Monday, September 25, 2017

Monday Musings

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I looove my new white watch! And my new orange pillow. I don't normally gravitate toward orange, but I recently got some new couch pillows that are mostly beige with orange accents and I adore them! When I saw that little pumpkin-spice colored one at Pier 1 this week I just had to grab it!

My week: It was a pretty quiet week here. At work I was busy getting things around for my big Halloween bulletin board. I feel like I just got the AzkaBANNED Prison banned books board up; I can't believe it's almost time to take it down!

Reading: It took me a while, but I finished the time travel (to 1300s Italy) novel "The Scribe of Siena" by Melodie Winawer on Friday evening. It had taken me all week to read the first 200 pages, and man did they drag, but the second half picked up and I read/skimmed the last 250 pages in a few hours.

Now I'm reading "American Eclipse: A Nation's Epic Race to Catch the Shadow of the Moon and Win the Glory of the World" by David Baron, which is a readable and fairly short (just over 200 pages) non-fiction book about the total solar eclipse of 1878. I've learned a ton already, and though it's a little to dry to read non-stop, I'm thoroughly enjoying it. I had it from the library in time to read it during all the eclipse fervor last month (even though we didn't get to see it here in Hawaii) but I just didn't get around to it.

I also started "Himself" by Jess Kidd, an Irish mystery-ish novel (with a tinge of magical realism -- the protagonist can see dead people) I've been looking forward to for ages -- my library finally got it in! I'm not too far in and it's not quite what I expected, but I'm definitely liking it. If you need a good October-ish book (because October starts in just a few days, if you can believe it!), I'm thinking this is a good choice!


Watching: Jarrod was back to working ridiculous hours this week, so we didn't have much time for movies and TV (plus football is on all weekend in our house this time of year thanks to my football-obsessed husband). We did watch a few more episodes of "Orphan Black" -- it's getting pretty hokey and, while I do love the show, I think it's probably a good thing this is the final season.

Baking: Pumpkin cookies with maple cream cheese frosting. Mmmmm.

Cleaning out: My Goodreads to-read and maybe-to-read lists. When the combined total of those lists hit 900(!!!!!!) I knew it was (well past) time. I culled about 200 books -- most of which I had no recollection of whatsoever --  but I could definitely chop more. Sometimes I think about deleting the lists entirely and starting from scratch. How do you handle your to-read list?

Lusting after: The new Harry Potter collection from Pottery Barn Teen! I totally want that glow-in-the-dark Marauder's Map pillow (and pretty much everything else)!

Putting out: Fall decorations! It was quite an endeavor because the under-stairs closet where all the holiday decor is stored became kind of a catch-all this year for puppy-proofing and everything else, so there was a lot of stuff to sort through before I made it to the fall boxes. It allllmost wasn't worth it, but now that I'm surrounded by pumpkins I'm glad I did it. And now the closet is organized!

Blogging:

Monday Musings
My Fall 2017 To-Read List
10 Things I'm Looking Forward To This Fall
Book Review: Good Morning, Midnight by Lily Brooks-Dalton

Looking forward to: We're taking professional family pictures with Alohi on the beach this week for our Christmas cards, and while I'm honestly sort of dreading the photo shoot (Alohi is sure to be a total maniac) I'm excited to see the results!

Also, fall TV starts back this week! I'm especially looking forward to "This Is Us" and "Poldark," and I'm going to give the "Will and Grace" revival a try. What shows are you excited about? Are you going to watch any new ones?

*I'm linking up with Kathryn of Book Date for It's Monday! What Are You Reading?

9 comments:

  1. I'm excited for Big Bang Theory. I only started watching it a few years ago but really enjoy it. I pained the living room yesterday while my husband was at work so didn't get tons of reading done. However, I hope to tonight. Can't wait to see how the photos with Alohi turn out!

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  2. I'm so excited for Fall TV too! Not the same series as you but I'm excited to see my favorite series back on TV. :)

    My It's Monday! What Are You Reading? post.

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  3. Fall TV! The Voice is back! Come see my week here. Happy reading!

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  4. I love Fall TV! The return of old favorites and a peek at new ones. This Is Us is one of my favorites.

    Your books look tempting...enjoy!

    Thanks for sharing, and here are
    MY WEEKLY UPDATES

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  5. Oh my gosh, cutting back the TBR list is so refreshing!!

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  6. I have the Scribe of Siena on my TBR. I don't know when I'll get to it though. Those pumpkin cookies sound amazing too. Have a great week!

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  7. I can't imagine having that many books on my To-Read list. I think mine got to be about 120 when I decided it was just ridiculous. I had a very complicated relationship with it before I got rid of it completely (which I wrote about here: http://blog.threegoodrats.com/2015/05/its-over-to-read-list.html) and I only recently began letting myself have a list again. I've managed to be quite restrained so far, but if I know anything about myself it's that I don't learn from my mistakes :)

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  8. I'm excited about Poldark starting back this weekend. I've kind of given up on my Goodreads to read shelf as being anything near accurate since I enter a lot of the giveaways and the books get added to the shelf but then if another giveaway for that book comes up I'm notified so that's good. Girl Who Reads

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