Grad Rush and a New Project

Quick post during this here the busiest week of college: Graduation Week.

I swear, everyone wants to go out to eat/get coffee/get drinks. Thankfully though, I'm feeling very in control of my food. I planned it all out and I'll be good. I'm feeling very positive about it since I've already eaten out 3x this week and will be eating away from home for six out of the next seven meals. It's amazing how much more in control I feel when I plan first and then eat, instead of the opposite.

I've only been running once, but we've spent our evenings this week ripping up carpet, painting the ceiling and priming the walls of our was-disgusting guest room in anticipation for my mom staying here this weekend (I'll post photos soon).

Lastly, with the end of my last final for school, I have now begun a period of my life that I've been looking forward to for a long time: my Year of Pleasure Reading. With all of the thesis research and books for school I've been reading, I haven't read a book for fun in a long time. Since I'll only be teaching for 12-15 hours a week next week and then I'll be starting my MA/PhD, it's the best time possible to spend the next year reading for fun. My goal is to read 40 books (of any kind, size etc) and to blog about my experience and to get suggestions from you all.

I've already started my first book, My Blue Notebooks by Liane de Pougy, who was a courtesan in Paris in the early 1900s. It's a collection (and a translation) of her own personal journals. So far, it's very interesting. I also have books 2-4 lined up since they've been gifts (or an impulse buy on Amazon):

2. Extremely Loud and Everything Close by Jonathan Safran Foer (gift from my English Director of Studies)
3. Water for Elephants by Sara Greun (impulse buy on Amazon after a recommendation)
4. How Proust Can Change Your Life by Alain de Botton (gift from my thesis director/French Director of Studies).

Any other good recos? I'm accumulating a list! :)