Unraveled Wednesday 5/17/23

 Hello Everyone!

How are you?  Let me tell you, this going to the office is getting old!  LOL  I don't know how I used to do it day in and day out, 5 days a week and most of the year.  It is exhausting.  I want to say thank goodness for the pandemic which allowed me to begin working from home, but I don't want to say that because the whole pandemic was/is just too, too horrible.  But I'm guessing you all know what I mean and how I feel.

Fletch and I managed to get our grocery shopping done in record time yesterday and I was at the office by 11 a.m.  I hung around until after 3 then raced home, picked up Fletch and drove to Skippack to drop off our ballots.  I even had an email this morning confirming that my ballot had been received.  Last night I was too tired to do much of anything but watch an episode of Poirot ("The Mystery of the Spanish Chest") and read a few pages before succumbing to sleep.  Now it is Wednesday and time to link up with Kat and her Merry Band of Unravelers to talk making and reading.  Two of my favorite subjects.

The second Crazy Zauerball sock is progressing nicely.  Not fast, that's for sure.  I did manage 5 rows last night while listening to a book with Fletch after dinner, but my eyes kept closing, so I stopped at that point.

Crazy Zauerball Sock #2

Just a little bit past the halfway mark of the foot.  Then it will be on to the toe decreases and Kitchenering up to the finish.  Then it will be time to cast on a new project.  Of course I am already (have been) thinking about what that may be and I think there will be at least two if not three projects cast on.  Living dangerously!!  LOL  My thought is a skirt (Shakerag of course) a shawl or a cowl and naturally another pair of socks.  Whew!

As if that were not enough to keep my busy (along with my stitching), I have got a lot of reading to do!  I have finished up a couple of lovely books.  First up I wrapped up The Shrines of Gaiety by Kate Atkinson.  As I think I mentioned in last week's blog, I found this book to be an enjoyable romp through London during the Roaring Twenties.  Nightclubs!  Police (some good and some not so much)!  I did enjoy this book a  lot.  Sure I wish she had spent more time on some characters and less on others, but it wasn't my book.  

That book was finished Saturday night.  I immediately picked up Foster by Claire Keegan.  I had been in queue for this book for months...like a lot.  I had listened to Small Things Like These sometime last Fall and loved it, but I really wanted to read Foster with my eyes.  Most of you know this is a short (but powerful) book - under 100 pages and I read it in one sitting.  Oh my!  How I loved this book.  It broke my heart, but I loved it.  The whole time I was reading it I was thinking of Willa Cather.  I think Keegan's writing reminds me of Cather.  But, I'm not really sure because I have not read any Cather in years.  But I kept thinking of "My Antonia" or "The Song of the Lark."  

Now I am in the midst (more than halfway through) No Two Persons by Erica Bauermeister.  Another book I am enjoying quite a bit.  This book is more like a series of short stories - each chapter focusing on a different person and how a book impacts or influences them.  The same book in every case, but different folks and different reactions.  I'm finding each of the characters to be fairly intense in one way or another, but it's an interesting concept for a book and a good read.

Meanwhile, Fletch and I are continuing to listen to The Road to San Donato by Robert Cocuzzo.  This is a memoir of  the author riding (biking) through Italy with his father.  There is more history than I expected and so far not a lot of food (which I had been hoping for - LOL).  The narrator is not the greatest by any means - quite the monotone voice.  But, we will finish it.  We only have a little over 4 hours left (it will still take some time as typically we listen for only 20 minutes after dinner).

And I guess that's a wrap for me.  A sort of long winded post.  Thanks for sticking with me.  Now I need to pour some more coffee, wake up, figure out what to wear today and head to the office.  My hope is to escape shortly after lunch and have some time to stitch or knit this afternoon.  Fletch is grilling steaks for us tonight, so no major dinner prep for me!  Be sure to head over to Kat's Blog to see what everyone else is up to making and reading.  I guarantee you will be inspired!