Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon — October 2020

Boy it’s strange to remember how excited I used to be for this. To be locked in at home and just read for hours, LOL.

I just finished a run to the airport. Rather strange to just drive past the Las Vegas Strip without stopping.

In terms of planned snacks, also a bad idea because I already ate them instead of fixing breakfast. Hey, they were handy and I was up at 3 am.

Not sure how often I’ll be posting or what challenges. I didn’t volunteer to moderate anything so free to just read and catch up on posting as I feel like it.

First up will be Kitty’s Mix Tape by Carrie Vaughn, an anthology featuring tales of her Kitty Norville series.

★★★★½ “Emerald Blaze” by Ilona Andrews, Hidden Legacy #5

Neither did I, but unlike Leon, I would be highly unlikely to shoot each of them through the left eye “for symmetry reasons.”

REVIEW – I am still loving the “Hidden Legacy” series from Ilona Andrews. I never warmed up to the Kate Daniels books despite liking some of the short stories. But this one is firing on all cylinders. I dropped my star rating slightly just because I wasn’t happy with the romantic outcome for Catalina. Catalina, however, is definitely coming into her own with this book. Not sure how much I can say without spoilers, but Catalina is dealing with her “secret” job for Lucien and the pressure from paternal grandmother.

We had accepted this job pro bono, because snatching a service animal from a child in a wheelchair was a heinous act and someone had to make it right.

For more details on the book, see publisher page at https://www.harpercollins.com/products/emerald-blaze-ilona-andrews?variant=32204521144354

I’m back. Booklikes is not.

I started this right in time for our current plague and lost some motivation. Sadly, my main book site (booklikes) is now defunct. Not even sure I can get to my blog posts there to move to this one.

At any rate, I should be more active posting here. And on other book sites as shown below. I won’t ever review again on goodreads nor trust them with my book catalog (I’ll catalog my books there but trust this blog, Libib and LibraryThing to be the real data).

This month was end of booklikes for me (I was “Debbie’s Spurts” at http://donealrice.booklikes.com). I really wanted to hang in there. To be honest, fictfact dying hurt me worse because booklikes’ ending wasn’t a surprise.

I’m happy to join you fellow goodreads, Shelfari, fictfact and booklikes refugees in whatever you do here on WordPress and BlogLovin — if I am not following your blogs already, please comment letting me know..

I’ve managed up until this year to mirror my reading status and reviews on booklikes to LibraryThing and to Libib just in case. But I sure lost a lot of other content unless can get back in long enough to rescue.

On LibraryThing I’m at https://www.librarything.com/profile/Spurts .

Libib has pretty much no social but it’s a place to at least catalog my books in case LT dies or sells to amazon. Has excellent data import and export for backup. It does keep saying will be adding social features (and does let you review). I’m http://spurts.libib.com/ there

On Goodreads I had been tracking my currently reading but not making any reviews (because I pretty much only was active in a couple of groups) — and I still don’t have the heart to try reviewing on Goodreads again or trusting them with my book shelves. I’ll be more diligent about keeping my book tracking there up to date and likely share some statuses in addition to group activities. I’m https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/6282458 on goodreads.

New favorite … microwaving steaming devices and gardening groups

Now that I’m cooking at home more (and for just one) — I’m starting to really love the microwave steam bags and the personal/for-one sized microwave steamers. Bags are more convenient because just toss when done but the actual steamers don’t have to be restocked.

I know, such a boring time, eh?

I’m not advertising for any brand or type. But I do prefer the steam bags that have a chart printed right on them showing recommended microwave times for various foods.

Most days during this shutdown, I’m guilty of planning meals on least amount of prep and cleanup based on food on hand.

On facebook, I’m starting to really enjoy the gardening groups. Didn’t think I would because I do have spring fever and miss gardens, woods, ponds, etc. from Kentucky now that I live in Nevada. But flowers and even what’s-this-weed posts are cheering me up and passing the time.

Clearly I’ve been very bad about keeping up this blog. To be honest, that’s partly because I started in a panic that a favorite online book community I reviewed on might disappear. But I do have good intentions of doing better.

Well, doing better when my brain is more normal. Right now, I’m am so all over the place–when I write it’s so jumpy and fragmented. What’s your favorite discovery or activity during this?

Uncorking – Social Distancing Day 14

Stared at the wine a while before deciding to open this one even if had no one to share. Had a successful quick run to a grocery store after a senior neighbor reported toilet paper, ground beef and microwave popcorn were in stock so it worked for a nicer than normal lunch.

Randomly looking through my TBR books, I decided to read some anthologies. I’m not a big short story reader — there are authors, in my opinion, who are very good at short stories and others who are not where winds up like a teaser or excerpt of one of many modern authors’ other books. Don’t even get me started on retelling same stories from different character points of view — that’s a big hit or miss with me, definitely should add something to either the story or the characters.

This time, found some good ones and some leads on other book series I will be trying. So glad my difficulty concentrating or getting motivated to do much of anything made me try some shorter works.

Finally missed something about Kentucky other than loved ones — actually started to go out to grab some cuttings of lettuce, spinach, mint and herbs because that what I used to do in April leading up to when I would start the tomato seeds and examine the orchard buds and bark. Then remembered, nope, left the herb garden, cold frames, cutting gardens, orchard, vegetable garden, the quinces, the bulb gardens, the flowering moonlight …

I haven’t regretted it. I loved my gardens when was younger and stronger, but I know I would not have been able to keep caring for them. Out here in the desert with just the front yard plants builder placed and HOA requires me to keep until one dies and I can replace it is about all I can handle of yard work.

And, at that, the builder was in a hurry to be done with subdivision and get bond back from city where as one of the last houses I think they randomly dumped plants in my yard. The other homes have somewhat of a grid of plants regularly spaced, mine look dumped except that the sprinkler heads were placed mostly close. The other homes have a tree and at most an ornamental grass, nothing close to sidewalk. Mine, lots of ornamental grasses I am about to accidentally kill because sick to death of trimming back to sidewalk and invading my tiny porch — and I admit nothing about the third and forth trees that were already tearing up the sidewalk and my driveway which were mysteriously replaced with a bay and a rosemary.

Unlike neighbors, until I planted the one rosemary I have nothing with a color variation or flowering. Nor, except for two trees, something I would have expected to do well in the Las Vegas climate — I was actually looking forward to having a few native plants and had been researching. Maybe next year; I finally got my electric timmer unpacked and ready to go as soon as I have hand strength which should help with the grass issues.

Cheese Side Up – Social Distancing Day 11

Amused me to see directions on some frozen potato skins saying to place on baking sheet cheese size up. With the ventilated pizza pan I was using, boy would the other way have made a mess. On the other hand, who would place them cheese side down?

At any rate, I went out today because needed to mail a tax item certified mail (post office full of literal red tape to denote how far to stand back and limiting to only 10 persons at a time and encouraging everyone to use self-service kiosk — but seemed well staffed).

Heard rumor of toilet paper in at Super Walmart near me so braved it. Yes, they had a few 4-packs of generic — but only behind the customer service desk and limited to one item per person. I got mine and texted the neighbors exactly that and one of them told me to pick them up a pack. Hello? Limit 1 so how would I pick one up for myself and one for them without being accused of hoarding or having something saying I was a caregiver buying for others?

I’m in pretty good shape supply wise and all utilities are working. Plus I have decent neighbors. Not a hoarder but I tend to stock up over the months as items go on sale or shop warehouse packs because don’t like shopping for the necessities (or forget I had something on subscribe and save).

I had some birthday amazon gift cards and some credits loaded in my account and spent some time looking at local charity donation wishlists. I was able to send almost nothing, everything pretty wiped out, out of stock, not sure when will be available again. Of course the shelters and Ronald McDonald House and basically everyone in the world other than hoarders is in need of disinfectant wipes, tp, food items, etc. I was able to send some pet food items to a couple of shelters but not exactly what was on wishlist (I just looked up their address and had amazon ship there, didn’t even try to navigate how to drop things curbside).

Hearing from relatives and neighbors back in Kentucky, I am glad I am here. Lots of mine work for Ford Plant, Amazon distribution centers and even the welcome center / rest area on I-65 between Louisville and Bernheim Forest. All three places have employees testing positive for COVID19. No one I know has the symptoms or been tested positive yet, but some are self-isolating and others are employed by places not letting them self-isolate.

Next read?

The TBR pile is just … useless.

I have a few books I don’t want to start where the previous books in series have absolutely wow’ed me. But I keep putting off starting because then they will be over. There’s a point in this pandemic where I think I might need them.

In the meantime, I did wolf through Smoke Bitten by Patricia Briggs. Reminds me I need to figure out spoiler tags on WordPress before I can review it.

Then I tried a few lighter fare, Kindle Unlimited freebies and assorted friend recommendations that I couldn’t finish. Some were awful and some I think I just wasn’t in the mood.

One of my huge roadblocks is that I really miss FictFact.com. That’s where I really kept track of the TBR. Could see series at a glance. Had a new release calendar to alert me when new in my series came out.

Another friend just finishing a series asked for recommendations for new series; that made me mentally go through some I remembered.

Somehow I missed two new releases in Abby Cooper Psychic Eye. Probably because not my usual fair as the paranormal or psychic elements don’t play that huge a part. More chick lit and cozy mystery.

I think the two new to me Abby books might suit. Abby gives a shit about people, always tries to help. Has actual relationships with more than the lust interest. Often “help” looks more like something Lucy Ricardo and Ethel Mertz would do — but that’s part of the fun.