Monday, 18 July 2011

One Down, Plus A Quandary

finished "Room" early this morning over breakfast coffee. the Sunday paper had to wait. this afternoon, i started on my next book, "Winter's Bone". progress (on the reading challenge, anyway).

the quandary in the subject line refers to a discussion a friend and i had about what constitutes "read an actual book for 30 minutes a day". should that be 30 minutes straight through or can it be 10 minutes here, 20 minutes there. it came up because, on saturday, i was interrupted by a phone call 10 minutes into my read. i finished up with 20 minutes later. i'm thinking that it counts. the real crux of the challenge here is more along the lines of reading something of substance...i.e., an actual book...versus attaining a zen reading mode for 30 minutes. i got the impression she disagreed. hmmm...

have been doing okay on the organize and purge challenge as well. okay, okay, some of my 'organizing' is actually moving piles of stuff into more centralized and controllable piles, without actually organizing. but that gives me space to do more organizing, so i'm counting it.

the big problem has been the sleep thing. i'm trying to get a full 7 hours of sleep a night, with the add on that, on 'school nights' (sunday-thursday before work days), i get in bed by 11pm. i've been doing okay (with a few misses of 10 minutes or so) with the 11pm bedtime, but finding it hard to stay asleep for 7 hours. it's like my body has gotten used to 5-6 hour nights. but, again, think that's part of the challenge.

and, no, i decided not to pick the Mr. Roger's book referred to in my last post. it just got too technical and confusing, so had to set it aside. oh well...

5 comments:

M L Jassy said...

I'm writing a PhD thesis and I find it hard to read a book for 30 minutes at a time. You are not alone!

Jen White Doom said...

I read every single book in every single Sweet Valley High series while I was writing my PhD dissertation, Mitzi G. Try those... you can finish each one in less than 30 minutes so it is very satisfying! :-)

How did you like Room, Gnu Kid? I think that 30 minutes can be spread out, and I agree with your idea that it is more an attempt to read something of substance. I enjoyed Room quite a bit. What did you think?

bob said...

It's whatever you want it to be!!!!! All depends on what you want to do -- knock out 30 mins a day or try to sit with a book for half an hour at a time? Either way, it's good to be reading.

Haven't read WB, but read how "Tomato Red" a couple months ago and loved it. He's an amazing writer.

Anonymous said...

it's your challenge! do it how you need to! i'm targeting 30 minutes straight -- because i'm working on re-wiring my brain toward better focus... but if your goal is to 'read something of substance', then no need to follow a block of time!

Anonymous said...

I agree with what others have said: depends on what you want to get out of the challenge, not on what anyone else thinks or says.

Sounds like you're doing well!