Casey’s Literary Rants

Casey Literary RantsIn which I rant about when books just aren’t enough

For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been completely stressed out of my mind. Being stressed isn’t abnormal for me, yet this time I’ve gotten to the point where I. Cannot. Read.

Yes, people, it IS  a sign of the apocalypse. Right in there between running out of all the chocolate in the world and burning books. I can never remember the order in which they come, but I do know we still have some chocolate in the world. Or was it all eaten right after Halloween? I know I for one, ate more than my weight in chocolate…and then some.

Back to my absence of reading, trust me it’s not for a lack of trying. I’ve picked up over a dozen books, some of my favorite authors and others by authors I’ve never tried before and not a single book has been able to capture my attention. I’ll read a paragraph, a page if I’m lucky, and then I’m ready to move on. It is driving me absolutely CRAZY!!!!!

If you couldn’t tell, reading is kind of my thing. It’s my happy place. It’s the thing that I go to when life turns into a monkey and starts flinging its feces at me. And now I can’t do it! [cue my wails of despair] So the big question is, now that I can’t read, what the heck am I supposed to do with my life? That, my dear friend, I have no clue how to answer. Oh, I’ve tried just about everything under the sun to amuse to myself with.

Okay, that was  a straight up lie. I mean, I’ve never tried bungee jumping but I don’t like falling from high places so…yeah, I’m so never going to try bungee jumping. What I really meant was I’ve tried a few things to try and relax maybe get back into reading. Yeah, uh huh, that’s working out about as much as telling life to stop throwing its nasty feces at me. It other words, it ain’t happening.

I tried the clichéd bubble bath. Over and over, I hear from other women, “There’s nothing a nice long soak in a hot bubble bath won’t cure!” Maybe it’s just me, but as soon as I sit down I’m ready to jump right back out and work on the next thing on my to do list. Am I really just supposed to sit there and do nothing? I guess I could read while I’m taking a bubble bath…if I could actually read. It always comes back to that, doesn’t it?

So what is a gal like me supposed to do in a world like this? I turn to the one thing that us readers know absolutely nothing about. I mean, I’m sure you’ve seen one around, but always forgone learning about it because there is a wonderful book just waiting to be read instead. What am I talking about? It’s, how do I describe this, that black…box, usually found in living rooms, although it can also be found in bedrooms, kitchens, and every once in a while, a bathroom. Most of them are flat now, usually hung on a wall. It’s shiny and…black. I know I’m blowing your mind away with my amazing descriptive skills but just wait until I tell you about what this “box” does.

Are you sitting down? Are you prepared to have your mind completely blown away? Okay, when you turn on this box, get this, on the front screen pops up a moving picture! Not only that but the moving picture can tell its own story! I never, ever would have discovered this brand new technology had I not been able to read.

There I go, lying to you guys again. Somebody ought to tell me that lying is bad. The truth is, I’ve known about TVs my entire life – I just usually spend more time reading than I do sitting in front of the TV. Since I have lost that integral part of my life, I have turned to TV. I’ve discovered that while there are some really stupid shows out there, there are also some really awesome shows too. I have a really long list of shows I’m currently addicted to. I mean, it’s really long and because I know you guys are just dying to know what I do in my spare time, I shall list them all. They are:  The New Girl, The Walking Dead, Grimm, Once Upon A Time, The Big Bang Theory, American Dad, NTSF:SD:SUV, Family Guy, Psych, Tough Love (though I’m so not liking this new season as much as I adored the other two), and The Office.

See , I told you I have a lot of shows. Yeah, a lot of those shows I was addicted to before now but I only just discovered The Big Bang Theory about a month ago, even though it’s been on for a few years. And I am so kicking myself for not discovering this awesome show earlier! I am A-D-D-I-C-T-E-D to it. For those of you who used to be like me and not know about this awesomeness, it’s about a group of nerds and their really hot neighbor. I just adore nerds. A-freaking-dore then. They’re so antisocial and smart and awkwardly shy – doesn’t that just melt your heart?!

Anyway, I’m so addicted to The Big Bang Theory that I’m watching it right now while I write this rant. Yep, I’m sitting here with one eye on the T.V. and the other eye on my laptop. How multi-talented am I? And that isn’t all I’m doing. I’m kinda, sorta studying for my Oceanography exam I have tomorrow morning, talking with Jackie and the rest of the girls from LE in a meeting, trying to figure out what to write about in a short story for my creative writing class, trying to figure out what to say in my speech I have to give on Thursday about students going to class stoned and hoping that no one else notices all five gazillion mistakes in the latest issue of my newspaper. (And yes it is MY newspaper, since I became co-editor-in-chief and that means I rule that paper.)

Alas, I must stop ranting about being stressed and start actually doing some of that crap. So, see ya. Hopefully I won’t die from stress in the next couple of days. And, you know what would be even better? If I could start reading again, that would make like A-M-A-Z-I-N-G.

About Casey 203 Articles
Casey is the founder of Heart Full of Ink, Director at Reading Until Dawn Con, and a full time cheese addict. She's been ranting and reviewing for Literary Escapism since 2010, and is part of the trio #3Bloggers1Series podcast. When she's not reading, looking for new books, or stalking authors online (waiting for more books), she can be found binge watching Netflix. But really, her life is all about DEM BOOKS!

5 Comments

  1. Take a deeeeep breath. Step away from the edge. It’s okay to zone out in front of the TV for awhile instead of reading. Even if it goes on for several years LOL. That’s how long it took me before I got back into my current reading binge. My husband calls the TV, “the godbox”, with good reason – it occupies both sight and hearing at once, so it’s much easier to immerse yourself in it and sometimes that’s what you need.

  2. Oh I know Casey, I LOVE The Big Bang Theory as well!! And know how addictive it is (don’t you just love that the episodes are so short that you can binge-watch them? ;-p) Enjoy watching the series and hopefully you’ll find your way back to reading very soon :-)

  3. While you’re trying out shows on TV you should try out Middle, Suburgatory, Modern Family (ESPECIALLY Modern Family) and Happy Endings on ABC Wednesday nights. You can also go to ABC on the computer and watch episodes there.

    And on Tuesday nights – there’s Last Man Standing (Tim Allen’s new show) and Man Up on ABC starting at 8, then at 930 p.m. there is Raising Hope on Fox (channel two around my area). Hell-a-good shows.

    Then there’s all the quirky crazy weird shows – like It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia on …I always forget, but it can be looked up. Crazy, totally amoral vain characters who do crazy things. And Workaholics – stoners who are always in some weird situation on either MTV or VH1….or was it Comedy Central? I don’t remember, but you can also look them up. Anyway, those are the comedies that I catch on a weekly basis. The other must see t.v. for me is Doctor Who, but they only seem to show six shows, then go on hiatus for a couple months. BBC America – Doctor Who needs to be filmed and aired WAY more often.

    Enjoy TV, and hope you find your reading mojo again soon – sometimes it just leaves for a while, but it usually comes back. :) Happens to many of us.

  4. I went through a faze where I couldn’t read.
    It was really odd. I had been reading for longer than I care to remember and hadn’t had any difficulty until very suddenly I couldn’t do it. I could still read individual words and understand the meanings but I could read the same sentence over and over and although the individual words would make sense the sentence did not.

    I got really stressed and went to the doctor in case it was possible for a teenager to get a stroke or something.
    Turns out it was stress. And all the stress I had been getting carried away with was only making it worse.

    Give it some time and it will all work itself out.

    p.s. Have you tried something with animals. They are usually pretty good at getting your mind to purr.

  5. I”m just getting off of a looong period of not reading anything or wanting to read anything. Honestly what got me back into it was audiobooks. I needed something to keep my mind occupied at work so I wouldn’t zone out as much. So I started loading the audiobooks of a few of my favorite books on my ipod and listened to them at work. Usually it only took getting about half way through listening to it for me to want to pick it up and read it again. Still haven’t started anything new but I guess that’ll come back in time.

    ~Kayla

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