Nothing happening around here

Just got back from a library trip.
A ritual precedes every library trip I make these days, a pointless ritual of research. The night before, I scour Internet lists for the 'best of' whatever genre I'm in the mood for, with the Waterloo Public Library catalogue open in another window so I can determine every so often that no, they don't stock that book either. Or maybe they do, but there are umpty-dozen holds on it and it won't be in until long after I'm dust. Every so often I discover, miracle of miracles, an interesting-looking book which the catalogue informs me is actually ON THE SHELVES. Then, almost without fail, I'll make my way to the library and find a dozen things that weren't on my list in the first place.
Such was the case today. Only one Neil Gaiman on offer, and I just read it a couple of months ago. A couple of books from this edition of The List that, on closer inspection, didn't appeal as much as I thought they might.
WPL has a "FastRead" 4-day loan system for recent hot arrivals, and every so often I'll kid myself into thinking I can finish off six or seven hundred pages in that span of time. Years ago, I wouldn't even blink at a deadline like that--I managed two or three books that size a week--but then, I didn't have a wife, kids (and just try and tell me our two dogs aren't kids) or any responsibilities. My life consisted of working, sleeping, and reading.
(And no, I don't miss those days one bit. Not when loneliness and despair came standard with all that free time.)
So today, I'm looking at that FastRead section again, noting the latest Stephen King novel, Lisey's Story, on there and thinking hey, four days is a long time. Especially when two of them are weekend days. I can do it.
Add to cart.
On the off chance Lisey's story turns out to be on a par with From A Buick 8, which made me want to buick myself, I needed at least one backup book. I found a Greg Benford book of short stories that looked very promising, and threw it in. Eva was busily gathering together her list for the next three weeks, a considerably smaller pile than usual, only seven or eight books. (I've seen her get twenty: carrying that kind of load out of the library is an exercise in engineering.) Eva tends to divide her reading time lately between certain kinds of romance, and children's series like Pendragon and Artemis Fowl. The kind of job she has, her brain needs to be dialled way down or she'll explode; and that was how I found myself in the children's library for only the second time since I was a child myself.
While I'm down here....
I scooted right over to the K's, looking for Korman, Gordon. His Macdonald Hall series is a blast from my past. I didn't know the first time I read through those things that their author was scarcely older than I was...he wrote This Can't Be Happening At Macdonald Hall! when he was all of twelve. And there staring out at me was a book I consider to be a masterpiece of children's literature, entitled Don't Care High. It helps that I went to a high school that might have been its twin.
Quick, get that in the basket before some little snot sees it.
La-di-da-di-da...hurry up, love, it's taking you longer to find How To Eat Fried Worms than it will for you to read it. In fact, excuse me, I'll go fry up some worms right n--
Tom's Midnight Garden!
That's it!
For years I've been trying to remember the name of a book I read way the hell back in grade four or so. All I could remember was a kid discovering a huge garden behind his aunt's place that seemed to be at least partly imaginary. That and I'd loved that story to pieces, once. I'd thought it might be called "Secret Garden" or something like that, but my searches always led nowhere. Now here was that book, right in front of me.
Three CDs later, we're checked out and home, and I find within pages that I'm really not in the mood for Lisey's Story. The first twenty pages are mind-numbingly depressing. Knowing me, I'll pick it up again anyway, probably tonight. That's an odd little foible of mine. The Leafs might play so badly that I'll snap the TV off in disgust, but wait five minutes and it'll be on again. But I doubt I'll get anywhere close to finishing Lisey's Story in four days...no, three, now.