It’s been almost two years to the date of being locked down due to COVID.  How many damned times have I had to use those word?

I’m still leery of going without a mask, getting on a plane and many other little things I once took for granted.

Two years is a long time.  A really long time and while I want to believe the world will soon be able to treat COVID-19 and all its cousins as endemic instead of pandemic, I believe we’re in for more.

I’ve watched the world lose its everlovin’ mind.  Please, someone, explain to me how requiring shots and masks for the public good is government overreach.  Explain to me how those who enter the military are required to take a list of shots from A-Z, children entering school are required to get vaccines, and people who travel may be required to get shots in order to be allowed entry, have done all that without batting an eye but absolutely refuse to get another vaccine.  Please explain how covering our mouths to keep our germs from reaching someone else is a bad thing.  And please explain how convoys of trucks think they’re going to make any change in policy designed to keep us healthy while scientists research the best way to fight this thing.  Please.  Anyone?

Explain to me how people think it’s right and proper to invade the US Capital, spread feces on the walls and claim President Joe Biden’s election wasn’t legal and correct.

Now, as I type this, Russia has invaded Ukraine and is lobbing bombs like candy and beads from a Mardi Gras float.

Thankfully, I have been able to continue working.  Thankfully, we’re now work from home permanently.  Thankfully.

All of this, of course, has put a crimp in my writing.  We’ve all lost so much and while my personal losses are more along the lines of, “I thought we had a plan,” instead of people I love dying, I’m still pained by those losses.

It also took a toll on reading.  That was a really big loss.

Around the end of 2021 the realization hit that I really missed being around people who read.   I’d lost my mentor, my editor and contact with anyone who would even notice I always had a book with me.

So, I’m working to resolve a lot of that.  I’m back on LibraryThing with peoples who loves books as much as I do and who go crazy for lists almost like I do.

So far this year, I’ve read 14 books, right on track for 75 or more by the end of the year.  Which is a huge relief to me.  I’m on a book buying diet, no books are purchased unless there’s a necessary, compelling reason.  I laughingly tell people I’m cleaning house one book at a time because I’m reading out of the boxes and boxes of books I already own.

I’ve also been going through said boxes and cataloging, purging and annotating the collection.  That’s been satisfying as well.

Being on LibraryThing has also loosened whatever blocked me from writing reviews.  There will be some changes there too.  My friend Richard turned me on to Nathan Burgoine‘s Three Sentence Review which I’ll be using as starter fuel.  There’s an entire box of books waiting for me to get on with the reviewing already!