"and rip out his favorite pages"

The beauty of Jan Term is all the down time that springs from taking only up to 5 credits. There's quite a bit one can do with so much uncommitted time. Like, I can sleep as much as I want to now because of my only class in the afternoon. Or I can watch dozens upon dozens of movies with friends. TV shows are starting up again this week and the next so I can watch those on line if I so desire. When it stops being so grey and rainy and actually starts snowing, I can build snowmen and take pictures outside. I like keeping busy. Heck, I might even start crocheting again.

But what I really want to do is read. I haven't done much reading just to read in a long time. And when I do, it normally takes me a long time because schoolwork gets in the way or I have to go do something else and I don't get hours to just sit by myself in a little nook and just read. I miss reading a lot. And since I'm not currently taking a literature class, I can read whatever I want. So that's what I'm going to do. I guess you could call it a New Years' Resolution of sorts, at least for this month. Hopefully, I'll manage to get to a bookstore in the near future and just spend a bit perusing the shelves and breathing in the smell of paper and ink and fresh words on pages. I already know what I'm going to get. But I love bookstores. So I'll dawdle a little.

Here's my hopeful reading list if anyone's interested:

• Atonement by Ian McEwan (I have to finish it! I started it at the end of the summer and haven't gotten very far because school started up not that long after I got it....)
• Ulysses by James Joyce (It's one of those books that I've been wanting to read and know that I should read because of my major and will probably read in some future class, but haven't gotten around to and am now determined to make it happen!)
• The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde (I love Oscar Wilde and I've read some of his other stuff and every time I'm in a bookstore, I always see something by him. And one of my room mates was raving about it a few months ago. And I happened upon the movie from the 1940s back during Thanksgiving but I'd come in when it was almost over and didn't want to ruin the ending for myself.)
• Orlando by Virginia Woolf (I don't know if I'll be able to get around to it, but my English professor mentioned this early on last semester and it sounded really interesting. I've also been meaning to read some of her works for a while but just never got around to it....)

I'm on a tight budget because of school and saving up for a trip for Spring Break, so I don't know if I'll be able to buy all of them. And there's some books lying around at home that I bought towards the end of my junior year of high school that I never got around to reading too that I can probably get the next time I'm home to keep up my reading. I'd have my mum send them to me, but I think they're buried somewhere in my room or in boxes in the garage. So I'll just find them myself. I might read some Shakespeare before Spring too in case I finish all of those or can't get some of them. I have lots of options. I'm quite proud of myself now. This month (and hopefully the rest of the year if I can find time between classes and assigned books....) should be really good. I'm quite looking forward to it.