Maybe I’ll take a nap.

Maybe I’ll lie around near the microwave like this:

    Willie’s arms never fit.

I feel like I’m finally home.