Comment Policy, State Of Health and Audiobooks

A bit of a catch-all post, since I sort of feel like the blog has been a Dead Zone this week and I've got a few little things to talk about.

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First things first, as much as I hate to do it because since the Blogger upgrade the whole thing sucks harder than my vacuum, I've turned on word verification for comments.  I know, I know.  Really folks, I wish I could leave it off - but the level of spam I'm getting is starting to annoy me.  They were just targeting older posts, which wasn't quite as annoying because for any post older than 90 days I make y'all go through comment moderation.  But the asshole spammers seemed to have figured that out, so now they're targeting more recent posts.

So yeah, the crappy Blogger captcha is on. 

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I'm still not totally "right" (no comment from the peanut gallery), but I'm mostly back to normal after my recent bout of sickness.  If nothing else it served as a reminder that really, I need to take better care of myself.  Oh, like maybe I need to get better about exercising more consistently.  I'm the bandwagon poster girl when it comes to exercise.  I go great guns for a while, and then something happens to make me fall off.  This last go around it was taking a tumble down the concrete stairs at work while hauling a box of moldy, disgusting books that some "generous" soul donated to us to the dumpster.

Really folks, you can throw books away.  No really, you can.  Especially if it looks like they were living life as a petri dish for the last 20 years.  Libraries are broke, we're not desperate.

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I've been listening to some audiobooks recently, mostly as a way to keep my reading mojo going and amuse myself while commuting.

What I tend to like about Robert K. Massie's books is that he makes Russian history accessible to your average lay-person.  Catherine The Great: Portrait of a Woman was a really interesting listen for about the first half.  The stuff about her childhood, and her eventual "courtship" and marriage to Grand Duke Peter.  After she becomes Empress though it kind of fell apart for me pacing-wise.  It just....wasn't quite as stimulating.  It ended on a strong note for me though since by that point those wacky French are having their revolution, and it was interesting to read about Catherine's opinion on that minor bloody matter.  All in all, it was something I'm glad I listened to, and really glad I didn't read.  I think it would have been a slog if I had tried to read it.

After that it was Catch Me by Lisa Gardner, who I'm quickly realizing writes good suspense threads that I enjoy listening too, but her main characters tend to irritate me.  I'm not sure if I hated Boston homicide detective D.D. Warren, or I just hated the way the reader read her.  I also felt the author had a tendency to info dump a little too much via her characters pontificating on suspect profiling etc.  Also, is it just my dumb luck that the two Gardener books I've listened to (this one and Say Goodbye) dealt with pedophile story lines?  I kept going with it because I loved the suspense thread, and was riveted by one of the secondary characters.  Again, a good listen, but I'm in no rush to keep reading about D.D. Warren and unless a back cover blurb intrigues I'm probably done with her as a character.

Right now I'm in the middle of In The Woods by Tana French, a book recommended to me by online buds (Keishon most notably) and coworkers.  The reader is....not the greatest.  It feels like all the characters are yelling their dialogue.  Everything comes out like there is an exclamation point at the end of every sentence.

Also, the storyline, while interesting is kind of bugging me.  The basic idea is that Rob Ryan went missing with his two BFFs when he was around 12.  He was found, covered in blood, while his two BFFs have been missing ever since.  He, naturally, remembers nothing.  He grows up, becomes a homicide detective, and is now working a case that is eerily similar to his own.

Here's what I don't get: his past is a huge secret.  His bosses have NO clue.  He used to go by Adam Ryan, and as an adult he started using his middle name, Rob.  What, they don't have something like social security numbers in Ireland?  Employers, especially law enforcement, don't run background checks on their employees?

HOW THE HECK IS HIS PAST SUCH A BIG BLOODY SECRET??!?!?!?!?!!?!?

Maybe we're just more paranoid here in the States.  Hell, even I had to be fingerprinted when I applied for my current job and I'm a librarian (although I am around children all day, so I really do understand the logic behind it).

But I'm keeping with it, mostly because now I'm sucked into the crime.  We'll see how I feel about the ending before determining if I'm going to carry on with the series.

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So that's what's going on around here.  Anybody reading anything good?  Have an audiobook recommendation for me?