How I Find Time to Read!

After telling Jeff about my last post, he said "wow, 28 books? That makes you sound like all you do is lie around and read!" So, to qualify that (absolutely ridiculous) assumption, I thought I'd pass on my tips on how to find time to read! Most of my reading gets done before bed - I climb into bed (usually at some ridiculously late hour) and read anywhere from a few chapters to a few pages depending on how tired I am (reading makes me sleepy!). After that, I find the best time to sneak in a few pages is in the bathroom! Take your book with you, do your business and stay put while you read a few pages (usually no one will bug you while you're in the bathroom and you can get a few minutes' peace while you read a bit!). Then, of course, is remembering to take your book with you (which I almost never do!) and read during those tiny "found" times like waiting to pick up a kid, or in a doctor's office waiting room. Jeff swears that if you bring a book for a doctor's wait, you will get seen faster! Murphy's Law or something. By far, the best marathon reading I get done is when I have a long period of time where I am not needed or demanded upon for something - as you can imagine, this is a rare occurrance, but it DOES happen occasionally, like during a camping trip, road trip or in 2006 when I spent two days in the hospital with Hannah while she had her appendix out. Like I said, it's a rare event. I'm not saying you should hospitalize your children just to get your book read, but still, you must find those opportunities. Now, that's not to say that every person....man, woman and child, shouldn't have at least a half-hour of uninterrupted time during each day to read. That, in my opinion, should be a law. In fact, we tried to do this with our family once. We stopped everything we were doing, met in the family room and sat down to read our own individual books (or magazines, or comic books) for a half hour. It was so nice. But as in all things, busy-ness took over and we stopped doing it. Still, it should be a mandate. Everyone should find time to read! Now stop reading my blog and go pick up a good book!