A Miscellaneous Tuesday

We had lots of snow dumped on us the other day, after some really lovely warm (in the 40's) weather. I didn't take photos of the new snow. I am pretending it isn't really there (one of the benefits of being mostly home bound). Weather is still nice in the house, with two new pots of daffodils Oscar brought home.

I am saddened to learn of the earthquake deaths in New Zealand. It is such a small country that everyone knows people who know everyone else. It's as if 65 residents of Ypsilanti died one day. Heartbreaking.

I received 24 (twenty four) brand new books for review today. It's like Christmas whenever a box arrives from Freshfiction. Today's shipment had two especially intriguing books: The Mystery of Lewis Carroll by Jenny Woolf and I is an Other: The Secret Life of Metaphor and How it Shapes the Way We See the World by James Geary

Speaking of Freshfiction, I now have a total of 122 reviews published. I have ten more rough drafts almost ready, and a few more books I am in the process of reading, plus, of course, all those waiting in the wings. And just in case the physical books start to run dry, I am a member of netgalley, via the auspices of Freshfiction.
Netgalley is where many publishers send out pre-published books as pdf files that automatically delete themeselves on the day of publication. In the meantime, because I am an established reviewer I can request any book I want to read, as many as I want to read, and the publisher is likely to say yes and send it along. This means a childhood dream has come true. I will never, ever run out of new books to read.
I grew up way out in the country, the closest library was very small and we only were able to visit every few weeks.
 I read through all the books I was interested in very quickly, and I was never, ever able to carry enough books home with me to last the two weeks until the next visit. I always had a secret dread of running out of books to read. Logically I know I wouldn't run out of books even without Netgalley, one only lives so long, of course, but knowing I have this limitless font of thousands and thousands of books from which to choose whenever I get a hankering is SUCH a powerful joy!

In knitting news, I am almost finished with the shawl sample for Lynnie. 4.5 rows to go, then the bind off. I am making the largest size and here near the end, the rows are approximately 485 stitches long. It takes me a bit more than an hour to do two rows, and my hands generally give up about then. It is a beautiful shawl, but I will be happy when I am done! My own knitting patterns are waiting patiently :-}