Miller Time Friday: Easy Reader

No, not that Easy Reader, much as I adore Morgan Freeman...

Nope, I'm talking about book reading and your favourite way to read a book these days.

You know I am loving being able to read for fun and learning and not just for information (I still sometimes wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat thinking I haven't answered email #187!), but how where and when I read has changed now that I am - ahem - in my 50s.

Real books

Love em, need em, want them.  Nothing feels better than having a real book in your hand, does it?  This is what you'll find me mostly reading around the house.

Unless...

I need to resort to my e-reader. 


Why would I resort to my ereader?

• The book is too heavy for me to hold in my arms in bed.  Anyone else suffer from this?  I like to lay down to read in bed, but there was no way I could have read The Luminaries or Mark Twain's autobiography!  Enter the ereader!

• The font is too small.  Sigh.  I have a stronger prescription for the glasses I use in bed, but sometimes they're not even enough and then I resort to my kindle app and make the font NICE AND BIG.  This has its pluses and minuses.  The biggest plus is that I can read it.  The biggest minus is that suddenly I see that I will have 14,000 or so screens to get through and well, that's kind of intimidating. 

• Travel.  An ereader is so easy on the plane.  You can have all your books with you and it's almost like you are wrapping yourself up in a cocoon of words.

• I don't need to have that book in my library.  I find it very difficult to get rid of books.  Necessary, but difficult.  And there are some books from the get-go that I know I will only read once and I'm not sure if any of my friends will want to read Rob Lowe's autobiography or if I would have told them I bought his autobiography (well I just have..) and so I bought it on the kindle.  By the way, it was a good book.  Rob Lowe has very Zelig/Forrest Gump tendencies.  You'll have to read the book to know what I mean, though most of you can guess.

And then there is the whole choice of which ereader.  Kindle, kobo, Barnes and Noble's version, iPad.  I own a first generation kindle, but I prefer to sync it to my kindle app on my iPad, since it doesn't have backlighting and makes an odd clicking noise when I turn the page, which late at night appears to be a rather LOUD clicking noise and suddenly you have the sickening feeling you are in an Edgar Allan Poe story.... Did I say too much there?

Would love to hear what you are reading and how you are reading things these days!

I just finished Joseph Boyden's The Orenda, which was recommended to me by my friend Mary, who did a short review of it on her blog here.

I was mesmerized by this book.

It's part "Last of the Mohicans" meets "The Mission" meets sweeping epic.  I finished it on Saturday and I am still thinking about it.  Now I have to go back and read the rest of his work.

In honour of reading, and the fact that somewhere right now, I am likely having a glass of champagne with the Beast at his castle, let's have a cocktail shall we?


Alice and Wonderland (Drink me!)

Grab your cocktail shaker and fill it with ice.
Add 3/4 oz of Tequila, 3/4 oz of Orange Juice and 3/4 oz of Coffee Liqueur.
Shake and strain into a shot glass and serve.

Did someone just see the Cheshire Cat?

I'll be back Sunday, because you know that's my High Holy Holiday: THE OSCARS!!!

Man, I love that look...