This day I confirmed that I have not the power to resist food when it’s free and it’s dessert. It is a bad tendency that must be curbed. I have a waistline to trim and I’ve got a bet to win.
This day I dared another in exchange of a caffeinated drink. He took the dare. I have to shell out the money but I have yet to see if I really did get the better end of the bargain.
This day I learned a French word, ironed out two idioms and read a law on history and culture. These do not make me smarter but I take delight in knowing useless information.
This day I persistently persuaded another to do something outside regular affairs. My persuasion failed but my persistence earned me a compromise and it wasn’t a long walk I earned.
I haven’t gotten around to finish The Time of the Uprooted by Elie Wiesel mainly due to my preference to save that book for one straight reading. What I’ve managed to finish, as of last Tuesday, January’s end, is the novel Next by Michael Crichton.
I bought the book during one of those instances of I-am-in-the-National-Bookstore-and-I-MUST-buy-something-whatever-that-something-is. It was on sale for only Php35.00 (or was it Php45.00). I would have taken it immediately as a sign that the book must be so bad that the bookstore wants to get rid of it. But I found Next side by sight Night, which is the more famous work of Elie Wiesel. And even if I already have a copy of Night (the one with the preface of Robert McAfee Brown), I immediately bought the book of sale (the one with the preface by Elie and translated by his wife Marion). Thinking that I’ve got a good bargain with my Night, I didn’t mind taking another book to the counter, which was Next.
Next is one of those books that is difficult to put down once read due to the intriguing nature of the plot. It’s an easy read but there are too many characters in the novel that I wasn’t able to find a hero/ine to root for, not even the character (can’t even remember his name) who had a transgenic kid. In the end, you hold on to it just to know how things will turn out. Some of the stories are just too outrageous, even if this may just be me speaking too soon. It’s a far cry from the Jurassic Park novel but it’s an interesting peek of the wicked possibilities. It’s generally entertaining though not brilliant.
So for my a-book-a-week endeavour, it’s 1 down and 51 more to go for 2012!
