And I've Been Reading, Too...

So during my blogging hiatus, I've been doing more than Twittering/Facebooking. I managed to polish off Carrie Fisher's Wishful Drinking in about two hours - wow, Princess Leia has issues. It's a quick read because it's pretty much a stream-of-consciousness look back at the life she's had that hasn't been wiped out by electro-convulsive therapy. Getting glimpses of the life she had with her parents (can you say car wreck?), the madness of Star Wars, and her relationships is kind of like reading Star Magazine, but the stories are all real. Wow.


Still sticking with the Mary Todd Lincoln fictional bio, in between book reviews. Currently, I'm in the home stretch with a book called To Heaven By Water, which is a story about the lives of a retired British journalist and his grown kids after his wife dies. The hard part about books like this? There are flashes of interest between parts that slog along. I have to push this one through because I want to be done with it; I've got two more manuscripts on the on-deck circle and am in a serious sci-fi mood, so I want to get to some of MY books.

I've been knitting, too, although for a little bit, my knitting mojo seemed to have followed my blogging mojo out the window. I tried to cast on for a warm winter hat for winter's last gasp, but ripped it out because I couldn't get gauge. I tried to cast on for two different spring sweaters, but they fell upon the same fate as the hat. Finally, I just did what I normally do when I can't get it together - I picked up some sock yarn and went to what's become my 'go-to' project - socks.



I'm working up the Cirque pattern from the Spring 2009 Knitty issue, and I love it so far. I love cabled socks, but I've never made a pair for myself; this pair has little circular cables all the way down the leg and through the instep, so it should look nice when it's done. I'm working it up in Panda Soy Silk, which I believe also has a little bamboo to it. It feels so soft; I hope it washes up nicely.



Okay, so back to books. When I was growing up, my Uncle Billy had the greatest room in the world. It had several bookshelves lining the walls, and I remember how I'd sit on his couch/bed and look through them constantly. I remember his various Time/Life series, his encyclopedia, and most of all, I remember the paperback novels. Science Fiction, fantasy, some horror, all for me to browse. Uncle Billy's the person that introduced me to Tolkien as a child; he, along with my father (believe it or not!) imbued me with a love of science fiction and fantasy, which ended up forming a lot of the person I am today.

Anyway, recently Uncle Bill handed off a box - a BIG box - of those paperbacks. Digging through the box, I saw covers from 30 years ago that I remembered like it was yesterday. I've posted a picture above of two of the books - how '60s/'70s sci fi are they? So awesome.

I even tried to dig into one of them right away. The Gray Prince, the book on the right, is a Jack Vance novel. When I looked Vance up on Wikipedia, I discovered that he's a pretty heavy hitter in the sci fi arena, so I dug right in. Holy. Crap.

As my friend Keith put it, when I brought the book to him, "pre-Star Wars sci fi and post-Star Wars sci fi are two VERY different things." Talk about psychadelics. After two weeks and a total of nine pages, I waved a white flag. I'll have to try this another time, when I don't have Star Trek on the brain. In the meantime, the books are safe and cozy and awaiting my leisure. I feel like I've got a nice little piece of my childhood back.



My on-deck circle... soon, my sweet Doctor Who books, soon... (yes, there are other books there - notably, Cryptonomicon and a Battlestar Galactica novel called Unity, not to mention the Torchwood books) And yes, that is Daniel from Sandman standing guard in front of the books.