February 2023 Wrap Up: can you tell I was tired? xD

~reading

How many books that I planned did I read?

I planned 3 books, AND I READ ALL THREE! WHAT A RARITY! But in total I finished 7 books this month.

The Plan:

I just went for 3 books in February, because I think even at that point I knew how the month would go. xD

The Result:

As I noted, I finished the three I had wanted to get done in February. Thank goodness I had Hero in a Halfling by William Tyler Davis as a lighthearted and fun read, because Her Name is Knight by Yasmin Angoe was WAYYYYY more brutal and violent and hard to read for the subject matter than I expected. I really needed those to counterbalance.

I also stumbled into some unexpected nonfiction this month with Beyond the Wand by Tom Felton (aka Draco Malfoy in the Harry Potter movies) which was a lovely memoir with a good mix of behind-the-scenes fun and personal reflection from him that made me feel warm and fuzzy. This is How Your Marriage Ends by Matthew Fray was one I found from an article about a blog post he wrote years ago. I’m not married and don’t plan to be, but I found it was applicable to any long-term relationship you might have. Honestly, I even used some of the ideas in meetings with coworkers this month! I really enjoyed it overall, from both a practical standpoint of ideas for fixing (or preventing!) relationship problems, as well as from an emotional reflective point that got me thinking and considering.

The Dalai Lama’s Cat by David Michie probably wins for favorite book this month because of how it made me think, opened me up to new ideas, possibly showed me a spirituality I can embrace, and genuinely entertained and interested me. Super recommend!

Biggest flop of the month was definitely Really Good, Actually which is an ironic-sounding sentence. You can read my review if you want to hear about all the ways it disappointed me. 🤷‍♀️

Reviews Posted in February:

• Review: Really Good, Actually by Monica Heisey
• Review: The Duke and I by Julia Quinn
• Review: Age of Vice by Deepti Kapoor
• Review: Beyond the Wand: The Magic and Mayhem of Growing Up a Wizard by Tom Felton
• Review: How To Turn Into a Bird by Maria Jose Ferrada (translated to English)
• Review: The Dalai Lama’s Cat by David Michie

~stats

• My reading was 29% nonfiction this month
• My top genres were all tied at one each!!
• I mostly read books that were reflective, funny, or emotional
• My average rating was 3.14
• I traveled to Canada, England, Ghana, and Russia. In the United States I went to Miami.

~life

WELL. I’ve been sick for about 4 weeks straight at this point, so that’s how February went for me. xD I don’t typically get ill, and when I do it’s short and mild, so this is really strange for me. A constant cough and sore throat, achey chest, etc. Guess I should probably go to a doctor at this point. Anyway, that has sapped a lot of my energy in additional to grim gray and rainy February days. HOWEVER, it’s now March 1st and I can officially say that I didn’t have a single “breakdown” day in February which is a huge improvement for me in what’s often my worst mental health month each year. Yay? 🙂

I don’t think I did much else. xD I played lots of games (Hogwarts Legacy!!) and spontaneously booked a short vacation for June, but most of it was spent on the couch watching foreign romance shows and/or reading. And also, napping on the days when my sickness got particularly bad.

Just recently, the website Zooniverse entered my life. It allows people to assist in research projects requring human identification or analysis of images, which also helps in training AI to recognize that information more accurately for future research. It’s been very interesting to learna bout different projects, as well as delightful to see some of the images captured. For example, the Squirrel Mapper project around gray and black variants has been a personal favorite because squirrels are so cute! I also have a personal longstanding curiosity about why some squirrels are black, and about how uncommon they are.

Also, tax filing. Whoohoo!

~blog

Building on my above section, I was tired AF in February y’all. I used all my energy just to be okay, so posting and creativity took a distant backseat.

• Views: 5124
• Likes: 89
• Comments: 33
• Followers: 414 total @ end of month

Lower numbers than usual which is no surprised considering I only had 10 posts and there were only 28 days! *shrug* self-care comes first 🤗

Here are some of my favorite posts I worked on this month, in case you missed them!

• Top Ten Tuesday: Books With Love in the Title!
• Review: The Dalai Lama’s Cat by David Michie
• A very satisfying graph

And here are some of my favorite posts by other bloggers!

• Cartagena, baby! by Amelia @ Taking Off With Amelia — this is by a friend of a friend who are traveling together right now, and I was super excited to see her perspective of their adventures!
• A week in the life of Braeden – accessible lifestyle of a young person with a disability by Julie at Have Wheelchair, Will Travel — this was a really interesting look at what Braeden’s days generally look like (and TBH they look way hella fun and fulfilling)
• Top Ten Tuesday: Recent Favorite Ships by Jaime @ Keeper of the Wood Between Worlds — I’m terrible at remembering romantic partnerings in novels, so this was a fun way for me to see if I’d be interested in any of the books based on them!