Tag Archives: library books

Thursday Thoughts

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The Mad Reader
I am an avid public library user. When I am looking for a particular book (always ebooks these days), I look first at the Denver Public Library, as their ebook borrowing period is three weeks. If they don’t have it available, I then check Phoenix, which only allows a two-week borrowing period for ebooks. If either library has the book but all copies are currently checked out, I put the book on hold (unless I’m in a particular hurry to read the book). It never fails that all of the books I have on hold become available at the same time. That has happened recently. As a result, I have been madly reading, reading, reading. Sometimes the characters or the plots become confusing to me. I try to tell myself, just let the book go and borrow it at a later date. No luck, however, because I am certifiably crazy. At least when it comes to reading.

Seeing Cinderella
Since we returned to Denver from Mesa, I have been promising Kaiya and Mylee that I would take them to see Cinderella, the non-animated version starring Lily James of Downton Abbey fame. We have had a bit of trouble finding a time that worked, but finally we made plans to go to the movies last Saturday. (Here’s a little secret: we went to see Cinderella primarily because Nana wanted to see it. It was well worth the price of admission, if only to see Cinderella in her ball gown.) Anyway, Saturday happened to be the day that Alastair, looking for an escape from his three sisters, stopped by to see if Papa needed any help around the house. Papa put him to work on various projects. Sometime a bit later, I made mention to Alastair that I would be leaving to go pick up the girls so that we could go to see Cinderella. “Can I go too?” 10-year-old Alastair asked, much to my amazement. “Sure,” I said, “if you don’t mind seeing a princess movie.” Apparently when he weighed his options between going to a princess movie and spending the afternoon with his sisters, the movie won. It’s not easy being the only boy. He sat quietly and watched the movie. Afterwards I asked him what he thought. “Well, there were a lot of princesses,” was all he said.

Seeing Tomorrowland
AlastairBut I made it up to Alastair. For reasons unknown to me, Denver Public Schools were closed Tuesday. I don’t know why, though my suspicion is that since Denver had a bit of a dry winter, there are snow days remaining and the teachers, who by now are on their very last nerve, deserved a break. Anyhoo, I invited Alastair to go to see the movie Tomorrowland. He had mentioned he wanted to see it. Much to my surprise (and Alastair’s disappointment), all four of the kids wanted to see the movie. So I borrowed the van and off we went. As for Tomorrowland, well, it wasn’t really my cup of tea. I’m more of a Cinderella kind of gal. But the kids seemed to like it. And to my amazement, after the movie, the kids chose crepes for lunch. My suggestion was a burger. Go figure.

Taking a Walk
Baby Cole is learning to walk. He has the standing part down pat. In fact, he

Cole at his one-year-old birthday party, getting ready to try his cake.

Cole at his one-year-old birthday party, getting ready to try his cake.

will stop dead in his crawling tracks and stand up, apparently just to show us he can. He’s getting to the point now where he will take a step or two, and then realize that he doesn’t have four appendages on the floor and will drop like a soldier who spots the enemy on a battlefield. I give him another week or two. Nothing cuter than a baby who has just learned to walk.

E-Gads, Part I

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blurry ipadWhen Bill and I took our three month tour of Europe back in 2008, one of my biggest concerns was just how I was going to have access to books for the entire trip. I read A LOT! Probably at least a book a week.

I packed up a box of books and sent it to the hotel in Galveston, TX, where we stayed the night before we got on the cruise ship that took us over to Barcelona where our adventure began. Even though I didn’t pack a single hard cover book, it still weighed a LOT. My idea was that I would consider the books to be dispensable. That meant as I was reading them, I would tear out and dispose of the pages I’d already read, thereby making the box increasingly lighter.

Except I found I simply couldn’t destroy a book.

So I went to Plan B. I would simply leave books behind when I’d finished them. Perhaps a hotel staff person could read English and would take the books. Or, if there was a used book store, I would take them there.

That didn’t work either. I did manage to leave some books behind. However, in fear of running out of reading material, any time I came across a bookstore that sold English language books, I bought a couple. Or I would read the book and like it so much that I simply couldn’t leave it behind (because heaven forbid I would purchase a second copy when I got home).

Right before we left on our trip, Amazon began presenting a new-fangled contraption called a Kindle. Despite being a technological neophyte who clings to 19th Century inventions, I could full-out see the advantage this so-called Kindle could have for our trip. They were expensive (as new technology always is), but the price didn’t matter. What did matter, however, was that they were so popular that they were on back order and I wouldn’t be able to acquire one for several months. Too late for my purposes.

So, as I said above, I packed the box of books. And at each stop on our tour – and we saw a lot of things and spent time in a lot of different places – Bill would have to haul out that box of books to carry into our hotel. God bless my husband. He never complained.

We no sooner got home, however, than Bill – who embraces any new technology – got his first e-reader, a Sony, I think. It was rudimentary. Difficult to load books, no back lighting thereby often requiring a book light to read, not a lot of memory. I, on the other hand, clung to my paper books. Don’t get me wrong. I wasn’t self-righteous about it. But on the occasions when he would be trying to find his place in the book (remember, it was rudimentary), I would say, “Look, Bill. Here’s my bookmark,” as I quickly opened the book to my place. It was flat-out hilarious as you can imagine. His sides hurt from laughing.

But then people besides my technology-loving husband began buying e-readers. Jen, for instance. What’s more, she was loving it.

Again, I tried really hard to not be self-righteous. To each his/her own, I told myself. I simply couldn’t imaging not reading a paper book. And being a serious Library user, I couldn’t imagine not borrowing books from the library for free. Seriously? You pay for every book?

And then Bill bought me a Nook for Christmas. I think it might have been 2011.

I loved it immediately. Tomorrow, I’ll tell you why.