:booking:

Are you a spine breaker? Or a dog-earer? Do you expect to keep your books in pristine condition even after you have read them? Does watching other readers bend the cover all the way round make you flinch or squeal in pain?

No. No. Yes. Yes. Ok, just kidding, mostly. I know that it is impossible to keep a book looking new forever, but I do try to take good care of my books. The really good ones are like friends and I enjoy visiting them time and again, so it behooves me to treat them well. I never open a paperback past flat, and the thicker a book is the less far I open it, at least until I have the spine limber.

Now, I have something else book related that I want to discuss, and I know that many of the folks from BTT will be interested in this.

BookSwim
is an outfit like NetFlix for books. You pay a flat rate, and borrow books from them. Unlike the library, you keep the book as long as you need to finish it and there aren’t any late fees. I’ll be right upfront and tell you that that banner above is an affiliate banner, but I believe the service has some merit, and is of direct interest to my readers.

And here’s another thing I think will interest you: Thomas Nelson is looking for bloggers to review books. I signed up yesterday, and my first book is on the way. They do ask that you post a 200 word review on your blog and on Amazon, but in return you get to keep the book. Not a bad deal at all . NAYY, YMMV.

My mother and I were discussing history a while back, and she found my theory of counting history by lifetimes intriguing. Now, just discussing history with her is rare, since she hates the subject (I know, right???), but since what I said interested her, I thought it might interest you, too.

I adhere to the young earth theory, and that will give us about 6,000 years of BC history, and of course about 2000 of AD history, rounding off a bit. That’s about 8,000 years. Given an average lifespan of 75 years, that’s just 106 lifetimes. Now I know that the lifespan has not always been 75 years, and so do you. But Biblical life spans were much longer, and that helps to balance the much shorter life spans during the middle ages.

My point with that is this: 8000 years ago can be hard to grapple with, mentally. 106 lifetimes is much easier to get a handle on, and shows that the course of human history is not as long as we sometimes think. And consider this: Adam had lived almost two of those lifetimes before his third child, Seth, was born. Seth was born when Adam was 130 years old.

When Adam was 687 and Seth was 557, Methuselah was born. Methuselah was the son of Enoch, who “walked with God and was no more, for God took him.” When Methuselah was 369 years old, his grand-son Noah was born. Methuselah died at 969 years of age, just before the flood. So we can do some simple math and find that the flood occurred approximately 1656 years after creation.

In lifetimes: about 22. To put a little perspective on the length of patriarchal life spans, only 10 generations were recorded, inclusive of Adam and Noah from creation to flood, and Adam was still living when Noah’s father was born. Adam lived 930 years, almost an eon, almost 12.5 lifetimes. Noah died at 950 years old, about the same time Abraham was born, about 2006 years after the world was created, 350 years after the flood, almost 27 lifetimes into the history of mankind: a quarter of the way into recorded history!

So here I am on Saturday around noon, churning through my to do list. Why in the heck do I feel compelled to keep on like this? Every day, there is more stuff to do than minutes to do it in. And I am not just whining when I say that–I seriously need to sit down and figure that out, because this is just not right. I mean, Biblically, it’s not right, even, to never have a minute to just BE.

How are we supposed to be still and know He is God, if we are never still?
Where are my boundaries, and how can I make sure that they are respected?

Yeah, this is the first only shot I took, and I don’t even know what it looks like. I’m not taking the time today to make sure it’s “acceptable”.

Sometime this week, remind me to tell you how I said “I need 5 minutes” and walked into my room and shut the door, only to have it opened not 45 seconds later. If I look a bit harried, now you know why.

Ack, my glasses reflected. I hate that. Absolutely hate it. Not changing it anyway. 😛

:booking: This week, we have a meme for BTT, which is a little different, but at least it’s bookish. let’s hope I can remember the answers to these questions!

What was the last book you bought?
A school book for one of the children. Book for myself, Thousand Splendid Suns which I still haven’t read. Oops.

Name a book you have read MORE than once
The first three of the Outlander series

Has a book ever fundamentally changed the way you see life? If yes, what was it?
The Time Traveler’s Wife

How do you choose a book? eg. by cover design and summary, recommendations or reviews
All of the above, but also by title. When I have the funds to do so, I tend to walk down the aisles of the bookstore (library) and pick up te ones with intriguing titles.

Do you prefer Fiction or Non-Fiction?
Fiction, but I read more non-fiction

What’s more important in a novel – beautiful writing or a gripping plot?
Both. I’m not one who can get past mediocre writing to get to the plot.

Most loved/memorable character (character/book)
James Alexander Malcom Mackenzie Fraser. D’uh. (from the Outlander series)

Which book or books can be found on your nightstand at the moment?
Umm, right now, my nightstand is across the room from my side of the bed, but I keep the books my kids aren’t supposed to know I have there.

What was the last book you’ve read, and when was it?
Continuous Cables last week for a review

Have you ever given up on a book half way in?
Oh yes.

:selfportraitsunday:

Still rocking the amazing hair from Friday on Saturday night. It’s an exciting life, isn’t it?

So, I think I might have stayed up a little too late last night, working on this theme and reading feeds. I had insomnia for the first time in months, and it was around 2 when I finally crashed. Odd to think that used to be how I lived, yk? Anyway, it is surely telling on me today. I am slow and my mind is sluggish. Don’t you just hate it when you can almost feel your mind creeping along instead of zipping like it ought to?

Anyway. Let me tell you what else happens when I am this tired. First, I end up getting sidetracked every 3 minutes, like someone with ADD, flitting from twitter to zemanta to this message board and that message board and also a few paid blogging sites in an endless round robin. Second, I sit here with information overload and completely pole-axed by the amount of stuff I need to take care of off-line. Third, if it’s shiny, I am installing it on my blogs, which is usually a good thing, but I think I better get up pretty quick before I break something.

If, of course, wild thing were the name of this theme. Which it isn’t. The actual name is Notebook Chaos. Pop on over out of that feed reader, and let me know what you think!