Grill out today in the name of St. Lawrence

Today is the feast of St. Lawrence, who happens to be the patron saint of archivists and librarians. He was a deacon of the early church of Rome, and his primary task was to preside over the financial records of the church. In 258 the Emperor Valerian confiscated all church property and executed the pope (Sixtus II) and seven deacons who were distributing food and funds to the poor, mostly widows and orphans. The emperor demanded that Lawrence hand over the records of how much money had been distributed and an accounting of the current financial state of the church. As any good archivist would do, Lawrence informed the emperor that such a massive request would take three days to process. Lawrence arranged to quickly spend the money remaining in the accounts (a common event to archivists--being told they have a limited amount of time to spend any remaining budget--example: me, three months ago, spending four large figures in less than two weeks). When the emperor demanded to see the wealth of the church, Lawrence showed him the widows, orphans, and the poor, and told him that these were the treasures. The Emperor was incensed and ordered that Lawrence be roasted alive over a fire on a gridiron. Lawrence is reputed to have said, at one point, "You may turn me over, I am well done on this side."

I need a new bookcase...

I got myself into kind of a bind in the last couple months by trying to read too many books at one time. Usually I have 3-4 going at once...one I leave at work to read during lunch, one I leave at Bret's house to read while he's watching baseball or whatever, one in my car to get me through unexpected waits in restaurants, doctor's offices, whatnot, and a couple at home by my bed and scattered around other places.

Yeah, I read a lot.

But this time I was in over my head. I was trying to clear my plate so I could devote my brain to Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows but unexpected events kept that from happening. Added to the dilemma of what to read next was the fact that I was trying to RE-read the two prior Harry Potters' to refresh the story in my mind.

Are you following this? To sum it all up, these are the books I had going all at once when July 21 struck and I dropped everything to figure out what happened to Harry.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
by J.K. Rowling
Kitchen Confidential,
by Anthony Bourdain
To Say Nothing of the Dog
by Connie Willis
Thursday Next, A Sequel
by Jasper Fforde (this was another one that I was looking forward to--I've read his other books and have been waiting for the next one for a few years now).
Bloodsucking Fiends and You Suck
by Christopher Moore (I started You Suck and then realized it was a sequel to the first, and had to go back and read Bloodsucking Fiends first.)


In the last few months I've also read: (including but not limited to)
Swapping Lives
by Jane Green
(her other books have all been so good, and I'm not quite sure why this one was so boring)

A Song of Ice and Fire Series, 4 books:
A Game of Thrones
A Clash of Kings
A Storm of Swords
A Feast for Crows
by George R.R. Martin
(My boss is a big fan of this series, and he got me started on it. Its taken me about 5 months to read my way up to this point. Now I have to wait with the rest of the world for the next one)

Grace (Eventually)
by Anne Lamott
(loved it, loved it, loved it)

A Light from Heaven
by Jan Karon

Dark Angels
by Karleen Koen


On my "to be read" list:

Peony in Love
by Lisa See

Leaper
by Geoffrey Wood (hey, my high school English teacher wrote a book!)

A Tale of You and Me
Ann Brasheres(already started)

The Wizard of Oz
by Frank Baum (already started, reading this one and Mansfield Park via daily delivery of half a chapter to my email inbox)

Guy not Taken
Jennifer Weiner

Mansfield Park
by Jane Austen (working on this one right now)

And of course, there are still stacks of unread books around the house. I'll get to them eventually, but I kind of like knowing there is always a new book to pick up.

Anyone want to send me a new bookcase?