Eye Twitches and Top Ten Reads

Still working on that classroom tour post.  My camera's batteries died when I was about halfway through taking pictures of my room and the things in it.  I replaced the batteries, and have taken my camera to school, but I've been a poop about finishing the picture taking process.  That's okay.  It's probably not going to be worth the wait anyway.  Ha.

This was a four-day week, and it left me exhausted and with a twitching eye.  I don't know what this coming week is going to be like, with five days and all.  Sheesh.  :-)

There's a post going around on Facebook that asks for your top 10 most influential books in your life, and then you tag some people to do the same.  I was tagged by my friend Becky a few days ago (okay, maybe it's been a week...).  I figured I'd do the post here.  So here you go... in no particular order:

1. Anything by Jodi Picoult.  I started her series with The Pact, then later read Nineteen Minutes and Salem Falls.  And then I just kept going.  I couldn't stop.  Picoult is an amazing storyteller (and her book Storyteller is amazing, too) and she takes on thought-provoking topics.  She does her research, and her fiction seems more like it's non-fiction.  Couldn't ask for much better.
2. Anything by Jane Green.  Her books are fun and engaging.  I've definitely had late nights reading because I couldn't put her book down.
3. Philippa Gregory's series of books covering the early kings and queens of England (The Constant Princess, The Boleyn Inheritance, etc.).  I love the time period, and she tells a good story, too.
4. The Handmaid's Tale.  I can't remember the first time I read this -- maybe junior or senior year of high school?  Maybe early college?  But I remember having to read it for my core philosophy class, and that had been the second reading.  I loved it even more the second time around.  And have read it many more times since.
5. The Harry Potter series.  You just can't go wrong.  And having taken Latin in high school made it that much more enjoyable of a series.
6. The Berenstein Bears books.  I still love these and still read them.
7. The Crucible.  We read this in 11th grade English.  I will forever love this play.
8. The Boxcar Children series.  This, the Sleepover Friends series, and The Bobbsey Twin series were the first series chapter books that I remember reading with my mom.  Every payday Friday, my mom would take us to the bookstore for new books.  And these were the ones I usually went for.
9. The Book Thief.  We did this as a summer reading assignment a few years ago.  It was amazing.
10. Jen Lancaster's books.  She hilarious.  She tells you like it is.  She's got my sense of humor.  What's not to love?

There are so many more books I could add.  This is a tough challenge, if you're a reader.  Then again, it would probably also be a tough challenge if you're NOT a reader.

Looks like this is going to be the stopping point for tonight.  My eyes are starting to close.  And I want to go read a few chapters in the 3rd book of the Game of Throne series.  I'm almost done with it.