Prone to Panic

Dear Reader,

In recent weeks it has crept to my attention that, for some inexplicable reason, I seem to have paltry panic attacks over all the wrong things. Now if I were a good and righteous person (ahem that some people mistakenly think I am ahem) I would have be panicking about significant things: like my dreaded end-of-year exams that are just 'round the corner, or the state of our Ummah, or the condition of those starving on a global scale, not to mention the availability of precious resources and endangered wildlife for my grandchildren or any other such noble causes.

But instead when I panic it's over a clean white shirt fallen off the laundry line and into the flower bed, or missing my train station or milk boiling over onto the stove or not being able to finish a book before sunrise (yes that really did happen). The rest of the time I'm as calm as a cucumber. Actually scratch that last line, it's far too cheesy. Not that I've ever seen a cucumber panic on a chopping board. Come to think of it, I've never seen any vegetable in that state. Okay, now I'm babbling nonsense.

Hazard a guess at what I've been doing when I should have been panicking about my exams. Go on it's not that hard. .............. Yes, that's right, I've been reading. And not even anything particularly productive or enlightening either. What has had me addicted for the past few months? you might ask. Well, with cheeks burning red with embarrassment I admit that I've been reading grossly-icky-mushy guilty-pleasure-y Regency Romances by Julia Quinn.

It began back in December after a particularly boring lecture in Lecture Theatre G (one of the two lecture theatres that always does a great job of sending me to sleep). A good friends of mine, who also shares my passion for Jane Austen, enthusiastically ... forcefully (yes that more like the word I'm looking for) suggested that I read the Bridgerton Family Series. ------->

I wasn't too keen when I picked up my first Julia Quinn. I didn't want to like it and I was only really reading it for my friend's sake ... at first. Yet after finishing the first one I had to read another and then another. Next thing I know I've read seventeen books by Julia Quinn and spent God-knows how many hours doing it. It's not the ridiculously obscenely flagrant romance that occurs in the books that has me hooked. But rather Quinn's hilariously superb portrayal of these imperfect humans and their relationships with families - especially their siblings. Having two brothers has made it especially easy to relate to Eloise and Daphne Bridgerton as well as Olivia Bevelstoke. Furthermore, the heroes of her novels always seem to have a certain vulnerability and it is always intriguing to see how they over come it.

<---- The last Julia Quinn book that I read was What Happens in London (though I much prefer the UK covers). And now I absolutely cannot wait to read Ten Things I Love About You. Lucky for me my birthday is in July, a few days after it's release date, and I plan to convince one of my brothers to buy it for me as a gift - they're both quite hopeless when it comes to presents. But, on the hole, my favourite of all Julia Quinns is Romancing Mr. Bridgteron, and anyone who know me well will know why I like Penelope Feathering so much.

Which reminds me. In my last blog I completely forgot to mention something of vital importance. The inspiration for my style of blogging was in fact Lady Whistledown. And I firmly believe that if she were real and lived in the 21st century, she would have been a blogging sensation.

Anyway, that's all for now. I can smell the chicken-corn soap and home-made garlic bread calling to me, calling me down stairs, waiting to be devoured. It cannot be resisted.

We'll meet again when I can pry my face away from books and panic

Nida