(Y-11) Gearing up for May the 4th.

Tomorrow is Star Wars, or more commonly known as May the Fourth.

An as a huge fan of the saga I will indulge and both movies and comics of this beloved universe.

For the movie part, I’ll play it according to tomorrow’s mood.

And on the comic-book front, I’ll put my Kindle Unlimited subscription to good use, mainly to read both the Star Wars and Vader series, which are part of the new Marvel Comics take on the series.

I’m looking forward to a complete day of perusing on a galaxy far, far away.

azr.

3 May, 2019 0

(Y-11) A quick number update

Here is my numbers update, this is freshly pressed numbers.

Total pages for (Y-11) : 23,455 pages.
Pages to next milestone (25,000 pages): 1,545 pages.
Pages to the main goal of the year (53,000 pages): 29,545 pages.
Pages to the second-best year of reading (32,149 pages): 8,693 pages.
Pages to the best year of reading (47,705 pages): 24,250 pages.
Pages to 500,000 : 243,518 pages.

I hope that my weekend reading pushes me over those 25,000 pages.

azr

3 May, 2019 0

The only positive thing about waiting is that I can catch up with my reading.

For this occasion will be Jeff Lemire’s Gideon Falls.

2 May, 2019 0

(Y-11) Back to reading, well kind of.

I have just come out of one of the worst weeks in total reading for this year.

But, I am determined to shake off this slump and get back to my usual form, and do it fast.

Just passed the 23,000 page mark for this year and I am currently aiming to reach 25,000 by my birthday, which is June 6.

For get things started, I am reading some of the work by Scott Snyder on Batman, this time during the New 52 events of DC Comics.

Finished Volume 4, and I will start volume 5 shortly.

Also, I will try and read some of The Last Threshold, currently on page 137, to close out the Neverwinter Saga and see what I’ll jump into next.

For now I’ll try to read some more.

azr.

1 May, 2019 0

(Y-11) Getting back to form

With only Saturday and Sunday left in my reading week and a total of 116 pages of the 1,162 projected in order to reach this year goal, getting back on track with my reading is of the utmost importance.

Today’s plan is to finish the first volume of Alan Moore’s Promethea, start to read Star Wars graphic novel about legendary Admiral Thrawn and make some headway with The Last Threshold.

Caffeine don’t fail me now.

azr.

27 April, 2019 0

(Y-11) Disconnect to reconnect

I took some days away to unwind and recharge.

I read only a few pages but it was just what I needed.

But there was red wine, so everything is good.

Not to mention a beautiful white desert.

And to top it all off a mountainous oasis to relax.

So now it is back to reality and hopefully back on track with my reading.

azr.

26 April, 2019 0

(Y-11) Between pages and ancient curses.

I am enjoying this vacation period so much.

In between reading and napping, I have been able to squeeze in some other activities, for example, right now I am gearing up to finally finish work on my little desert oasis.

And, a couple of days ago, we went to see the temporary exhibition of the famous pharaoh Tutankhamon.

Comprised of over 200 pieces, some from the original time period, and some amazing dioramas depicting the mummification process make this exhibition a must for any lover of history.

I am planning to go again after the vacation period, so I can go thru it more slowly and read all the information.

Here are some pictures.

Now, concerning my reading, I am working on the fourth book of The Neverwinter Saga, The Last Threshold, from which I am currently on page 33 of 434, it has been a slow start but my pace is catching a good rhythm.

Also, I finished the second volume of the now classic series of Vertigo Comics by visionary writer Warren Ellis, I am of course talking about Transmetropolitan, which follows the misadventures of journalist Spider Jerusalem in all his dystopian gonzo glory.

For today; I’ll work on two graphic novels, the third volume of All-Star Batman and some throwback Hellblazer story, City of Demons, beautifully illustrated by one of my favorites illustrators, Sean Murphy in collaboration with fantastic writer Si Spurrier.

Now concerning my numbers, it has been kind of fluctuating between really good days, for example, 316 pages, to really mediocre days, I mean 44 fucking pages, come on.

But the important thing is that I haven’t got any 0 pages days in a long time, and my current total for this the eleventh year of reading is 22,807 pages, still 31 days behind schedule, but I’ll put the pedal to the metal and close down this gap.

In whole, I have read 255,834 pages and I still have 244,166 to reach the next major milestone in my crazy project, 500,000 total pages.

And according to my calculations, this will be reached on May 3 of 2029, this is also something I have to keep on chipping away and get it closer to my current date.

But the only way to do this is to read.

And on that note, I’ll see you soon, I have some reading to do.

azr.

19 April, 2019 0

(Y-11) making some headway, vacation edition, part one.

As the second day of my vacation comes to a close, I sit here, well lay here will be more accurate, with a great feeling of satisfaction.

Yesterday, I finished the third volume of the Neverwinter Saga, Charon’s Claw, this after almost two months of reading.

I will promptly start reading the fourth and final volume of this intriguing saga, The Last Threshold.

Also, I finished the first volume of the new Kick-Ass run, again with the legendary team of Mark Millar and John Romita Jr., every bit as fun as the original series.

Tomorrow, I’ll post some numbers of my latest efforts on closing the gap on my reading and a special treat from a quick museum visit from today.

For now is back to reading for the rest of the day, because tomorrow is an early morning gardening day.

Happy Readings!!!

azr.

16 April, 2019 0

(Y-11) Therapy day

I officially began work in my little desert oasis.

I will try to get it done by Wednesday in order to enjoy some long reading/drinking sessions.

Right now it is a bloody mess.

But at least I got the pruning done.

I’ll take a break and then get started on the floor and rock work.

azr.

15 April, 2019 0

(Y-11) Vacation Time

Today marks the first day of the two-week spring vacation period.

Also, tomorrow will be the mid-point day for this eleventh year of reading, for which I’ll post something on Monday morning to see how I am faring for the first half of this amazing year.

As always I have big plans for my reading, and in between, I’ll squeeze some traveling and hopefully some work on my little desert oasis to get in shape for the upcoming summer season, I have been promising myself to have this space to read comfortably outside.

And I will follow thru this time.

I have so much to go thru in this post, and I know that I have been really lazy, I mean this is the second of the month of April and it is almost half-way done.

So let me begin with what I have been reading.

I finished five graphic novels, ranging from some good old Batman to the Mad Titan tearing his way thru the Marvel Universe.

On that note, and trying to catch up with Thanos’ recent storyline, I read Infinity Book II and Thanos Rising, the latter beautifully executed by Jason Aaron, on the controls as the writer, and the amazing artwork by Simone Bianchi.

On the DC Universe front, from which most of the reading comes, I went thru some new, some past storylines I haven’t read and one historic milestone.

To start off, I finished reading the sixth volume of the current run of Detective Comics, beautifully executed by James Tynion IV, it is always great fun to run around with the Bat Family thru the dark crevices of Gotham City.

For some passed storylines, I finally finished reading Forever Evil, by now legendary DC writer Geoff Johns.

I read the first two issues when it originally came out back in 2013 but lost track it and now came to find to read in my Kindle Unlimited subscription, so I took advantage, and let me tell you, watching Lex Luthor as the hero will always be disturbing.

And to keep on transversing the DC Universe, I read some single issues of new material, or at least newly published here in Mexico.

Spinning off the events of Dark Nights: Metal comes a new story about the spooky Batman Who Laughs, developed by the all-star team of Scott Snyder and the wonderful Jock.

Also in the Dark Knight department, the highly controversial and now infamous Bat-penis, I read the Spanish and censored edition of Batman: Damned, by the always edgy Brian Azzarello and the stunning art of Lee Bermejo, this particular edition has the variant cover edition by Jim Lee.

Another series I started reading is Justice League Dark, and I love it from the first page, I am a sucker for all the magical and weird characters from the DC Universe.

I read the first two issues and yesterday bought the third one, which consequently is the conclusion of the first story arc.

Which relates directly to the idea of bringing to the main continuity of characters such as Swamp Thing and John Constantine, from which I am currently reading the first story arc in the Rebirth era of DC Comics.

And now to finish off my recent trek thru the DC Comics Universe, the historic and landmark issue number one thousand of Detective Comics, in which the Dark Knight not only reaches this historic number but he also celebrates 80 years of publication history.

I got the Bernie Wrightson variant.

To close out the comic book/graphic novel front, I read the omnibus of B.P.R.D.: 1946-1948, where you can see the first years of the agencies peculiar cases, all of this pre-Hellboy’s involvement, for he was a wide-eyed kid living somewhere in the New Mexico desert.

And some of the amazing sketch drawings of the series.

Now on the book front, I keep on pounding away on the third book of the Neverwinter Saga, Charon’s Claw, currently on page 327, and I have plans to finish the saga on the first week of the spring vacation so I can start reading the first two book of Brian Catling’s The Vorrh Trilogy on the second week.

In which we are taking a small trip, but more on that later.

This has been an eventful couple of weeks, I went to “Fiesta de los Libros” which is an event of my Alma Mater where you can buy all its the scientific or historical publications but the catch is that the price is around 5 dollars for all the books you can fit on a paper bag they give you, needless to say, I took around 7 bags home with books related to my masters degree.

Below you can see the place and some of the exhibitions during this week-long book celebration.

The other event was a home game of the newly founded Mexican League of Football, in which our fair city, Ciudad Juarez, has one of the five inaugural teams.

They started losing the game by 16 to 0 at the half but came from behind to claim a 24 to 16 victory.

The next game and season closer is on April 28, and hopefully, we will be playoff bound.

Now I will like to talk about my numbers.

For the eleventh year of reading, I have a total of 22,029 pages and closing in the last year total with only 10,119 pages to go, just before the halfway mark.

Still, I am 30 days behind my reading schedule, but what are vacations for if not for closing down gap from crazy reading projects.

In concern of my total reading for my project, I have amassed 255,056 pages of reading and on the next significant milestone, which is reaching 500,000, I have 244,944 pages to go.

And in my projection, which started as the finishing date of the particular number to be on July 26 of 2029, now it has come down to May 14 of the same year, slowly but surely I am gaining ground.

In order to chip away at the page at my total pages to read and on to get that finishing date closer I have promised myself to grab my enormous pile of to read books and try to at least knock down 3,000 pages and a couple of months of ground gained.

Here are some of my reading materials for the upcoming weeks.