Checking in
Feb. 28th, 2012 10:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pegkerrI'm never quite sure how much to post here. Elinor Dashwood is preoccupied with some of the stuff under the surface that she feels she isn't free to talk about much in public.
Fiona is having a blast in college. Although her social group has fallen apart a bit this semester, she is adoring all her classes (Calculus, Spanish, World Religion and Script Analysis [theater]). She made the Dean's list last semester and has never been so on top of her game, academically, as she is now. She loves it and is very content and happy that she picked the right place to go to school. I think I mentioned that she's planning on going to (Mitch's) prom with him this spring. Hilariously, Mitch's dad Randy has already bought her two potential dresses off ebay and is contemplating a third.
Delia continues at her charter school. She tried out for a play and got a small part, and so that has kept her after school some. Our commutes together continue to be quite enjoyable as we explore our various iPod mixes together, although I miss listening to the news on the radio (Delia Does Not Do News). She spent last weekend buying the material for a crazy dress, with a pleather bodice and pink skull and crossbones material for the skirt(!).
I continue to do P90X. Increasingly grumpily, because although I think I'm gaining core strength, it doesn't seem to be doing anything magical to my body at all--no weight loss. Yes, I know muscle weighs more than fat, but my scale also measures body composition, and the number of pounds of fat has not budged at all, either. This is infuriating. Particularly at 5:30 a.m., when I'm groggily trying to ignore how ANNOYING I find Tony Horton.
I had stepped back from Alternity for a bit, due to family distraction, but I'm back now, and oh, it's been such fun!
I have been reading gobs and gobs of romance novels. I check them out as ebooks from the library and put them on my Nook. I've read HUNDREDS that way. This is a really new obsession--I'd never really read romance novels before this past year. No idea why, but it is what my backbrain seems to want. Like popcorn. I am not feeding my body Dorito chips, through sheer willpower, but I am feeding my brain romance novels.
I continue to enjoy Mark Reads Lord of the Rings (he has now reached The Return of the King and is agonizing over the siege of Minas Tirith). Inspired by this, I spent all day listening over and over again to The Charge on the Pelennor Fields. Watch this scene: it'll get your blood going. This is currently my favorite scene in the entire history of cinema.
Fiona is having a blast in college. Although her social group has fallen apart a bit this semester, she is adoring all her classes (Calculus, Spanish, World Religion and Script Analysis [theater]). She made the Dean's list last semester and has never been so on top of her game, academically, as she is now. She loves it and is very content and happy that she picked the right place to go to school. I think I mentioned that she's planning on going to (Mitch's) prom with him this spring. Hilariously, Mitch's dad Randy has already bought her two potential dresses off ebay and is contemplating a third.
Delia continues at her charter school. She tried out for a play and got a small part, and so that has kept her after school some. Our commutes together continue to be quite enjoyable as we explore our various iPod mixes together, although I miss listening to the news on the radio (Delia Does Not Do News). She spent last weekend buying the material for a crazy dress, with a pleather bodice and pink skull and crossbones material for the skirt(!).
I continue to do P90X. Increasingly grumpily, because although I think I'm gaining core strength, it doesn't seem to be doing anything magical to my body at all--no weight loss. Yes, I know muscle weighs more than fat, but my scale also measures body composition, and the number of pounds of fat has not budged at all, either. This is infuriating. Particularly at 5:30 a.m., when I'm groggily trying to ignore how ANNOYING I find Tony Horton.
I had stepped back from Alternity for a bit, due to family distraction, but I'm back now, and oh, it's been such fun!
I have been reading gobs and gobs of romance novels. I check them out as ebooks from the library and put them on my Nook. I've read HUNDREDS that way. This is a really new obsession--I'd never really read romance novels before this past year. No idea why, but it is what my backbrain seems to want. Like popcorn. I am not feeding my body Dorito chips, through sheer willpower, but I am feeding my brain romance novels.
I continue to enjoy Mark Reads Lord of the Rings (he has now reached The Return of the King and is agonizing over the siege of Minas Tirith). Inspired by this, I spent all day listening over and over again to The Charge on the Pelennor Fields. Watch this scene: it'll get your blood going. This is currently my favorite scene in the entire history of cinema.
(no subject)
Date: 2012-02-28 08:53 pm (UTC)Let's swap favorite titles and authors! :D
Have you read Smooth Talking Stranger by Lisa Kleypas?
(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 07:44 pm (UTC)I particularly like Regencies. I've read several by Carla Kelly that I've really liked. Particularly a stand out was Marrying the Royal Marine. Apparently, Carla Kelly grew up as an army brat, and she tends to tell stories not about lords and dukes in ballrooms, but about very real people lower on the social order who are dealing directly with the Napoleonic War. That book was genuinely moving about love in the middle of war. The Surgeon's Lady, another in the same series (following three sisters) deals directly with the horrors of battlefield surgery at the time.
But the best one I think I've found was Joanne Bourne's The Spymaster's Lady. You could argue that the heroine was sort of a Mary Sue, but on the other hand, it showed a masterful command of language, very distinctive character voices, and pulled at least four twists which were extremely surprising. And the spies in this book think and act like spies instead of dilettantes.
There were other authors, however, whom I found distinctly underwhelming. (I'll never pick up anything by Kat Martin again, for example.)
(no subject)
Date: 2012-03-01 09:04 pm (UTC)I started off as a real Regency fan too, but I actually like Lisa Kleypas' moderns much more than her Regencies. Her Regencies seem to always have some flaw in them that makes me feel like the romance just isn't quite right.
I do like Joanna Bourne very much!
Do you read Smart Bitches Who Love Trashy Books?