Once again I'm finishing this very late, but it's my Wednesday night, so that's better than last week's Thursday.

I was an enormous wimp about my Mohs surgery, but my family rallied around me anyway. My brother got up before dawn so he could drive me in (if I was there all day they thought I wouldn't want to drive home in city traffic). My sister went to work in the downtown office (rather rare) in case I needed support, as my brother would have leave to get to a convention, but I had a friend on tap to pick me up in the afternoon.

And then my great surgeon yanked all the bad skin cells out on the first try, so he was done cutting by 9:00 AM. (Mohs is for skin cancer -- they cut off a bit, then check to see if the edges are clear, repeat. Sometimes you have to repeat six or eight times). Mine was right below my eye, so it was a bit awkward. Also I hate needles so I spent the whole time aggressively picturing myself on a Hawaiian beach and ignoring whatever they were doing to my face and pretending to have no idea why nurses kept swabbing my face. Nope. I don't have insides! Nothing to see here! But I didn't scream or cry or accidentally punch anyone, so the medical team assured me I had been a good patient.

Anyway, I was all sewn up by 10:00, so my brother drove me home and then went to Portland to win fame and glory by taking first place in THE WACKY RACERS Lego Convention event. He probably won a lot of other things, because he is smart, but that was the one he was risking missing by taking me to the hospital.

The day before I had my elementary book club, where we discussed Front Desk, and it went really well. One girl came in late, but it turned out she was for the second club, but no one else came in. The librarian is a substitute while the main librarian is out on leave, and it turned out that neither of us had any idea what the actual start/end times were. I mean, I know when the first one starts, and when the second one ends, sorta, but because of the oddness of pandemic lunch/recess times we can't just split that in the middle. So we spent the second session figuring out what was going on; the student was also confused because she had completely missed the February meeting and then no one else showed up. My number vary wildly -- sometimes I get a lot of kids (like 20) sometimes 2 or three, or one. And sometimes it's the first session that is tiny and sometime the second. I'm a complete amateur so I am just glad for an excuse to read books.

Friday was my birthday so I had a cake and also a lot of pizza because it was Book Club night, the one where we are all old friends so it's a chance to discuss a book and then just chat. Everyone enjoyed the cake and we had all my favorite pizzas, and they all told me my face wasn't that swollen at all.

And then Sunday came and someone broke into my house and stole an hour! Humph! I needed that hour!

I'm trying to keep up with my Deep Space 9, and knowing that The Next Generation is vanishing from netflix makes me move faster. I think I managed to watch three episodes this week.

I am still second on my list of all the Cybils finalists. But I'm still working on the categories (as you see, middle grade SF is showing up), so I have hopes of regaining the top spot. Look out, Shaye! I only need like thirty more books to catch up!

The Book Date does a weekly roundup of what people are reading, want to read, or have read each week called "It's Monday! What Are You Reading" but I'm probably too late to go sign up. Ditto for the children's lit version at either Teach Mentor Texts or Unleashing Readers.

Started

Rescue on the Oregon Trail (Ranger in Time, #1)

Everybody Fights: So Why Not Get Better at It?

Nubia: Real One, L.L. McKinney. Cybils finalist.

Rescue on the Oregon Trail, Kate Messner. Talbot Hill book club pick.

Persuader, Lee Child. Tuesday book club.

Everybody Fights, So Why Not Get Better At It, Kim & Penn Holderness. Because I binged their youtube channel.

Love Code, Ann Aguirre. Sequel to Strange Love.

Kiki Killira Breaks a Kingdom, Sangu Mandanna.

Completed

The Barren Grounds (The Misewa Saga, #1)

No Middle Name: The Complete Collected Jack Reacher Short Stories

Sorcerer to the Crown (Sorcerer Royal, #1)

The Barren Grounds, David A. Robertson. I definitely see all the Narnia comparisons -- the kids going through a portal to another world that reflects their religion and have adventures working to save things and in the process learn to be better versions of themselves -- more compassionate, more open to family connections, closer to their sibling. It's also a fun read -- the adventure is fun, the animal friends are interesting and witty, the danger is real but not overly creepy.

Front Desk, Kelly Yang. For Talbot Hill book club. I really enjoyed this reread, and the book club went really well -- two full tables in the library, and most of the kids had read it. They liked the idea of the kid getting real responsibilities and helping her family, and they discussed the prejudice she and the other tenants faced. It was a really fun half hour!

My Last Summer with Cass, Mark Crilley. 2021 Cybils Young Adult Graphic Novel finalist. Sometimes I'm really glad I'm not a judge for this read-all-the-Cybils project, because a book can be really good but I hate reading it! This book is about a girl who has a fight with a friend and does something awful. Something I would have trouble forgiving. So although the beginning and middle were interesting, and I really liked how the characters were drawn (I did occasionally forget which kid was which, but their words and actions quickly set me straight even when I couldn't tell the two girls apart.). But the ending was hard to read (especially as I was struggling with Girl From the Sea); I'm not sure that friendship should be revived. Maybe it isn't -- maybe they part as not enemies but don't go back to friendship. I could see that.

Rescue on the Oregon Trail, Kate Messner. Talbot Hill book club pick. Records show I've read this before, but I could only remember Sam the rescue dog, not what bit of history he time traveled to rescue in. Yes, someone dies of dysentery, yes they lose some stuff to the river (but no lives, because of Sam the rescue dog), and it's much more narratively satisfying than the card game (or, I assume, the game the card game is based on). Sadly, only one kid turned up for this club, and she had read last months book, so we just ate cookies and decided on our next pick.

No Middle Name, Lee Child. Reacher short stories. I liked the variety -- some in first person, some from people around Reacher, some in the same voice I'm used to in the books. Although the latest book is in first person, so maybe I just haven't seen all there is to see. They do what I expect, so I was happy.

Nubia: Real One, L.L. McKinney. 2021Cybils Young Adult Graphic Novel finalist. This definitely felt like a comic book, complete with assumptions that I know a lot of stuff I do not in fact know (like Wonder Woman's role in society, or the rules for returning to the Wonder Woman homeland). The illustrations were not really my style, but I usually could keep track of who was who (not always, but then that's pretty much always true for me. I'm getting better, though!). The story was strong, mixing realistic problems both small (crush on a boy! who maybe is crushing back!) and large (the police keep shooting kids that look like them), along with super power problems (keeping a secret is hard! is it parental paranoia when they really are out to get you?). So, it wasn't for me, but I recommend it to others.

Sorcerer to the Crown, Zen Cho. My Friday monthly book club picked this just as I was finishing it up. Most of us enjoyed it, although some found the racism and sexism inherent in the society made it difficult to enjoy. It should read as a slightly frothy fun book, so I can see that. The author is clearly on the side of the brown characters, not society, but it's still a deal. I obviously have better memories of the ending than the beginning. I liked the romantic scene at the very end, and I appreciated the young lady's ruthlessness while not wanting to be close to it.

Everybody Fights, So Why Not Get Better At It, Kim & Penn Holderness. A bit of an odd read for me, since I am currently very single, but I like their silly songs, which I spent the day after my little surgery enjoying, so I wanted to show support by checking out their book. Hey, I think one of the library challenges is "unusual genre" so relationship advice is definitely that! It was fun to read because it was easy to picture them in their example fights from their show, and the advice was also good. Maybe I'll use some of the fighting techniques with my kids, in terms of communicating better what I need from them as roommates.

Love Code, Ann Aguirre. The characters don't quite have the zany exuberance of Beryl, but Aguirre gives the AI amnesia so we still get a lot of confusion. They are so very careful of each other -- it's a charming manual on the importance of respect and consent in a romantic relationship. With a cute feathered predator zipping around their ankles, for added fun. I'm definitely moving onto the next one, as soon as I decide what format to buy it in.

Bookmarks Moved (Or Languished) In:

Ok, I'm only going to put a book in here when I actually try to read it. Or at least actually pick it up and think about reading it. This week I made some progress in:

Sweep of the Heart (Innkeeper Chronicles, #5)

Red Hood, Elana K. Arnold. Cybils finalist. It's in second person and she has a sex life, and I'm feeling really creepy reading it. Yikes!

The Girl From the Sea, Molly Knox Ostertag. Cybils finalist. I think the protagonist is behaving terribly towards her girlfriend, and I'm rooting for the girlfriend to call it off for her own good. The protagonist is very young and it's OK for her to make mistakes, but right now all my sympathy is for the other girl and I really want her to realize she deserves something better.

Live Free or Die, John Ringo. This is The Baen Free Radio Podcast serial, so every week they read a few pages to me. I made it into January! There was an exciting conclusion! I was just thinking it was a good ending, but it turned out to be only part one. I guess that's the risk of a serial; I have no idea what page or percentage I'm at.

Ancestral Night, Elizabeth Bear. I'm listening while I clean the kitchen at night. It took me a while to adjust to the narrator, who is definitely not Elizabeth Bear. But then neither are the book's characters.

Sweep of the Heart, Ilona Andrews. Another Innkeeper story! I'm on chapter 9.

Forging a Nightmare, Patricia A. Jackson. I thought I had lost this, but my son had picked it up because it looked good.

Coyote Dreams, C.E. Murphy. Oops. The library took it back.

Winter Tide, Ruthanna Emyrs. I really am enjoying this.

Terra Nullius, Clare G. Colman. I am going to finish all the book club books from when I was Cybils-ing. This is from Sword and Laser, maybe November?

Forfeit, Dick Francis. Hmm, maybe I should read another Francis while I get up the nerve to read the hard part.

Picture Books / Short Stories:

None.

Palate Cleansers

These books I'm barely reading; lately I use them as bribes to get me to deal with the mail. I've been ignoring my mail.

The Educated Child: A Parents Guide from Preschool Through Eighth Grade

YEAR OF WONDER: Classical Music for Every Day

The Educated Child, William Bennett.

Wool, Hugh Howey. So close to the end!

Dates From Hell, Kim Harrison & others.

50 Great Poets, ed. Milton Crane.

Year of Wonder, Clemency Burton-Hill. OK, I'm doing the day's song, and then jumping back to where I fell behind.

Reading Challenges

Cybils 2021: Finished two more graphic novels!
Early Cybils: Working on Red Hood again. I'm not liking it much, so I also have Heat on hand. And Front Desk was a 2018 finalist, but I read it back then.
Reading My Library. The library had a pipe break and is closed for repairs!
Where Am I Reading 2022. Oregon.
Libraries: 20/55 for the Tacoma Extreme Challenge.