Ramblings on libraries and life upon the wicked stage

Well, it seems I need to blow the dust off the Singing Librarian, doesn’t it?  So very many weeks have passed since my last blog entry, and although much has happened, the world of the wonderful web knows nothing of it.  There are an assortment of reasons for the deathly silence that has hung around this little corner of cyber-space, chief among them my house move.  We didn’t have enough live power sockets to run my PC at first, and then it objected to having been neglected and went on strike.  I got it back from the lovely computer fixing people today, fought the urge to hug and kiss it, and have now got it up and running in my new room which is so very close to the city’s majestic cathedral.

This last weekend was a particularly busy one and should furnish me with sufficient material for at least three blog posts, I should think.  But first I shall return to that ‘To Do List’ which I wrote back in the mists of time.

Answer Reed’s questions.  I did that in the very next post, which allowed me to feel as though the completion of my list was a very real possibility.

Move house.  I did that too,  just over two weeks ago, and it’s wonderful to be here.  OK, so we still lack functioning lights in the kitchen, we have more loose floorboards than you could shake a whole bundle of sticks at, the television aerial cabling hasn’t been done and the hot water likes to take its time in the morning, but it’s wonderful.  It’s our house, big and old with a strange and new bit at the back.  We can see the cathedral from the front windows, and the cat has enjoyed a couple of wonderful adventures exploring the world beneath the floorboards on two different floors.  The four human inhabitants of the building have refrained from physical violence thus far as well (apart from the authorised use of force against stud walls and rubbish plastering jobs), which is encouraging.

Read.  Another mission accomplished.  Wonderful.  Both the accomplishment and the books.  I enjoyed all three of the books mentioned and would commend them to others.  I am now obsessively checking to see when the normal paperbacks of the sequels to The Lies of Locke Lamora and The Night Watch will appear.  I am tempted by the current trade paperback editions, but that would look untidy on my shelves, which just wouldn’t do.  In order of reading, my one sentence reviews.  The Moonstone is a masterpiece of plotting with some very funny characters, even if some of the details of the ending can be seen coming from a very long way off.  The Lies of Locke Lamora does an incredible job of world-building with an intriguing setting, and another exciting plot, though I felt the violence was sometimes more than a tad gratuitous.  The Night Watch is utterly compelling in its reinvention of the supernatural, combining it with elements of the police procedural and espionage thriller.  My most recent read was The Alchemist, which I can sum up in two words: don’t bother.  It is short, though.

Sing.  Ah.  Well.  I did start to learn both ‘King of the World’ and ‘Serenade’ and can do chunks of them sans sheet music, but I haven’t completed the task and I didn’t even start on the other two. 

Relax.  I actually feel very relaxed most of the time these days, actually, which makes a pleasant change.  The Library of Doom tends to rob me of the relaxation, but it soon comes back.  And this without fulfilling my promise to self.  I never did manage a day in the country or by the sea, though I did go on a remarkably pleasant walk around Bishopsbourne in a ludicrously picturesque bit of the county.

So there we go.  The Singing Librarian is alive and capable of stringing sentences together.  He did reasonably well at his summer ‘To Do List’ as well.  Who knows, another blog entry or two may appear by the end of the month as well!