To Read and to Clean

So, it’s Saturday again, huh? Yes, you get to sleep in a little later, and you don’t have to actually show up at the office, which means that whatever stress you are feeling over your job can be safely ignored for large chunks of the day. All of that sounds great up until about the point that you finish your coffee and your banana and take a moment to look around you.

That’s what I just did, and I came to the conclusion that my life is a disaster…or at least my house is.

I had this vision of myself lolling about on the couch today, letting my back heal, watching movies, reading dollar-store paperbacks, and generally ignoring the world. I could have gotten away with it too if I had just skipped that one little glimpse around the house that had me saying dang.

Laundry, dishes, and the general care and maintenance of floors and other household surfaces aren’t too terribly forgiving of backaches and bad moods. They just sit there waiting to be done anyway like a gang of wild-eyed children waiting to pounce on the first bucket of Halloween candy. They cannot be ignored.

Thus, I have no choice but to find a way to convince myself to get up and do what I always do in these cases–the bare minimum I can get away with without actually having to move to the yard.

I have decided to do that today with audio books because cleaning while distracted by a story has always worked out so well for me before. I tend to do one thing and then sit down, completely forgetting that the one thing was supposed to just be the start of a long list. But that’s okay. I did do that one thing, and that’s one more thing than I had done before. Sometimes you just have to bargain with yourself this way.

So in this spirit of major industriousness I have downloaded five books from Audible this morning. Usually I don’t have that many credits at one time. I tend to spend them as fast as I get them. Lately I’ve been busy staring at walls and feeling put upon by them, so I haven’t had as much time for reckless spending and reading. That made me happy this morning when I realized I could buy five books at once. That’s like being told you can buy five pieces of candy at once, and when did your parents ever let you buy more than one piece at a time?

I figure this way I might get as many as five things accomplished today, or at least I might get as far as writing down five chores I aspire to attempt.

Anyhow…here’s my list of books:

The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan: Young Adult Fantasy. I read this a few years ago and gave my copy to my nephew. I enjoyed it but not as much as Harry Potter. Now that there aren’t any new Harry Potters coming out, I think I might want to go back and read this whole series, so I’m just going to start at the beginning all over again. And no, I haven’t seen the movie. Is it good?

The Lost City of Z by David Grann. Non-fiction. Craziness and real life mysteries in the jungle with a big whopping man vs. nature conflict going on. I haven’t heard anyone say whether this book is worth the iPod space or not, but it sounds interesting to me.

Wikinomics by Don Tapscott and Anthony D. Williams. Non-fiction. This has been on my wish list for about three years due to the fact that it sounded like something I ought to read. I wasn’t sure it was something I wanted to read. But last week I read an article that reminded me I had never read this book, so I decided to take the bold next step of acquiring the book.

Fall of Giants by Ken Follett. Historical fiction. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 100,000 people have personally recommended Follett’s Pillar’s of the Earth to me. It sounds great, but I haven’t read it yet. I considered downloading it from Audible, but the audio book is more than 40 hours long. I questioned my attention span and my dedication, so I went with a book by the same author that is only 30 hours long.

At Home by Bill Bryson. Non-fiction. I hope this is both funny and informative. The last thing I read by Bill Bryson was. I heart Bill.