I really don't know that I can describe to you just how much I love the library. When I go to a bookstore I walk around slowly, waiting for a title to jump out at me, loving that I'm around so many books, but anxious because I'm going to have to choose. I can't take home all the books; that would be neither financially nor spatially plausible. So I have to decide just which one will fit my mood, which one is worth the money, which one I will want to keep. It's a pleasure, but one with an edge. The library, on the other hand, is heaven. I can walk in and pick up any book that strikes me as even slightly interesting, without thought to money, space, or if I'll even read it. Books light up at the library, drawing my attention and calling for me to bring them home. I don't think it's possible for me to walk out with just one. And I don't have to. I just scan my library card, swipe my books, and walk out. It's like a food kitchen-- have some nourishment and go, nothing asked in return. I love it. I went to the library today to pick up a book I'd reserved; Daniel Handler's newest novel Adverbs. The line at the pick up desk was long, so I decided to walk around a little and browse. By the time I made it to the desk, I'd accumulated 4 other books. Seeing as I'd just returned 5, that brings my total of library books at home waiting to be read to 11. Will I read them all? Probably not. Will the books I got today unfairly skip ahead in line before the books I got last time? In all likelyhood. But that's the way it goes. Would you like to know what's on the pile? Picked up today: Adverbs by Daniel Handler The Vesuvius Club by Mark Gatiss On Michael Jackson by Margo Jefferson Flapper by Joshua Zeitz A Return to Modesty by Wendy Shalit From last time: The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror Cinderella's Sisters: A Revisionist History of Footbinding by Dorothy Ko Groucho Marx, Secret Agent by Ron Goulart The Triumph of Numbers: How Counting Shaped Modern Life by I.B. Cohen The City of Falling Angels by John Berendt Where the Truth Lies by Rupert Holmes The People of Paper by Salvador Plascencia Quite the eclectic mix, don't you think? I'm kind of amazed how many non-fiction books there are there (a full half of the list), I must be in a mood.