Thursday Thoughts on things

1.  The bastard squirrels have eaten too many of my bulbs. Lori is going to re-plant spring bulbs for me in the fall. The few that remain are crutching along. I've been planning my front flower bed this past week.

2. I've had Like the Weather by 10,000 Maniacs in my head all week, specifically because every day this week I've walked out of my house in inappropriate attire and refused to go back in for a heavier jacket. I feel a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather. It's like the 1990s up in here.

3. Pedicure today. I'm in need.

4. Every April, MFD likes to play the guess how much we owe in taxes game. I do not like to play this game, but I humor him. This year something went terribly awry during said game and his typo had me thinking we owed the federal government $110,000. Never mind that there's no way that could possibly be, I was not thinking clearly and I believed it. He was out with clients and didn't get my frantic WTF texts so basically I nearly died and within minutes had planned to sell everything I own and move into a van down by the river. He had a hoot of a laugh when he got back to me, as has everyone else who has heard this story since Tuesday.

5. Jana and I are super jazzed that Show Us Your Books had 55 posts link up this month, including ours. What a fucking fantastic community of readers. When people ask for book recommendations, I'm just going to send them to this link and say if you can't find one here, I don't know what to tell you. Thank you and good day. I SAID GOOD DAY. Anyhoo Jana and I met up for lunch on Wednesday and even though she drug two old books I lent her with her, I left them in the booth with the romantic notion that someone in need of a book might happen upon them.

6. Happy National Library Week!

7. Jana also bought me this Urban Decay Sheer Revolution lipstick, which I love a) for the name and b) for the color.

8. I cancelled my plans this weekend because I need to slow my roll and re-charge in a major way. I will always say no to things in order to say yes to my sanity.

9. I've been watching Rectify. Have you guys seen it?

10. E-card of the week:

Show Us Your Books - What I Read in March

My friends...it feels like it's been an age since we've all gathered to discuss books...like, it's been longer than usual. But here we are, on Show Us Your Books day! Something new this month: In parentheses at the end you will see where/how I read the book. I just want to keep track and I'm doing it here.

If you want to actually hear Jana and I talk about books, reading, and other things that may or may not be related out loud, you can catch us once a week on The Armchair Librarians. It's on iTunes or you can click here: http://thearmchairlibrarians.libsyn.com/podcast

And one more thing before we start - Dani from Faster than Forever and Erin from Texerin-in-Sydneyland are challenging themselves and everyone else to read their books...like all the books you own that you haven't gotten around to reading yet. They're doing that in June and linking up on Thursday, July 14, so if you link up here you'd have Show Us Your Books on July 12 and that on July 14 and there you go, you pretty much have two posts that write themselves that week. Plenty of time to go through your books and get a pile going.

Linkup Guidelines:

This link up happens the second Tuesday of every month.

The next one is Tuesday, May 10, 2016. 

1. Please visit and comment with both of your hosts, Jana & me
2. Please display the button (need it? let me know) or link back to us on your blog post
2. Please visit a few other blogs who've linked up and get some book talk going!

Here's what I read since the last linkup. As an example of how I don't really count books...when I sat down to write this post, I was sure that I had only read four books since the last linkup. 

Engrossing Reads

Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly - Based on actual occurrences of women in Nazi camps, specifically Ravensbruck. Good Lord, this story. World War II stories are so hard to read, which is exactly why they must be told and re-told and read in all of their incarnations. So we don't forget how terrible humans can be to each other. And so we don't forget how resilient the human spirit can be. It was a very emotional, very good read. I liked the alternating viewpoints. (Free from Netgalley, e-book)

All the Missing Girls by Megan Miranda - I spent most of the book in a WTF daze. Everyone is unreliable, especially the narrator, but in a book like this that's part of the fun. I did not like how they tried to sell how the story was told in the forward...let me read it and decide for myself. Overall interesting. (Free from Netgalley, e-book)

Water From My Heart by Charles Martin - Have I mentioned how I hate the star rating system on Goodreads? I hate the star rating system on Goodreads. But this is a flat out five star for me. It gutted me in a wonderful way. I do love a good redemption story. Probably the best book I've read so far this year. (Library, hardback)

Passed the Time Just Fine

If I Knew You Were Going To Be This Beautiful, I Never Would Have Let You Go by Judy Chicurel - Mouthful of a title, huh? Mouthful of a story, too. I wasn't sure if I liked this book as I was reading it. I'm still not really sure. It was almost like each chapter was a short story with characters from others. Some of it was out of order. It was interesting, that's for sure. (Library, hardback)

My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga - So I read this right after Lilac Girls. Nazi torture and teenage suicide...tough week for books. I liked this one, the spin was a little different and the main characters were interesting. I also liked how the author touched on depression. (Library, hardback)

Last Ride to Graceland by Kim Wright - I needed a break after two heavy books and this was perfect. I liked the characters and the story. It was a good, quick read. (Free from Netgalley, e-book)

Before the Fall by Noah Hawley - The writing was beautiful and I like the way the story was told, but I felt like the book was trying to be and do too many things and coming up a little short on all fronts. Fewer threads to tie together and less backstory in some cases probably would have put this book to a 4 or 5. I loved the Scott character.(Free from Netgalley, e-book)

Opening Belle by Maureen Sherry - I don't know what I was expecting, but it wasn't this book. It wrapped up the glass ceiling problem a little too tidily. And in a world where equal pay for equal work and family/work balance are still both huge issues, I wasn't really in the mood. (Library, hardback)

The Silent Sister by Diane Chamberlain - The main character bugged me. A lot. Like an annoying little gnat. A lot of things about this bugged me now that I think on it. But it was still passable. (Library, hardback)

Hard No

n/a

An InLinkz Link-up

TWTW - the one with my people

Friday was the Villanova NCAA Men's Basketball Championship parade down Market Street - I stepped right out of my office to watch...and stood next to a student peeing in a bottle. Good times. We also got headshots taken, and I got this mask at Sephora after talking to the makeup guy about redness. Home to send MFD off to the shore for the weekend and talk to Lori until midnight, sustained by Trevose Pizza and the baked goods she brought.

Saturday we celebrated Baby D with a lovely shower complete with Val's special touches. As you can imagine, I was extremely pleased that the favor was a coffee mug. When it was over we went back to Laura's mom's house and spent a rainy afternoon lolling around on the couches for many hours, eating Brother's Pizza, and laughing our asses off. I felt so good leaving there. I love my old guard girls. Kim and I came back to my house and sat on my couches with Lori for a few more hours.

Sunday Target run with Lori, then we stopped in to see my fabulous niece Lola Jean, who was rocking her I Love My Aunt shirt since two aunts were visiting. On the right is the newest outfit purchased for Lola.

Weekly food prep-I didn't wannnna this weekend so I kept it simple. Breakfast: egg muffins with sausage and gouda; turkey taco meat and salsa (I wanted fresh, they were out, rat bastards) for lettuce wrap lunches; sweet bell peppers, snap peas, and oranges for snacks; and salmon with greek yogurt and dill/rice/steamed green beans for one dinner. Avocado toast for another, and I will probably make a pork tenderloin later this week.

The dogs are exhausted from visitors and excitement. And honestly? So am I. I didn't get enough sleep or drink enough water this weekend.

Sunday afternoon Jana and I recorded for The Armchair Librarians.

I finished a book (Show Us Your Books is tomorrow!), finished the first season of Flaked, and started Rectify.

Peace.

Two weekends in a row of seeing my people. My cup runneth over. 

Tell me about yours! 

Linking up with Biana at B Loved Boston for Weekending &

I love the nightlife

Just kidding, I hate it. I am much more of a day person. This post is about how I spent my nights this week. I've covered the day before in Play by Play: My Day in Pictures. I copied this idea from Dani @ Faster than Forever, and you can see her post here.

I try to do the following things on weeknights because I don't want to spend my weekends cleaning:
1 - Spend 20 minutes on my daily dos, which means picking up around the house, putting stuff away, wiping down counters and baths, dealing with the dishwasher and laundry. I am usually successful at this five days a week.
2 - Tackle one small-ish task. Some nights I tackle zero and some nights I surprise myself and get a lot done.

You only see one mention of reading, but that's a nightly thing for at least five minutes before bed. I also turn on my Himalayan salt lamp and diffuse lavender oil. You might think these are woo woo things but I sleep solid as a rock since I got that Himalayan salt lamp.

Sunday night

1 - Setting up the outlines of blogs for the week and watching a lot of Shades of Blue
2 - Final kitchen cleanup, broke my coffee spoon rest and I'm keeping it anyway
3 - Sunday night ritual: mask
4 - While the mask is doing its voodoo, I lay out my clothes & bracelets for the week
5 -  The dogs come upstairs but are otherwise not interested in what's going on
6 - In bed before 9, always a Sunday night goal

Monday night

1 - First Mister Softee sighting, he drives by the house very fast because he has been at war with MFD for 10+ years
2 - Zumba. First time back in a few weeks and I was sucking wind.
3 - Villanova game. I couldn't fall asleep until 1 a.m. after that buzzer beater.
4 - I meant to do things after zumba but I basically sat on the couch all night with the dogs.

Tuesday night

1 - Finally assembled the burritos I made on Sunday for the freezer.
2 - Things that should've been on my wrestling a gator post: wrapping gifts. I am the worst at it.
3 - Did about an hour of work in the basement and unearthed this 1987-1989 notebook between me & Jen. LOL
4 - Geege hurt his paw when him and Mae got in a food fight and was limping around and being pitiful.

Wednesday night

1 - First week of flexing my hours to make a 6 pm zumba class on Wednesdays
2 - Things come home from the shore in that tote and
3 - Things get repacked to go back to the shore in that tote. MFD is heading down Friday.
4 - Picking up around the house, done pretty much daily. I didn't do Monday this week.
5 - Cleaned out the fridge. How does it get so grody?
6 - Cut up cantaloupe.
7 - Argued about politics and taxes at 10:30 p.m.
8 - I diffuse lavender next to my bed at night.
9 - Had to stay up until 12:15 to finish this book. I was over it.

Thursday night

1 - Vacuum upstairs. Blah.
2 - Record for over an hour with Jana and end up with...no recording on my side. I have no idea what happened but it stopped at 42 seconds. Sometimes technology bitch slaps you to remind you you are not the fucking boss. But a new episode of The Armchair Librarians did drop yesterday, so check that out! http://thearmchairlibrarians.libsyn.com/podcast
3 - I had other things I wanted to get done but the tech fail killed my soul so I painted my nails (Humidi-Tea) and read, both of which always make me feel better.

And today? Today is Friday. And it's Rex Manning Day, which is a cause for celebration.

What do your weeknights look like?

Thursday Thoughts: Abbreviated version.

1. Frightening. Face swaps.

2. Annoying. Time Hop.

3. Reading If I Knew You Were Going To Be This Beautiful, I Never Would Have Let You Go by Judy Chicurel. It's depressing and the title is a mouthful. Show Us Your Books on Tuesday.

4. Wearing. Bracelets of the past week.

5. Swooning. Photo from Sunday.

6. Listening to Flowers in Your Hair by The Lumineers. Specifically them singing it in the stairwell.

7. Waiting on these which I will wear them like the crazy pug lady I am. Thanks Jodi for the find!

8. Groupon. I feel like MFD right now. I bought two groupons this week.

9. Excited to see my people at Laura's shower this weekend.

10. E-card.

Sassy e-cards. Sounds like a good place to work.

Kristen and Gretch for What's New With You?