A Random Ani Update...

Typically, I would be announcing news and stuff on the weekly 'It's Monday!' meme, if I wanted to be consistent, but seeing as how it's way past Monday, and I haven't posted a thing in over a week, I figure that a random update will just have to do.  And in so doing, I'm also stealing my own 'It's Monday!' meme format, just because I'm lazy enough to do so.

Also, here is a random photo of Baby on our road trip this weekend to start off the post:

Just sunbathin' and enjoying the breeze at a gas station.

Life has been rather busy lately, with family events and lots of social gatherings.  My younger cousin was married this past Saturday, and so we had lots of relatives flying in from different places to celebrate with her.  And since she and her husband live in a different city, about three hours away from home base, all the relatives living in the same town as myself and my immediate family had us a road trip out of town.

Of course, it was quite cold, and my cousin was determined to have her outdoor wedding.  It was beautiful, of course, and the ceremony was rather symbolic, fusing together a little bit of American, a little bit of Chinese, and a little bit of Persian (her groom's side).  I probably would have found it rather interesting if not for the fact that I was so focused on the weather being a bit less than ideal.  I feel kind of bad about that now, but at the time, all I could think of was why anyone would want to have an outdoor wedding in the middle of April when the weather in our region can always change at the drop of a dime.

I sincerely apologize to my cousin.  Your wedding was very beautiful, your dress was beautiful, and the ceremony was inspirational.  The food at the reception was yummy, and apparently the groom's father made all the sweet snacks on the dessert table, including little cookies, little cakes, and baklava.  BAKLAVA!  I love baklava...

Meanwhile, a few hours before we were to arrive at the ceremony, while we were on the way to lunch and hadn't changed into formal wedding-appropriate attire yet, my father realized that he hadn't packed his dress shoes.  As we were NOT going to drive three hours back home to get said dress shoes, the only other options included borrowing a pair of dress shoes from someone, wearing his sneakers with his suit, or making a quick run to the closest retail store for a new pair of shoes.

We went with option C.  I took my parents to the closest DSW where my dad found himself a nice pair of leather dress shoes... and my mom also found herself a new pair of heels to replace the twenty-year old ones she'd been trying to replace for the past few months.  Fun times.

Outside of wedding events, there was also a lot of socializing and eating, wherein my older uncle vowed to try every flavor of Gelato available at an Italian buffet we went to for lunch called Cinzetti's.  I, of course, was immersed in the Creamy Chicken Marsala Pasta, and some chocolate lava cakes.

Road trips make me tired, and sometimes people make me tired as well.  But we still had lots of fun, with the laughing and the talking and the teasing and the eating.  Did I mention the eating?  I feel like we've done NOTHING BUT EAT for the past five days.  Not that I'm complaining, but as much as I love food, sometimes you kind of need a break.

Unfortunately, with all the activity, it all means that I barely had time to read.

I am so, so very behind on all my reads.  And I have two library books that need turning in by the end of this week... one of them Wild Country, which is almost five hundred pages long.  Looks like I've got some catching up to do, as well as some blogging to get to.

What I Read Last Week

Nada...

What I'm Currently Reading

What I'm Planning to Read Next

Other Plans On the Blog

So, yeah, nothing has really changed since my last update on what I'm reading.  I managed to finish reading Mort in the wee hours of this early morning, and now I'm going to get back to Wild Country and try to make a dent in it before I have to turn the book in.  If I'm lucky, I'll have it finished before the weekend is over and not have to wait a few months to check it out again.

I've been enjoying The Scarlet Pimpernel, taking it a couple chapters a day, every few days.  I actually haven't touched the other two books in a while, but plan on getting back to my audio book of Behemoth, and then working on the rest of Furry Logic as I get a chance (yes, I'm very behind, but I definitely DO want to finish reading it).

Hopefully, I'll be able to start the Indigo read soon, and after all of that, I'll just have Dangerous by Amanda Quick, and I Contain Multitudes by Ed Yong to finish up my Reading Assignment for April...  But to be totally honest, I'm more than likely NOT going to make full marks for this month, and one or two of those books probably won't get read.  Since I'm still working slowly on Furry Logic, three guesses as to which book will end up getting axed until next time.

Because one of my auto-buy authors will be publishing a book this month next week... and it's definitely NOT going to just sit there on my Kindle and look pretty, that's for sure.

I've got another review being written that is severely overdue for publishing.  Well... not severely overdue, but it's been long enough since I finished reading the book that the review should have already been posted.  And then a short review for Mort will probably, hopefully, be forthcoming soon.  Otherwise, since I haven't finished any other books since, I don't have any other reviews to post.  And since I'm still working my way slowly through The Scarlet Pimpernel, I don't yet have a new Snakes and Ladders update (Is anyone else still playing?  I feel like I'm in last place.)