Now that I am out of school for four months, I have time to read for leisure. Again, I am making a summer reading goal. This time my goal is twenty five books and I feel well on my way. I will list the title, the author, and a short synopsis and review of the book.

1. Jewel by Bret Lott: A woman and man are happily married with their children until the woman gives birth to a mentally retarded daughter. Against doctor cautions, she does not institutionalize her child. The basis of the plot is focused on Jewel and her struggles at raising her daughter. I thought this story was hard to get into, but once I did I could not put it down.

2. Thinking in Pictures by Temple Grandin: Grandin describes what living with autism feels like and what it is. In the process Grandin gives insight into her past and into her career. I think this book is very useful for me, a must save. It gave me real insight on the autistic mind, and I would def. recommend it to any teacher.

3. Incidents in the Life a Slave Girl by Linda Brent: Written in the 1860's, this story is unique in the fact that it is an actual recount of slavery from the slave girls point of view. I thought this story was very insightful. While I understood slavery was an evil part of America's past, I never fully got a glimpse at just how evil it really was.

4. Home to Harlem by Claude McKay: This is parallel stories of two young men trying to find their way in Harlem. This story is both blunt and realistic. The speech had me envisioning the life of Harlem Renaissance!

5. The Five Love Languages of Singles: This book goes into the details five different "love languages." It gave numerous tips on how to better love and serve others. While I appreciated the tips, I was not sure I bought into love languages, merely because I identify with all five of them equally. They includes acts of service(like I unloaded the dishwasher because mom was busy), words of affirmation(At dinner tonight I said "Hey dad, everytime you make corn it comes out perfect. Thanks," physical touch(I hugged mom before she went to sleep), gifts (Stephen gave me this book to read), and quality time (my brother and I had a conversation on a ten minute car ride). I am not unfamiliar with the love languages, but it did make me aware of how I could better express love.

6. Bad Boy Brawly Brown by Walter Mosley: Brawly Brown has gotten caught up in gang activity. He is caught up in more danger than his youth can handle and it is Easy Rawlins job to find him and help him. At the request of Brawly's mother, Rawlins is on a quest to save Brawly.

7. Snow Place to Die by Mary Daheim: Judith is a caterer ready to retire when her cousin calls on her to cater a telephone company's winter retreat. While the pay is good, there is a murderer in the midst of the resort. The residents are secluded, snowed in, and Judith and her cousin Renie tackle the task of solving this murder mystery.

8. The White Hotel: This is a fictional story of one of Frued's patients, who wrote a detailed sexualized journal entry. This story provides the journal entry, Frued's analysis, and the patients life after treatment.

9. Green Darkness by Anne Seton: The past literally came back to haunt the present. When Cecllia gets really sick, a doctor realizes that her past life is taking over her present body. This story intertwines the present with lives from the 1500's. 

10. The Trees by Conrad Ricthter: This story takes place in the late 1700's and dictates one families struggles to pioneer land in Ohio. 

11. Warriors Don't Cry by Melba Pattillo Bates: Melba was one of the Little Rock Nine. She beautifully writes about the positives and negatives of being a pioneer in intergradation. I enjoyed Melba's walk through her hellish junior year in high school because it made history so much more real to me. Rather than just a newspaper article or passage in a history book, there was a real voice and a real emotion behind the tale. It really brought history alive!

12. Native Speaker by Chang Rae Lee: Native Speaker is a novel about an Asian immigrant. This man describes his undercover job, his relationship with his father, his struggling relationship with his wife, and the death of his son. I thought the relationships weaved in this novel were super realistic and made for a great read.

13. The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold: A fourteen year old girl was murdered by a neighbor. She is now observing her family and friends coping with her death from heaven. She describes heaven and her desperate desires to be living again,

14. Alibi by Joseph Kannon: After World War Two, Adam, a soldier, has come to live with his widowed mother. His mother quickly becomes engaged to another man who Adam suspects of helping the NAZI's.Now he finds himself struggling with unusual moral dilemmas.

15. Left Behind By Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins: This is a postapoplectic story. Suddenly, half of the earth's populations disappears. Everything they own, including the clothes on their bodies, disappear. Among the living are Buck and Rayford. Both men try reason out the disappearances in the midst of new turmoil.

16. Special People by Juile Nixon Eisnhower: Julie describes the six most inspirational people of her childhood.

17. Stolen Away by Max Allan Collins: A novel about the police investigation of the Lindenberg kidnapping.

18. Tell Me a Story by Don Hewwitt: The best way to put this is storytelling by a storyteller.

19. Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer : For some reason, I could not shake the sinking feeling that Krakauer authored this book as justifaction of all of the lives lost on Mt. Everest during his journey and that he had a self-severing motive for writing. However, this did not hinder my interest in this story. I thought this would be a boring read, but it hooked me. I dream of being athletic enough to conquer Everest, but I am also aware I do not have the potential or the skill to make a safe trip. I felt like I was living vicariously through Krakauer.

20. The Last Song by Nicholas Sparks: Ronnie is a resentful young woman since her parents divorce. Her mom suddenly sends her and her brother to her dads house in N. Carolina for the summer. The catch: Ronnie has not spoken to her dad in three years. This is the summer where Ronnie learns how to love and forgive.

I was recently reading the latest issue of "Seventeen." I feel like the articles and tips are still geared for me. Dating tips caught my eye, because now that Stephen and I are so far apart distance wise, it is extra hard to make a relationship work, so we need to be super creative. The human interest story always catches my eye. And I still like reading make-up tips. The freebies are always nice too!

However, I was looking at the advertisments. The oufits they have thrown together cost more than $200. WHO DO THEY GEAR THOSE ADS FOR??? I have no idea!

Marybeth is my favorite shopping buddy. We go to Kohl's and buy jeans for $10 or less and we got to Old Navy because of the awesome $5 shoes. Jeans in this magazine are over $50. Do they think the majority of teens really buy this stuff? ARE teens so superfical that they buy this? Seriously, college has taught me to look for deals, because I still make minamuim wage! So do high school students! Where do teens come up with money for a $65 pair of jeans and $100 pair of shoes? I make $165 a week, and money has to go to gas, a phone, fast food, a night out with my girls, a date, college, ect. At the end of the week, I only have $10 or $20 to go shopping.

I want to know why ads for expensive shoes are geared to college kids or soon-to-be college kids, because in college, Walmart and the dollar store became your best friends! They should advertise the sales on the expensive brands, because those are the deals that I really want to know about! I don't want to shoes that actually cost $100.  I want the shoes that look like cost $100 or more for 25 bucks. So, Seventeen, my sugguestion is that for all the independent young adults, please show us cool, pretty stuff for under $25, because they are few and far between in that magazine.

I feel like I am not getting very far this summer. It has been two weeks and I have yet to find a job. So I am going to make a few goals, and I will supply the reason I make each goal.

1. I want to run a seven minute mile by August. I have already dropped a minute off my ten minute time because I figure if I can run a mile in seven minutes I will be really good shape.

2. I want to lose 20 pounds by September because want to be a "healthy" weight for my height by the time I am twenty one.

3. I want to have at least one job interview by the end of next week because not only am I poor, but I am bored. And well, SOMEONE needs to be hiring right?

4. I want to read at least fifty books by the end of the summer, because I never get to read when I am in school, so I want to take the oppuntunity to lose myself in a few books while I am at home.

5. I want to make a scrapbook for the last two semesters in college, because I want to make one every year.

I have a job and my scrapbook is complete.