121909

Ok, so I am still reading Outlander...but it's kind of slow going, mainly because I couldn't really concentrate on much during the last month of working on my MLS. However, I am now finished with my MLS (yay...) and able to read. And knit, and cook, and play with my kids, and clean...it's hard to decide what to do (except I really hate cleaning).

I love Outlander - it's sort of a weird time-travel romance with lots of sex, which sometimes can, in my opinion, detract from the story, but there's plenty of plot and detail and character development in this book, and Diana Gabaldon is a great writer and researcher - so the sex is somewhat peripheral to the story but at the same time integral to it. Does that make sense? At any rate, I do love the book...I am sure I will read the whole series. I might be on my deathbed before I actually finish it, because the books are heinously long and I am a heinously slow reader (odd for someone with an MLS, I know...). But I digress.

So I am plunging back into Chick Lit, because I need some light, relatively mindless reads...and I have chosen Twenties Girl (which comes highly recommended by my co-worker, Mary Pat) by Sophie Kinsella and Going Home by Harriet Evans (who comes highly recommended by my co-worker Erika). So far I am tearing through Going Home, which only further proves that Erika and I have frighteningly similar tastes in books. ;)

I am also endeavoring in the new year to plan a little more in advance for my "Check it Out" columns in the Courier and Press. My February column will be covering novels about great artists...so I am reading The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham, Sunflowers: a Novel of Vincent Van Gogh by Sheramy Bundrick - and some others. Don't want to spoil my fans by listing them all. (Ha, ha...like I have fans...)

In the movies department, I watched Whatever Works, Woody Allen's movie with Larry David in the lead role. I didn't like it - I didn't even finish it. Even Patricia Clarkson couldn't save it for me....Evan Rachel Wood is so annoying, and Larry David should just stick to improv. He's no actor. Skip it.