Yellow Wallpaper

I just did a search through old blog posts and discovered that my favorite word to use in describing posts that contain a number of unrelated ideas is "random". I have a number of posts titled things like "random brain dump" or "random stuff". I used to blog a lot more about focused, specific things. Apparently I don't have opinions anymore about anything and am now just using the blog as a public journal to keep track of what's been happening in my life. I think part of the problem is the fact that I don't have a lot of time to sit and think about stuff, I don't have a lot of time to write it out, and some of the stuff I have opinions about has to do with sensitive things like my job and my divorce that I don't want to talk about publicly. Well, things change, and I guess after nearly 8 1/2 years of blogging I should be happy that I still have a few friends out there reading what I write.  The last two weeks have been normal--busy, t

The first week of February went surprisingly well. The weather has been cold and either snowy or rainy, which I actually like since it clears out the air and makes winter a little more normal. Last Saturday night I took S-Boogie to see the ballet Swan Lake on campus; I've never gone to a ballet other than The Nutcracker so it was an interesting, new experience. I really liked enjoyed the performance a lot, though S-Boogie was a bit tired by the end and wasn't sure if she had fun or not. Monday was P. Bibby's birthday--I feel like the last four years have flown by, despite the fact that life is so different from how I imagined it would be back then. We started celebrating on Sunday with a family party that evening. I also invited the kids' summertime nanny since she is one of P. Bibby's favorite people. The party went well and she got a lot of great presents that she's been playing with all week. My attempt at making homemade pizza for dinner was an unfortuna

The Flight of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesey I've read Jane Eyre more than once and have never quite loved it or understood why so many people like it. The romance between Jane and Rochester is particularly odd to me--the paternalistic nature of it and their differences in age and maturity turn me off. This book is a somewhat loose retelling of Jane Eyre set in Scotland during the 1950s and 60s. As an adaptation I thought it worked fairly well, especially since it did not completely adhere to the book (especially in the end), and I liked Gemma more than I ever liked Jane. My only problem with it was that the romance ended up seeming even more creepy and weird in the updated, more modern version. The House at Rose Creek by Jenny Proctor  I was surprised that this book ended up in the general fiction category rather than the romance category, since I had it pegged as a romance. However, it is also the story of a woman's self-discoveries, personal change, and conversion t