31 days....oh, who am I fooling? It's Read-a-Thon time!

Eh. So much for 31 days of posting, huh?

The October Read-a-Thon is fast approaching. Saturday, October 22, if any of you are interested.

There are a myriad of good reasons to participate in this semi-annual festival of all things book-related. After all, a serious reader jumps at any excuse to spend an entire day focused on nothing but the printed (or pixilated) word.

Alas, I lost my mind and scheduled a craft day with a friend for that Saturday. Since it is at her house, and transporting the sewing machine is always a pain, I'm thinking I may be able to bend the craft day rules a bit to make things fit into the read-a-thon.

I "collect" three main types of books: mystery novels, cookbooks, and...quilting books. In addition, I subscribe to two three two quilting magazines. Rather than take a project to work on for craft day, I can load up the car with quilting magazines and books.

The herd of magazines needs thinning, anyway. Every couple of years, I go through the stack (one magazine publishes every other month, the other one per quarter), pulling out articles and patterns of interest. Then, every four years or so, I go through the accumulated pulled-out articles and thin those out. Yes, it sounds like busywork (why not just read, then recycle the magazine instead of pulling things out, to not be looked at again until they are on the way to recycling years later?). But every minute spent looking at other quilts, other techniques is a valuable aid in your own future quilting.

And thus, I won't feel guilty counting those hours towards my reading goals.

The best thing about the fall event is, frankly, the season of the year. How can you not want to curl up in front of a fire, with a good book and a cup of hot chocolate (or glass of wine) close to hand? Or prop a book up to read while you have a thick beef stew (cooked in the crockpot, so you can continue reading) for dinner?

Even if you cannot commit to read for the full 24 hours (I'm not that crazy, personally), consider signing up. That simple act of committing guarantees you will spend more time in a book that day than you would otherwise.