Books

Total read since January: 33
(target is 36 by December, to be on track I should have read 24 books by now)

Big reading month! I am just three books away from hitting my goal for the year and I have two more months! Probably a good thing, too. I don’t think I’ll be doing much reading next month… November is for writing! Anyway, here’s what I read:

• Outlining Your Novel — I forgot I’d purchased this one. Then one day I decided I needed an outline for my work in progress project and dug this up on my Kindle. If you are working on a writing project that is feeling like it’s getting a little complicated, or if you are not quite sure where you are going with your story, I highly recommend checking out this book. Even if you are devoted to the “pantser” camp… you may just discover (as I did) that life on the other side really isn’t that different — it’s really just organized notes, not a soulless, Roman Numeral dotted doc that you must then follow mindlessly. The author of this book has some excellent advice that you can put to use immediately. (Longer review on Goodreads…)
• Booby Trap — My manager at my previous job is a breast cancer survivor and she wrote and published this book about her experience. She wrote most of it while she was undergoing treatment, and based this book on blog posts she was writing for her friends and family. The book provides an inside scoop about the breast cancer experience and manages to be light hearted and even funny. I recommend it if you or someone you know is going through something similar. Or if you’re just curious. I’ve always had a lot of respect for Allison, and knowing more about what she went through and how she handled it (I could totally picture her and her husband and kids while I was reading this) just added to that respect.
• The Great Gatsby — re-read this for the first time since high school. I remember loving this book in high school, so much so that I kept my copy of the book (instead of returning it to the school at the end of the class). I’m now tempted to go dig up the paper I wrote about this book in high school so that I can see what “deep thoughts” I had as a teenager about this book.
• The Girl of Fire and Thorns — I had been thinking about getting this one for a while and it ended up on a Kindle Daily Deal, so I pounced on it. I think I tore through it in a weekend. The story is a bit of a twist on your average epic heroine fantasy adventure. The heroine, for one, is not your typical heroine. She’s very devout, and pretty much eats her feelings. But she’s “chosen” so you know there’s gonna be an adventure. There is also some romance, but no love triangle (thank you! so sick of the damn love triangles!). One of the main dudes in the story has a mustache (also different!). The book is flavored with all sorts of things that aren’t quite what you’d expect that make this feel like a “new” story, instead of the old same thing. If you enjoy feisty ladies going on adventures and saving the world, you should check this out.
• The Shambling Guide to New York City — This one was kind of a surprise. I stumbled on this author based on a recommendation somewhere on the interwebs. I think she might have won a best first novel award or something. I thought her book looked interesting, and it was reasonably priced on Kindle, so I took a chance. I ended up devouring this book. It’s a fast, fun read along the lines of Christopher Moore (especially his novel A Dirty Job, which is my favorite of the ones I’ve read). If you like books and TV shows about monsters living among us, you should definitely check out this book.

I feel a little bad that I was kind of stingy with the stars this month in my Goodreads reviews. I’ve been taking a UC Berkeley Extension class called “Developing the Novel” and working on my own thing, plus workshoping my classmates’ work. So, I’m a little more critical than usual of writing and story craft. These were all good books, but all got three stars because I was being picky about the writing, character development, and/or the plot structure. At the same time, since I know how hard it is to do those things really well, I don’t want to criticize.

Writing

I didn’t blog this month. That was kind of on purpose. I didn’t have much to say. There is a lot going on and I needed a break. I did finish my Mystery Fiction class, and I wrote a bunch on my chosen work in progress project for my Developing the Novel class. I got into a pretty good groove of writing almost daily for the past couple of weeks. I discovered Scrivener which is a software program for writers (fiction and non-fiction), and has this awesome little progress bar that shows how you are progressing to your daily word count goal. I love it. But I have a feeling there won’t be too much blogging for the rest of this year. I’m going to focus on finishing up my work in process project. I’ll blog if I feel the urge, but otherwise things may be a little quiet around here until January.

Swimming

My US Masters Swimming FLOG (Fitness Log) says I swam:

• 15 of 31 days (target was ~20 days)
• 27.73 miles (target was ~30 miles)

This month was part taper and part recovery with one big, 2-day race in the middle. I’ve already blown past my goal of 250 miles for this year. As of today I’m at 285 miles for the year. I am hoping to get to 340 miles for the year. That would be an average of about a mile a day for 365 days with about two weeks off. I have no races for the rest of the year, just training and getting psyched for the spring short course yards racing season that kicks off in January.

Movies

Oh the movies this month… I think we got four really good movies from Netflix this month. I expected one or two to be good, but was totally impressed with (at least aspects of) all four. Unfortunately, I’ve spent so long writing the other bits that it’s getting late. I’ll keep this brief…

• Much Ado About Nothing — Just watch this. Shakespeare’s words in a modern day setting. It’s so good. And I’m not just saying that because Joss Whedon made this.
• The Great Gatsby — The update. The Leo version. Great soundtrack. Too much “old boy.” And what is it about Tobey Maguire that I find so annoying? Leo is actually really good in this. So is Carey Mulligan.
• Galaxy Quest — OMG. How did I miss this? SO GOOD. It’s like an inside joke for sci fi fans. And Alan Rickman is amazing. Also, Tim Allen is really good in this. Hell, the whole cast is great. If you haven’t seen this movie, just go watch it.
• Iron Man 3 — So, I loved the first Iron Man movie. The second was meh. The Avengers was great. Thor and Captain America were both terrible. I’m kind of getting sick of super heros. I had no idea what to expect here. I watched it out of loyalty to the franchise and because of Robert Downey Jr. So I was totally unprepared to really like this movie. It’s a good movie. I was amazed. And, spoiler, they don’t do the damsel in distress thing. I mean, they trick you into thinking that they are going that way, and then they don’t! Hurrah! I still don’t think it would pass the Bechdel Test, but… I’ll give them credit for progress.

Tomorrow starts my second most favorite month of the year… NOVEMBER!!! November is exactly half-way to my birthday month, and it’s the first real month where the weather gets colder (relatively speaking… it is California…) and it feels like you should be cozying up with a book and a mug of tea next to the fire. Or, writing a novel, because November is also NaNoWriMo. So there’s that. I can’t wait!

Books

Total read since January: 28
(target is 36 by December, to be on track I should have read 24 books by now)

I didn’t have much time to read this month. I only finished two books. But I started (and nearly finished) two more — see the Goodreads “currently reading” box in the side bar for a preview of what’s coming next month…

• Crown of Midnight — worthy sequel to Throne of Glass… but feels a bit like a “middle book”… still, I really like this world and these characters, so I devoured this one and am eagerly awaiting the next one in the series. When I have more time I may go back and re-read the first one and then this one and try to write something more thoughtful later. There are many references to events in the first book which I barely remembered, and it relies heavily on knowledge of what happened in the first novel to understand what’s going on in this one.
• Silent Harmony — super fast, fun read… talented and ambitious “underdog” heroine + boarding school + horses… definitely a literature niche that appeals to many young women and girls — and I would definitely recommend this to anyone that likes that combination. The mystery aspect was mostly well done and kept me guessing about “who done it” until the end. Though, if I knew more about horses and horse culture politics I might have had a better idea from the hints provided. I only gave it two stars because I’m several years past my horses + boarding school phase. However, I can see how this would be a 3-4 star book for someone who is still really drawn to that stuff.

Writing

I’ve been working on “developing the novel” this month and, besides the swimming workout posts, managed to write four blog posts in September. I was trying to match the swimming workout posts one for one so that anyone who doesn’t like to read about my swimming workouts would still have something to read on my blog.

I started having a bit of a “blog crisis” over the weekend… these are the periodical events that cause me to kill my blog and hide under a social media rock for a while. Not sure exactly what’s behind this one, but for now I’m resisting the urge to retreat into my shell.

Swimming

My US Masters Swimming FLOG (Fitness Log) says I swam:

• 20 of 31 days (target was ~20 days)
• 38.78 miles (target was ~30 miles)

Last month of the “training” phase of my workout plan. I hit it hard and am looking forward to taper and a big race and a little rest in October before jumping back into the training phase and starting prep for the spring racing season.

Movies

Three movies this month! I am still not in much of a movie watching mood. But since Greg broke his foot and has been in a cast, movie watching picked back up again in September. The movies we watched this month were:

• Winter’s Bone — resisted watching this for a while because I wasn’t sure I would like it, but boy was I wrong! This was a really good movie — possibly the best movie we watched all year. Definitely the best movie from this month. After watching this I went and added all the “2013 Oscar buzz” movies to my queue so I won’t be the last to watch the good movies this year.
• Spy Game — this is an older movie that Greg added to the queue (I am getting sick of Netflix and movies, and he’s the one with the cast on his leg, so I let him pick). Again I was pleasantly surprised. It’s a spy movie and it has Robert Redford and Brad Pitt, so I wasn’t expecting much. But, it’s a really well done spy movie… not a special effects, blow things up, ooh look at all my awesome technology spy movie. A nice change of pace.
• Kings of Summer — I thought this was going to be good. I missed the free screening at work, and the trailer looked promising. It was okay. Some parts were really funny. Some parts were really thoughtful. But I lost count after the third “bonding montage” of the boys in the woods. And Greg was frustrated because he didn’t find it at all realistic that they would have been able to build this cabin in the woods in such a short period of time and with nothing but bikes to haul stuff to the construction site. But… the funny parts were funny… oh well.

Seriously cannot believe it’s October already! This year is going by so quickly.

Books

Total read since January: 26
(target is 36 by December, to be on track I should have read 24 books by now)

Only three books this month and none knocked my socks off. Here they are in order of most to least favorite:

• Under the Empyrean Sky — I really wanted to love this book. I like the author. I like the genre. I like the concept of a post-apocalyptic world overrun with and built around GMO corn. But this book fell short of “love.” It was good. I liked it. It was just a little too “YA” for me. Too much boy growing up angst — anger at his dad, anger at the town bully, anger when he (inevitably) loses his girl, general anger at life, etc. Not enough about the world the story is set in. It left me with too many questions about the people, the classes, the politics, the history, the setting… But don’t listen to me. If you are intrigued by the official book blurb description, you should read the book. I’ll probably read the sequel. I’m interested enough to see where he goes with this.
• Out of the Deep I Cry — Russ and Clare solve another mystery in Millers Kill, NY. Yes, I am still reading these books. Yes, it is presumably for my Mystery Fiction final project. But, yes, I admit I am sucked into the story and the budding romance and actually WANT to keep reading these, even after I finish my project. Trashy romance / mystery novel? Yeah, kinda. Well written with thoughtful characterization and plotting? Yes! New guilty pleasure reading? Maybe…
• The Skull Beneath the Skin — This is the last novel I had to read for my Mystery Fiction class. It was a slog. So much description. So much gothic moodiness. So much drama. I mean, the client was an actress, but still. Blech. Not my favorite book from this class. I struggled to finish it. But, I did it! And now I just need to finish the last online module and my final project, take the final exam, and I’m done! (That still sounds like a lot of stuff… the slog continues…)

My goal for next month is to write deeper and more critical book reviews, ideally closer to when I actually finish reading the book.

Writing

My blog posts this month were almost exclusively about swimming. I am not sure that counts as “writing.” As much as my mom loves me, I’m pretty sure even she is bored silly by blog posts about swimming workouts. So, I am going to attempt to write about other stuff (in addition to the swimming workouts) next month.

I would drop the swimming posts, but it’s part of who I am and what I think about. Also, I want to be a resource for people who want to do lap swimming for a workout but have trouble coming up with workouts, or staying motivated. Ideally, I want to inspire people like me who had no idea they could still swim competitively after college that they can and should because it’s so much fun! Really!

Outside of the blog, I made some slow progress on the writing project this month. And by slow, I mean I only added 2k words. Sigh.

Still, I did some planning and thinking and plotting. I am starting a new writing class in September — Developing the Novel. I’m hoping that will help me carve out more of my free time to FINISH THIS DRAFT by the end of this year.

Swimming

My US Masters Swimming FLOG (Fitness Log) says I swam:

• 21 of 31 days (target was ~20 days)
• 39.94 miles (target was ~30 miles)

NEW RECORD for both number of days and number of miles in one month! Since pretty much the only thing I have been posting on this blog this month has been swimming workouts, you probably already heard enough about my swimming. So, I’m just going to celebrate this little achievement, and post this impressive chart of my yards / month that really shows how far I’ve come since January (and how lazy I was April thru June).

For those of you totally bored by my swimming workout posts… sorry. I don’t think they’re going away. Maybe just skip them? I’ll try harder to post other stuff besides swimming. Promise. Although, if you are sick of my swimming updates, you’re probably not even reading this section. Oh well.

Movies

This may be a first. No movies in August. I got a movie from Netflix in the first week of August that is still sitting, unopened, in the living room. I just haven’t been in the mood to watch a movie.

However, I did stumble upon one bit of amazingness that I can’t believe I am just now finding out about… The Lizzie Bennet Diaries! In the last 24hrs I’ve watched all 100 episodes. It’s AMAZING! I love it. They did such a good job adapting Pride and Prejudice to modern day. And the actors / actresses in it are fantastic. If you like Jane Austen, you should go watch this right now. Just be warned, you will get completely sucked in.

Next month: September… Back to school! My favorite time of year! (even though I am no longer in school…) And, even though it’s fall everywhere else in the country, it’s now finally “summer” in San Francisco. Yippee? (I miss real fall…)

Books

Total read since January: 23
(target is 36 by December, to be on track I should have read 21 books by now)

Vacation time means more reading time for me. I only finished two books during my vacation. Then I finished one more on the plane ride home. But, even outside of vacation, I’ve been reading like crazy this month, and I’m finally caught up (actually, a little ahead) of where I should be to meet my 36 books target for this year. Of course, my “to-read” pile just keeps growing because I am always finding or receiving recommendations for awesome books out there that I want to read.

Here are the (six!) books I read this month, stack ranked by how much I liked them, from most to least favorite:

• Swim: Why We Love the Water — LOVED this book. So many fun facts about the history of swimming and swimmers. Made me feel proud to be a swimmer, and made me want to go swim laps. Highly recommend this to anyone who loves the water and loves to swim.
• Where’d You Go Bernadette — This book cracked me up. Having lived in Seattle and worked for Microsoft, I can vouch for the fact that Maria Semple has Seattle and Microsoft nailed. One of my favorite parts is the transcript of the TED Talk. So perfect. I really enjoyed this book. It made me miss the city I think of as “home” (even though I grew up in the Midwest). Highly recommend this to anyone who has ever lived in Seattle and/or worked in technology (even though the book really isn’t about working in technology at all). Think Gilmore Girls, but set in Seattle.
• A Murder is Announced — Read this one for my UCBx Mystery Fiction class, but I actually enjoyed it. It’s very British and amusing, if not laugh-out-loud-funny. It’s sort of a comedy-mystery. I kept thinking I had the mystery solved, but then something else would happen and I would change my mind. Definitely kept me guessing (and engaged) through the end.
• A Fountain Filled with Blood — Read this one for my UCBx Mystery Fiction class final project. I liked the first book in the series (the one I read last month) better, but this one was still good. The story was fast paced and takes place in the Adirondacks where I was on vacation this month. My only (small) complaint is that the main character, Clare, was a bit more inconsistent in this book than she was in the first book. In this book she constantly flips from being responsible to irresponsible, and takes some actions that seem out of character based on what we know of her background. I hope this improves as the series continues, because I like her character in general, and I am drawn in my this will they / won’t they relationship developing as a (major) subplot. 
• Island of the Sequined Love Nun — Was less than impressed with this one by Christopher Moore. No matter how many Christopher Moore books I read, I still think the first one I read by him (A Dirty Job) was the best. Maybe his brand of humor / writing style has diminishing returns?
• Unfamiliar Fishes — Originally bought this for my mom because she lived in Hawaii and loves it there and also enjoys history. She read it and passed it back to me to read and it sat on my shelf for years. Brought it with on vacation and had a hard time getting into it. The text seemed to ramble without purpose and periodically repeat bits. It was almost as though it was a series of essays that were strung together into a book. I finally finished it, and then left it in the Adirondacks for future campers to enjoy.

I was hoping to be able to tackle more of my non-fiction selections while on vacation. It’s harder for me to read non-fiction in the start / stop way I have to read while I’m working. I only get about thirty minutes of reading time on the bus, and the rest of my reading time happens on the weekend. It’s much easier for me to devour novels on the weekend than meaty non-fiction. Plus, novels are more of an escape worthy of weekend downtime.

Writing

I haven’t been keeping up the blog this month, mostly due to “no screens” time during vacation. But also because I’ve had a lot on my mind that hasn’t been post-worthy. But, I have been doing a tiny bit of writing. I dusted off one of my two unfinished novels (finally) and started (slowly) working on it again.

The one I picked (I need a good working title…) had just over 16k words already typed up. I also had a few scenes scribbled in a notebook. After re-reading what I wrote I immediately decided that 1) this is utter rubbish writing, but maybe a decent story, and 2) it probably needs to be written in first person. The annoying thing is that I remember I started writing this in first person, then painstakingly changed it to third person, and now I’m having to go back to my original, first person narration.

This month I edited all the existing text, added the handwritten stuff, and then added a few “new” scenes. I now have just over 20k words. There are about 100k words in a novel (unless you’re George R.R. Martin, then it’s between 300k and 450k per novel…). So, at this rate, this may take me a while. But, my goal is just to ignore the “this is complete crap” voice and finish the story. I can always make it better later. Or just leave it gathering virtual dust on my hard drive. But I’m going to finish it.

Swimming

My US Masters Swimming FLOG (Fitness Log) says I swam:

• 20 of 31 days (target was ~20 days)
• 35.18 miles (target was ~30 miles)

Woo hoo! I did it! I finally hit my target for both number of days and miles! Yay! I owe all this to vacationing somewhere that I could easily swim daily and a little change of routine that increased my motivation to get out of bed in the morning.

This month I got to spend a week swimming around in a lake in the Adirondacks. On my first day at the lake I swam across and back a total of five times — not all in a row, but total for the day. That was the most I swam across and back for the whole vacation, but I did that trip at least once a day, and usually more, sometimes with friends, sometimes with small children, always with someone in a boat patiently accompanying me.

When I returned from vacation I decided to capitalize on my adaptation to East-coast time and get up early to swim in the outdoor pool instead of going to the gym. I LOVE swimming in that pool. It is so much more motivating the swimming in that dinky little three lane pool in the basement of Equinox with five other splashing humans and a sporadically working time-clock.

Because of this, I am planning on canceling my gym membership and buying a bulk pass to the outdoor pool instead. I may regret this decision come winter, but it doesn’t really get too cold here in the winter. Mornings now, in the middle of summer are in the mid 50s and overcast. I expect it will be a bit colder, maybe mid 40s in December / January, but the pool is always the same temperature. Besides, we have yoga classes and a weight room in our office, so I’m really just using the gym for the pool at this point (not that I’m using the office facilities, either… but I could…).

I need to step up my training in preparation for the fall racing season. Anything I can do to make that a more enjoyable experience is going to help me swim more — and faster. As you can see from this month’s stats, I am definitely finding the outdoor pool more motivating.

Movies

Not a big month for movies. Possibly recovering from last month’s movie watching binge. More likely, my movie watching time was allocated to swimming, reading, and writing. Here’s what we watched:

• Anchorman — Confession: neither of us had ever seen this movie before. Apparently it is a bit of a “classic”? It was okay. Some parts were funny, and, really, Steve Carrell was the best of all the characters. Is this the movie where that whole “mic drop” thing started (Vince Vaughn at the end, reporting at the zoo)? or does that pre-date even this movie? Answer here?
• Pitch Perfect — If you’ve been keeping up with my blog(s), or know me IRL, you know I am a sucker for feel-good “team” movies like Bring It On, Stick It, and Dil Bole Hadippa — especially ones with a strong, sassy female lead. So it should come as no surprise to you that I loved this movie. (Slightly more surprising was that hubby also liked it…)

There you have it — an extremely long post all about July to make up for my lack of blogging. I can’t believe that tomorrow starts AUGUST! It’s almost back to school time (my second-favorite time of year)!