I just got back moments ago from Chicago dropping off cousin Hobbes. Brother Todd and wife Stephanie come home tomorrow from Argentina, which means we’re back down to one dog and one cat. We love watching cousin Hobbes but 170 lbs. of dog (90 for Hobbes, 80 for Athena) is a lot to manage.

Thank God I didn’t wake up early Saturday morning to get down to Chicago in time to pay a $20 cover to watch England vs. Israel in Euro 2008 qualifying. The game ended, by all accounts, in a dead-boring 0-0 draw.

Is there anyone who didn’t think Steve McClaren would be an awful choice for England manager? I thought he was a ridiculous appointment since his club record is abysmal and he was the right-hand man to a manager that was hounded out of the country after the World Cup. Did the FA really think he would turn England (who had to be one of the dullest teams in Germany this past summer) into world beaters?

Got about half-way through A Farewell to Arms on the round-trip journey, and I can’t figure out the title because Henry gets wounded in the legs.

Anyway, I’m enjoying it but I’m not finding it as engrossing as either For Whom the Bell Tolls or The Sun Also Rises, and not just because it takes place in Italy instead of Spain. There’s a lot of couples’ chatter/banter in AFtA that I find more cloying than in his other work, and it’s this kind of “I don’t want to tell you darling/ tell me/ but I don’t want to tell you/ but I want you to tell me/ then shall I tell you?/ please tell me/ perhaps I will” dialogue that I can do without. Quite often there’s a lot going on between the lines and Hem will slip in a line like “I didn’t mean to make you cry” so the reader understands that the small talk is masking emotions, but other times it drives me crazy.

I’ll finish The Wild Shore tomorrow and the more I read, the more I like it. Robinson has a way of twisting and turning the story so I keep finding myself surprised without the story feeling contrived.

It’s 80+ degrees today. That’s about a 40 to 50 degree temperature switch in a week, which freaks me out.

Current Mood: Bushed, But Must Read |