Progress, Progress, Progress

Is there a word that sounds prettier than progress? Pioneering maybe, or completion. Those are also good words. Espionage has always been one of my favorites... I'm checking in today to update you on the progress of my Great Summer To-Do List (v. 2). I have successfully completed an entire section at this point, and finally wrapped up a book!

After picking blueberries with a good friend, I have officially followed all my traditional summer traditions. A pint of blueberries always feels like more than you think it's going to be, and I've been munching on these goodies all week. I am thinking about attempting to make something neat out of them... I have been wanting to try my hand at jam, but I'm pretty sure I don't have enough for that. Maybe one of those tiny pies I see on pinterest? Hmmm....

I have finished my annual Agatha Christie read, which was an anthology of Hercule Poirot mysteries. Some of these mysteries were incredibly intriguing to me, and others fell pretty flat. I found that I couldn't read too many in a row or my head would swim with the vanity and pretention of that happy little Belgian. Though he may be incredibly polite, I don't think we'd hang out. Too many random French phrases thrown in there that I had to look up.

I was running errands today and wanted to finally drop a couple books off (I had an audiobook overdue--to fund our public library systems, of course), but I was just one short story shy of finishing. I couldn't drop it in the box and check it off my list without legitimately finishing it! So I parked in the library lot and wrapped it up.

I'm so glad I did--the last story was by far my favorite, and I think the most interesting. It featured M. Poirot's younger, more naive days as a humble police detective in Belgium. Maybe I just preferred that version of him better than the seasoned vet who knows how valuable his "little gray cells" are. It's called "The Chocolate Box." Seeing as how it dealt with murder, it left me craving more Christie than chocolate... but now I'm back to the Roald Dahl biography and very nearly finished with his younger years. Now onto the good stuff about writing everyone's favorite books! Also, war!

It's been a beautiful summer so far.