Book Review: Digging to America by Anne Tyler

Book Club is in two weeks and I am feverishly trying to read through the book Digging to America by Anne Tyler.



I had just started Nicholas Spark's book The Lucky One when my mom reminded me that book club is coming up and she is done with the book. Darn, I really hate reading more than one book at a time because that usually means I didn't like one of them or I forget where I was in the book.

Mom said not to worry as this is an easy read, but I just want to make sure I get it read so I can participate. Y'know?

So far though, I am sad to say I am not impressed with Digging to America. I feel like I keep waiting for something to happen in this book. It feels stagnant like they are setting up the characters for something to happen, yet I am already almost half way done. So I really hope it gets better and pulls me in soon. There are some really touching moments like when the girls come to America, but it feels like I am missing something.

I am probably just spoiled though because I just read Jeannette Walls new book Half Broke Horses and I could not put it down!

It literally read itself it was so good. I loved every second from the part where she begins in the rural farm of her parent's to the city life and then in between being a teacher in the frontier. Just amazing stories that seem so surreal. She is an amazing woman who I can't imagine being since she rides across states at the age of fifteen on a horse all by herself. Simply in awe of this woman who wants to make her own way in life and surely ends up doing so. It is a must read!

New find - book app

I am constantly seeing books that I want to buy, but at the moment cannot invest in. In the past, I would carry a pad of paper and pen with me. When I didn't have it, I would ask whomever I was with if they had one. Even going so far to ask the sales associates if they had something I could write on.

When I attained my phone, I would make a list on colornotes, but I didn't always remember I had the list. Lately I have been just taking pics of the books with my phone then when I load them on to my computer, I would write them down. A laborious task. Not to mention, I just recently had to update my phone, which means it needed to be wiped clean and though I thought I saved the booklist to my computer, turns out I didn't. So I lost all the books I have been cataloging for at least a year.

Yesterday, I found a book app called MyBookDroid and though I have yet to take it for a spin out in the real world, I love it for just keeping the list of books I want to buy in my phone. It is so much easier and made to keep books in a list, rather than colornotes. I have been feverishly typing in book titles from the pics I still have saved on my computer. (thankfully I had taken some pics)

I enter the book title, author and then I can enter in the description, ISBN #, Subject, Publisher. I can list it in whether or not I have read it, want to read it or other. Though the easier way to do this process rather than enter manually us to look it up in Search and then add the book.


I can give it a review as well.



I can scan the book's UPC codes too! This I cannot wait to try!!


It will show a list of the books covers, the name and author.

It even has a button to show I LENT a book out!! Yeah, makes it so much easier.

What app are you using to catalog books?

P.S. Also, I am looking for a good phone application for grocery shopping.

P.P.S. Here is a great link to Time Magazine's best books ever

P.P.P.S. Here is a list of Top Banned Books from the American Library Association

Wordless/Outdoor Wednesday - New England

A few of my favorites (out of the almost 1000 pics) taken on a recent vacation to New England.



I can't believe all the architecture pics I came home with.




I almost got ran over for this next one bc the guy in the car waiting for me to cross the street had zero patience even though I was in the crosswalk.



Wordless Wednesday

Outdoor Wednesday

Post It Note Tuesday - mascara and mystic

Grace in small things - edition ten

1. Learning to beat someone at their own game, especially when I am not a game player, but rather shoot from the hip.

2. Finally after a decade of wanting to go to New England, I have accomplished that life goal! (more to come on that)

3. Getting into a brief (but fierce) argument with Saint, when I finally broke down and apologized -

• Me: Do you still love me?
• Him: Of course, he says and leans in for a kiss while looking me directly in the eyes

Sigh, love rocks!

4. Watching my father, the best salesman I have ever known, at work using words to sway people into upgrades and extras simply by being nice and brilliant. It truly is an artform what he does. If I could be so lucky to have half of his skill.

5. Starting my novel, FINALLY, which I feel oh so fabulous about so far.

BONUS: Knowing that a groovy girl is winning the battle against drinking. I am so proud of you Schmutzie!! Keep it up because I believe in you.


Wage against the batter of embitterment and take part in Grace in Small Things.

inattentive parenting satisfaction

I had this family in the other night, shopping around, but in reality they were just wandering around looking at things while they waited for their dinner reservation. Which is code for the parent's walked around and talked while the kids ran, RAN, and destroyed everything in their path. We were all waiting passionately for them to go eat dinner.

Lo and behold, the kids popped back up later in the evening - do people NOT watch their kids anymore? Or is that just me.

They ran (again RAN) through the store, hiding under the racks and making a cacaphony of noise. One of my sales associates kindly told them this wasn't a playground and to behave. They left.

BUT came back later, right before we closed.

Now, I wanted really badly to ask them to come back with their parent's, but I know from experience comments like that infuriate parents who are lackluster about parenting in the first place, so I refrained. I watched as these two rascals hid behind a clothing rack and proceeded to spray a megaton of cologne on their shirts.

At first, I wanted to ask them to stop that, but then it occurred to me that they would just go into the next store and do the same. So I didn't say a word. Instead, I watched them bathe in the cologne to the point where i could smell them from six feet away.

I realized I had won. These inattentive parents would have to sit in the same car with these two angels and smell them the entire ride home. Not to mention try to finish their dinner with the pig pen lingering. I felt very satisfied knowing they would be inconvenienced as much as I felt I had been. Not to mention, those kids definitely ruined their shirts from the amount of oils left in the fibers from the spraying.

Completely unrelated, I woke up with this Melissa Etheridge song stuck in my head, so I found it on my itunes and blasted it while getting ready for work. Why, oh why can't I find the OFFICIAL video instead of some f'd up pic video? Just plain weird.