Of course some things will be exempt from this spending/shopping ban like books ( I read a lot), and school fees, etc.  The goal of all this is to basically cut out all my unnecessary spending as well as to plan out my spending much better.  I am an impulse buyer, I freely admit it, and I need to cut it out.  I am pretty bad, but considering what I make on a yearly basis, I have little to no savings and I certainly don’t have any RRSP’s.  I do however have a pension through my current employer and I have about 15k in one from my previous employer (gotta love matching employer contributions).

Why am I not just starting the ban now you ask?  Well, of course Christmas is coming up and I have to buy presents.  Not to mention, there are some pretty big purchases that I have either been planning for a while or have become a necessity as of late.  So once those are done, I will be spending/shopping free.  I can save and pay off what minimal debt I currently have.  Hopefully with this little endeavour, I can train myself into actual financial responsibility.

Nicole

My lack of reading has changed recently due to my purchase of an ipod Touch and a lovely little app called Stanza.  Now on my two hour commute into the office and home each night (that’s two hours each way), I can read books on my ipod.  Normally I don’t like to read in digital/ebook format, but considering how many hardcover books there are that I want to read, this is a better alternative that damaging my back from lugging them around all the time.    Plus, it’s a great way to read all those trashy books without anyone knowing what you’re reading.

On to the books!

Generation Kill – Evan Wright

Ok, so this book has become my recent obsession.  I have this thing for war books, specifically modern war books.  This one was one of the better ones that I have read in a long time.  It’s not a cautionary tale, or a tale about the difficulty of military life.  This is just simply the story of the First Recon Battalion of the United States Marines and their experiences in the opening days of the war in Iraq.  The book is actually very humourous without actually trying and I frequently found myself laughing out loud while reading it.  This was not such a great idea as everyone sitting near me on the train now thinks I am some kind of degenerate for laughing at anything that is found in a book called Generation Kill.  The book of course is a longer version of the critically acclaimed series of articles that appeared in Rolling Stone Magazine back in 2003 called ‘The Killer Elite”.  There is also the critically acclaimed HBO series Generation Kill, which follows pretty much to the letter some of the events found in this book.

Other books I have recently Read:

Stuff White People Like – Christian Lander

Infidel – Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Cleopatra’s Daughter – Michelle Moran

A Drink Before the War – Dennis Lehane

Smile When You’re Lying: Confessions of a Rogue Travel Writer

To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee

Where the Sidewalk Ends – Shel Silverstein

….more later!

In other news, I only have two more working days until my staycation begins.  Now if only I could get my mother out of the house for the 1.5 weeks that I am off, all would be well.

The Heretic Queen: A Novel

The Heretic Queen: A Novel – by Michelle Moran
Nefertari, niece of the famed heretic queen Nefertiti, becomes part of the court of Pharaoh Seti I after her family is deposed, and she befriends Ramesses II, the young crown prince. When Ramesses is made co-monarch, he weds Iset, the granddaughter of a harem girl backed by Seti’s conniving sister, Henuttawy, the priestess of Isis. As Nefertari’s position in the court becomes tenuous, she realizes that she, too, wants to marry Ramesses and enlists the help of Seti’s other sister, Woserit. But when Nefertari succeeds in wedding Ramesses, power struggles and court intrigues threaten her security, and it is questionable whether the Egyptian people will accept a heretic descendant as their ruler or if civil war will erupt. Moran (Nefertiti) brings her characters to life, especially Nefertari, who helped Ramesses II become one of the most famous of Egyptian pharaohs. Nefertari’s struggles to be accepted as a ruler loved as a leader and to secure her family’s position throughout eternity are sure to appeal to fans of historical fiction.

The Well and Mine

The Well and Mine – by Gin Phillips

A tight-knit miner’s family struggles against poverty and racism in Phillips’s evocative first novel, set in Depression-era Alabama. Throughout, she moves skillfully between the points of view of miner father Albert, hard-working mother Leta, young daughter Tess and teenage daughter Virgie, and small son Jack. They see men who are frequently incapacitated or killed by accidents in the local mines; neighbors live off what they can grow on their patch of land; and blacks like Albert’s fellow miner and friend Jonah are segregated in another part of Carbon Hill—and often hauled off to jail arbitrarily. When Tess witnesses a woman throwing a baby into their well, no one believes her until the dead child is found, and few are shocked. Tess, hounded by nightmares, and Virgie, on the cusp of womanhood and resistant to the thought of an early marriage to the local boys who court her, begin making inquiries of their own, visiting wives who’ve recently had babies and learning way more than they imagined. With a wisp of suspense, Phillips fully enters the lives of her honorable characters and brings them vibrantly to the page.

The Secret Between Us

The Secret Between Us – by Barbara Delinsky

Deborah Monroe and her daughter, Grace, are driving home from a party when their car hits a man running in the dark. Grace was at the wheel, but Deborah sends her home before the police arrive, determined to shoulder the blame for the accident. Her decision then turns into a deception that takes on a life of its own and threatens the special bond between mother and daughter.

The Secret Between Us is an unforgettable story about making bad choices for the right reasons and the terrible consequences of a lie gone wrong. Once again, Barbara Delinksy has delivered a riveting study of family and a superbly crafted novel, perfectly targeted to reading groups and fans of provocative fiction.

Nefertiti: A Novel

Nefertiti: A Novel – by Michelle Moran

Nefertiti and her younger sister, Mutnodjmet, have been raised in a powerful family that has provided wives to the rulers of Egypt for centuries. Ambitious, charismatic, and beautiful, Nefertiti is destined to marry Amunhotep, an unstable young pharaoh. It is hoped that her strong personality will temper the young ruler’s heretical desire to forsake Egypt’s ancient gods.

From the moment of her arrival in Thebes, Nefertiti is beloved by the people but fails to see that powerful priests are plotting against her husband’s rule. The only person brave enough to warn the queen is her younger sister, yet remaining loyal to Nefertiti will force Mutnodjmet into a dangerous political game; one that could cost her everything she holds dear.

The Cellist of Sarajevo

The Cellis of Sarajevo – by Steven Galloway

One day a shell lands in a bread line and kills twenty-two people as the cellist watches from a window in his flat. He vows to sit in the hollow where the mortar fell and play Albinoni’s Adagio once a day for each of the twenty-two victims. The Adagio had been re-created from a fragment after the only extant score was firebombed in the Dresden Music Library, but the fact that it had been rebuilt by a different composer into something new and worthwhile gives the cellist hope.

In this beautiful and unforgettable novel, Steven Galloway has taken an extraordinary, imaginative leap to create a story that speaks powerfully to the dignity and generosity of the human spirit under extraordinary duress.

So once again, when I have finished the books I will review them.  My own personal library is steadily growing!

Instead of being in front of my 52 inch television watching Liverpool get spanked (I hope), I will be in a car with my mother driving to Windsor for the day.  If this wasn’t for a dying family member, I wouldn’t go but even I am not that insensitive.

I wonder if I can hijack the radio and find the game to at least listen to it on the way.  This may or may not be a good idea as I tend to get a little nuts when watching football.

Memo to self: Life gets scheduled around the football watching schedule!

Shut Up, I'm Talking

Shut Up, I’m Talking: And Other Diplomacy Lessons I Learned in the Israeli Government — A Memoir  by Gregory Levey

So I have been interested in this book for a while and finally decided to buy it.  The author goes for an interview for an Internship at the U.N. only to be told that they are not offering internships and being offered a job as a junior speech writer for the Israeli delegation.  Needless to say, it snow balls from there and he soon finds himself about to vote on a U.N. resolution, only no one has told him how to vote and he doesn’t know what they are even voting on.

A Mercy by Toni Morrison

A Mercy by Toni Morrison

Jacob is an Anglo-Dutch trader in 1680s United States, when the slave trade is still in its infancy. Reluctantly he takes a small slave girl in part payment from a plantation owner for a bad debt. Feeling rejected by her slave mother, 14-year-old Florens can read and write and might be useful on his farm. Florens looks for love, first from Lina, an older servant woman at her new master’s house, but later from the handsome blacksmith, an African, never enslaved, who comes riding into their lives . . .

At the novel’s heart, like Beloved, it is the ambivalent, disturbing story of a mother and a daughter – a mother who casts off her daughter in order to save her, and a daughter who may never exorcise that abandonment.

Roots by Alex Haley

Roots by Alex Haley

One of the most important books and television series ever to appear, Roots, galvanized the nation, and created an extraordinary political, racial, social and cultural dialogue that hadn’t been seen since the publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The book sold over one million copies in the first year, and the miniseries was watched by an astonishing 130 million people. It also won both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award. Roots opened up the minds of Americans of all colors and faiths to one of the darkest and most painful parts of America’s past.

Brethern by Robyn Young

Brethren by Robyn Young

Christendom’s desperate attempts to maintain a foothold in the Holy Land against a furious Muslim jihad is embodied by Sir William Campbell, a young, idealistic Knight Templar, and the devout Baybars Bundukdari, the sultan of Egypt, determined to rid the region of Western influence. Young shifts between the rival camps; there is plenty of battlefield action, and a romantic interest for William in Elwen, the beautiful young niece of his fallen mentor. There’s also a mystery for William to solve: the disappearance of the Book of the Grail, which contains the explosive (and heretical) agenda of a secret group of Brethren within the Knights Templar. Combining rich historical detail, clever plotting and engaging characters, Young has crafted a historical thriller that will have readers turning pages and envisioning the sequel.

The Charlemagne Pursuit by Steve Berry

The Charlemagne Pursuit by Steve Berry

As a child, former Justice Department agent Cotton Malone was told his father died in a submarine disaster in the North Atlantic, but now he wants the full story and asks his ex-boss, Stephanie Nelle, to secure the military files. What he learns stuns him: His father’s sub was a secret nuclear vessel lost on a highly classified mission beneath the ice shelves of Antarctica.

In an effort to ensure that this explosive information never rises to the surface, Langford Ramsey, an ambitious navy admiral, has begun a brutal game of treachery, blackmail, and assassination. As Malone embarks on a dangerous quest with the sisters–one that leads them from an ancient German cathedral to a snowy French citadel to the unforgiving ice of Antarctica–he will finally confront the shocking truth of his father’s death and the distinct possibility of his own.

I will most likely put in a huge book haul for the end of the month to add to my ever growing collection.

My New Years Resolution for 2009 is to read at least one book a week.

Seeing as we are currently 11 weeks into the year (thank you again blackberry) and I have read 16 books so far, I would say that that is pretty good.  Never mind that I read 8 of the 16 in one week.  In my defense or shame, those 8 were not particularly challenging.

Below you can see a list of the books that I have read so far.

Week 1: Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

Week 2: Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer

Week 3: New Moon by Stephenie Meyer

Week 4: Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer

Week 5: Dead Until Dark by Charlaine Harris

Week 6: Living Dead in Dallas by Charlaine Harris

Week 7: Club Dead, Dead to the World, Dead as a Doornail,  Definitely Dead, All Together Dead,  From Dead to Worse by Charlaine Harris

Week 8: The Templar Legacy by Steve Berry

Week 9: The Venetian Betrayal by Steve Berry

Week 10:The Alexandria Link by Steve Berry

Week 11: The Charlemagne Pursuit by Steve Berry

There you have it, the list so far.  I will update the list every week when I have finished a new book.  Right now I am not sure what my next book will be as I have a whole bunch of them in my library that I haven’t read yet.  And yes, I do promise that there will be some actual books of substance on this list.