(no subject)

So the eeee!'s in Greece for a conference, and since he's been gone I might have watched nearly a dozen episodes of Gilmore Girls. And maybe I danced around the house to Motown music, and tried to chop garlic to the beat of "Devil with a Blue Dress". The intro to "Devil with a Blue Dress". I'm really not talented enough to do that. And maybe that's why I'm surrounded by five thousand books that I'm not reading, and I need to decide what to bring with me to Greece.

• Master and Margarita, by Mikhail Bulgakov, Possession, by A. S. Byatt, and Ship Fever, by Andrea Barrett. The first two were on my to-read list, and as the bookstore didn't have Servants of the Map I picked up Ship Fever. It turns out I've already read Ship Fever, duh, and while I like it, and don't regret buying it, it's not a contender for the trip. So I'm considering the other two, but I admit I'm a bit intimidated by the Bulgakov. This is entirely because Crime and Punishment scared me away from Russian novels.
  
  
• Diary of a Provincial Lady, by E. M. Delafield. Oh my, this is brilliant, and written in the same sort of clipped first-person perspective that Helen Fielding later used for Bridget Jones's Diary. I started it today, and fell absolutely in love at:

  Arrival of Book of the Month choice, and am disappointed. History of a place I am not interested in, by an author I do not like. Put it back into its wrapper again and make fresh choice from Recommended List. Find, on reading small literary bulletin enclosed with book, that exactly this course of procedure has been anticipated, and that it is described as being "the mistake of a lifetime." Am much annoyed, although not so much as having made (possibly) mistake of a lifetime, as at depressing thought of our all being so much alike that intelligent writers can apparently predict our behaviour with perfect accuracy.

  It's very tempting to bring this with me, but I'm afraid that it's so short I'd finish it before takeoff.
  
  
• Edith Hamilton's Mythology. This is coming with me, because it's small and easily fits in a bag, and what better place to read about Theseus and the Minotaur than Crete?
  
  
• No Place for a Lady: Tales of Adventurous Women Travelers, by Barbara Hodgson. It's . . . fine. It's interesting, but it's going for a broad overview of women travelers, rather than focusing on the adventures of a few. And that's fine; I was just hoping for the latter. It also seems too short to bring for a trip.
  
  
• The Penguin Historical Atlas of Ancient Greece. Not only am I a dork, but my brother's a classics major, and he recommended this. This has a nice broad view of Greek history, and I hope to flip through it before I leave town. On Thursday. Morning. Because I have to fly through freaking D.C. on the way to Greece, because heaven forfend the eeee! and I ever buy plane tickets or make hotel reservations in a timely fashion.
  
  
• Sense and Sensibility. I like this book so far, very much, but just haven't had time to really sit down and read it. So maybe it's a good choice for the plane ride. Plus, small paperback! (The eeee!'s luggage didn't make the plane at JFK, despite a FOUR-HOUR LAYOVER, and with three stops between here and Santorini, I'm a little nervous about mine. I might carry it all on, which I hate doing, but I'm afraid that we'll be in Crete before my luggage gets to Santorini.)
  

I don't know why thinking about this is always so difficult. I mean, I should be doing laundry right now, or working -- not considering which books to take on vacation.