confessions of a southside catatonic chataholic

...They don’t want to be reminded of wars or tragedies or economic catastrophes."
~ Mark D. White

In which Tosca discovers that her graphic novel reading experiences to date have been mere dabbling. Now, finally, she has an inkling of why people enjoy them so much. Can she got a w00t!

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...Travel my way, take the highway that is best
Get your kicks on route sixty-six'
~ 'Route 66' by Nat King Cole (written by Bobby Troup)

In which Tosca writes a somewhat long and rambling post with no point whatsoever except to state what she's reading (which is also related to her 2013 international trip). C'est tout. The clip is, of course, Nat King Cole's version of 'Route 66.'

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...no apparatus, no appointment of time and place, is necessary. It is the only art which can be practised at any hour of the day or night, whenever the time and inclination comes, that is your time for reading; in joy or sorrow, health or illness.'
~ Holbrook Jackson

In which Tosca works on getting back her broken book mojo by reading a number of books - three horror titles courtesy of SFFANZ for reviewing, and three graphic novels found while generally hanging out in subversive pockets of our library catalogue. Namely, yaoi graphic novels (two with the sex scenes ripped out of them) and zombies (with the horror scenes intact).

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...that determines what you will be when you can't help it."
~ Oscar Wilde (did anyone have better quotes than Wilde?)

When I don't have to read, I read fanfic and sometimes confuse it with the actual tv show it comes from. Made up fan stories about a made up tv show. Confusing make-believe with make-believe? Uh-oh. Maybe, I'm reading a little too much of it. But how can I tell? When is too much fanfic enough? Is it when you reach that point where you find yourself getting confused between what happened in fanfic and what happened in the episodes? Or is it that moment when you realise you've read more fanfic than library books in the last 5 months? Or is it when you find yourself speaking in fanfic comment style to your siblings (I told my sister that I was 'Ded of hotness.' Needless to say, she said, 'You're a dork.')? Or is it when you see all tv shows in fanfic terms (is it normal that I saw Blaine/Glee's 'Baby, it's cold outside' as 'dubcon')? Or is time to call it a day when you find yourself crying over a 50 chapter long story where Jensen dies and leaves Jared desolate, even though you know he's alive and they're both happily married to women? I have done all of those. So...when was enough again?

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... this joy not chilled by age, this polite and unpunished vice, this selfish, serene life-long intoxication.
~ Logan Pearsall Smith

I'm late for my Monday post because...well, just because. Take your pick: I was lazy, tired, had a toothache, had an earache, had a headache, all of the above because they were all tied up in a wisdom tooth I'm too chicken to get yanked >.< So here's my Monday 'What I'm reading' update. It's kind of a quick one, though, because my book mojo is still broken and, as a result, I'm not getting much done that isn't sent to me to review for SFFANZ (Science Fiction Association New Zealand). So...what am I reading?

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...and therefore sacred.'
~ Gunter Grass

This week I'd be happy if I could find a bad book nevermind a lifechanging one! My book mojo is broken. Or maybe I wasn't ready to be back reading, yet. I took a 6 week break because everything I tried was like so much white noise. Is my book mojo permanently broken? I'm not sure. I hope not. Ordinarily Monday is my 'on the shelf' post, which is just a basic rundown of what I'm reading/watching at the moment but I'm a total #fail in that respect this week. A few times I've tried to crack open a book and have gotten as far as the first chapter or the intro and then - nothing. No spark, no hook, no magic. I am a book-deadzone.

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...to give our souls a chance to luxuriate.'

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...and keep us from being a burden to ourselves.'
~ Jeremy Collier

Well, actually, books keep me from being a burden to everyone else :) It's true! If I didn't have books I'd be in your space annoying you ten times as much as I usually do. So put *that* in your pipe and choke on it (no, I do mean choke on it, not smoke it). Boy howdy! It's been an age and a half since I last blogged. Not because I haven't wanted to, but more because I haven't had a chance to. In the last few months we have closed up mum & dad's place (they're living in the wilds of Taipa for some reason that totally eludes me), I temporarily moved in with a sibling for 3 months while looking for a place and then moved again. This time permanently. So mother krunkin' glad to have left the hood behind. Remy the Pooh grows exponentially. I kid you not - the kids rolls have rolls for crying out loud. See pic. What'd I tell you?

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...some long dormant craving to be mentally alive.”
~ Autobiography of Malcolm X

I do not remember when my love affair with books began. As a precocious 11 year old reading 'Fear of flying' by Erica Jong? As a curious 9 year old reading Nabokov's 'Lolita'? As a 7 year old with a literary crush reading The Hardy Boys under the blankets after lights out? As a 5 year old reading Milne's 'Now we are six' with my mum? As a 3 year old listening to my mum read me bible stories (that were more like horror stories as a toddler but hey, what did I know?). Earlier, perhaps? I'm not sure. I'll probably never know. But everyday I am grateful that it began some day, some when, and that my parents fostered it. It's Monday and this is an 'on the shelf' post or a 'what I'm reading' post.

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...No man will ever make love to a woman because she waxed the linoleum - "My God, the floor's immaculate. Lie down, you hot bitch."
~ Joan Rivers

I detest house cleaning - it may make others feel virtuous but I find that it gets in the way of whatever it is that I want to do at any time: lying around, reading, watching tv, playing on the interwebs, picking my nose, ANYTHING. Sometimes, though, it's a necessity. Especially when you're preparing to move house. And the highlights of it all are when you come across unexpected little treasures. Like I did tonight. It's Monday so this is my 'on the shelf' or 'what I'm reading' post and, believe it or not, the house cleaning bit ties in to my latest read.

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...in the living of a good life.'
~ Mortimer J. Adler

I think, book wise, I'm living the high life. For a while I've felt like my book mojo and blog mojo was broken. Or lost. Or maybe diverted. Some of that I blame, in a good way, on Carriger's 'Changeless.' The ending threw me for a six and, for a while, things seemed a bit flat, the other part of that I put down to being slightly burnt out (at least book wise). Slowly (very slowly) but surely my romance novel mojo has come back. My nonfiction mojo...hmm, not so much. You know that tingle you get from a book you pick up that just seems full of so many possibilities? I got it on Sunday when I finally started sorting through my latest requests and found the travelogue below. It's Monday and this is my 'on the shelf' or 'what I'm reading' post.

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...slightly exhausted at the end. You live several lives while reading it.'
~ William Styron, interview, Writers at Work, 1958

Sometimes, though, you lose your book mojo and feel like you live several lives just opening the cover let alone trying to read a complete novel. I think that's what happened to me. I lost my romance novel mojo. For most of May I was picking books up, taking them home and reading them without really getting anything out of them. As a result I haven't posted a review to our library website all month. Ack. That's not an indictment on the authors, either, it's more about my headspace. Probably the whole birthday-ambivalence thing. For someone who produces 2 romance newsletters a month, losing your mojo is a big bucket of wtfery, right there. It hasn't quite come back, but I can feel a tingle. A possible resurge. A mojo-less Tosca has to be ignored, though, because books have to be read, reviews have to be written and newsletters have to be sent out. Were those moods just hot flashes? At 35 I'd hope not but who really knows. Let's not call them hot flashes. Let's call them 'intense, short, tropical vacations' instead. Makes me feel better. As Kalani tells me, 'To-may-to, po-tah-to.'

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...by what you can carry away from it'
~ James Bryce, 1838-1922, British historian and politician

The two books listed below are ones I am finishing (for the 2nd time) and beginning anew. It is the 1st title that I believe fits the quote most accurately. It's Monday which means this is my 'On the shelf' - what I'm reading - post.

Working in the back section of the reference library means that I don't get half the chance I used to for viewing new books. Everything used to come through Acquisitions, Processing and Cataloguing - which meant that I could mosey on down and have a looksee at all the pretty new books. I love the smell of new books. They signify new possibilities, new hope, new adventures and new life. Now that we outsource a lot of our buying and cataloguing I have to be three times as vigilant as branch staff about keeping up to date with new stock. It's not a hardship because I genuinely love reading. It sounds so...twee to admit that. It's almost (but not as dodgy sounding) as a teacher saying, 'I loooove kids.' Thanks to my beady eyes I'm kept very busy requesting anything and (almost) everything. I won't bore you with indepth reviews, I'll briefly list the book details (with a link to our catalogue), the synopsis and a couple of sentences about my thoughts.

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