Pet Peeves

You're still doing better then me Urs. Around here you bring up the fact you write and more often then not you'll hear something like "I don't read" or "why read when they make all the good books into movies". Hell, I have had people in my neighborhood stop their cars when they see me standing down at my daughter's school bus stop reading while I wait for her and ask me why I read so much. I hate to paint all Southerners as illiterate, not the least of which because I'm a Southerner myself, but damn if some of these people aren't working really hard to live up to the stereotype.

HYdraMStar wrote:

"why read when they make all the good books into movies".

I have no idea why I found this so funny, but I did.

I had a dead-end job working parking garage booths, and I would read CONSTANTLY. I could not believe the amount of questions like, "What are you reading? Is it good?" that I got. Mostly from Hispanics. In fact, probably all from Hispanics, now that I think about it.

Most of them asked if I was reading the Bible. Gotta love Catholics haha.

It's both amusing and extremely sad at the same time to think that some of these people have never read a book for personal pleasure in their entire lives. I started reading at like 2 years old, and was heavily into it by kindergarten. Of course, I was weird and I don't expect everyone to do that, but WOW, read a book now and again!

It's the best therapy (well, that and chess) that I have ever found for a cluttered brain.

So, yea, the Why do you read so much? crowd thoroughly irks me as well. In fact, it got to the point where I was answering that question with numbers. Seriously. I became a local celebrity for it, and everyone started doing it, once they figured out what I was doing (which was avoiding the question entirely).

Worker bee: Hey! Why are you reading every time I see you?

Me: 47.

Worker bee: Wha? (giggles).

Me. 534.

Worker bee: Oh, ok.

wonder if they thought were some rain-man or guy with plans to break Vegas.

You got to tell you did this every happen while reading any of Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide novels, because that would have just been too good.

I find the biggest problem with reading is the promoted concept of: getting away for a nice quiet period. Me, and most people, truthfully seldom have a nice quiet period. Reading thus becomes something that most "would ike to do." I know many people that would read, IF "they only had the time."

I read while at at red lights. Sitting there like some doofus waiting for a machine to run a timer is not how I want to spend my life. I thus pick up and read a paragraph. As many stop lights as we have in our town, I can sometimes read a whole chapter going to the store. I will also bring a book when I go to the bank, pay bills, or dealing with any business (besides simple shopping). I hate to simply sit and wait, but a book makes me feel that the time is well spent (as well as passes faster).

That is what we need to promote. Not just reading, but filling the holes in one's day with reading. A book is not something to "get away and do," but something to make one's life complete.

ok... that is sooooooo going on my list of things to try... reading while waiting in line