My best friend

mocks me a lot because despite being a librarian, I don't read much anymore.  In fact, I can't tell you how many books I've read in the last year, maybe five, and those were mostly non-fiction books, like gardening ones, with lots of pictures.  Don't get me wrong, I've always been an avid reader, at least until about 5-6 years ago, and then everything petered out.  I don't know why.  I've had lots of excuses.  I'm too busy. I'm tired. I can't find a good place to read (I cannot read in bed, for example, and at the old apartment, there wasn't really a good alternative, whereas here there are chairs or the kitchen table, so that excuse doesn't work anymore.)  Since the beginning of this year, I've read two gardening books, but again, lots of pictures, not much text.

I have several books out from the library.  He accuses me (rightly) of hoarding books from there without reading them, sometimes for several checkouts, because I always mean to read the books.  I have the following out right now:

1. "A" is for Alibi by Sue Grafton
2. The Oversight by Charlie Fletcher
3. Lost in Translation: An Illustrated Compendium of Untranslatable Words from Around the World by Ella Frances Sanders
4. The Forgetting by Sharon Cameron
5. Caesar's Footprints by Bijan Omrani
6. La Belle Sauvage (The Book of Dust, book 1) by Philip Pullman
7. A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab [which YKWIA has borrowed since I obviously wasn't going to read it in a timely manner]
8. The Landmark Julius Caesar: The Complete Works (Gallic War, Civil War, Alexandrian War, African War, Spanish War) edited by Kurt A. Raaflaub
9. The Well-Tended Perennial Garden: The Essential Guide to Planting and Pruning Techniques by Tracy DiSabato-Aust
10. Edible Landscaping by Rosalind Creasy
11. Native Plants of the Southeast by Larry Mellichamp
12. Starter Vegetable Gardens: 24 No-Fail Plans for Small Organic Gardens by Barbara Pleasant [which I have actually read from cover to cover but am holding onto to make copies of one of the plans]

I also have a thirteenth book on hold that has arrived: Anatomy of a Genocide: The Life and Death of a Town Called Buczacz by Omer Bartov.  I'll check it out tomorrow.

So here is my conundrum.  I would like to read them all. I actually have time now to get some reading done.  I think I'll start with Sue Grafton's book because I have fifteen days left on that loan and it's very unlikely I can renew it, as I'm sure others put it on hold after her death.  I also want to knock out the gardening books, the language book (which is just a small illustrated description book), and Caesar's Footprints.  That leaves the actual Julius Caesar text, the one on hold, and the fiction books, all of which I have some time on.  If I can read these, I'll be doing very well.  And maybe, just maybe, YKWIA will stop taunting me for my lack of reading.  I will make progress on my 'To Be Read' pile!  To that end, I'm going to take Sue Grafton's book and go into the study and read, while YKWIA naps. :)  Oh, and where I pulled the books off my bookcase headboard to look at the titles and authors, the cat is now in the pile's space and is looking quite pleased with himself.

PS I got a notice from the Lexington Public Library that they had decided not to fill the position that was advertised, and for which I applied, which was Branch Manager of the Village Branch. I do wish employers wouldn't advertise positions they are not going to fill anytime soon. I was excited by the possibility of getting or at least interviewing for that one. Oh, well.