Post-Christmas/Pre-New Year's

First off. I didn't post yesterday and I probably should have. I know Christmas is such a rough time for so many of us, myself included, even if I don't talk about it too much.

My Christmas, present wise, was small but very nice and meaningful on the family side of things. I got a new Roku Express 4k and 18..yes, 18! packs of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. I also got finally got a Venus razor and some refills. From Barb and Tom, i got a T-shirt, some new slippers, and Ty Beanie Baby themed flip flops that have kitties on them. I can't really wear the flip flops outside or anything because they are tad bit big. The good news about them is that they do not allow me to walk on my toes, so I will wear them for a few hours a day as part of physical therapy at home.

For the We Be Book'n Christmas Exchange, I got a couple of gifts I wasn't expecting and a couple I was. I got A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas and some punch needle embroidery hoop made of wood.

My newest friend from WBB got my Into the Mist by PC Cast, a book I'd planned to get after the New Year.

We had Bookmas in Brayan's little book club, too. It was a bit of a Secret Santa. Well, sort of. I don't know if you can really call it Secret Santa when you know who's getting your gift. Anyway. Mine giver was Brayan, and he spoiled me this year. He got me not 1, not 2, but 3 books, you guys. I have Husband Material by Alexis Hall (thanks again to Valerie for finding me another amazing LGBTQA+ RomCom series) ,
He also got me two autographed books. The first is Tom Felton's Beyond the Wand. I am beyond (no pun intended) ecstatic about this as over the years, Tom Felton as an actor and young man has become somewhat of a fascination of mine. I may not have liked his character Draco Malfoy for much of the movie franchise but in the end he came around, and Tom did a fantastic job. The second was an autographed copy of Charm, the 5th in the Crave series by Tracy Wolff. This one actually surprised me more. Brayan is almost always full of surprises though, so I should know better than not to expect the unexpected.

The only problem I see happening with the Tom Felton book is that I have a horrid feeling that either Lissa or Valerie might have also gotten me the same book (sans signature). If they did I will have two books. I need to figure out what I will do with them. Valerie suggested (cause she was at the Bookmas celebration) that I keep one as a reading copy, and one as a signed copy. Now, that's actually not a bad idea, and I would have done, except that these are hardcovers, and I still hold that hardcovers stand up better if they are read and reread. and in the case of memoirs, I only ever read once. Now if I had Rob Paulsen's, which I still want to get in print, I'd probably read that one over and over.

I spent most of yesterday setting up my new Roku. The majority of my streaming services managed to stay signed in, miraculously. I was kind of shocked to be honest. But good for me. That is the main thing I hate about setting up new devices that require passwords. Especially when said devices don't have standard keyboards.

then I went through Paramount= again and added a bunch of stuff from Nickelodeon that I didn't know was on</> Paramount+ now. Such as House of Anubis, Hey Dude (a classic from the 90s that I absolutely adored. But not nearly as much as....) Salute Your Shorts! Which is also on there. Almost all the shows from the Snick era are there but Space Cases. and i gotta be honest, I didn't look closely. I gotta see if the Secret World of Alex Mack is on there, too.

I also spent a good portion of the day crocheting. I am working on Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. He is having a bit of a Disney Renaissance right now, and I am so here for that. His long time fans are ecstatic to see him returning to merchandise. I know I am, too,. I've known about Oswald the Lucky Rabbit for a long time, being a hardcore Disney fan, and loving Disney history myself. I've also always felt that Universal did Walt dirty after he left them and should has relinquished the rights to Oswald a very long time ago. But what do I know about copyright law? -shrug- Nothing, really. Especially when it comes to those that pretain to cartoons, and their creators passing.

So for 2023, I have decided it will be a year of much more crafting and much more consumption of stories and and narratives of stories that interest me. Not just fiction, either. I am finding more and memoirs I want to read. I also have become somewhat fascinated with certain true crime cases. So I might explore that interest a bit more. I found an audiobook that was included with my membership that looked really good so I may start with that. I wanna blame 20/20 for that. They have been doing True Crime reports for the last two seasons, and most of them have been really good, and intriguing, so... you never know!!

But my reading plans are easy.

1. Book Club books in any order. (Lissa, Val (SHadowhunter re-read must be resumed) and Brayan's, where books are picked every month/two months)

2. 1 Book of the Month book of my choosing to try and get some read

3. A book of my choosing. It looks like a lot of work, yes, but this is important to me because I have a few goals that pretain to We Be Book'n, too as far as reading.

I will be doing A-Z challenge this year, a lot more seriously. T'm also planning to shock my friends and show up at the next Zoom on Wednesday for an hour or so. I know I told Brayan the other day on the phone that the Zooms actually annoy me when they're too big. Because we end up doing more talking than we do reading, so I feel sometimes they're pointless to call them "Reading Zooms". But. These ladies and gents (When Jay is there), are still considered family, and I need to make a much better effort to be a part of the community that I love so much. :)