Saturday, December 31, 2005

Library Statistic

During this bout of sickness, I had some time to catch up on my reading. One thing I read was the latest Reader's Digest, where I found this interesting statistic from the American Library Association:

Ohio residents check out 14.6 items from the library each year. The
national average is 6.9.

I'd like first of all to thank my mom for personally raising that statistic in Ohio--I'm sure she is the reason Ohio is so far out in front! But secondly--14.6 items per year? That is the highest? Doesn't that just amaze you? The library is FREE, people! Take advantage of it! Wow. I should look up all the states, because I am curious as to where Virginia rates. We have pretty good library systems here in NOVA, and all my friends check out tons of books too.

Speaking of libraries, I went yesterday afternoon since Bob got home early. The bad thing about this sickness was that I hadn't been to the library before it all hit, so I didn't have any new books for myself to read. Well, actually that's not true--I was THRILLED to receive Climbing Parnassus for Christmas from Aunt Claire and Uncle Jim , but that is a book I want to read with a highlighter in my hand, not my head in the toilet! LOL! What I really wanted was some cozy brain candy--hey, if my stomach can't handle candy, my brain still can! I was forced to reread some collections of Christmas short stories that I had around the house. Nothing makes me more Christmas-y than reading Victorian or Regency stories set at Christmas time, preferably at a nice house party in a large estate in the country. Ahh, it sounds so fun! Going out and gathering all the greenery and mistletoe, finding a Yule log, making wreaths and garlands, going wassailing, sledding, skating on the frozen pond (there's ALWAYS one of those, as well as lots of snow, you know!), church at a cute little coutry church, having a huge Christmas feast that the cook makes and the servants serve and clean up . . . sounds great! Just the thing to escape vomit-filled sheets and my own sad lack of servants to wash them! LOL! Anyhow, I was glad yesterday to get some fresh books to read. Still nothing too challenging though--I even found a "cozy" murder mystery set during Christmas! Just the thing to read during Monday's football extravaganza!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Hey Claire, was that Peter fellow a spam in disguise? Or an attempt to sell in disguise? How do you go from garden gifts to library stats? I have only had that one person comment on my blog and she never came back and commented.
Anyway. You KNOW I totally agree with you. I am lucky (poke, poke :0]) to have the Pikes Peak Library at my disposal. I use it for brain candy, and learning to do all sorts of new things (raise an organic garden, raise chickens, alternative sources of energy, plan a wedding, etc, etc, etc,!)I loved this audio book called "The Secret Life of Bee's". I highly encourage you to listen to it rather than read it the next trip...oh, wait, you may not want the boys to hear it. Not that it's bad or anything. Anyway. It was a delightful story.
Glad to hear you are all on the mend. Love to all. Miss you! P

Bob and Claire said...

LOL, definitely spam! The funniest one was on my brother's blog several months ago where he posted a long entry about cereal, and some spammer posted his own website and talked about how as long as everyone kept talking about these important issues, real peace would happen, issues would be resolved, blah, blah, blah. Too funny!