Grace Notes @ Snarkattack

I finally finished a book of selected short stories by Edgar Allen Poe today and restarted reading some poetry by W. B. Yeats - let me tell you, Yeats is dense stuff.

I also came across this article which suggests 14 ways to cultivate a lifetime reading habit. I’ve been reading for as long as I can remember - which is since the age of three, when I was taught. Only a short time in high school saw me stop reading (the first year I began to suffer from depression, in my third year of high school).

So why read? I don’t know to be honest but reading a good book is better than watching television sometimes. No, truly. Last week I was reading 2 highly enjoyable books and just wanting to know what was going to happen next but only letting myself read a certain amount so I’d have something to look forward to the following day. Which reminds me, I was supposed to venture out this week and buy the 6th Harry Potter book which I’ve yet to do.

I very bravely (or stupidly, the two do seem linked somewhat) signed up for a Facebook profile and one of the applications has an option where you can show people the books you’re reading, have read, owned and such. It actually reminds me a bit of aNobii but sadly you can’t add books to the library and I was unable to add my Yeats poetry volume to the list of books being read because it doesn’t exist! Harumph.

I haven’t had any news for ages hence my lack of blogging - this is a good thing. Much better than me whinging about how crap my depressed life is. Truthfully, I haven’t been doing much except sleeping though today I fared much better and managed to read a few E. A. Poe stories, hop on the treadmill for 45 minutes (I kid you not) and practise my gamba.

Today I received one of the submissions I’d sent out about a month or so ago. The envelope was nice and thick (not very encouraging as it means R-E-J-E-C-T-I-O-N) but seeing as I didn’t know a thing about their magazine and only that they were looking for short stories and poetry.

They actually bothered to type up a letter and thanked me for my professionally handled submission. Uh-huh, whatever. Well duh! How else are you supposed to look good if you don’t treat the submission process seriously?! Ugh! They then told me the short story I submitted wasn’t a short story (pretty stupid when they could have said mine didn’t fit their criteria - 1500 words is not a short story to me. It’s a vignette. Mark - we’ll be having words about this…). They also told me my poetry needed editing. Interesting. Edit how exactly? Who are you that I’m supposed to believe you when two real poets had told me one of them was publishable?! Ugh again! Okay, so maybe it’s not fantastic work I gave them but the vague comment had me peeved.

And what came next? An ‘invitation’ to join their workshop and ‘present’ what I’m up to. As if anyone would care?!?! And of course, a form to join their group. I’m beginning to think the ‘call’ to submit poems and short stories was just a hidden member recruitment drive. I’m also suspicious of anyone that labels themselves ‘poet laureate’. According to whom? Self-named?

The thing is I’d actually considered joining when I first learnt about the group independently - it’d be a good thing for me to go to when I move closer to the city but now I don’t know. I could try going to one to see how I like it I guess. In this last year I’ve become a seasoned writing group attender and am after something serious (sounds like a relationship, hahaha!) as many of the ones I’ve been to have been too amateurish.

I should stress that I’m not annoyed by the comments made even if they seem uselessly brief and valid by anyone’s standards - it’s the fact that the call for submissions seems to be a thinly veiled way of soliciting members for their writing group. Perhaps I misread things but it does very much seem that way. My father was watching me as I opened the rejection of submission wondering what on earth I was looking so perplexed about! Sigh, another day of fun and games in the would-be writer’s day.

Inspired by that list of bestsellers I posted a few days ago, I’m happy to report that I just finished reading Anne of Green Gables by L. M. Montgomery and found it absolutely delightful. It’s been a while since I read anything quite so uplifting and I actually got so engrossed in it in the bath last night that I let the bath water get tepid!

The Spring Reading Challenge is well and truly over. I managed a total of eleven books which I’m not really all that happy with as a lot of them I’d already started and I didn’t get through as many as I would have liked. My own silly fault for attempting to read too many damn cerebral books, methinks. Yep, that’s my excuse; if the books I wanted to read weren’t quite so taxing on the brain then I’m sure I’d read more. Still haven’t finished Vanity Fair (the novel, not the magazine!).

So far, it’s been a good long weekend - for those of you reading overseas, it’s the Queen’s (of England) Birthday weekend here, celebrated in early/mid-June. I chose not to go away for the weekend with the in-laws to the seaside (not such crash-hot weather, given that it’s winter here and all) and have been at home, relaxing.

As I type, I’m over halfway through Anne of Green Gables - the list I previously posted having inspired me to read. Ralenth, if you’re reading this, I expect a full report on how many of those titles you’ve read (probably heaps, I wager). I’ve been through the list a few more times realising that I didn’t highlight a few books I’d read, so you might want to check over it again as I’ve edited it.

Last night, thanks to a good friend letting me know, I stayed up and caught my pop idol guest presenting on Rage (a video clip programme on [Australian] TV channel ABC). Oh my god, I totally forgot how much I loved Pulp - got to see fabbo clips of some of their older hits which totally blew me away. God, Jarvis is such a sexy bloke. He chose some awesome stuff, I was totally blown away and stayed up till 4am watching. And Pulp were not a one-album wonder as my mate J-P thinks. I’m listening to Last.fm right now and they’re playing Jarvis covering a Leonard Cohen song. Golden.

The other things I’ve done this weekend have been eating yummy food (I don’t remember enjoying food this much…weird), playing World of Warcraft (my human warrior is finally levelled up to 20! yea! Check my character out here) and…the pièce de résistance…I learnt to lace myself into my corset. Still not perfectly, but getting there!

Filched from Singular Scene, a mate of mine…

Ones in bold indicate those read. I have a horrid feeling Dee might’ve read more than me, which is appalling given that I was a lit major. Bad moi. Someone tell me to stop playing World of Warcraft and get reading dammit!

Edited to add that the ones in italics are ones I plan on reading.

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25. Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. The Bible (not all of course!)
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald) - reading
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrew Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery) in French too! woot!
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According to Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down (Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97.White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

Okay, I just really wanted to post the list because James Joyce’s Ulysses is on it. That is easily one of my fave reading achievements, being able to say I’ve read it because it’s bloody hard and I don’t care what anyone says, it’s impressive that I’ve read it, heh heh. Believe me, it ain’t easy going.

There’s a lot of books there I’d like to read. I should try polishing off some of the books on this list. Does it count that I’ve read a lot of those authors but not the works of theirs on this list? Then there are those I wish I hadn’t like Dan Brown. Though I might read Angels and Demons on a Sunday afternoon, he’s nice and pulpy (don’t shoot me).

Damn, makes me want to go on a bit of a popular fiction binge, I don’t read nearly enough and not all popular fiction is awful.

edit 24/5/08: yea, read a few more! woo!

Ugh, not going to make it to dhal night tonight as it’s 6.30pm and still in pyjamas (sorry K). I’ve had a hard week despite doing very little - go figure. Last night I met up with the future in-laws and the stress has me exhausted. I don’t know what was particularly stressful about it but I was nervous as hell and that tends to burn up a lot of my energy. I’m actually home resting today because I’ll be spending most of tomorrow evening at my brother’s fiancee’s place as she’s having a birthday party and our entire family is invited. I’m way nervous. Yes, again.

I’m also horribly down about my weight. I haven’t put on *that* much weight but the state of my body has me depressed (in the regular person way, you understand). Working out on the treadmill for 30 minutes everyday doesn’t seem to be doing much and I’ve been watching what I eat. I’ve been drowning my sorrows in Aperol and soda, and BPAL imps’ ears. But at least my puss still loves me. Grr, stupid medication!

Got an awesome care package from a friend in Phoenix, Arizona! Then less than a week later, received some fragrance samples I bought from her with a maneki neko tee. It’s so cute! The first care package contained 2 packets of Jelly Belly jellybeans (yum!), a beautiful bookmark, a book by Banana Yoshimoto called Asleep (which sadly I’d read) and other such delights.

What else? Was taken shopping by the parents last weekend, have started a new poetry course and have a villanelle brewing after being reread Elizabeth Bishop’s villanelle ‘One Art’ where the repeated line is ‘The art of losing isn’t hard to master’. I think my repeated line is going to be ‘The flesh on my belly has thickened’ seeing as I seem obsessed by it of late.

You can read Elizabeth Bishop’s villanelle at this link.