Cabin fever is setting in with me. Yesterday I got an email from a place on the North Shore where in the past we have rented a cabin; they are opening next Monday and all rates are 25% off until the end of June. I suggested to Smokey that we take advantage of it. While he initially was in favor, after further thought he was less than enthusiastic. Once we diagnosed my cabin fever we reached a compromise: when the weather is warmer (it is 44˚ and raining today) we will go visit someone and sit in their yard to chat.

Livin’ on a prayer.

Guarding a baby ruminant.

I’ll take cat.

I need to give some credit. Many of the humorous (and not-so-humorous) screenshots I post here come from the IG feed of prisrob1. Here are more of her contributions, plus some from other feeds. Thank you, oh humorists of Instagram; you are helping the rest of us cope.

Some non-corona humor.

Since I titled this post Unraveled, perhaps I should tell you what i have been reading.

Divergent by Veronica Roth. I opened the Kindle app on my iPad to see if there was anything there that I hadn’t read and discovered this. It seems like random books just show up there. Actually, not completely random, because the ones that have appeared are not so far off of things that I do read. Perhaps I did download it myself and don’t remember. Anyway. I read this YA speculative fiction novel. Okay, a bit juvenile for an adult, but hey, the libraries are not open so what am I gonna read? If I get desperate enough — not likely — I may read the next book in the series.

Enemy at the Gates by William Craig. Speaking of books that just show up, this one was on my iPad, too. As much as I would like to know more about the siege of Stalingrad and its historical import, this one was too dry and too focused on military moves and generals.

Stalingrad by Anthony Beevor. This book has been on my bookshelf haunting me for several years. When the book above failed to capture me, I turned to this one. It seemed like it might be what I was looking for since in the introduction the author talked about how most books on the subject talk about the military aspects of the siege of Stalingrad, but he wanted to focus on the people, both civilian and military. Smokey teased me that, after I had become an expert on the Battle of Britain after listening to The Splendid and the Vile, now I would become an expert on the siege. Sadly, it did not happen. I got 50 or 75 pages into it and lost interest. It was me, not the book.

The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco. Once again, on my iPad. I know I had wanted to read this for a long time so I must have downloaded it. Currently about 30 pages into it. Unfortunately my pandemic brain is finding reading to be difficult in the same way that I can only knit garter stitch right now. Perhaps I will go back to it, perhaps not.

The happy news is that our library will open on Monday for curbside pick-up. The less good news is that we can only request books on our own library shelves instead of from anywhere in the 54-library consortium. Good news is that the online catalog allows narrowing search by genre and by library. Pandemic brain (see above) craves mysteries right now, something predictable and a bit formulaic… like genre fiction. I shall pick up three mysteries on Monday, two of them by author I am not familiar with. Who knows, maybe I will discover a new series to binge on.