Not About Packing

So I should be packing up everything, but I can't seem to muster up the energy. At this rate we're going to have to abandon half of our stuff to the buyer. (There always is something, though, isn't there? Weird curtains and odd pieces of lumber stuffed in corners of the attic and basement.)

The older ducklings are at Grandma's today, but I have temporarily picked up three extra who are not allowed to go visit their new baby sister in the hospital owing to flu season having officially started yesterday. I am glad I do not have triplets. Actually everyone is occupying themselves pretty well, but I certainly do not have enough lap space for three toddlers.

Yesterday I picked up a bag full of library books to tide me over until we leave. It left me wondering why murder mysteries are such good comfort reads. Actual murders would, presumably, not be comforting. I suppose it is the moral resolution; it is Judgment Day for other people, which is always far more comfortable than it should be. A really good novel is about Judgment Day for yourself, which is always uncomfortable. That is why I have not read any really good novels lately; that and I accidentally packed Anna Karenina after reading the first twelve chapters.

Nonetheless, I was really distressed to start Alexandar McCall Smith's Scottish series and discover he had gone for a second forty-something lady with a troubled past marriage but a kind and philosophical outlook. He surely could have managed something with a little more variety if he had tried. Or maybe he thought it would have been trying too hard to be distinctly different? Or did he think switching from Botswana to Scotland was change enough and he'd better stick to what he knew for the rest?

I shall read it anyway.