TGIF!

This has not turned out to be the Friday I expected. Yesterday I had a nice lunch out with my daughter at the Hard Rock Cafe (neither of us had ever been - it was okay, but nice to go out together), and today I was going to take the day off but since she sleeps till nearly noon anyway, I thought I'd work until 1:00 and then we'd spend the afternoon together. Wrong.

I get in to find panic. Big task assigned after we all leave last night, due at 4:00 today. I'm the only one who can do it. No way in hell I can get it done by 1:00, it's now 3:40 and I'm in hurry up and wait mode because until someone sends me their input I'm stuck. Will I get out of here by 4:30? Who knows. So my daughter went to a friend's house for the afternoon. So much for getting my errands done and spening the afternoon together. Grrrrr. I am really annoyed with the whole thing. I should have taken the day off. So it's been the sucky Friday from hell. On the upside they had sweet potato fries in the cafeteria for lunch (since I hadn't brought my own.).

Anchors Aweigh by Janey Chapel (100 pages)

This is the follow-up to Maritime Men. Eli and Cooper are finished their training and waiting to get their assignments. They are almost guaranteed to be split up which sucks but is a fact of life. They agree to rent a house together and they find out that Eli is being deployed right away and Cooper is going to be a second in command with two of the remaining guys and stay behind.The tentative plan is that when Eli comes back he'd take over command of Cooper's group so they'd be together. It was quite interesting to see Cooper have to be the boss. He'd always relied on Eli and he questioned if they only reason they were any good, and he himself, was because Eli made them good. He had to do some growing up and stand on his own as did the other guys. It was also hard for them to be apart for months with zero contact allowed. They had agreed to remain faithful and rather than just float quite so much they actually acknowledged their relationship and how they felt. So it was a very nice conclusion to their romance and I really enjoyed it and I am quite sure I could never serve in the military. Too much work. :-)

Freaks in Love by TA Chase (101 pages)

James is a bodyguard for a crime boss in post apocalyptic city where bomb radiation has created mutants (freaks) who live in a ghetto behind a wall, the rest of the city controlled by 3 crime families. Magpie is the body guard of a rival boss but he and James get along. James is unusual, he's completely hairless, never talks and has tattoos all over his body. A meeting is called at which the crime bosses are killed. James grabs Magpie who has been shot and takes him to the North Side where he uses his contacts to heal Magpie. Seems James is a freak but I'll keep it a surprise just how so. He and Magpie start a relationship and are basically trying to stay alive in Freaktown. Someone is trying to kill James and he finds out the Freaks plan on rising up against the NFs (non-freaks). He and Magpie plan to get on a train to another city where freaks and NFs live together. They then have to manage to avoid getting killed, get past the checkpoints as the crime families think they are responsible and get on the train before the rebellion starts. It's quite the wild ride. It really sucked me in as I wanted to see how they were going to escape and who was after them. I thought it also gave me a good picture of what it was like in Freaktown with everything abandoned, no electricity, a kill or be killed environment. I also liked James and Magpie, they were both killers, that had been their job, but they knew they could rely on each other and Magpie was also realistic enough to admit that maybe the reason they were attracted was the "we must survive" thing and maybe it would burn out. So if you like books with a futuristic bent I think you'll enjoy this one. This is two TA Chase that I've read lately that are very different and I've liked them both.

Just to make my day the tiniest bit brighter, I'll post this video. I don't particularly love this song or Miley Cyrus but I adore the signer Stephen Torrence. He actually has several videos and even some duets. What I like about this one is they actually give you the subtitles of what he's signing and you can see how it's not verbatum but gives you a sense of what's being said. Everytime I hear the song I want to do the "butterfly flies away" hand motions and the "nodding my head like yeah". You can't help but want to sign along cause he's having so damn much fun.

Have a great weekend everyone.