2 down, 48 to go . . .

I finally finished Anna Karenina yesterday, around 3pm. WHEW!

The reason it took me so long to read it (two months, the longest it's ever taken me to read anything except The Book of Mormon--including the 2 weeks it took for Little Women) is because I sort of had to psyche myself up to read it every time I wanted to sit down and do it.

See, the whole book is set in 19th century Russia, and is about people in the Russian aristocracy. The customs, clothing, cities, and even the characters' thoughts were all strange to me, so to understand even a little bit of it, I had to concentrate really hard on what I was reading. So, I couldn't really read before bed or anything like that--I had to be mentally awake. That severely cut down the amount of time I could read, and I couldn't read more than 9 or 10 chapters at a time for the same reason--it all just started to run together after a while.

I posted a review of the book at LibraryThing which is more of a rant than a real review, but read it if you like.

I've got 48 books left now, to reach the 50-book challenge posted a couple months ago on the Lois & Clark Fanfic Message Board. So, yesterday I decided that for the next book, I was going to choose one that was shorter, and more modern. That way, it wouldn't require too much concentration and I could read it faster. Not to mention, my brain needs a rest from all that cerebral-ness.

Around midnight last night, I realized that I hadn't yet chosen a book, and since it was so late and I just wanted to go to sleep, I didn't go down to the computer to use LibraryThing to figure out what I had. I just chose a book that I could see just by looking at the shelves upstairs.

I decided I was going to re-read my Harry Potter books. That way, I'll have books 3-8 out of 50 in the bag, and I'll be prepared when book 7 comes out on July 21 (two days before my brithday, yay!).

Stuck Home Again

Well, Kimba did help me shovel the back walk and the driveway in the back yesterday. But someone plowed the road back there, and now there's a mound of ice-hardened snow where there used to be a perfectly clean end of the driveway. My little VW Bug won't get over that.

I called Kimba (she has a Toyota Rav4, with 4-wheel drive, which is how she was able to get here yesterday), but I'd woken her up. Her back was hurting, and I felt bad enough that she'd shoveled my driveway with her heart condition yesterday, so I told her to go back to sleep.

I called work again and told them that I couldn't get there, so I'm home for another day. Good thing I have enough vacation time for three snow days if I need them. I just hope I don't, because I've got plans for the rest of it--plus the week's worth I should be earning over the rest of the year.

I'm hoping to go to girls' camp this year with the young women in the stake--I miss girls' camp, and I still have yet to go on the fourth-year hike, so if I do go this summer, I'd want to be with the fourth years as a leader-type person.

Plus, I'm hoping to go to SEFF (the Southeastern FoLC Festival) to meet a few of my friends from the Lois & Clark Fanfic Message Boards. Although, it's kind of iffy whether or not there will even be a SEFF this year, since Genine (the person who's organizing the event) is currently having some doubts about her ability to be there.

If there's no SEFF, I hope to be able to go to LAFF, but that's not very likely. SEFF would be in Tennessee, which is get-to-able, but LAFF is in Los Angeles (I almost typed "Lois Angeles!"), and no matter which one I went to, I'd still have to buy a plane ticket, since driving there would take too much time, and I don't have that much paid vacation time!

Not to mention, saving up money for food and souvenirs and the hotel room and such is going to be difficult with my current financial situation. I just hope my income tax returns get deposited soon.