Of Winter and Books

 Gratitudes:

1. Dunn Bros coffee. 
2. Kindles & Wine book blog - if I have no idea what to read next, I check out this amazing blog! I feel like I'm sitting around a table at a coffee shop chatting books with my besties. 
3. Brené Brown because her books on shame, courage, and resiliency are full of awesome. 

I've been rather quiet here and on social media because this winter hasn't been good to me so far. Hubs wants to move to somewhere with less extreme weather, believing this will help my fibro. Honestly, from what I experience, read, and research, if there are barometric shifts in weather, there can be flares. If there is stress, there can be flares. If you move and eat and breathe, there can be flares. Sure, moving somewhere else might help. But it might not. I know what I'm in for here. I have a good support team here. My doctors are here.

In other words, I'm not ready to move and the simple (or complex) act of moving may cause enough stress that I will flare and be in an entrenched state for some time. Life holds no guarantees. I'll stick with where I am for now. Unless I win the lottery. Then I'll move somewhere and bring my people with me. :) 

An upside to not doing so well is that I have a lot of time to read. I think I've read twenty books in January alone. Some of that was rereading. And not all of it was fiction. Sadly, I didn't keep a good list so I have to go back through my notes and update my lists. A problem I have is that I have paper books and e-books. My paperbacks I can scan the barcode and upload to my tracking sheet. The ebooks, not so much. Especially when some of them are library books and some are from Amazon, others from Smashwords, and yet others from Barnes and Noble. I've been thinking about a system that will easily allow me to track all these books and honestly, I'm back to a spreadsheet. It's a bit tedious but it works. I can upload the spreadsheet to my iPad or my phone when I'm shopping and quickly see which books I've already read. I can add books I want to buy or read and sort it by that. I can even add the books I'm waiting to be released. If I adopt the GoodReads spreadsheet upload procall I can even use the spreadsheet to update that internet based database. 

Now I just need to remember to update the darn spreadsheet when I read a book. 

A few notable books I've read this month are:

• I Thought it Was Just Me by Brené Brown
• The Spiritglass Charade by Colleen Gleason
• Sunshine by Robin McKinley
• Nine Rules to Break When Romancing a Rake by Sarah MacLean
• The Survivor by Vince Flynn and Kyle Mills (Vince started this book before his death in 2014. He left us too soon, but the series is in the capable hands of Kyle Mills so Mitch Rapp will live on)
• The Bourbon Kings by J. R. Ward
• My Kind of Wonderful by Jill Shalvis
• Face of Danger by Roxanne St. Claire
• The New Testament: Methods and Meanings by Carter Warren and Amy-Jill Levine

I found the two nonfiction books I read fascinating and thought provoking. I will need to read them both again as they are packed full of great information and one can only absorb so much on a first pass through. I was reminded how much I loved reading research articles and books for papers in college, even if I didn't love writing the papers that often went with the reading. It almost, but not quite, made me want to sign up for classes somewhere. 

Hopefully the winter will decide whether it wants to be cold or mild and I can get back to cleaning and organizing the house. And walking the dog with regularity. Velcro Dog says hi, but the way.