May 2013 Recap

I guess what they say about time moving faster as you get older really is true. I feel that every time I sit down to write my monthly recap I always wonder where the month went regardless of if it was short or long month. Regardless it was a busy month on the blog and in the real world. I somehow managed to stick with my post schedule of every Monday, Wednesday and Friday and had 95% of all the posts written at least three days in advance so whoop for that! That planning ahead helped me with my first Culture Corner and Work Out Wednesday posts and I’m already looking forward to getting started on June’s posts.

In addition, the planning ahead helped for when my entire family was in town for my younger sister’s graduation from her Master’s program (that’s her to the right). While they were in town I played host and tour guide for five days in a row and we went to numerous restaurants, touristy places, museums and even to see Pirates of Penzance at the American Repertory Theatre. But as soon as they were all gone I wound up with a stomach virus and spent two days in bed which stunk, but at least I’m feeling better now and was able to get to work by the end of the week just in time for another four-day weekend. And as if things weren’t busy enough as it is, when this posts I’ll be running around work slightly crazy trying to help the alumni relations team as work is hosting the 2013 reunion classes the weekend of the 1st and it’s going to be an awesome weekend full of all sorts of exciting activities and events!

Recent Acquisitions

Considering the Friends of the Somerville Public Library had their Spring book sale this month I think I got out unscathed. I got yet another copy of Wuthering Heights (YAY! I’m going to have to do a post on my obsession with Wuthering Heights when I re-read it sometime this year) for volunteering to help set up the library and I picked up Satrapi’s Persepolis and Persepolis 2 and Marx and Engels The Communist Manifesto on one of the sale days. It was a good thing I had family in time or I would NEVER have gotten out with so few purchases. The other book pictured, The Map of Time by Félix J. Palma, I bought when I went to buy my cousin’s graduation card at a local bookstore. I just couldn’t help it I had to walk through the remainders to get to the cards and it was only $5… In addition to those four books I got a couple of Kindle daily deals: The Man Who Loved Children by Christina Stead and The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway, both of which have been on my to-be-read list for a long time.

Challenge Progress
I squeezed quite a few challenge books in this month, but like last month, only two were listed. In addition to those two I added two bonus books two my Mount TBR challenge, read one galley/ARC and one book for book group. And of all of those THREE were nonfiction and one was a short story collection! So once again I’m giving myself a pat on the back for expanding my horizons a little more each month 🙂

• Mount TBR Reading Challenge
  • Monthly Progress: 2 books + 2 not listed
  • Overall Progress – 7/12 (58%) + 8 not listed
• Back to the Classics Challenge
  • Monthly Progress: 2 books
  • Overall Progress – 5/11 (45%)
• Tea and Books Reading Challenge
  • Monthly Progress: 0 books
  • Overall Progress – 2/4 (50%) + 1 not listed
• The Classics Club
  • Monthly Progress: 1 book
  • Overall Progress – 23/100 (23%)

What’s Next
I’ve started The Canterbury Tales (it’s actually a selection of them) and I’m looking forward to actually reading the tales and not just having to memorize the prologue. In addition I read an article a few weeks ago about the history of men’s underwear and thought it was fascinating so I checked out The Story of Men’s Underwear by Shaun Cole from the local library and I plan on reading that.

Other than that I’m just hoping to get through the month at work unscathed and not too exhausted as there is still a lot happening on campus. I’m definitely trying to get back into the swing of making CrossFit three days a week (I missed the entire week after I posted Work Out Wednesday and then another day the following week because I got sick) and seeing more improvement.

Hope you all had great months and, like us in Boston, are looking forward to some real summer temperatures in June.