I am now entering year three of Tackling the TBR. Slowly but surely I have made big strides in getting by TBR under control. When I first started in 2019, my TBR was topping out at over 5,000 books. I don't know that I will ever get below 500, but a #BookDragon can dream!
I will be posting on the 7th, 14th, 21st, and the last day of the month. Feel free to join in if you'd like!
Previous Week's TBR Total: 2,919
Currently Reading
Books Added to TBR: 0
Books Removed from TBR:
Books Read
Books DNF-ed: 0
Duplicates Removed: 0
New TBR Total: 2,919
Any of these catch your eye? Have you already read any? Let me know!
Happy Reading!
Sarah
Happy Blogger Apocalypse Day! Isn't it fun????
ReplyDeleteSeriously though- i see several here I'd like to read.
OMG, right?? I was freaking out. Did you get emails this morning saying that your posts were reinstated? I did, whew. Hopefully everything you lost can be restored.
DeleteI did get those emails. Although the links they give go nowhere, but I see they're back in my Drafts so I can re- post them. Gah.
DeleteWhat a clusterfuck this night was, right?? I am glad to hear your posts were there! The links were all pointless, because the ones they sent me went nowhere as well. Everything was back in drafts. Whew!
DeleteIt looks like you have room for some more thrillers...
ReplyDelete...Which I am sure is exactly what I will find when I visit you here in a bit :P
DeleteLooking forward to your review about Amsterdam. Have you ever been there? As you might know, my son lives there.
ReplyDeleteYes, I remember you mentioning that!
DeleteI have both fortunately and unfortunately been to Amsterdam.
Fortunately because we were able to visit the Anne Frank House and I was able to stand in those rooms, look at her journal, and bawl my eyes out at the utter cruelty and horror of it all. I have never been so humbled before and I absolutely cherish the memories I have.
The unfortunate part is that we were stranded in Amsterdam an extra week beyond what we intended and lived at the airport for 12 hours a day until we finally were able to get home. It was literally up early with our luggage, wait for the shuttle to get to the airport, run from gate to gate for 12 hours hoping to board, then getting back on the shuttle at the end of the night with our luggage to go back to the hotel.
Our main destination was Ireland. My mom, cousin, and I flew on Buddy passes because my uncle works for Delta. We chose to fly into Amsterdam because we wanted to see the Anne Frank House, and they had several Delta flights in and out each day as opposed to only one a day in Dublin. Getting to Amsterdam was no problem and we were upgraded to first class.
Getting home was another story entirely. It turned out that on the weekend we were trying to get home, it was the last weekend before school started and also the construction workers' holiday. This made it the third busiest weekend in the history of Schiphol and if I ever see that damned airport again I will scream. Because we were traveling on Buddy passes, we got last priority on flights. My cousin would have had a higher status, since it was her dad who worked for Delta, and my mom and I had a lower status because we were not immediate family so as long as she was travelling with us, her status was bumped down too. My uncle started listing us on ANY flight out of Amsterdam, just so we could get back to the US and travel from there, but no luck. We could not even get into the massive Delta hub in Atlanta.
My cousin ditched us on the sixth day and got right on a flight home. That night my grandparents bought two round-trip tickets for my mom and I on another airline (cheaper to do round-trip than one-way) and we landed in New Jersey the following afternoon where I was taunted with the skyline of Manhattan but no time to explore as we made our way to our connecting flight home.
The good in this is that I bonded with other travelers in the same situation and we still chat to this day even nearly 12 years later. I loved the city itself but when I go back, it will be by train from some other point in Europe!
Oh no! What a nightmare! My son didn't have a good experience with Schiphol, either, they both might use it again, though, because one of them lives there. But no, Amsterdam ist not my favourite city in the world. Granted, they have some great museums but all in all, I would never go there again if my son didn't live there. And there are so many great cities in Europe, visit them all before returning there.
ReplyDeleteIt was an absolute nightmare! But I am incredibly thankful for the amazing time we had in Ireland prior to being stranded, and with the chance we had to see the Anne Frank museum. I really liked the city itself most of the time and enjoyed how relaxed and comfortable parts of it felt. Other parts, though, felt menacing even in the bright afternoon sunshine and there truly were times where my stomach was in knots and I never figured out why.
DeleteYou are right, partly the city has some nice areas and I know every larger city also has its bad ones but I know exactly what you mean when you say it felt menacing. It's the whole atmosphere. No, I don't really warm to Amsterdam, either.
DeleteAlmost felt like a completely different city from certain blocks to others. I'd like to show Eleanor the Anne Frank House and that's it.
DeleteThat's true. I hope you can make it one day. We might even be able to meet!
DeleteThat would be wonderful!
Delete😘
DeleteMy goal for visiting Germany is to see the places where my family came from. I have to get this information from my grandpa; some of his siblings have traced our German family line back to the 16 or 1700s. I want to see Berlin, and dip down into Austria at some point also. I also want to see the Bavarian Alps - I love the mountains so much, they are so soothing. Poland is also a must. I have to see Auschwitz and bear witness. I can't be that close to Hungary (Budapest especially), and Romania without visiting sites there - Vlad Dracul is an endless source of fascination.
DeleteThat's what most Americans want, visit the places of their ancestors. Do you have an idea where exactly they are from? You can send me an e-mail with the names if you don't want to write it here.
DeleteBerlin is definitely worth visiting. My favourite large city is Hamburg.
My travel-mad son has seen Auschwitz. And Budapest is his favourite citz ever. So, you're in for a treat.
I will ask my grandpa or one of his sisters what cities they've traced back to and let you know.
DeleteThere are many German cities I want to see - Berlin, Hamburg, Dresden, Munich, Frankfurt, Cologne, Leipzig, Nuremberg, Heidelberg, Stuttgart, Dusseldorf...I could go on. Basically I want to see everything in all of Germany, forever and ever.
I have been OBSESSED with Budapest for a long time, I can not wait to visit some day.
Send me your address and I'll send you some picture postcards. My e-mail address is in my blog under my profile.
DeleteWill do, thank you! Right now I am trying to finally get all caught up on comments and queue up new posts now that Eleanor and I are back home, there's so much to do!
DeleteOh, I can imagine. You must be completely exhausted. Take your time. And relax.
DeleteThank you! Eleanor will be with her dad for the next six days now, unfortunately. It is his summer vacation parenting time. I plan to sleep a lot to recover from last week, then get reviews done, and maybe even some new designs for the blog. But first, lots of sleep!
DeleteTry to enjoy your "alone time". I'm sure it won't be great, I know I would have hated it but I hope you can have some quality activities after you slept off your stressful week.
DeleteThank you! It is very weird to have the house quiet for so long. But sleeping, reading, and blogging make the time go by quickly so pretty soon I will be picking her up. That's what I keep telling myself anyway!
DeleteGood girl.
DeleteIt's the best thing I can do to avoid climbing the walls!
DeleteI know. I did that for twenty years and it helped me through some very, very tough times.
DeleteAnd to top it off, our power went out around midnight Saturday and didn't come back on for 18 hours. There are still about 46,000 people without power still today. Bad thunderstorm came through with hurricane-strength winds. The whole area looks like a war zone.
DeleteOh my goodness, that sounds like a nightmare. We hardly ever have power outings. I remember one that lasted 11 hours and that was bad enough. Usually, we don't have any.
DeleteThe storm was not unexpected, but the hurricane force winds were. It's the worst outage since the power company has been in operation. As of right now, it is down to about 10,000 without power which is great progress, considering the total was about 191,000 on Saturday. Those who still have no power, it is mainly due to needing to get the trees removed from the power lines in order to make repairs. The other issue is that for many of the remaining people, the damage was to their homes where the power was ripped away, not the other way around. In those instances the power company can't fix it, an electrician has to because it is private property. Some people make still be without power on Friday. Massive trees have been ripped out of the ground, fences are completely blown away, cars damaged from trees falling on them, the works; there's so much damage.
DeleteWe are going through some bad storms over here, as well. Our area isn't affected but many further South are. Quite unusual, we never had anything like that. But, as you well know, "climate change doesn't exist". 😉
ReplyDeleteYep, it is all made up and not real and scientists don't know anything, lol
DeleteNo, they just got drunk all those year at university and now try to tell people they know better. ;)
DeleteLos Angeles County in California is requiring masks once again even for people who have been vaccinated. Today the sheriff said he would not use resources to enforce the mandate because it is not 'backed by science'...
DeleteThey haven't stopped wearing masks here. Everyone still has to wear them which makes me even madder at all those who don't want the vaccination because it's mainly for them we still have to wear them. I find it very hard, can't breathe as easily as without. But what do we want to do?
DeleteThere's tons of idiots here who never wore them, so that was great. And now everyone is just running around without masks, vaccinated or not. Yet people seem to forget that there are kids who can not be vaccinated yet, so maybe be a little more cautious? I still always wear a mask whenever I got out, whether Eleanor is with me or not. I am not putting her at risk.
DeleteIf you didn't wear them here in the shops, you were thrown out but many would not wear them properly. There are also adults with a health condition who cannot be vaccinated and we got our jabs for them, as well. I can't wait for the day when we don't need the masks anymore but as long as we do, I will wear them.
DeleteUnfortunately I live in a state that is super Republican (though my city is much more evenly balanced), so some people just never wore masks and were stupid. I don't understand the utter selfishness of people who both refuse the vaccine AND to wear a mask. Like, okay, you don't want the vaccine but cover your face at least, do SOMETHING helpful.
DeleteThat's because they don't want to believe that the scientists are correct. And they want to accuse the "bad Democrats" that they limit their freedom. It's the same with those idiots here. Plus, we have elections in September, so the politicans really take advantage of that.
DeleteThey seem to forget that I and my daughter have the freedom to NOT DIE from their stupidity. It's ridiculous. I hate living here sometimes. Being an American is embarrassing.
DeleteThere are idiots in all countries. Your recent last president gave them all a great platform. We have seen more stupid people during Covid than we ever thought would be around but they are. So, don't worry about being American, stay the way you are and show people that there are also decent people in your country. I have many during my lifetime and most of them were really nice and clear-thinking, it's just that the idiots stand out.
DeleteMeant last, had typed recent first and then thought that would be confusing. Sorry.
DeleteThat is true, the idiots do stand out quite a bit because they are the loudest and know the least!
DeleteI didn't even notice!
DeleteMy parents always said, if you get loud, you are in the wrong. I think todays' politics show that they were right. Look at the voice of that stupid nazi leader AH. And your last president.
DeleteAbsolutely. On both counts.
Delete