The Great To Be Read Pile

I did a quick calculation the other day. If I read one book a week from one of my bookcases that houses unread books, it will take me about 75 weeks to finish. That's over a year. And only one bookcase. And that assumes that I won't buy any new books.

The thought of all these books to read sort of makes me feel like Sysyphus. Except there are no rocks or hills involved. Just books. Still, that may be why I'm not reading much. Too overwhelming.

I did finish Whatever Makes You Happy by Lisa Grunwald. The Oprah Magazine recommended it but People did too so I thought it might be safe. It was touch and go at the 50 page mark. I stuck with it because of the real and fictional research on happiness and it's theme, the meaning of happiness. In the end, it was thought provoking but I didn't really like or care about the main character, Sally.

I was also a little disappointed with Julia Quinn's related books, The Lost Duke of Wyndham and Mr. Cavendish, I Presume. The books follow the same events from the perspective of two couples, Grace and Jack, who ends up being the real duke, and Amelia and Thomas, who loses his dukedom when Jack proves to be the real heir.

I didn't mind knowing what was going to happen or the writing repeats like some reviewers. I liked following the same scenes and conversations from the points of view of the different characters. What bugged me was that the real stuff - how both men dealt with their radical changes in situation - was glossed over.

If you're keeping score, that's one book from the shelves, one from the library, and one from the store. I'm toying with the idea of doing a year without book shopping but that's just crazy talk.

Reasonable, Responsible Adult

The hardware on my computer crashed.

On Thursday, while I was waiting for the death knell on the Dell from the computer repair guy, I went shopping and was completely, utterly seduced by the Mac notebooks. So cute. So portable. So much fun. So cool.

I didn't buy one immediately which I thought was very adult of me. But I talked about the Mac at work on Friday. About how much I loved it. About how much I wanted one. About how I could justify buying it because it was so cool and could do so many things to help support my blogging life. And I really, really wanted it. Really. And since I would be spending a lot of money anyway, why shouldn't I get exactly what I wanted?

That was when N said she was reading Confessions of a Shopaholic and that I sounded exactly like the girl in the book.

I was prepared to totally disregard her comment. Because ... well, because.

I talked about the Mac with M, my brother, on Saturday morning. I told myself I wanted his opinion. I knew he loved his Mac and that he would say I would not be sorry if I got it. But then he had to go and add, "if you can afford it".

I was prepared to totally disregard his comment too.

I headed to the Apple store.

Somehow, before I made it there, I found myself turning my car into the Best Buy parking lot. I told myself it wouldn't hurt to look at the other notebooks one more time. I got the specs on one I sort of liked. I went to Borders to have coffee and did some calculations.

It's all very well for Becky Bloomwood, the aforementioned shopaholic, to spend whatever she wants. She's fictional. I'm not. She's twenty-something. I'm definitely not. She (N should stop reading here - spoiler alert) is going to end up with a cute, rich guy. I'm not.

I bought the HP.

No Blogging from Me for a While

My computer died on Sunday capping what was a seriously lousy weekend consisting of a big flare up, cancelled weekend away, and missing the chance to catch up with my cousins. Plus they are threatening me with the bar bill.

Anyway, this is a stealth blog from work. It will be the last for a while until the computer situation gets resolved.

Think happy computer repair thoughts.

Missing the Boat?

I was up early this morning unable to sleep because my legs and hips ached. After I organized my pills for the week, I got online.

About four years ago, I met Pixie Campbell at a Writer's Spa retreat in Taos, New Mexico that was led by Jennifer Louden and Suzanne Falter Barnes. I've followed Pixie's blog since. This morning I was clicking on links to Pixie's blogroll and came across Jen Lemen's blog. There was an entry where Jen writes about meeting and interviewing Cokie Roberts. At the end of the entry was this paragraph:

"I wish this were a beautifully written post that really captured all the power and wisdom of these tiny moments, but all I can say is that I’m really deeply grateful for today. I hope I can be the kind of older woman someday who inspires somebody younger to be brave and to take incredible chances for love and wholeness and peace (because I did it myself), all the while being willing to endure the pull with dignity and grace. That’s the most any woman can hope for, don’t you think?"

While Jen's pull is family and career, I couldn't help but apply her words to my own pull between fibromyalgia and life. I worry that my illness is winning the tug of war. It's easy to go inward to the place that's all about being sick because, let's face it, some days it is just so darn hard to live with the chronic pain and fatigue of fibromyalgia. But I want more.

Like Jen, I want to be the kind of older woman who inspires others. I'm far to close to older woman status to waste time not living fully.

Thanks to the women who inspired this post:

Jen Lemen - http:// jenlemen.com/blog
Pixie Campbell - http:// pixiecampbell.typepad.com/pink_coyote

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By the way, one day I'm going to figure out how to post my own blogroll. Promise.

Look How Far We've Come

My concentration has been shot lately. I don't know if it's the meds, weather changes, old age or what. It stinks but there's an upside. (There's always an upside in my happy, optimistic world.) I've been expanding my online horizons and finding all kinds of interesting things.

Yesterday, ABC News ran a story about a class action lawsuit against the company owned by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. In the suit, 72 women claim pregnancy bias saying that they were demoted, lost career opportunities and suffered reduced wages as a result of their pregnancies. The article states that according to charges filed with the EEOC, the company has a "systemic, top-down culture of discrimination" created by Mr. Bloomberg himself.

Earlier this week, personal finance blogger, FruGal, posted an entry about a conversation she had with a business owner acquaintance who admitted that if he has two candidates of child-bearing age, he'd rather hire a man than woman. He sees hiring as an investment in his company. Men are the better bet because men don't have to divide their attention between work and children. He'd rather hire men even if the women applying for jobs don't actually have children.

Last week, the findings from a study on the impact of gender views on wages were released. The study followed male and female participants over a 25 year period . The study found that men who held traditional views on gender roles earned, on average, over $11,000 more a year than men who held less traditional views. (I won't mention the wage differences between the men and women. There's no such thing in my happy, optimistic world.) I told one of my co-workers about the study and said that in order for him to get ahead in the wage game, he had to tell his wife to get barefoot, pregnant and in the kitchen. He said he'd have plenty of time to earn more money when he saw his kids every other weekend after saying that to his wife.

Obviously we now know why Michael Bloomberg is richer than God, FruGal's acquaintance owns his own successful mid-sized company, and my co-worker is languishing away at company X.

Here are links. Enjoy.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Blotter/TheLaw/story?id=5940693&page=1

http://www.totallymoney.com/frugal/?p=374

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/21/AR2008092102529.html?sub=new