Awhile ago (which could be anywhere from a few months to a couple of years, you know), Stefan mentioned Paperback Swap. I kind of filed it away in the “cool” spot in my brain, but never got around to signing up.  Until, there was a big rush of scrapbookers signing up on one of my message boards. This reminded me that I wanted to sign up, so I did, using Stefan as my referring member.

I absolutely love it! My “to read” list is overflowing! It is so lovely to read a review of a book, head over to the site, and put it on my wish list. I have to read a book about Eleanor of Aquitaine, and and excellent Historical Mystery (is Richard III guilty?). I've indulged a bit of guilty pleasure reading, and found new treats to read.


One of them, “A Short History of Tractors in Ukranian” was a delightful find. Like RedMolly, I'd seen the title and thought it sounded good. It's not a rollicking comedic read, while there are amazingly funny scenes, it is really a bittersweet book about the Ukrainian immigrant experience, about family and the secrets that we keep, about getting older and losing your parents, about the Second World War in the USSR, and about the Ukrainian experience during Soviet times. The author clearly has a background in the immigrant community as she is able to nail the cadence of English with a Ukrainian accent beautifully. I highly recommend the book (Dawn, it's headed your way when I finish Ostrov).

And, if you want to sign up for PBS, let me know via email, I'd love to have you use me as a referral!

This morning, my finger kind of hurt. It felt like a cut, maybe from dry skin. I didn't think anything of it, but when I was sitting in my weekly office meeting, I noticed that it was puffy, and wait...there were two little fang marks. I think I was bitten by a spider.

I'll keep you posted as to what Super Powers I get.

Keeping Up With the Muggle World Isn't Important when you have such a good book to read.

We went to hang with the lovely Mousethief family (and Lizzie Bennett too!) on Friday night, and walked over to their local bookstore and picked up the new release at the stroke of midnight.

Reading in the car on the way home didn't work that great, but I did get a few chapters in before falling asleep that night. I awoke and immediately began to read, hoping to get it read before I had to scrap with friends at 5pm.

At 4:45 I was two chapters from the end, and knew I'd be late. Thankfully I scrap with three teachers (one of whom gave me the title of this post) and a librarian, so they understood when I was about half an hour late having finished up the book.

I want to re-read the Epilogue, as by that point I had it open on my desk while throwing scrapping supplies into my bag. However, Eddie is working on the book now, so it'll be a few days before I get to that.

It was most excellent, and I thought a fine ending to the series. I'll not post spoilers here, but I would welcome discussion in my comments, so if you haven't finished, keep that in mind.