Some big literary news this week: T.S. Eliot letters, among best-known sealed literary archives, open at Princeton after 60 years The above is the link to the Princeton announcement. There are plenty of articles (here is one from BBC ) starting to report on this, and I expect that it will be some time before we have all the information. I have sent Goodreads friend requests to a few of you. Here is my link if we am not already GR friends: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/4554525-jayne

I also started making my own a few years ago. I love my planner 🙂 I made it in Word and I have one of those clickman things. It only took a long time the first year.

I am oriented toward the present and the short-term future. My brain can only think out to about five years but I am typically only thinking about plans for the next 12 months or so. I think my breast cancer diagnosis (2006) changed my thinking about time and making plans. Plus, whenever I look back and think about all the things (good and bad) that have happened over the years that were outside of my predictions, it seems like a waste of mental energy to look too far out. The past is the past. I can reminisce and be nostalgic, but I am very careful not to dwell in woulda coulda shoulda.

Looks good - thank you!

Where did your armchair travels take you? Which books stood out, made an impression and/or stayed with you the longest? What did you learn from them? Similar to Matryoskha, I am also doing a perpetual round-the world challenge. I think my rules for counting a country/province/territory are also similar. I require (1) a strong sense of place and (2) the book cannot be written by an "outsider." Who is an outsider? I think about it on a case-by-case basis. I know it when I see it 🙂 I only managed to add four to my list: Ukraine, Quebec, Hungary, and Ireland. I revisited Denmark, England, Norway, Finland, Italy, and the Netherlands. I am doing the same thing with the 50 states + territories. I added six this year: Washington DC, Oklahoma, Georgia, North Carolina, Louisiana, and Illinois. Which book had the most original, most unique story? Not sure about original or unique, but some of my favorites were Milkman, The Goblin Emperor, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, the Faulkners, Lincoln in the Bardo, and The Alberta Trilogy (Cora Sandel). I did not realize it until I wrapped up my data, but I read a lot of Miss Read and Tove Jansson! Which book made you laugh? Which one made you cry? Hmm. No laughing or crying. Plenty of smiling and cringing. Which book did you like the least and why? The Moviegoer by Walker Percy. So boring. Ståsteder by Svend Brinkman. Overrated. American Gods by Neil Gaiman. He is hit or miss for me, and this one was a miss. Farewell Summer by Ray Bradbury. This is #3 in the Greentown trilogy. I loved #1 (Dandelion Wine) and #2 (Something Wicked This Way Comes), but #3 was a big disappointment. Which new to you authors did you discover and would you read another book by this author? Cora Sandel (1880-1974) deserves to be better known outside of Norway. There were many new-to-me authors, and I fortunately enjoyed most of them.

@mumto2 Congrats on finishing Bingo. Two of your books were among my favorites this year: Milkman and The Goblin Emperor. With the mention of How the Heather Looks (which I simply must read!), here are photos from last week's trip to NYC. I asked each family member for their top three three requests for the itinerary. One of mine was to see the real stuffed animals that inspired the Winnie the Pooh stories. They now reside in the New York Public Library (link to article). Poor little Roo was lost in an apple orchard in the 1930s.

Yes, please!

Congratulations! That is a huge accomplishment. I will be joining you next year with learning to read in a language. I'll be learning to read Dutch and will be starting with very basic children's books.

Thanks. Oops - sorry for posting in the wrong thread. I will delete my post upthread.

Is there a way to delete pictures from "My Attachments" if the pictures were part of a deleted PM? I have been trying to clear out my pictures using the My Attachments function, but some of my attachments were embedded in PMs that I have deleted from my inbox. Since I no longer have access to the PM, I can't figure out a way to delete these photos and free up the space.

(deleted) This should have gone in the wrap up thread - oops.

Good morning and Merry Christmas Eve to those who celebrate. I really should be getting ready for tonight's festivities, so I have skimmed the thread and will come back later with some of my own wrap-up data. My 10x10 did not fare well. I thought about ditching it instead of carrying it over, but now I think I will continue. I'll probably flip-flop that decision a few times between now and the beginning of 2020. I did more traveling this week. I had a drizzly weekday alone in DC and three crazy-fun days in NYC with my family. For now, I will just share my photos from the day in Washington. I do want to share some more photos from both New York and Denmark, but I have to clear out my attachments first. First photo: The big Christmas tree in Union Station. If you look closely, you will see that its decorations include Norwegian flags. The tree is a gift from Norway to the USA. Second: A model of the Capitol building in the Botanical Gardens Third: The Rotunda at the National Gallery of Art Surprisingly, I practically had the Botanical Gardens and the art museum to myself. I can only imagine how crowded they will be next week!

Hello, BaW friends. I am just starting to make my 2020 reading plans, and appreciate all of the book list links. I did not even come close to finishing my 10x10 challenge, and I am conflicted about whether or not to continue with it. On the one hand, I am not one to fret over changing things up for the New Year/New Decade. But on the other hand, I am not sure that my 10x10 continues to serve me. Hmmm... Since I became an empty nester in August, I have done a lot of traveling. I guess that is what happens when you have children living all over the place. Since August, I have made seven longish road trips, flew to my Mom's house for a long weekend, and I recently spent three weeks in Europe. In November, I went to Denmark (for the first time since moving away in 2016), and I went to the Netherlands to see my son. It was a bit early for Christmas decorations, but they were starting to put them up. The first two photos were taken in Denmark, and the third one was in Rotterdam. I hope everyone has been doing well!

Any suggestions for which town to stay in?

@Negin and @JennW in SoCal thanks for the beautiful travel photos! I got The Beleaguered City by Mrs. Oliphant through ILL. Old, not-so-in-demand-books are always fun to request through ILL because they usually come from the venerable Enoch Pratt Library in downtown Baltimore, and you often get an actual old book. The Pratt Library was founded in 1882 and is one of the oldest public libraries in the USA. It was just that novella, not a set of stories - but I was not disappointed since I got to enjoy a deliciously old and somewhat dusty copy of The Beleaguered City. Thank you, @Violet Crown for the suggestion. While I enjoyed it enough, it was not what I expected. I did not do any research so I mistakenly assumed that it would be set in Scotland. Finding myself in France was unexpected. I also discovered that it could fit my Good Catholic/Bad Catholic category. That was a plus. But I had wanted something spookier, and it was not very spooky. So I stayed up too late last night reading Edgar Allen Poe stories. I am alternating between beloved stories and new-to-me stories. I've also been meaning to comment on Gossip at Thrush Green (#6). I liked it, but there was one eye-roll-worthy subplot. Some of the young folks were (gasp!) smoking marijuana. Of course, much of the gasping and gossiping about this tsk-tsk situation was done at a cocktail party where the upstanding residents of Thrush Green were slugging down their whiskey. The whole subplot just felt out of place in this series. @tuesdayschild you mentioned #8 upthread. How was it?

Where would be a good place to stay for one night on the Jersey side of NYC? We have booked a long weekend at a hotel in Midtown Manhattan, and will be driving in from the DC area. I would like to stay somewhere more reasonably priced the night prior so that we can get up in the morning and drive into NYC early in the day. Any suggestions?

@mumto2 The Goblin Emperor is one of my top 10 this year, too. And I am nearly finished with another book that will definitely make my Top 10 - the audio version of Milkman by Anna Burns. I see on GR that you also gave it 5 stars. I drove my son back to college this weekend, and had many many hours of listening time. We have another road trip this coming weekend, and I have about four hours left to go. I'll save those hours for that journey.

@Violet Crown I have already resolved myself to the fact that my 10x10 project is going to take me two years! I do still like my categories enough to keep going. I might read The Beleagured City for spooky. Thanks @mumto2 for letting know that a free version is out there.

Hello, All. I have been on the same two books for quite some time: De nærmeste by Lotte Kirkeby Hansen. It is a better-than-average family drama. It is taking me a long time to read because I read slowly in Danish. 1968: The Year That Rocked The World by Mark Kurlansky. It is taking me a long time to read because it is 480 pages long. Its primary focus is on the student protests that took place in the USA and Europe in 1968. I have learned a lot about what happened in both Western and Eastern European countries. And because I needed a change, I started Thrush Green #6 (Gossip From Thrush Green) last night.

I am glad that your surgery is behind you now. WIshing you a speedy recovery.

Invite me, please. All three of mine are young adults. I stopped opening up to my IRL friends about my kids a long time ago, and I have never been comfortable doing it on the boards. But I have written countless imaginary posts to all of you, asking for your advice 🙂

I am sorry, Quill. Hugs. And I truly don’t mean to pick on a previous poster, but while 5 year survival rates are comforting, I recall researching 15, 20, and 25 year rates for young women with breast cancer and being not-quite-so-comforted. As for survival guilt, no, I do not have that. There are enough cases of bc raging its ugly return 15+ years later for me to feel survivor guilt. ETA: Sorry if I am being negative. I went to a funeral for a peer last week. He died unexpectedly from a heart attack, and it was indeed so sad and shocking.

Jenny, your thread inadvertently did me a favor. I had been putting off looking into whether or not I have the textured implants that are now under recall. I now know that my implants are the smooth type, not the textured type. I had to call the plasitc surgeon's office because I could not find the card with the data. Fortunately, the surgeon's office still had easy access to my surgery report and I was able to quickly find out the answer. Learn from my mistake: If you get the implants, keep track of the card that describes them in detail. Forever. I probably have it somewhere, but I can't find it. In my defense, I have moved three times since 2006 - including moving overseas and back. And yes, I did intentionally put this off. I have been through the wringer with health scares too many times. Unless the health scare would benefit from IMMEDIATE action, I wait until it suits me mentally to deal with whatever it is. I had learned about the recall over the summer, and decided I could wait a bit when I read that the FDA was not recommending removal of the recalled implants unless there are symptoms. But your thread reminded me not to wait TOO long. Breast Cancer.org: Recall of textured implants and tissue expanders due to rare lymphoma (ALCL) concerns

My son had three years of Russian. He had my course descriptions and his tutor wrote a LOR. That was perfectly fine for admissions. He did also meet with some faculty, but certainly not at every school. And then he had a Russian placement test at orientation.

I hope you get to go see her, Quill. Being able to visit my overseas son makes it bearable. I just booked a ticket for November. I wish I could have stayed until the Christmas markets open, but I wanted to get back here for Thanksgiving. I will be there during the off-off-off season, but prices are better and crowds are light. That's the silver lining, I suppose. Hugs to you!