goin' high tech

Well, Santa launched both the Sarge and I into the high tech age with two of these:I'll admit that I've avoided one until now. The Airman (my hubby, an E-6 in the AF) got one last January and loves the danged thing, but not me! Nope, I didn't need that newfangled crap. I love books. The feel, the smell. No, I didn't like reading on a computer and I sure as shit wasn't going to spend that kind of cash on one! Then I realized one day that it sure would come in handy for school. School only, mind you, where I'm already reading books online for papers, and I don't much care about having a hard copy book. It wasn't like it was for pleasure, it was all work! And that was the Airman's hook. He bought me one, and I figured since I actually had the damned thing I'd actually try it out. So I bought a book. And I read. And I fell in love.

And then this gift doubled, as it allowed me to buy another book, a book I haven't read in a long time.

See, there's this book, the first truly grown up book I read as a kid. Castle Perilous is a scifi/fantasy crossover about a strange castle, magic and mayhem. It rocked and I fell in love. I was already a reader, but this truly sent me over the edge. The original copy, read back in the day (1988 if you must know, meaning I was 9) has disintegrated over the years. I've since replaced it, and watched that one come apart as well. So, there I was, the day after Christmas, in Hungary, and I occurred to me to look for it for the Kindle, and there it was.

$9 and several hours of reading later, this gift brought me back to my childhood and gave me access to something I was afraid I would eventually lose forever. Not only that, my beat up copies are in a box in Hurricane somewhere, far from where I am now. I've been working at school for 7 months with one week off int hat time. I'm a history major so there are upwards of 100 pages of text to read a week, 2+ pages to write each week, response to other students and to the instructor each week, and every 8 weeks a 10 page paper. Times two. Needless to say, I haven't read for fun in a long time. This Christmas was different. I'm taking a sabbatical to get back my sanity, undig my house, rediscover my waistline... And now, to get acquainted with John DeChancie and his worlds.

It wasn't the gift this Christmas that was important. It was the hope on the Airman's part that this would be a way for my life to be less difficult and more fun. The ultimate gift, though, was that it reconnected me to my ultimate gift, given by the Six and Lu, my folks. Truly the gift of joy of reading is immeasurable!

-The DO

*Do I need a disclaimer? I'm not sure, so here goes... I don't care if you buy one of these, and I have nothing whatsoever to do with DeChancie or Amazon, apart from spending an ass ton of cash there. Seriously, this post isn't even about the Kindle, really. It's about books in general. Those, I do think you should buy, though sadly the books aren't paying me to say that. K... We good?