Wheel of Time - COMPLETE!

Damn this feels good:


Considering I was reading Lord of Chaos back in November of 2010, these progress bars have been up on this site for almost a year now and I'm finally done with them! I read the last book, Towers of Midnight, in only 14 days which is pretty impressive for me (for over 800 pages).

Now I need to clear the progress bars on the right and figure out what I'm reading next!

Reading Update - Late Summer 2011

I breezed through Knife of Dreams (Wheel of Time book 11) in June and The Gathering Storm in July, then started on Towers of Midnight (book 13 and the latest one published) on August 9th. I'm only about 100 pages away from finishing it and nearing the point of being completely caught up on Wheel of Time. This is something that only two years ago I thought I would probably never accomplish, and here I'll have read 6 books (and one prequel book) of a 14 book series in 2011 alone. My average time to read the 700-1,000 page books has been 30 days almost exactly with one book taking me up to 49 days to finish (The Path of Daggers, book 8) and the quickest one finished so far being done in only 21 days (Knife of Dreams) - but I'm at 13 days of reading Towers of Midnight and have a strong feeling I'll be finishing it tonight.

With this large task nearly complete, I'm not sure what I'll be moving on to next. The Song of Ice and Fire books are high on my list, as is the first Dark Tower book - The Gunslinger. I also have some non-fiction books to read, and I'm fairly certain that I'll be re-reading Dune sometime VERY soon here.

In other news I've been playing Magic: The Gathering lately which is an awesome blast from the past. Mostly we're playing Commander (or EDH) which as a format was very enticing to me and many of my friends to jump back into the game.

Oh, also last year I enjoyed talking about GenCon but this year I've mostly left it out. I'd at least like to list the things I bought as I believe I did last year and found it a good exercise:

• World of Warcraft: The Board Game - Burning Crusade Expansion (a steal at $15)
• a set of 25 Alea Tools magnets for my D&D game (mostly reds for bloodied heroes/monsters)
• 2 sets of earrings for Becky
• one set of Chessex Dice for Becky
• Gold: The Series Season 1 DVD

I believe that's it, which is insane and I'm sad I didn't buy more stuff but also very happy with myself that I can go to something like GenCon and be pretty reserved in my spending. If I remember anything else I bought I'll be sure to come back and add it to this list!

New Music - August 2011

I've thought about doing "Music Monday" posts, but instead I'll just keep posting about the new music I've been listening to and if it happens to be on a Monday then yay!

The Young Professionals (TYP) - "D.I.S.C.O."



- This one just gets stuck in my head, and I think the video's pretty damn entertaining too. For some reason the blatantly NOT to the beat playing of instruments interests me I guess.

Skylar Grey - "Dance Without You"



- Sure, Skylar Grey might be well outside of the type of music a lot of my friends listen to, but I've listened to and enjoyed plenty of Lady Gaga, Rihanna, Amy Winehouse, and plenty of other female musicians that I would consider just as outside of my normal music tastes. This song in particular is very reminiscent of several Bjork songs and I love Skylar's voice lately.

Justice - "D.V.N.O."



- Becky and I were introduced to the band Justice through the awesome song "Civilization", and as I do these days I searched around YouTube and found this one that is a favorite of mine the last month or so. VERY Daft Punk, but I don't think anyone would say that's a bad thing. :D

I have several other songs that are a part of my daily listening lately, but I'll save them for another music post in a week or two.

This week I'm flying out for GenCon, which I've been going to for the last 3 years (this is my 4th year) and I'm super excited about it! Looking forward to hanging out with a lot of people that I only get to see once or twice a year at conventions like this, and the usual good gaming and good times that always happen while we're there!

Also, if there's anyone out of the no-one that reads this that doesn't already know - my wife Becky is pregnant! She's due in early March and we're super excited! That's it for today, and probably the rest of the week due to GenCon, thanks for stopping by and I hope you enjoy the music (if you do, please comment and let me know).