Intellect Protection Services
Tuesday, November 10, 2009 at 11:38PM I’ve been reported to the Intellect Protection Services by my dusty reading list books. The complaint includes neglect and being held unlawfully on the dresser in my bedroom. Upon the IPS’s unscheduled home visit they found these: 
Call me paranoid but I think the blabbermouth Petrushka doll has been the one ratting me out. The more I defend capitalism and the free market the bitchier she gets. Maybe I can appease her with some beluga caviar or a shot of Stoli. I would throw her in the next bonfire, but Pricess #1 brought her back from Russia, where she lived while studying abroad.
I explained to the Intellect Protection Service representative that I was still actually reading a lot, just more in short story form and that my Internet related activities really are expanding my knowledge base. Do they think mastering the world of blogging, twittering and facebooking is easy for a girl who went to college when computer hard drives took up a whole room in the lab and certainly didn’t fit on your lap?
I'll admit my rate of books read per month has decreased for the past year. If a book doesn't grab me right away it is far too easy to be distracted by the shiny object of stainless steel with the white apple on the cover. So what, I've went from being labeled a voracious reader to a computer slacker. I still have put in a respectable showing as far as books read recently.
One of my favorites this year was Quiver, by up and coming local author Peter Leonard. It packed in the trifecta for my soul: 
suspense, Michigan locations familiar to me and a sprinkling of NASCAR. I think they should make a movie of it along the lines of Get Shorty which was developed from a novel by Elmore Leonard (Peter’s famous daddy).
Bitter Is The New Black by Jen Lancaster is my bathtub reading buddy and I’m half way through it. But my blogging and twittering have also interfered with my bathtub time, leaning more towards quick showers these days. A book that should have taken me about 6 hours to read is taken me about 2 months so far.
I carry small books to keep me occupied while waiting for all the little things and people I wait for daily. I’m trying to expand my vocabulary with Diane Law’s Dictionary of Bullshit (lexicon of corporate speak) and a more appropriately titled book while waiting in public is David Sedaris’s Holidays On Ice, a cold weather favorite of mine.
I also bet that jealous Russian hussy didn’t produce any of my pictures from this year as I read my way through Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse book series upon which the show True Blood are based on. There’s 9 in the series so far. What is more engaging than a story set in the deep South that includes vampires, shifters, werewolves and fairies? OK, so it’s not Tolstoy’s Anna Karina but it is highly entertaining and incredibly stimulating to the imagination.
My teenage daughters goaded me in to reading Stephanie Myers books Twilight, New Moon and Breaking Dawn last year. I had resisted the whole movie craziness until I finished the first book. I was immediately drawn in by the vampire angle. Unlike the teenage fans I find Bella, the heroine of the saga quite annoying.
You had better believe I am counting down the days to the release of New Moon. I am captivated by the Quileute Indian legend that's featured so heavily in the sequels and I can't wait to see my favorite character Jacob shift into a powerful wolf mid stride.
Anyway I wore that pesky IPS lady out blathering on about wolves, Native Americans, rattlesnake hunting and the North Carolina connection of my family's Cherokee bloodline. Her eyes glazed over and she agreed to check her sources out more carefully in the future.
Reader Comments (8)
Well played, Mrs. Mayor. One of the things I like about my Palm Pilot is that I can be reading Winston Churchill or Danielle Steele on it, and no one can tell the difference. So it's always Churchill as far as you know.
There was a study a few days ago that people who spend a lot of time on the web may read more words per day than in "War and Peace" (http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/16294/1/).
So you might not actually be behind, after all.
girl, you are cracking me up! i am way behind on my reading list. maybe a 17 hour drive to TX for thanksgiving will help that.
I adore David Sedaris! As for the Twilight series, ugh. The writing was just so . . . bad. Still, I admit I want to know what happens to the wolf guy.
Have you read any of Philippa Gregory's books? She writes great historical fiction. Don't take my word for it.
"Gregory's research is impeccable which makes her imaginative fiction all the more convincing." - Daily Mail
I am currently reading "The Other Queen" and learning much about Mary Queen of Scots. Just finished "The Constant Princess" about Katherine of Aragon, also known as Catalina, the daughter of Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand of Spain.
Curled Up with a Good Book, Curledup.com says:
"Gregory exposes the hopes and flaws of these larger-than life historical figures, personalizing their dramsas and re-creating a world circumscribed by court intrigue, the excesses of power, and the constant jockeying for favor with the royal family."
Sounds alot like the world today, no?!?
Tom has read all the Steve Hamilton books you turned us on to and has Steve K. into them as well.
Hope you find some curled up time to read this weekend!
Off to the Gala! We will miss you but hope you have fun family time!
Just thinking if you read these you may want to be referred to as the "Queen" of Sasstown as opposed to the mayor. Right now in our metro area mayor isn't such a hot word... ; )
Don't forget - as if you could - that you have five princesses and one prince! You could refer to your husband as "Duke", "sir" or "Nobleman", allowing your "queenship" to rule the roost.
Food for thought...
It didn't even occur to me that Peter was Elmore's son. Also, good work reading the entire Twilight series. I stopped after the first one, claiming it was because it was so "non-literary," but the truth is I was finding it too deep for me for a few months there this past summer when I was coming off my ADHD medication. My taste in books has changed quite a bit over the past few years, and I have no problem putting down a book that I'm not enjoying after a hundred pages. This blogging business is time consuming and something's got to give :)
i too have let my reading fall off in lieu of the damn computer. it's like an addiction. i like the comment above though that said avid computer users read a lot of words--that makes me feel a tad bit better. i haven't read the sookie stackhouse books but i'm going to because we started watching true blood this season and it's hot. i've been a vampire reader since anne rice came out w/ her series--loved it (though the movie? not so much). the girl sucked me into the twilight series and i have to agree w/ you on bella. i really felt like slapping her most of the time. i prefer jacob to edward (of course the girl is just the opposite) and she can barely stand waiting until this week when the movie comes out. she's read the series numerous times (and reread the 4th book more than a dozen because it's her fave) and is rereading the series now before we go see the movie. oy vey.