And that's why I don't read

I helped with a baby shower for my neice Kassie on Saturday, which of course, meant I had to break out the Cupcake Book and try something new. I don't remember what this one was called, so I called it Triple Chocolate Mint: 1) chocolate cake, 2) mini chocolate chips on top, 3) white chocolate in the frosting. There is mint in both the cake and the frosting - YUM! I made some more of the Key Lime Pie cupcakes, too.




Since I am still kinda (well . . . really) intimidated by my co-workers, I generally eat lunch alone at my desk. Lunch usually consists of something Stouffers or dinner leftovers, accompanied by carrot sticks and butterscotch pudding. (Ask Lane - I'm the kind of person who will eat the same thing OVER and OVER, never branching out, until I get really sick of it, and then I move on to the next thing.) Since 30 minutes is a lot of time to eat, I have taken a book along to read. This is quite momentous. I don't think I have read more than a few entire books since college, or at least since children.




I used to love to read. I read all the time. I used to read Gone with the Wind at least once a year. Then I went to BYU. It ruined me for reading. Between my history major, which required SO MUCH reading, and my English minor, which truly ruined me for "literature," I just haven't read much. I read the Ensign, and the Book of Mormon (just don't ask how long it took me to finish it). But to just sit and read a book? Yeah, I don't do that.




Until I started reading this book during my lunch break. Generally I don't read fiction when I do read, tending toward non-fiction, and mostly biographies. This book I'm reading was loaned to me by Lane's dad, who told me I would "love it." I'm not far into it (30 minutes a day isn't very long) but I am really enjoying it. It is a historical novel, about the time leading up to the Revolutionary War. I really look forward every day to my few minutes reading. But as I read along, one passage or another will get me curious and then when I get home I have to go get out my old history text books to read up on this or that. In fact, it so wet my appetite for information on the Founding Fathers that I took the kids to the library tonight and got myself a book (biography, of course!) on George Washington, which I haven't been able to put down since I've been home. I even rode my dusty exercise bike so I could justify just a little more time reading! Perhaps a 17 year break is adequate and my love of reading could possibly return.





So since I've been so enjoying this book I borrowed from Lane's parents, it only makes sense that I, in all my clutzy glory, would ruin the book. I don't mean ruin the story or ruin the ending. I mean actually ruin the book. Every morning I pack my bag with my book, my lunch, and my water bottle. Monday morning when I got to work, and unpacked my bag, I found that I hadn't capped my water bottle tightly and my bag was fully of water. The book, which was at the bottom of my bag, had been sitting in a puddle for I don't know how long. I was sick. It's bad enough to ruin a book, but to ruin someone else's book is awful.




So I quickly looked the book up on my favorite website of all time, Amazon.com, and found that I can get it without any problem. So to my dear father-in-law: You will be getting a new book. It kinda works out anyway, because I am enjoying the book so much I think I would like to have a copy to keep, even a warped copy. See what happens when I read?