Books and busing

I've got a temporary position right now which has been great for the finances. Still looking for that elusive permanant position, but I'm sure it's out there, somewhere. The temp job is pretty far from home and I've been being a good commuter and taking the bus. The result has been a feast of reading. I haven't devoured books so quickly in a long time and I've been able to finally get to some long awaited books I had to put off while I was in school.

So far here's the list:

• What is the what, by Dave Eggers (everyone should read this book)


• The Girls, by Lois Lansens (surprisingly good)


• The Hitchhikers Guide (a classic)


• Massachusetts, California, Timbuktu, by Stephanie Rosenfeld (an emotional roller coaster)


• Possible Side Effects, by Augusten Burroughs (so funny, I laughed really loud on the bus)


• March, by Geraldine Brooks (disturbing)

It seems like there's more but my memory is failing me, again.

More later,
Sarah

The sick pleasure of noise in the library...

Just as a sampling of one of the many reasons I love being in the library and around other librarians. The other day I was helping our head librarian shift some books in our reference stacks. There's some sick pleasure that can be found in the shuffling of books from one shelf to the next.

One of my co-workers aptly described it as being like, "defragging your hard-drive." And she's totally right, it's that kind of satisfaction...of course, you have to have the right personality to find pleasure in this sort of activity. So here's where it got funny, we're shifting books to condense the stacks, as we're doing this we're removing un-needed metal bookends. Since we're in the library (you know shush and all that crap), I begin quietly stacking them off to one side...my boss grabs them and flings them down on the floor at the end of the aisle (about 8 feet away)hitting the metal covering on the radiator. He does this over and over as we shuffle the stacks and we laugh and ponder the noise insulation value of all these books.

I love librarians.

Books, books, and more books...

I am so enjoying my summer off from classes, basically all I've done is read. I've got a few small projects, and picked up a 3rd job (yeah, I know that's crazy) but most of my free time is being spent reading. I thought I'd list what I've been reading here, I'll add some more information about the individual books later...mostly I need to make a list before I forget what I read.

To simplify the rating process of my likes/dislikes a * means I liked it enough that I'd tell other people to read it. the lack of a * does not mean I don't like the book, it just means I would be cautious telling other people to read it...like it requires a disclaimer or something. Thankfully, I have liked all the books I've read for the most part.

So here's the list (in no particular order):
*The Well of Lost Plots , by Jasper Fforde
*Something Rotten, by Jasper Fforde
*Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston
Gilead, by Marilynn Robinson
The Big Over Easy, by Jasper Fforde
*Couldn't Keep It to Myself: Wally Lamb and the Women of York Correctional Institution (Testimonies from our Imprisoned Sisters), by Wally Lamb
*Reading Lolita in Tehran, by Azar Nafisi
*My Year of Meats, by Ruth Ozeki
Ummm.....I think I'm forgetting some, I'll have to get back to you.

I'm currently reading Library an Unquiet History, by Matthew Battles

*Note: it would seem I couldn't finish Library an Unquiet History, I plan to come back to it, but for now, it was too dense for my muddied gray matter.