Bookworming v2011

The man who does not read good books has
no advantage over the man who can’t read them.

–  Mark Twain

Absolutely true.  I hold the above quote close to my heart and it is mostly upon a loose sort of conviction that I choose my reads.  This post will be continuously updated right up till the last day of 2011.  I am hoping my 2011 list will look much healthier than 2010′s.

The list of books read in 2011 are:

1. Twilight, Stephenie Meyer
2. New Moon, Stephenie Meyer
3. Eclipse, Stephenie Meyer
4. Breaking Dawn, Stephenie Meyer
5. The Faraway Tree series, Enid Blyton
6. Heidi, Johanna Spyri
7. Pride & Prejudice, Jane Austen
8. Heaven is for Real, Todd Burpo with Lynn Vincent
9. Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
10. Norwegian Wood, Haruki Murakami
11. The Missing Rose, Serdar Ozkan
12. Be the Pack Leader, Cesar Millan
13. Poirot Four Classic Cases, Agatha Christie
14. The Gift of Fear, Gavin de Becker
15. Cinderella, Henry W. Hewet
16. The Shadow of the Wind, Carlos Ruiz Zafón (reading)
17. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth (reading)
18. The Time Traveler’s Wife, Audrey Niffenegger (reading)
19. Light of the World, Pope Benedict XVI (reading)
20. The Three Musketeers, Alexandre Dumas (reading)
21. Dream Psychology Psychoanaysis for Beginners, Sigmund Freud (reading)
22. The Hunchback of Notre-Dame, Victor Hugo – planned
23. Twenty Years After, Alexander Dumas – planned
24. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape, Peter Hedges – planned
25. The Great Gatsby, Scott Fitzgerald – planned
26. Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie – planned
27. A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens – planned
28. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass, Lewis Carroll – planned
29. Belief in God: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, T.J. Mawson – planned

Need to bring this post up before it gets buried.  I am making terrible progress and I am re-reading some children’s classics on my kindle, for example Cinderella.  Time to catch up, and hopefully the kindle will help!

2011 in Review

And today, my dear friends, is the final day of the 2011 Daily Post Challenge.  Exactly a year ago, I made the commitment to post every single day.  And today, I am proud to announce that I have completed my part of the pact.  And a total of 387 posts to boot!

It hasn’t been smooth sailing throughout.  In fact, there have been several occasions where I almost wanted to throw in the white towel.  It’s not easy to stay on this commitment, and I’m not sure if I want to commit myself again for 2012.  Perhaps not, considering how horrible some of my posts were.  You know, I would rather not blog when I don’t feel inspired.

Since the topic is about 2011 in Review on c a d e n c i e s, here’s some of the more notable blog posts:

The Busiest Day – on 4 April 2011 with Weekly Photo Challenge: Light.  It actually came as a surprise to me that this post would end up contributing to the busiest day on my blog because it was a very unassuming post and I wasn’t even trying to impress.  Perhaps this is a sign that I should not try too hard.

Post with Most Comments - The Need.  I think this was the first (and maybe only) time I whined about daily blogging on the blog, and the influx of comments (not that many, actually) encouraging me was so touching I swore never to whine about it again.

Post Most Favourited - it’s a tie between Weekly Photo Challenge: Sunset and Weekly Photo Challenge: Possibility.  Incidentally both posts are photo-centric.  Only goes to show that I take better pictures than write.  That is not to say that I take awesome pictures.  Still a long way to go.

My Favourite Post – this took a while because I went through all my posts in detail before deciding on my favourite.  And with the internet connection I’m getting here in Prague… I could have finished applying several facial masks and then some.  At this point, the honour goes to Redefine Perfectionism.

My Favourite Post on Sugar – has to be Sugar and Spice.  This post always brings a smile to my face whenever I read it.

Most Meaningful Post –  it’s a tie between Reaching for the Stars and No Problem Too Big.  The former because it is a philosophy I live by and the latter because I try to remember these quotes when things are not going the way I wish they would.

Funniest Post – A ‘Knight’ in Distress.  It was a really funny incident.  Even funnier coming home to two dogs who were not locked in behaving like they were the ones being locked in.

My Favourite Childhood Story - definitely Life Lessons from Daddy.  I love my cool Daddy, but only when he isn’t nagging at me.

My Favourite Series – definitely my series of childhood stories.  Being a mischievous child as I was, I have no lack of stories to share.  Just need to sit down quietly and organise some of the stories in my head.

The Series I Would Like to Pay More Attention to – air traffic control.  I think this topic fascinates a lot of readers.  And I actually enjoyed recounting some of the past experiences I had as a controller.

Series of Posts that Died a Natural Death – plantarium.  They just kind of died from neglect (my bad, I know but I did say that I do not have a green thumb).  I only hope those that I gifted the kit to had better luck with their projects.

Personally, many things happened in 2011 – I got myself baptised as a Roman Catholic, left my job in May for a year, lost Sugar, survived 2 months without the hubby and travelled on my own.  Some of them were significant milestones I thought I could never achieve, but I did.  However, I did not manage to get this blog profiled on Freshly Pressed.  Yup, that was like my secret wish because getting Freshly Pressed is like getting a stamp of endorsement that my blog is worth something.  Then again, I also worried about not being able to handle the attention should that happen.  ’Everything happens for a reason’ or rather in this case… ‘did not happen for a reason’.  I guess I’m not ready and it shows in the posts.

I was totally being myself on this blog – bimbotic, erratic, neurotic and eccentric – although I have to admit that towards the earlier part of the year, I tried to suppress some of those characteristics.  Oh, but once the tedium of daily blogging set in, my true colors emerged, didn’t they?

Thank you, my dear friends, old and new, for being with me throughout the past year.  And to my blogging buddies, I have this much to say… We did it!

Unfortunately, I don’t think I am up to another year of daily blogging.  Yet weekly blogging is not frequent enough for my liking, so I am finding middle ground – how about twice weekly or more?