Musing Monday: A home without books is no home at all!

Musing Mondays is a weekly bookish meme hosted by MizB of Should Be Reading. Just muse about one of the following each week:

Describe one of your reading habits.
Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s).
What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it!
Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it.
Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us!
Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!

Last week I mused about how I am a "messy" reader - and got some interesting responses. It seems a lot of people fall into extremes with their reading style, either being messy like me or neat as a pin like my dear BFF.

This week, I think I'll continue to muse about my reading habits. After all, the best part about a blog is talking about yourself!

Reading Habit #2

Before I talk about my reading habit, I think we need some background information. Because not only do I think a well-worn book is a well-loved book... I also think a house that looks more like a library is the only kind of house for me. Fortunately for me, my boyfriend agrees! Our house currently has six standalone bookcases, and at least five shelves on other pieces of furniture that I have turned into bookcases. There are regularly piles of books on both coffee tables, both of our nightstands, the filing cabinet in my office, the end table in the living room, and sometimes the kitchen table.

Of course, we spend a lot of time in the Barnes and Noble cafe reading books we don't own as well.

 ...we own a lot of books. I counted all of them when we first moved in together (and actually took them all out of boxes) and we had four hundred and some odd books. That was three years ago. Since then, we've moved into an actual house and managed to rescue nearly all of the books that remained at our respective parents' houses. I wanted to count our new collection when we put up the bookshelves here... But it was far too daunting a task. I would assume we own over a thousand books now.

Yep. And they are in every room of the house EXCEPT the bathrooms. Which is silly because we both definitely read in the bathroom! (Maybe that can be the subject of another Musing Monday.)

I took this picture when I had finished counting all the books we had in our first apartment together.

So, my second reading habit is this: I delight in finding new places to read in much the same way that I am always looking for new places to write. Having bookcases all over the house really aids in this venture. I can say with certainty that I've lived here for less than a year and I have spent time reading in each and every room of the house - as well as on the porch and the deck out back!

Are you like me, always seeking the next reading nook? Or do you like to curl up in the same chair every time you open a book?

As for me... I'm so intrigued by listing all of my book-y assets that I'm thinking some pictures of my collection might be in order soon...

Resuming Course

I was doing well with the posting for awhile. What happened?

My typical sinking-back-into-bad-habits happened. I'm pretty sick of resolving to do things and failing to follow through. You think that would be enough to motivate me to, you know, STOP FAILING. But it doesn't. Sigh.

At any rate, here I am now, more than a month since my last post.

Feel like I've finally settled into my job. Nice feeling. Though I still worry about working for what is, essentially, a paper company. Nobody buys paper anymore; it's definitely a dying industry. All I have to do is look around Holyoke to see what kind of destruction dying industries wreak on people's lives. (Let alone my experiences in Worcester.) But I've adopted a wait and see approach to this job. I'm trying to give it a few months to really get a feel of whether this is going to be successful for me long-term or not.

LESS THAN A MONTH FROM CLOSING ON THE HOUSE. Yes, that deserved the caps-lock frenzy.

Oh! And I get to see my parents and also Dylan's new niece (I think of her as nearly-my-niece) next week. That's incredibly exciting for the following reasons:

1. I haven't been home in a stupid long time. 
2. I love babies.  Especially other people's babies.  
3. The Fourth of July is the best holiday ever and the only part of summer I really look forward to. (I know, I'm weird.)

So there's all of that. Oh right. And I decided last minute to attempt to write 50,000 words of a chick lit/mainstream novel that I have only the bare bones of a plot for in the 31 days of July. While I vacation and move and all that. Yaaay...

Yup.

The Random Mind of Rachel

Here's something about me:

I prefer to keep most aspects of my life ordered in a logical manner. I understand that this is a losing battle - for instance, how does one keep ones thoughts from straying every which way with each passing whim? It doesn't matter. I strive for logic in all circumstances - it is the nature of my personality. In the past, I've given up this pursuit for various periods of time and it always ends in existential disaster, denial of emotion, and whiplash-inducing mood swings. (Tell me how that makes any sense and you win all of my undying devotion.)

To that end, I write. In physical words - be they on paper or in electronic format - I can find order in chaos. So when I am feeling particularly out of control, I try to bring myself back in line with writing.

Here are some things going on in my life right:

I was finally hired for full time work in customer service. This is a good job for me. I derive a lot of satisfaction from the day to day problem solving that comes with this kind of work. So far none of it is beyond me, and the levels of human stupidity I end up dealing with are relatively easy to handle.

Dylan and I are closing on the house I posted about previously in a month and a half. A lot of drama went into obtaining this house (and it's hardly over). When we tried to negotiate with the seller for roof and other damage repair, they refused to do anything. We made the difficult decision to walk away and ended up embroiled in an interesting bidding war for another house in foreclosure. The same day that we heard our offer had been accepted for this new house, the seller from our original house came back to us with an offer to re-roof if we could match our original offer price. Spoiled for choice, we came back and said yes. (The foreclosed house was beautiful with a ton of character and a huge yard, but we were also going to lose our ability to make money on selling it again in the future - not the case with this first house.) I am beyond excited about getting this house; I think I've moved into the exhausted phase of simply being impatient to move.

I have considering making myself a one year plan to make myself into a healthier person with better habits than I have right now. Mostly I want to do this to prove to myself that I can. I have tried and failed so many times. This is because I am constantly warring between feeling put-upon by strange standards of society to do these things and feeling that I am idiot and need to do them because they are actually good for me. Can you see me rolling my eyes at myself right now? I swear, for someone who tries so hard to live by her own rules of logic, I am truly terrible at it.

Anyway, here's a picture of my cat because she is my baby and what mama doesn't like showing off her pretty little girl? She greeted me with a lot of unusual purring on Mother's Day last weekend.

Something else I've been thinking about...
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Gatsby believed in the green light, the orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter — tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther.... And one fine morning —
So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.
- F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby"

The Home Buying Adventure

So I mentioned in my last post that the boy and I had our offer accepted on our first house.On Friday, the inspectors came to give us the bad news.

Needs an entirely new roof.

Garage has carpenter ant and termite damage.

BUT

Look at those beautiful hardwood floors.

And the huge yard.

There are a lot of other great things too. The roof and the damage to the garage (which also - surprise - needs a new roof) are the worst. Electrical is fine, foundation is fine... etc etc. We're hoping to negotiate a bit more, and hopefully close around the end of June.

I mean... Look at this living room.

That archway passes through to the formal dining room. The french door goes into what will become my office (hallelujah!). And beyond that is the kitchen - big enough for both a built-in work station and space for an eat-in table and chairs. Huge master bedroom with an en suite bathroom, and guest bedroom upstairs.

Yeah, I'm totally in love with it. I'm optimistic everything is going to work out.