Unintentional blogging break

Well I managed to fall off the face of the blogging earth in recent months. What I intended to be a short hiatus (in an attempt to avoid stumbling across any Harry Potter and Eclipse spoilers) turned into a much longer absence. Still not having read Harry Potter 7 or Eclipse yet, I realized if I waited until I had them both finished it could be a very long time before my re-entry into the blogosphere. In my defense I did complete HP #5 and have #6 at the top of my TBR pile. And Eclipse, well, I enjoyed the first 2 books so much that I keep putting Eclipse aside for when I really want to treat myself. Almost like I don't want to read it too quickly because I don't want it to end too soon. Anyone else do that? Have a book they are dying to read, but for some reason put others before it to prolong the excitement of that book they are so looking forward to? It seems to be a pretty consistent habit of mine.

I am reading Innocent Traitor by Alison Weir now. I have enjoyed the Philippa Gergory books so much that I find myself becoming more and more interested in the history of that time period. Innocent Traitor is equally as excellent as Gregory's books and I look forward to reading more of Weir.

Next on the list is A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. I'm reading this for a book club I belong to and seeing as I am hosting the next meeting, I need to put time aside this weekend to get some reading done! I haven't read The Kite Runner yet, but have heard very good things about both of these novels.

And of course I have to report on our recent trip out west to Boise, ID and Portland, OR - two great cities. To avoid repeating myself I'll link to my other blog's ramblings about the trip. I will mention here though that I finally made it to Powell's and it was everything I fantasized it would be. Heavenly. Sigh...

Other than that, lots of reading, knitting, and running going on here. We've finally broken past the psychological 5 mile barrier and have worked our way up to 6.5 miles. I never thought I would say this but I am starting to love running. Sometimes I feel like I could run forever (on a good day of course - on those bad days, half a mile feels like a chore). Just the idea that we can run for over an hour at a time feels like a huge accomplishment and the longer distances give us more of an opportunity to explore country roads. Next weekend we are aiming for 7 miles. Who knows - maybe that half-marathon is not as unattainable as I thought ;)

I leave you with a picture of some yummy sno-cones we enjoyed while visiting Portland's fabulous Rose Test Garden. Perfect way to end the summer.