Sunday Salon: Hello, February!

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Happy February! January proved to be a pretty great month in terms of my 2014 goals. I'm ahead of schedule on reading (10 books!) and film watching (30 films, 21 of them documentaries!). I've read each issue of The New Yorker, which I'm really enjoying. My participation in the #fmsphotoaday instagram challenge petered off in January, but I hope to get back into it this month. I've been keeping up with film reviews really well, but I entered 2014 with such a backlog of book reviews, I really need to get caught up on, that I haven't published reviews of most of my January reads yet. Over all, I'm quite satisfied.

Reading
Today I hope to finish both Click: When We Knew We Were Feminists, an essay collection, and The UnAmericans, Molly Antopol's debut short story collection. I've enjoyed dipping in and out of both collections the past few days, and I realize I should pair essays and short stories more frequently. Next up: the pile of February new releases. There are too many wonderful looking books coming out this month, and I can't wait to start reading them. Despite all of the new releases I read in January, my pick for best book of the month goes to a backlist title: Dark Places by Gillian Flynn.

Watching
This week I plan to watch The Square, another Oscar-nominated documentary, 42, and Captain Phillips. If my exhaustion subsides, I may squeeze in a few more too.

Life
I'm off to meet a friend for brunch. Tonight we're celebrating my father's birthday by going out to eat with my parents, so it's a full day of eating out. Thankfully, my appetite is starting to return, so I hope to have more than a few bites at each meal today.

The rest of February brings a lot of travel for me: a long weekend in Atlanta, a quick overnight to Lawrence, Kansas, and a week in Orlando--the first half for a conference and the second half to relax with my best friends from high school. I'm really looking forward to this time with family and friends before the baby arrives (or I get too pregnant to travel). Of course, time for travel also means time for reading and relaxing!

Pregnancy
I'm in the first home stretch: the last week of my first trimester. I hope my exhaustion and nausea subside this week and the promised boost of energy comes right on time. I'm really looking forward to the second trimester, as it has the fewest symptoms.

Now tell me: what's the best book you read in January?

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Comments

  1. JoAnnFebruary 2, 2014 at 11:49 AM

    You've had a great January of reading and watching, but what I'm most impressed with is keeping up with The New Yorker! I finally let my subscription lapse because I got so far behind :(

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousFebruary 2, 2014 at 4:56 PM

    January was a good month for me! I loved "Remains of the Day" by Kazuo Ishiguro, and "The Ocean at the End of the Lane" by Neil Gaiman was a close second.

    ReplyDelete
  3. TiFebruary 3, 2014 at 11:42 AM

    With my daughter, my nausea lasted until she was 2 months old! But, I found out late in the pregnancy that MEAT is what she wanted, even though I had absolutely not desire to eat it. Once I got some meat in me, I was not as sick. Maybe you need more protein? I am playing mother hen now.

    So much traveling for you! Make sure you stretch a lot. Again, mother hen. Tsk tsk.

    ReplyDelete

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