I started reading the funniest book at lunch today -- The Pirates! An Adventure with Scientists. (It's in a double book with The Pirates! An Adventure with Ahab on the flip-side. Can't wait for that one.) I'm a sucker for a pirate (arrrrr!) and it's proving to be a very silly adventure. I'm only a couple chapters in, but so far I have found out the best reason to be a pirate (the shanties) and that "I like ham" is an excellent pirate motto. The pirates are looking for a ship called the Beagle -- I wonder if they're going to run into a certain evolutionist? I imagine this book will be a super-fun read -- very entertaining! It also seems like something I would have either read when I was a middle- or high-schooler or something I would've attempted to write at that age.

I also read a very interesting book on Sunday called Love is a Mixtape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time by Rob Sheffield. It was a memoir by Sheffield set primarily in the early and mid-1990s when he met and married his wife Renee. But she dies five years after they marry -- which is where the loss comes in. The book was very moving. Although I knew Renee would die, I cried a lot after reading about her death and how Rob coped with the aftermath.

It was also very interesting to read about a young marriage -- Sheffield and Renee married at 25 -- and to hear about all their struggles with being married. I feel like so often you don't hear about what it is like to be married -- it's all about dating or having kids or planning the perfect marriage. But what about those years before you start having kids? Or right after the wedding? What's it like? As someone who is getting married soon and hadn't thought about some of these things -- especially his example of realizing that his wife would be the person that he would fail in front of -- it's both scary and reassuring. Scary because I hadn't realized that I would be in for such fears, but also reassuring to know that others have gone through them -- and put a name to these fears -- and survived.

Well, enough heavy stuff.

I am starting my marathon of "work every Saturday in May" this weekend. Should be fun! So tomorrow I am off and will be relaxing and not doing a whole lot. The big goal is to run -- I haven't gone since Monday, and I need to get in another one.

Sunday will be a busy day -- we're going to a friend's church, I have to work in the afternoon (program on getting a federal job -- bring the whole family!), and then Trip and I will be attending Doubt (the play) in the evening. Jam-packed!

Friday should be a pretty relaxing day though.