Weekly Wrap-up + My reading mojo is back!!! | August 9, 2020

Exams are over, yay!!! I’m so glad I can FINALLY move on with my life. I didn’t realize how much headspace the exams were taking up until I crashed and slept for the rest of the day, right after I submitted my last exam. It felt soooo luxurious to do that, especially since I’ve been waking up at odd hours over the past few weeks due to anxiety.

In other news, MY READING MOJO IS BACK!!! Just this weekend, I finished two of the books I’ve been struggling to get through for the entire July, plus I picked up Tender Is the Flesh by Agustina Bazterrica on a whim (which I first learned about through Callum’s review) and finished that, too. For some reason, I’ve been in a dystopian mood—fitting given my country’s political climate, lol.

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Books Read This Week

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Books I’m Currently Reading

Today, I’ll be starting the second book in Butler’s Earthseed series, Parable of the Talents. Melanie @ Grab the Lapels is saying this is much darker than the first book, so I can’t wait to see what Butler has in store.

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Books Added to My TBR

So I added a bunch of books to my TBR this weekend, inspired by Fatma’s post on Books Translated from the Japanese, Callum’s post on Women in Translation, and Emily’s post on the Booker Prize 2020 Longlist. Check out their posts for more recs!

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Yet Another Weekly Update… | July 19, 2020

Hello hello hello! I hope you’re all doing well! Please bear with me as I continue to churn out these weekly updates instead of reviews and am more delayed than usual in blog-hopping and responding to comments—it feels like something is always coming up to mess with my blogging and reading juju. My exams are also very close (the first half is NEXT SATURDAY AAAH) so I’ve decided to give myself after exams to get back to reading and blogging.

Some good news: I’m feeling much better than I was last week! After cutting out the food that I suspect has been causing my hyperacidity and bloating, my pains have been becoming less frequent and less severe. Plus, now that the worst of caffeine withdrawal is over, I find that my sleep is also getting better—I don’t even need an alarm to wake up now, when before I used to set three alarms (and snooze every one… lol).

Also, today, after I complained to a friend of my caffeine withdrawal, she sent over samples of her tea collection for me to try. She even taped the instructions on the bottles, since she knows I’m an ignoramus when it comes to tea. I was so touched! I might not be a tea person but this is the perfect time to get into it. She especially recommends something called Phoenix Oolong Tea, which she got from her visit to Shanghai.

So much tea! And a wild pack of Golden Oreos on the side. My brother and I are fans.

Also, Melanie @ Grab the Lapels and I will be buddy-reading Butler’s Parable of the Sower, so I’m slowly making my way through it. A number of reviewers on Goodreads have commented on how the theological aspects of the novel weren’t to their liking, since the protagonist here also tries to form her own notions of God, but surprisingly I’m finding it one of the more fascinating parts so far. I think it’s rather audacious to try to reformulate the Judeo-Christian tradition from your own perspective, and I admire the protagonist’s guts for doing it.

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Well, that’s it for now! Just out of curiosity, are you a coffee or tea person? What blends or leaves (flavors?) do you usually prefer? Let me know in the comments!

Announcement: Temporary Hiatus from Blogging

Hi everyone! I hope you’ve all had a restful weekend, and that you’ve spent some part of it curled up with a book. 🙂 For today, I’d just like to let you guys know that I’ll be taking a temporary hiatus from blogging and the blogosphere. My grandmother passed away last Saturday night at the age of 90, so for the next one or two weeks, my family and I will be occupied with the funeral arrangements.

I’m not yet sure how to feel about her death, but the prevailing emotion seems to be relief. She spent the last two years bedridden and unable to talk, let alone do her favorite things (cook, walk around the temple, visit the market), so it was more difficult for me to see her alive but horrifyingly miserable than to accept the fact of her death. Despite the suffering she experienced in the past two years, though, her death was quick and peaceful. I have a feeling that she’s in a better place, and much happier than she was in the last years of her life. Even if I’ve stopped believing in organized religion, the whimsical side of me still likes to imagine her strolling down the streets of Paradise, with her usual market basket on one arm and her rosary beads on another, calm and content and completely at ease.

Rest In Peace, Guama. I’ll miss you, but I’m going to be okay. I hope you’re happy, wherever you are.