Monday...Without Books. :(

Mood: Tired and a bit cranky (probably best to keep a safe no fly zone distance away from me today). 

It's Monday - which would possibly normally mean that it's time for another book review - but not today. Because today is a Monday without books. :-(

Okay, so not exactly a day without books - anyone who knows me knows that I've got three book shelves and a Nook filled with books so there are obviously books everywhere in my world. The problem is that I haven't finished reading anything in the past week that would lead me to say "YAY!! I must review this book on my blog! I just have to let others know about the awesomeness contained in these pages!!!"

Sigh. The truth is that I've been an epic failure as a reader. I partially blame my Nook. I love it. It's cute, and it's color and it allows me to have access to every.single.book I want to read. On the surface, this seems like a very good thing. In reality? Not so much.

Before I had my Nook, book shopping was an event. I would only get to visit a Book Store once in a great while. There are no book stores in my town so time had to be set aside to drive the 40 minutes to the nearest town with a large bookstore (my personal fave is B&N) and then I had to set aside a certain amount of money that I was allowed to spend on my book buying (because I have an ever so tiny book addiction and a very tight budget). THEN, I had to actually peruse the shelves and find books that I wanted to read that A. I could afford and B. I could find in less than the amount of time it would take my hubs to lose his mind waiting for me to find my books.

This plan worked for me. I had to decide what books I wanted to read and could afford in a relatively (by my standards - don't ask the hubs) short amount of time. Sometimes my choices were based on recommendations or my liking an author but most of the time my choices were made based on the shiny covers and the blurb on the back of the book jacket. I would take the books home, read them - like them or not - and that was the end of it.

NOW - I have all the books I could ever want available to be downloaded 24 hours a day! I can download samples, read the first few pages at my leisure and decide if I want to buy it to read the rest. Unfortunately I still have the small matter of a tight budget to consider - so what happens? I read sample after sample - wondering if each book, no matter how promising, might not be as good as the NEXT book sample I read. I worry that some night in a book nerd fueled frenzy I'll end up spending all of our bill money on downloading all the shiny looking new YA books and then hubs and I will end up sitting in the dark eating bologna by candlelight and not in the 16 candles romantic Jake Ryan way but more in the "I hate you and want a divorce" War of the Roses way.

Sigh. So, my fellow bloggie friends, anyone have any great recommendations? Something you've read recently that just knocked your socks off and you just have to share?

Sunday - The Day of Rest?

Mood: Stressed (Really? Murphy and his law are having too  much fun with my day!)

On TV: Food Network Challenge (Toy Story 3 cakes - am I the only one that didn't like the Toy Story movies?)

The hubs and I were awakened this morning by the unsettling sound of the airconditioner motor dying an early and unnatural death. Since the hubs was  snoring like a saw sleepy peacefully, I decided to get up and investigate. Luckily it turns out that the airconditioner wasn't exactly dying - but it was completely frozen over. Well played heat and humidity. Well played.

Hubs and I dealt with the frozen compressor and then decided that we hadn't had quite enough home improvement type projects so we headed out to Wal-Mart where we bought a much needed new bookshelf. Why was it much needed? Well, this is my *old* "big"  bookshelf:

As you can see, it's well more than overloaded with books. I also have a smaller  tiny bookshelf that is just as packed with books AND I also had the leaning tower of books. Alas, I neglected to take a picture of the leaning tower of books but it was a tower of books on the floor next to my bed that had grown so large that it was, you guessed it, leaning (see how clever I am with the naming things thing? If I had a baby, I'd probably name it "baby" - so yes, it is a good thing that the hubs has had the big snip).

Anyway, two hours, several curse words (seriously? The instructions were written in Spanish with pictures in Swahili), a few smashed thumbs and many false starts later, we ended up with this:

Just imagine all those books stacked up in a tower with no home to call their own. *sniff* Now they're properly shelved and happy! Oh, and because no bookshelf is complete without it:

Also, I totally have empty space on these shelves - you know what that means??? Hello B&N!!!