Late September, 2021: Hold The Phone

 What I'm scratching my head about:

I recently overheard The Spawn tell someone that he was 6 months ahead on his blog posts. What the hell?! Here I am, always running behind on my posts like someone with a broken-off heel chasing the last bus. And he has SIX MONTHS of bloggy freshness and goodness in the can??? That's half a year!!!

So yeah, I know eavesdropping is a bad habit, but The Spawn knows my flaws as well as anyone, so I asked him:

Me: [skipping the niceties] How the hell did you get six months ahead with your blog?

Spawn: [startled] What? I'm not six months ahead.

Me: [feeling uncomfortable, wondering if I'm going to have to give up eavesdropping because my hearing has gone bad] Oh, I thought you said --

Spawn: I'm two months ahead.

Me: Oh! Two! Again, how the hell...?!

What I read:

September is nearly finished, and it looks like it's going to be just three books completed this month: 

The Andy Warhol Diaries - Andy Warhol, Pat Hackett, ed.

Who Was Frida Kahlo? - Sarah Fabiny

The Lacuna - Barbara Kingsolver

Two of the books (The Lacuna and The Andy Warhol Diaries) were pretty chunky, to explain my low book count for this month. I also blame my newfound ardent fangirling of The Office and some new involved reading projects. If I'm being absolutely forthcoming, I should also cite my time on the phone as a reason. However, I did hit my dinger on Goodreads! I pledged to read 60 books in 2021, and The Lacuna put me at 62. 

What I'm reading:

Warhol - Blake Gopnik. I'm starting to worry because I haven't picked this biography up in almost a week. Every page is so very dense with information. Andy is still in art school in Pittsburgh! I can't go on/I'll go on.

American Cheese - Joe Berkowitz. Enjoying it immensely, but slow going. This is because some tasty information will strike my fancy and I'll stop reading and start down as many rabbit holes (Hello, Phone!) as there are holes in aged Swiss. My latest detour was to Erika Kubick's mouthwatering blog Cheese Sex Death It was there that I discovered her nationwide list of places to buy cheese, and guess what??? There is a place practically in my backyard, a mere 20 miles away in Sweet Springs. It's called, appropriately enough, The Cheese Store. Time to go a-fromage-ing. Lastly, here is a list of cheeses I've eaten this week: Sharp Cheddar, Baby Swiss, and Blue Cheese. 

The Office: The Untold Story of the Greatest Sitcom of the 2000s - Andy Greene. I absolutely love how this book about my new favorite show is put together. There's a short introduction at the beginning of each chapter, then it goes into interviews with writers, directors, and actors reminiscing about the show. It starts right from the very beginning, the utterly true beginning with Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant going back to when the UK Office was merely a glimmer of a brainchild. The documentary style of presentation is perfect since the show is a "mockumentary". Do I still have to put that in quotes, or is it a part of the language by now?

What I DNFed:

An audiobook, and I really don't want to admit to it, because it's by a distinguished literary presence who recently died. I've read several of the author's other books and admired them, but this one didn't click for me at all. To make matters worse, the author was the narrator and their voice was raspy. Sentences would fade towards the end. I didn't even make it to the end of the first CD. It's back in the library now.

What I'd like to read:

Cheese Sex Death - Erika Kubick. Hope there's loads of pictures.

Nightbitch: A Novel - Rachel Yoder. I can't resist a title like that.

Blind Man's Bluff - James Tate Hill. Memoir.

Cack-Handed - Gina Yashere. Memoir. 

What I need:

Another audiobook!