Calling it Quits: Read-a-thon Failure

One can never determine with certainty whether something is to one’s liking without trying it first. This is why I decided to participate in Dewey’s 24 hour Read-a-thon even though I run with a personal apocryphal version without stating it officially and keeping with the update posts and such. I started at 9.00 am and seven hours later I called it quits and watched “9”.

My focus is non-existent. I see something shiny, hear something catchy and I forget what I am supposed to be doing and dedicating full attention to the shiny thing. Then there is the fact that I bore easily and when those two amazingly unhelpful qualities mix together you get a much unmotivated reader. From practice I know that two hours is as much I am physically able to provide for reading, but it never hurts trying.

However there is that matter of external forces at work that kept me from chugging in more pages for the seven hours I was struggling. Despite me generously giving computer access to my small sister on a weekend, she preferred to use me as a climbing facility and ask how far I am and how stupid this was etc. etc. etc. Apart from that my grandfather decided to use me as a custom searcher for spare parts in the local area and the cherry on top of the cake were the household chores. Around the 7th hour I got a major headache and no reading is possible. So here is the breakdown:

Dunraven Road: 248 pages – I managed to finished that the very least. It was dark and I kinda liked it. Certainly of the more realistic and modern gothic vampire fiction.

Flesh and Fire: 50 pages – I decided that this book is simply too amazing and totally undeserving to be devoured in one sitting, but enjoyed in small sips like wine.

Frankenstein: 50 pages – I was just getting into the story, when the headache struck. Damn it and it was just getting good. I love the language and phrasing. Pure music.

So I didn’t carry on with this properly, but if you would look at the sum of all pages you will see that I pushed my reading with a whole week’s worth, if we take into account that Halloween Week will be the Busy Week of Hell academically as well as creatively. This Saturday has been productive after all, but count me out for next time.