Having a fire relit that you thought to be out

I've been reading again. This wasn't even a New Year's Resolution. I just started reading and I'm back to my old habits. I came in this afternoon, washed up then sat down and read a book cover to cover. Admittedly it was quite a small book but still. That makes my fifth book of the year so far. I blame Finchy. He bought me The Hunger Games for Christmas and on New Year's Day, I bought the second and third books in the trilogy, which I'd finished by January 3rd. Then I had a week's break, partly out of respect and partly for me to try and get them out of my head. I didn't stop thinking about it all for a while. I came to in the shower one day and realised I'd spent about half an hour trying to figure out how I was feeling about the fate of a particular character and how to correctly pronounce their name and how I felt about the fact that they were being played by Lenny Kravitz in the upcoming film adaptation (confused, primarily. I mean; Lenny Kravitz, where did that come from?) I urge you to read them, my obsessions do enjoy company. Also, the actress Kristen Bell had a Hunger Games-themed birthday party and it sounded awesome and I'd quite like one where people weren't just turning up and being confused. Anyway, stepping away from that particular crazy section in my head... actually no, back to crazy for a second: People may be put off by the whole it's-the-new-Twilight thing. Please don't be. It's really good. Despite the whole Team Peeta/Team Gale thing. Stupid other people. Any romance in The Hunger Games is kind of incidental to the fantastic set-up, brutal violence and often startling commentary on human nature, centred around a genuinely fascinating heroine.

Again, attempting to exit crazy for a moment, it feels really good to be reading again. I never really stopped, and I have read some good books in the last couple of years, but it feels like I'm myself again: Delving into fantasy and magic realism and normal fiction and occasional bits of actual educational reading material and plays and poems; scraping time together in my lunch hour and the walk to work and the precious hour of respite between getting in and going out and that half hour between going to bed and falling asleep. I'll have to put it on hold again in a bit when I starts a-line-learnin' again but I think I'll probably get far better at returning to it again. I've rediscovered the feeling that isn't just the promise of a good meal but also the appetite to consume it.