September Senses

As September begins I am...

Listening to... the podcast Welcome to Night Vale. I listened to the first episode of this show around Christmas time last year, but didn't fall in love immediately. After attending GeekyCon and meeting the Night Vale guys, I decided to give it another go. So, in August I listened to a few more, and in the last week, quite a few more than that. It's official: I'm totally addicted to this podcast!

Also listening to... a Great Course on the history of London as a city. Just started today, but it's helping me to get (even more) excited for my upcoming trip to the UK.  This course is serving as my bridge between "summer" audiobook listens and "autumn" listens.  I have three books lined up that I hope to finish before mid-November: Trigger Warning by Neil Gaiman, Dracula narrated by Alan Cumming and others, and Something Wicked This Way Comes by Ray Bradbury.  Plus, I'm adding to that list both the Night Vale book and The Epic Adventures of Lydia Bennet which debuts at the end of September.  Technically that last one feels more like a "summer" read, but I plan to listen to it as soon as it's available.

(Note: as expected, I quickly finished Felicia Day's book, and moved on to a short story called The Water Horse by Dick King-Smith. I'm told there's a movie of The Water Horse that is not very good, but the short story was just lovely. I'm consistently impressed with short children's fiction: another of my favorite audiobook 'reads' was Clockwork by Philip Pullman.)

Reading (in book form)... Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, and Coraline. I meant to do this ages ago, but now I have literally ten days left to get them re-read and to re-watch the cartoon versions of each.  Also, I may have bought the books for Maryellen Larkin, the new American Girl from the 1950s...

Seeing... golden early autumn sunset outside, best friends inside, fresh clean clothes drying on their drying racks, and two fuzzy kitties who currently want dinner pretty badly. I understand kitties, because it smells insanely good in my apartment since I'm...

Tasting... pulled pork, caramelized green beans and onions, and funfetti cupcakes!  When best friends cook, it's fantastic.  And, now that it's September, I can drink pumpkin ale with impunity!

Excited for... well, my upcoming trip, of course!  But also for the continuation of my job at Special Collections and the chance to see my current collection and its related collection through to the end. Best of all, I love my new work schedule.  It's perfect in terms of hours, and leaves me with time during the week to pour energy into new creative ventures-- and also to take up Spanish language-learning again (which I slacked on a lot during August).  And of course, I'm excited for the beginning of autumn! My favorite season!  As much as I love warm weather, September and October are my favorite months.  There's something about September and that 'back-to-school' feeling that has never gone away (granted, I usually am going back to school).  The cozy nights and crisp days and sweaters and boots and warm stews and crusty breads of fall make me tingly happy.  I can't wait for the World Series and Halloween movies and here's hoping that this year I might finally make it to an autumn festival or two!