Guess who has strep throat? AGAIN?
If you guessed Andrea Staats, you win! What do you win? The satisfaction of knowing you’re a winner!
So instead of enjoying the gorgeous, sunny, kinda warm weather we’re having here in Alaska, I’m stuck indoors, getting high on Sudafed. It’s not as fun as it sounds, promise.
Now, maybe the Sudafed has something to do with my opinion, but seriously, this is the funniest video ever:
I finally read The Catcher in the Rye. It was awesome, although I’m a teensy bit worried by how much I relate to Holden Caulfield. The whole world is full of “phonies” though, isn’t it?
Make these brownies. Die happy. If you are a vegan though, don’t bother clicking. It will only break your heart.
If you have a high tolerance for raunchy parody, you need to get to know RAAAAAAAANDY! Warning: if you are related to me, you will probably find RAAAAAAANDY! highly offensive. Just letting you know, Mom.
I have to wait until APRIL for new Fringe? The suspense is killing me. Although, that gives me plenty of time to read Quantum Physics for Dummies so that I can understand what the heck is going on.
Lonny might help fill the Domino-shaped hole in your life.
And finally, my cat, Tobias von Snicklefritz, is pretty much the cutest cat ever. EVER.
Or if you do, judge kindly.
It was requested that I get over myself and post my favorite books. I will do so, but I’m leaving out my commentary (which was mostly justifying my choices). Besides, in a world where Twilight and Going Rogue are runaway bestsellers, do I really need to justify my (sometimes spotty) taste in literature? No. No, I do not. And I’m not including links because I’m lazy! So there.
Not going to lie: I mostly read magazines.
Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding
Inferno by Dante
Dracula by Bram Stoker
Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. Shut up. Just shut up. Also, Stern Men.
The Feminine Mystique by Betty Friedan
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron
Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver
Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel
Anne of Green Gables (the whole series) by Lucy Maud Montgomery
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates
The Labyrinth of Solitude by Octavio Paz
The Diaries of Anaïs Nin— the DIARIES, people. Don’t go reading Delta of Venus and then blame me for leading you down the path of eternal damnation. Although I hardly think Delta of Venus leads to eternal damnation but that’s a conversation for another day.
Writing Down The Bones by Natalie Goldberg
My Mother’s House and Sido by Colette
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Anything by Bill Bryson, Alain de Botton, David Sedaris, Gregory Maguire, Hunter S. Thompson, and Mark Twain
I could go on but I’m not going to because I feel awkward. It’s obvious that there’s a gaping hole where Contemporary Literature should be but whatevs. I read for fun. If you do too, maybe you’ll like some of the aforementioned books.
For the past few days, I’ve been working on a post about the ten best books I’ve read in the last decade. And a funny thing happened. I started feeling really, really insecure.
INSECURE THOUGHTS
Are you seriously going to admit publicly that that is your favorite book?
How come nothing that you’ve read in the last decade was written in the last decade?
Shut up about Harry Potter.
You’ve read an awful lot of self-help books and it doesn’t seem like they helped. At all.
David Sedaris is an awesome writer and you will never, ever be as awesome as he is.
If your aunties find out you read that book, you will be uninvited to Thanksgiving.
Why don’t you ever read books for grown-ups?
You don’t even know how to pronounce your favorite author’s name, dummy.
(Do you know how to pronounce Alain de Botton?)
So I’m scrapping that post. The insecurities won this battle, but they shall not win the war!
Made by Gabbi.
I had been thinking that I need to join a book club, because isn’t that what grown-up ladies do? Besides, I rarely have the energy for nightclubs anymore. A book club seemed more my speed. And then whaddya know, my bloggy friends start up a book club.
We’re going to read Half Broke Horses by Jeannette Walls. And then we’re going to talk about it. If that sounds like something you’d like to do, email me: andreastaats AT gmail DOT com and I will hook you up. (I don’t actually know why people write their email addresses that way. I’m just doing it to fit in.)
Insecure Andrea would like you to know that she is not actually a slow reader. She is a super-fast reader, which has been a source of pride since kindergarten. The “slow” refers to the Slow Movement, which is all about slowing the heck down and savoring life. Doesn’t that sound sorta decadent and selfish? Yum!