I laughed, I cried, I deprived myself of sleep.
At last, I'm slo-o-o-owly beginning to surface from the deep shimmering pool that is new-Harry-Potter-book obsession. Actually, it's happening much more quickly than I expected it to, considering this is also LAST-Harry-Potter-book obsession. Normally I'm kind of thrown into a bemused funk for a few days, but I was pleased enough (read: radiantly happy) with the end to the series, even in spite of the inevitable "Whaddya MEAN it's over?!" that I've managed to pull through much better than usual. But enough about that--no actual spoilers, I promise.
Allen and I have traditionally pre-ordered two of each new HP book because, as I believe I've mentioned, those we usually don't share so good. This time, though, we only pre-ordered one from the Red Balloon Bookstore, where we were going to be attending the release party, and ordered the other from Amazon, to be delivered with the Saturday afternoon mail. We figured on just reading the first copy aloud together until the second one arrived. Instead, it ended up being so much more fun to read them aloud that we completely ignored the second one when it turned up in the mailbox, and just kept reading aloud all weekend. Turns out it's way better to find stuff out at the same time as each other, and to be able to speculate and guess things together, too; I just wish we'd done it this way for all the other books. We stayed up reading every night as late as we could manage, reading in bed till we fell asleep, then picking the book up again the next morning before we'd even stepped out of bed. Made for a pretty terrific weekend. We finished it at 3:30 on, well, technically Monday morning, and yes, although I was awake thinking about it till 4:30, long after Allen had fallen asleep, I still managed to get up at 6:00 and get me and my hour-and-a-half of sleep to work. (That's the Law of Being Up Late on a School Night, you know: 6-8 hours=adequate sleep, 3-5 hours=sheer hell, 1-2 hours=a refreshing nap.) I even had a voice left--and, after approximately 19.5 hours of reading aloud within a 36-hour period, I think that's pretty good.
On a quite different topic, I've got something a bit frightening coming up, here. One of my college roommates has started performing her original songs at coffeeshops again, something she hasn't done since college. (That's not the scary part.) She's had it in mind to get me and my violin involved with her music for quite a while--I actually remember her talking about it our senior year--and yep, she's finally reeled me in. So she and I and her guitarist (she CAN play guitar, but prefers just to sing if there's somebody else there to do it for her) are performing tomorrow night at a coffeehouse in Uptown. Aaaaand I'm only minorly freaked-out. So far. Pretty much the whole audience will be comprised of her church friends, so I'm not all that worried about that, and the rehearsals have been going very well--but I have been known to get a wee touch of stage fright. Even though I'm normally not literally on a stage. Which I will be, tomorrow night. I suppose it's dumb to be more frightened of my stage fright than of the actual performance, but there you are.
I only play on five songs, but I improvise at least a little on every one of them, which, though it's turned out to be easier than I'd expected it to be, is still scary. Part of me just wants it to be over with--but then, part of me knows I'll probably be right there playing with them again next time. Guess we'll see how it goes.
Also, last week I finally finished the wedding scrapbook that I began more than a year ago for my friend who got married in Mexico last summer. I gave it to her at the HP release party, and it reduced her to tears (mostly, I'm guessing, because it was late and she was exhausted, but still, it made me feel good--and bad). And then later in the weekend I realized I hadn't taken pictures of a single one of the pages. Oops.
**Edit: And I'm sorry if that icon gives you a headache. It's sort of giving me one. But I had to use it.
Allen and I have traditionally pre-ordered two of each new HP book because, as I believe I've mentioned, those we usually don't share so good. This time, though, we only pre-ordered one from the Red Balloon Bookstore, where we were going to be attending the release party, and ordered the other from Amazon, to be delivered with the Saturday afternoon mail. We figured on just reading the first copy aloud together until the second one arrived. Instead, it ended up being so much more fun to read them aloud that we completely ignored the second one when it turned up in the mailbox, and just kept reading aloud all weekend. Turns out it's way better to find stuff out at the same time as each other, and to be able to speculate and guess things together, too; I just wish we'd done it this way for all the other books. We stayed up reading every night as late as we could manage, reading in bed till we fell asleep, then picking the book up again the next morning before we'd even stepped out of bed. Made for a pretty terrific weekend. We finished it at 3:30 on, well, technically Monday morning, and yes, although I was awake thinking about it till 4:30, long after Allen had fallen asleep, I still managed to get up at 6:00 and get me and my hour-and-a-half of sleep to work. (That's the Law of Being Up Late on a School Night, you know: 6-8 hours=adequate sleep, 3-5 hours=sheer hell, 1-2 hours=a refreshing nap.) I even had a voice left--and, after approximately 19.5 hours of reading aloud within a 36-hour period, I think that's pretty good.
On a quite different topic, I've got something a bit frightening coming up, here. One of my college roommates has started performing her original songs at coffeeshops again, something she hasn't done since college. (That's not the scary part.) She's had it in mind to get me and my violin involved with her music for quite a while--I actually remember her talking about it our senior year--and yep, she's finally reeled me in. So she and I and her guitarist (she CAN play guitar, but prefers just to sing if there's somebody else there to do it for her) are performing tomorrow night at a coffeehouse in Uptown. Aaaaand I'm only minorly freaked-out. So far. Pretty much the whole audience will be comprised of her church friends, so I'm not all that worried about that, and the rehearsals have been going very well--but I have been known to get a wee touch of stage fright. Even though I'm normally not literally on a stage. Which I will be, tomorrow night. I suppose it's dumb to be more frightened of my stage fright than of the actual performance, but there you are.
I only play on five songs, but I improvise at least a little on every one of them, which, though it's turned out to be easier than I'd expected it to be, is still scary. Part of me just wants it to be over with--but then, part of me knows I'll probably be right there playing with them again next time. Guess we'll see how it goes.
Also, last week I finally finished the wedding scrapbook that I began more than a year ago for my friend who got married in Mexico last summer. I gave it to her at the HP release party, and it reduced her to tears (mostly, I'm guessing, because it was late and she was exhausted, but still, it made me feel good--and bad). And then later in the weekend I realized I hadn't taken pictures of a single one of the pages. Oops.
**Edit: And I'm sorry if that icon gives you a headache. It's sort of giving me one. But I had to use it.