Sleep Recovery

In the past 72 hours, I've slept at least 34.

My body still keels over at Midnight and, for the past few days at least, wakes up before 8:00am.  On Sunday, I got up at 7:30, showered, dressed, and made coffee that I never got to drink.  I was asleep on the couch before the pot had finished brewing.  I woke up five hours later nose to nose with the fluffy cat who was stretched out -- also sleeping -- along the back of the sofa.  The coffee was cold.

Monday was a repeat -- except I made it until about 1:30 pm before the nap took over, thus allowing coffee consumption.  This past night I managed to sleep for ten hours, so I'm hopeful that there will be no nap involved.  But I am, for the first time in days, feeling like I'm capable of complicated cognitive procedures. 

In my stupor, I've been reading Tanya Huff's The Enchantment Emporium, which I just finished this morning.  It's fun and witty, and -- once you get over the giant tangle that is the absolutely enormous Gale family, and their slightly incestuous but somehow not-gross relationships -- quite fast paced.  If I hadn't read other stuff by Huff and trusted her to get to the good parts eventually (and to drench the story in witty pop culture references and snappy dialog), then I probably wouldn't have gotten through the first sixty pages of confusing.  Huff, however, delivers.

Huff loves setting her novels in Canada, and this one is no exception.  Set in Calgary, Alberta, the Enchantment Emporium (aka junk antique shop) is a "staple in the community" -- a statement which takes on many meanings as the novel unfolds.

The whole novel was quite fun and precisely what more poor brain needed to unwind and recover.

Tanya Huff also wrote Summon the Keeper, set in Toronto, which I really loved, and the Blood Books which they made into the TV show Blood Ties, which I somehow never realized they made a season two of.  Must go Netflix, now!

I've managed to catch up on two episodes of Top Chef which I've missed while away at Odyssey, but all in all , my attempt to reconnect with television has been disappointing.  Summer TV programming appears to be ... really bad.  I did watch 13 innings of the Tigers-Rangers game on Monday before giving up and yelling, no! no more innings for you! And switching off the TV with much fanfare.  It was probably a good thing as the Rangers scored two runs in the next inning.  Bummer.