What’s a girl to do! Only a farthering of a distance was meant to be broached, yet the day unravelled into a bit of a bout of unexpected blessings, wicked kibitzing, deep belly laughing, quirky humour sharing, errand running with a friend, and the warmed cuppa chili with a fresh brewed cuppa coffee which cast off the deep chill swept round me bones whilst walking in the environs without a proper set of mittens! Laughs. Its a bout of a time alright, as gleefully spent as though I was plumb charged and ignited inside of a novel! Avenues of unknown delights rounded each bend, and this happy bookish soul was thankful in the end! The type of day which evolves simply as the winds cast their murmuring glow, Wintry crystal blue skies with a soft brush stroke of cotton white! Air as crisp as the shouldering winds keeping you chilled, with an expectation of ‘something!’ For me? Getting a second chance at participating in the Bout with a renewed sense of being! I wanted to relax into the Bout, settle into random convos, tweet & chat on blogs, and enjoy the whole process w/o the limitations of how many page counts!
Words, Pages, Context Consumed:
Honestly, I didn’t get back home in time to read as I was suffering technical difficulties with both my email server and my browsers! I was burning the midnight oils something fierce trying to source the cause of the issues! I tucked myself in past 4am, thrilled to bits everything was alright for the Author Guest Post for To Tuscany with Love! My eyes wandered to my shelves, where my ChocLitUK books were murmuring their silent whispers, as I am posting my very *first!* reviews for ChocLit book titles this coming Saturday! Each of the three Saturdays left in January will be a different featured ChocLit author & title! I feel so very grateful to being accepted as a ChocLit reviewer, because I oft thought to myself I am not quite a ‘chick lit’ girl, and now I can affirm that I am definitely a ‘choc lit’ kind of gal! The stories evoke such a hearty response of excitement of what lays beneath the pages! I cannot wait to post my reviews and to give my readers a few surprises along the way too! Romance for me is always a genre I will hungrily be motivated to explore, because I love solid story-lines which are founded in relationships, coupled with either adversity, angst, coming-of age, growing woes, or other bits of realism thrown in for good measure! I love solid character arcs, world-buildings (whether modern day or historical!), and a proper sense of who the characters are and why they are making the choices they decide! I like being swept up into a romance in the Winter, whilst the air is frightfully cold, and your mind is eager for the warmth of the story inside!
Hours Spent:
My mind was all a-swirl of the lovely moments and memories the day unfolded into my lap! I even met a new crafter who I hope will become a good friend — someone who crochets to my knits, but appreciates the social engaging with other crafters! Its sometimes hard to sort out where ‘crafters’ meet-up with one another, and so to help another creative find what I am finding lately was a way to pay forward the kindnesses I have been receiving too! Truly, part of my issue with reading today was trying to sort out how to stop re-thinking upon the conversations, the spoken stories, the little moments which brought so much joy; some days like today unfold by their own accord. They take you places you hadn’t planned, and enlighten you with moments you will fondly muse about long after the hours dissolve and a new day starts to dawn!
And, how about you dear, Bout’ers?! What do you do when life graces you with such a lovely day like mine!? Do you embrace it or stress about the readings you weren’t able to do? For me? There will always be time enough for books and reading; but life as it is being lived is an experience to cherish all by its own! Especially when everyday joy and kindness alights in your life during ordinary hours! Simple joys warm my heart forevermore!
{SOURCES: Bout of Books Badge created by Jorie in Canva to give readers & visitors who come to her blog a way to know of its existence and therefore increasing the mystery & lore surrounding it!! Badges for Coffee are given to bloggers to add personality to their blogs by Squeesome Designs.}
Bout! The Bout is About! The reading adventure has properly begun! My Day 1 Adventures, led me everywhere but inside of a book! :O Oh, my dear ghouls! Knitty as a bindi encased inside the joy of casting on yarn to needles whose fingers long since had ached to unite the stitches of purly delights! A spontaneous birthday celebration for a friend not yet acquainted, who alighted at the table where yarn unfolded into conversation! An unexpected encounter with a teacherly keen interest in literature! Knitters and crafters of all mediums represented cherished the bliss of a sisterhood bond of confession: spilling out reflections of projects, materials, and the excitement of completed confections! Extending past the hour of chance, another new friend as knitty as the last struck up a fortutious conversation about the extolling virtues of foreign language extraction! Merrily and giddy on the random joy of being, this bout’er of bookish virtue of exploration collected her classic purchase selection! A book arrived far faster than five, “The Ladies Paradise” a classic of selection! Smiles unfolding as stars realign, the hours dwindled down into nine! Words to compose, led this bout’er every which way to Sunday away from her goals!
One must always endeavour to read a bit of a book each day in order to keep the mind alert and free! Wonderous worlds await the eager reader, whose explorations of hidden dimensions is as easy to traverse as a turn of a page! A book, a portable and compact portal of a world not yet known, fully realised by the pen of the author who gave the world their words of narrative; wings of freedom to fly into the eagerly anticipative hands of dear readers!
Words, Pages, Context Consumed:
A wee bit of twitter, a helping handful of me blog, passages of “To Tuscany with Love” whilst writing and editing my bookish review of “To Tuscany with Love”! I spent my first day of the Bout rationalising that sometimes you must venture off into an adventure with a heart bent towards the inertia of jump-diving into the experience! Plans are always easily cast into being, but sometimes, your best not to cast out any plans at all! Grab your moment as you dare, take a risk and chance a pence towards seeing where you land! Therefore, my first day of the Bout wasn’t necessarily spent counting pages nor words or wicked sweet passages of character arcs and dialogue exchangements! It was merely my freedom of choice to join the Bout, settle into the behind-the-scenes final edits of a blog tour coming alive on me blog, and knowing that the hours stacked full and wide ahead of me would be hungrily consumed by the printed word!
Hours Spent:
I cannot readily remember the direct hour or minute, but me eyes ventured a glimpse at the clock as it struck several seconds past seven o’ clock! The evening was cast aflame and afire for those of us who consider ourselves owls of the night’s desire! I knew it wouldn’t be until well past dawn I’d reclaim my position inside the dreamscapes of morn! I ferreted out a quasi-plan of action for which books I wanted to sink myself into during Tuesday’s faire of folly! Of which, I wasn’t sure how far I could become entranced, but even a page of elapsed joy spent inside of a story was a minute more than I could have given this first day of the Bout!
Dear me, dear my, did any Bout’er exceed their expectations?!
{SOURCE: Bout of Books Badge created by Jorie in Canva to give readers & visitors who come to her blog a way to know of its existence and therefore increasing the mystery & lore surrounding it!! }
I was selected to be a stop on “To Tuscany with Love” Virtual Book Tour, hosted by JKS Communications. I received a complimentary copy of “To Tuscany with Love” in exchange for an honest review by the publisher Capriole Group, via JKS Communications. The book released on 7th January 2014. I did not receive compensation for my opinions or thoughts shared herein.
Synopsis of the Story:
Can one college semester abroad change the course of your life?
Bella Rossini, a vivacious college junior, lands in jail overnight with acquaintances whom she mistakes for friends. Shipped off to Tuscany by her mother, Bella is suddenly thrust into living with seven strangers during one life-altering summer.
Meet Hope, the sturdy and practical girl, steadfast in her loyalty to her boyfriend; Meghan and Karen, identical twins with an eye for fashion and beauty to match; Stillman, haunted by his hard past, and Phillip, an athlete, both fueled by competition; Lee, by family mandate in pre-med; and Rune, the Hollywood-bound wild child. All add sizzling chemistry and rebellious humor to the mix.
In one whirlwind summer, while uncovering the charms of Italy, they discover both friendship and love.
After their summer together, life – and loss – happens.
Returning to Tuscany 30 years later, their dreams, anger, secrets and disappointments create an emotional kaleidoscope. Their reunion sends them on a startling collision course that none of them could have predicted.
Set against the allure of Tuscany, with an irresistible fusion of heartbreak and humor, this debut novel, “To Tuscany with Love,” explores the fear of letting the past determine the future and the power of friendship.
Author Biography:
Photo Credit: Ashography Event Photography
Gail Mencini makes her literary debut with “To Tuscany with Love” (January 2014, Capriole Group) an adult coming-of-age novel set in central Italy.
Born in rural Nebraska, Mencini graduated with honors in 1976 from Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa, where she majored in accounting, economics and business administration. She holds a Master of Laws of Taxation degree from the University of Denver College of Law.
Mencini co-owned an accounting firm and practiced for 15 years in public accounting, specializing in tax law related to mergers and acquisitions and real estate. She also spent time in the higher education field, working as an adjunct professor at the University of Colorado and Metro State College, as well as the University of Denver College of Law. She was a repeat speaker at national continuing education seminars and a featured presenter in a real estate conference in the Caribbean.
In 1990 when she married her husband, Mencini became an “instant mother” of three boys plus another son two years later, which opened the doors to becoming a full-time mother and igniting her long-time passion for creative arts, gourmet cooking and traveling.
She went on to become a contributing editor and photojournalist for Buzz in the ‘Burbs, writing monthly cooking columns featuring dinner themes, recipes and complementary wine suggestions. She also served as interim director of marketing for Wine Master Cellars as the company transitioned to new leadership. She has been a member of the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers for nearly 20 years as well as the Pikes Peak Writers for over 10. She most recently joined Author U based in Aurora, Colo.
She writes and cooks in Denver, Colorado, with her husband and family who are always ready to critique her abundance of story ideas and recipes.
Tuscany. Where you can discover who you are?
I am quite sure that Bella must have felt like a fish out of water when she first caught sight of her surroundings in Tuscany. I liked how Mencini opens the story with her innocence of youth, distrustful of the unknown, and of venturing into a whole new country simply because her political protesting had worried her mother past the point of reason. She’s thrust into a Summer college abroad course of study, where she instantly meets up with six other twenty-somethings stranded in Florence for comparable reasons. Each of them brought their own whispers of self-discovery and the insurgence of sorting out how far they ought to dare living whilst an ocean and a plane away from their lives back in the states. It starts to set up as a coming-of age story for college students who never thought they’d be given an opportunity to abandon one way of living their life and exchange it for another.
In the corner of my mind, I had a curious lightbulb tuned to Bella’s mother’s real reason for sending her off to Tuscany, as there were small bits of insight into her mother’s state of mind at the time of her departure, which led me to be clued into the fact that perhaps, rather than the reality of Bella’s position in political affairs as a forefront motivation, I was nearly akin to thinking that perhaps her mother was facing a life shift in her own life and did not necessarily want her daughter to be present to live through the unexpected hurdle she was about to face herself? In this way, I thought the idea of Tuscany might take on a rather new meaning if this were to become true!
Strength and courage are nestled into us at stages in our lives where we might need to face an unexpected adversity, or a succession of adversities. What Tuscany gives to Bella is a foundation in living life as she greets each new day, and keeping herself open to the possibilities of what life can afford all of us. Each experience and adventure we nestle into our tapestry of lived hours, we gain both courage and strength to carry-on whilst life deals out the brutal truths we are never prepared to face. For Bella, Tuscany is where she shed her girlhood amour and walked into the sunshine with an armour fit for a woman.
Encouraging a penchant for the Tuscan landscape:
I still remember when the immediate joy of seeing Under the Tuscan Sun when it first made its theatrical release, due to the honest portrayal of one women’s journey towards redeeming not only her heart but the destiny of her path as she navigates the difficult road after divorce. The landscape of Tuscany opens up to you in little ways you’re not expecting to belove! I still remember the aura of Tuscany and the presence of ‘being caught up in life elsewhere’ to giving the impression that in Tuscany, you truly can re-discover who you are because your placed in an insular area where the buffering of the natural landscape with the homage of the people give you the freedom to do so!
Whilst reading To Tuscany with Love, memories first sparked to life in the motion picture of Diane Lane’s character’s journey, started to filter back into my mind, as Mencini has a way of writing Tuscany’s heart into her passages. She gives you just enough of a cursory knowledge of infamous landmarks and historical attributes to breathe the living heart of Tuscany into her story. She allows your mind to suspend itself back to a place which is altogether familiar and yet, unattached at the very same time! I find myself yearning to visit Tuscany each time I am transfixed by a story which is set there! Such a hearty passion for living, for food, for conversation, for expression and art, culture collides with the causal atmosphere of a best-lived day is the one of a slower pace where living becomes a part of the textural art of the setting.
My Review of To Tuscany with Love:
One of the reasons I find myself drawn into the world of story where characters are beginning to emerge out of their cocoons and start to enter into the heart of their living narrative (which is how I perceive coming-of age stories), is because it’s a bit like the sentiments you can hear whilst listening to a song by Carole King. All the positive loveliness in life starts to ignite and catch fire inside your mind whilst your out discovering the very nature of your being and the charted path your about to take stride towards walking. Each of us has a process of learning to walk towards and shift through. The idea of having the ability to have a chance of stepping up and out of our regular ordinary lives and take a moment out of our days elsewhere — that’s a powerful prospect to undertake! I personally would have jumped at the chance to study abroad for a Summer; although a full year would have been quite keen! The joy of immersion into a culture and lifestyle as different as the shades of evergreens makes the premise of To Tuscany with Love a story worth knowing!
She nudges you into the lives of Bella the seemingly rebellious girl who inadvertently has an awkward way about approaching how to expand her family circle; Stillman the decidedly and unabashedly forward bloke whose past is muddled through reflected angst of a past spent with an abrasive step-father; Hope a girl not yet grown into the wings of confidence but has yielded her heart to love; stalwart and bold twins Karen and Meghan, who recklessly pursue life how they dare to live it; Rune the broken-hearts-in-waiting rake who has a singular tracking mind; Lee the studiously training doctor who’d prefer to break out of his bonds of family obligation; and Philip the soft-spoken bloke who is attracted to Bella but lacks the charisma to draw her eye!
The pacing of the story unfolds in a series of flashbacks and near-precision reflective prose which paints the portrait of their lives whilst living in Tuscany. Told through the main perspective of Bella, the novel shifts forwards and backwards through each key protagonist to give the reader further insight into their worlds. For instance, in the opening chapters we spent time with Stillman as a young boy on a farm in Georgia to understand the underpinnings of his character’s motivations and character traits of how his environment as a young boy shaped who he became as a young man of this twenties. Each of our lived experiences takes a bit of the mould of our futures, as to stitch together our transitions and transgressions. His background is jaded by the loss of his mother at a time in his life where he needed a supportive encourager to guide him.
A classic triangle of emotions and newly developing love between two blokes (Stillman and Philip) and a girl (Bella), turn this story into a classic set-up of a romance which could have a complicated ending. I liked seeing how Mencini chose to take Bella on her journey through first love, first flirtation, and first experiences with the opposite sex. This is definitely an exploration of a women’s progression towards womanhood, of which fits nicely under the category of ‘women’s fiction!’
A refreshing story arc seeing the close-stitched connection between Bella and her Mum, where mother and daughter were the best of friends rather than sidelined as enemies or distantly in each others’ lives. I found it refreshing Bella’s thoughts were always tied to how her mother was doing whilst in Tuscany, and wound in excitement upon her return to New York! Tuscany was merely the impetus to set everything into motion which would follow next in each of their lives. Radical changes emerged out of the warm glow of Tuscany’s Summer’s holiday of study. It’s the measure of each of the characters how they individually chose to embrace their life back in the states which proved to be most remarkable of all.
On Mencini’s writing style:
There is an erstwhile frankness of self and station in the novel, where Mencini chooses to boldly assert the lives of the seven students in open honesty. She doesn’t hold back from revealing the blokes primal thoughts of love nor holds back the bolder strokes of narrative where their language choices would glower the faces of their Mums back home! She chooses to give an impression of raw twenty-something life being led with a bit of reckless abandon half a world away from where they had grown-up. It paints a real portrait of choices and decisions which everyone has to face at one point or another in their own life.
The time slips which occur throughout the story are eased into the book with a natural grace, as it allows us to grab bits of information through specific portals of the character’s life which allow us to understand them in the present. I always appreciate a writer who can master the technique, so that we are given the necessary information we need to attach ourselves to each character in turn, but in a way where the story is not led by mere facts, but lived through reading of their lives which takes the page to a personal bent of enjoyment! I love being half hinged to the present whilst having a firm footing in the past!
Fly in the Ointment:
I only wish the vulgarity which is threaded through the story in different intervals could have been better tempered because at some instances of its inclusion, I was all but cringing for a better turn of phrase to illicit the same emotional conviction. It felt a bit contrived in some ways, as if this were the only way that one particular scene or sequence could be appreciated if it had an illicit word thrown into the mix. I was nearly halfway through before I realised the frequency had changed from randomly included to more adamantly laced. There is a bit of a common slandering towards crude humour or crude descriptions of our bodies as well, which I know can be par for course in contemporary romances, but I felt they were out-of-place for this particular story. This has the full essence of a literary romance wrapped up inside a travelogue diary of one key character’s life hinged to six other lives she unexpected intersected with in Tuscany. I think I would have preferred if the pace and level of narrative in Tuscany had carried forward into the narrative that extracts their lives back in the states. The chapters in the states felt a bit rushed to me and contrite.
{SOURCES: Cover art of “To Tuscany with Love” as well as Gail Mencini’s photograph and biography, the blog tour badge, and the logo badge for JKS Communications were all provided by JKS Communications and used with permission. Blog Tour badge provided by Parajunkee to give book bloggers definition on their blogs. Post dividers by Fun Stuff for Your Blog via Pure Imagination.}
I honestly haven’t planned what I am going to do for Bout of Books, 9.0 because up until literally minutes ago, I wasn’t even considering joining this time around! Laughs with mirth. Life is blessedly unexpected and forever evolving to where you find yourself happily content to jump-dive into a readathon, participating in twittering chats through the official hashtag feed, and curling up with a brilliantly lovely book whilst the whole world winds down from a super-heavy snow storm which has cast my country in a wicked-cold mast of snow & ice! I am in one of the *only!* states w/o ice, but we are having a hard freeze, with our temperatures finally dipping down into the low twenties! Oh, what heavenly bliss, I tell you! I’m a part snowelf you see, and we like it *cold!* yet comfortable! Laughs.
Personal Goals and Motivations:
Hours Dedicated to Reading (in total): at least 8 to 12 hours per day!
Hours per day slated to Read: in flux
Starting Hour: the instant I am able to sit & read! :)
Ending Hour: 00:00 OR I will be winking to the hooting owls!
Books Projected to Read: 6
Potential Blog Posts (in total): ? {7 days to record my reading adventures; 1 declaration of intent to participate; 1 statement of goals and motivations; ? books to opine and review; 1 day after recollection}
Post my reactions to each book after I have concluded reading them, because more than anything I want to be wholly enthused about the stories, the characters, and the prose that each writer etches into their books — I want to challenge myself to read as many books as I can but not to the brink where I cannot fully appreciate them. I want to absorb them and allow their worlds to soak through to my mind’s eye.
Participate in the Bout of Books community by dropping by fellow participants’ blogs, leaving encouraging commentary, and share in the joy of this intensive week of reading! As well as find challenges to enhance my experience with this wicked sweet group of readers!
Blogs I scoped out to visit: Coffee Bean Bookshelf + Read Lately at the moment! This list will self-curate as the Bout marches onward!
I am hoping participants of *9.0* will drop by my blog as well, and in that way, I can get to know the readers who are just as excited about this as I am!
Dig into the ‘first’ book which alights in my mind to be read RIGHT NOW without waiting for another day to arrive which would be a better day to read it! Part of my reading life is attempting to decide when is the best day or time to read the exact book I am wanting to read the most!
Join in on the Twitter chats which I could only read about previously, which are scheduled as follows: Mondays @ 2pm(EST), Wednesdays @ 9pm (EST) <— schedule conflict!, and Saturdays @ 11am(EST).
{*} schedule conflict is the fact I am the unofficial #livetweeting secretary for The Star Chamber podcast, Wednesdays @ 9pm(EST)!! Full information is located in my sidebar! :)
Books to Absorb duringBout of Books 9.0:
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
{sync read via BBCom!} w/ Ruby @Rubysbooks
The Archived by Victoria Schwab
{sync read via BBCom!} w/ Ruby & Anya @OnStarshipsBlog
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
{sync read w/ Maggie!} @Magsteronni
The Gods of Heavenly Punishment by Jennifer Cody Epstein
The Dark Unwinding by Sharon Cameron
? to be decided! ?
{It is my fervent hope to know my onions about these books inasfar as to have the ability to blog about them whilst maintaining a grip on the read-a-thon as the hours tick off the clock! If I am successful the titles of the novels will serve as a link to the post about them! I am hoping that as the stories settle into my creative vortex, I can bring to life my reflections by which touched my heart at the very same moment I am meant to pick up the next book in line to carry on with Bout of Books 9.0!}
Each book has a different state of origin into my life, as they either came to me via a blog book tour or my local library! I will be quite eager to settle into the heart of each of the narratives that I select to read over the score of the week, as I not only am reading on a deadline for postings for my blog, but I am reading for pleasure at the very same time, which is one major difference between Bout 8.0 & Bout 9.0! I was a newly minted blogger back in August 2013, whereas I have had five months under my belt as a book blogger who has been a guest on a weekly bookish podcast twice! Each experience I gain uplifts my heart in joy! I am thankful that I can be a part of such a wonderful community of bookish souls!
Seven days,
168 hours,
with the prospect of devouring itching to read books and savouring the joy of discovering the ones which I am reading for a blog book tour!
Ooh, let the readathon be underway!
{*NOTE: Regular blog posts un-related to the Bout are threaded underneath the Bout!! Be sure to check out what I am posting alongside the Bout! This will constantly change as the week progresses forward!}
{SOURCE: Bout of Books Badge created by Jorie in Canva to give readers & visitors who come to her blog a way to know of its existence and therefore increasing the mystery & lore surrounding it!!}
Clearly, I have lost it. I’m actually signing up to participate in the *next!* Bout of Books! I had promised myself to skip over January’s, even though I had originally adverted this clever little badge in my sidebar over the Christmas holidays as being an upcoming 2014 event I would be active in! What can I say? One of the blogs whose feeds I receive through the lovely WP Reader {Read Lately} posted her Bout Entry, which had me thinking!? Why not have a randomly naturally occurring Bout!? Where I allow the books to float into my hands, and my heart to expand into the worlds I am itching to enter?! I can schedule a few of the books I know for sure I will diving into as the Bout carries forward, but for the most part, why not just kick back into my comfy reading nook, whilst half of my country is awaiting the snowload totals and overnight deep freezes to not be as difficult to emerge out of as they are predicting on TWC! :( My heart goes out to *everyone!* in an affected state!
{Official Blurb}: The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, January 6th and runs through Sunday, January 12th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure, and the only reading competition is between you and your usual number of books read in a week. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 9.0 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog – From the Bout of Books team
I, Jorie of Jorie Loves A Story is not only a seriously addicted reader of books which wrap me inside books which enchant my mind and murmur reflections in my heart after I put the books down, but I am a girl who is positively happy whilst caught up in the book blogosphere events which unite readers with books, and books with readers who love to chatter about why they love to read what they read! I am going to sit back and enjoy this Bout, without worrying about what I couldn’t accomplish during Bout, 8.0 and shift forward into 9.0 with a clear conscience! I will spend part of the Bout going back over my 8.0 posts, taking the time to fuse them into the final drafts they were always meant to be! Here’s to being spontaneous and seeing where the Bout takes me next!
Whose going to join me!? Sometimes caution really does need to be thrown into the four winds!
Added Bonus: I’m able to jump into the Twitter parties & conversations!!
Quirky Trivia: I read in a tweet that “#boutofbooks” was already trending & causing Twitter to blink! Marks my *second!* Twitter event in under 24 hours to have caused this, as I was chattering about #DowntonPBS, #Downton, & #DowntonAbbey Sunday night before and after the wicked sweet debut of Series 4!
Sidenote: I am positively addicted to seeing my “Dashboard” area encased in cocoa chocolate and toffee coffee colours! How did I not know you could change your screen colours!? Oh, this is awesome! “Home” by Philip Philips is rockin’ on my radio, could this be a more tranquil night to join the Bout!? I cannot wait for the Winter Olympics, as I still vividly remember Vancouver! :)
{SOURCE: Bout of Books Badge created by Jorie in Canva to give readers & visitors who come to her blog a way to know of its existence and therefore increasing the mystery & lore surrounding it!! Badges for Proud Book Nerd, Read All Day, & Coffee are given to bloggers to add personality to their blogs by Squeesome Designs.}
What’s a girl to do! Only a farthering of a distance was meant to be broached, yet the day unravelled into a bit of a bout of unexpected blessings, wicked kibitzing, deep belly laughing, quirky humour sharing, errand running with a friend, and the warmed cuppa chili with a fresh brewed cuppa coffee which cast off the deep chill swept round me bones whilst walking in the environs without a proper set of mittens! Laughs. Its a bout of a time alright, as gleefully spent as though I was plumb charged and ignited inside of a novel! Avenues of unknown delights rounded each bend, and this happy bookish soul was thankful in the end! The type of day which evolves simply as the winds cast their murmuring glow, Wintry crystal blue skies with a soft brush stroke of cotton white! Air as crisp as the shouldering winds keeping you chilled, with an expectation of ‘something!’ For me? Getting a second chance at participating in the Bout with a renewed sense of being! I wanted to relax into the Bout, settle into random convos, tweet & chat on blogs, and enjoy the whole process w/o the limitations of how many page counts!
