When I got home tonight, I had grand plans to clean my bathroom or do other similarly productive things. However, in the elevator from the garage to my apartment, I suddenly found myself exhausted. I didn't want to work on my romance novel or the business plan for my team, nor did I want to do housework. I decided to read a book -- but what book? Literary fiction seemed too heavy, and none of the unread romances sitting on my shelves appealed to me. Finally, I settled on a book I had bought in Des Moines several months ago -- 'Fortune's Fool' by Mercedes Lackey.
It's fantasy, which I haven't read in quite some time (other than Robin McKinley, but she doesn't count). However, it's my favorite kind of fantasy -- fairy tales respun into new stories. There is something comforting, engaging, entertaining, heartbreaking, etc., about seeing the same well-known stories retold in new ways. Even though you know the happily ever after will come, the stories still call to the primal archetypes that we grew up with; and really, who doesn't like happy endings? I like reading literary fiction, but I think I read romance because there is a guaranteed emotional payoff at the end. It's the same with fairy tales -- the Beast always becomes a prince, the Princess always breaks the spell, the evil witch always gets her just desserts. While I didn't think the writing was particularly strong (it was good in parts, but it could have used another careful proofreading), the story took bits from Russian fairy tales, particularly Baba Yaga, which I quite enjoyed.
Today was an excellent day at work. I woke up to make chocolate chip chewies for a team event, went to work, had a calendar full of meetings, and spent an hour presenting on company culture to some newer hires (including ten people who now report to me, so hopefully I didn't come across as too insane). Then, I ate far too many of my own cookies at the event; no one showed up for the first fifteen minutes, so Pete, Heather and I ate our own food and laughed at how sad our party looked. I ended up giving almost all of the remaining cookies away, since after eating cookie dough for breakfasts and cookies for supper, the thought of driving home with the smell of cookies in my car was nauseating.
On the way home, I made a quick stop at Crate and Barrel to spend the giftcard that Tammy gave me during the Olympics. Of course, I spent a bit more than the giftcard amount, but it was nowhere near as bad as my giftcard-encouraged expenditures at Sephora earlier this week. Then I got home, immediately started reading, and you know the rest. I'm looking forward to spending some time to myself this weekend; after a week of having to be 'on' at work, since I was in meetings most of the time, it will be nice to shut down and introspect for a bit.
I need to get back to the book this weekend as well, so I suppose I should go to bed so that I can get up at a reasonable hour at start accomplishing something. Goodnight!
No comments:
Post a Comment