I don’t read enough

Friends and such often talk of books they’ve read, authors being like this, that and the other and I always find myself lacking. It never fails to irritate me.

The main reason is I can never find the time and prerequisite enthusiasm to sit down and read. Like any typical lazy person I will gravitate towards television or video games. Even when I’m on the tube or any other form of public transport, I find myself staring into space or worse, reading the Metro.

I hold books in very high regard because you have to paint the picture yourself, you can’t top em for exercising your imagination. This is the main reason why my wafer thin readership troubles me so.

I’ve read a couple of books recently but a lot of people I know have “the book they’re reading at the moment”. It’s a perpetual thing. I’m a flavour of the month kinda person, I have albums that I like at the moment and tv I’m currently watching. So having a book on the go is very consistent with my way of absorbing mediums of entertainment. Books should be no different, but they are.

I’d resigned myself to being in a perpetual state of intending to read. That would be my thing. Whenever people start talking about books, I’ll just say I always intend to read, making paper thin excuses and then they’ll ignore me and carry on talking about this amazing new book about amazing things, interesting times and curious stuff.

However my resignation was premature. I have found something which could help me in my quest to become a habitual reader.

Josie Long, one of those lovely comedy types, is pioneering a movement called Hundred Days. This is involves you pledging to do something to improve you as a person for 100 days. A nice idea and the perfect excuse I needed.

It didn’t take long for me to figure out that my thread bare reading is the best possible thing I could pick to improve. All I needed to figure out were the rules of my pledge. I wanted something I could reasonably do. I gave it a noodle and decided

I will read a book for at least 20 minutes a day, for 100 days

So there you go. I’m hoping this will result in me taking a more active interest in reading or at the very least being less resistant to it. We’ll see how it goes……and here’s how it goes as I’m already on day 3!

The fact that I’m on day 3 means it’s going quite well so far. I almost forgot to do it on day 2 (my birthday) as I left the house without my book. I managed to convince myself to jack knife myself and go back and get it, I completed the 2o minutes on the tube.

The book I’m reading is this…

“The Gone Away World” by Nick Harkaway.

This book was recommended to me practically at gun point by my friend Jess. She maintains it’s one of the best books she’s ever read and strongly insisted I read it. So I am, should shut her up, though I doubt it.

I’ll keep my blog updated every couple of weeks or so with my progress, I’ll be really proud of myself if I can manage it. I’m gonna buy myself a present if I manage it, though I haven’t figured out what it is yet.

Onward!