Okay, it seems like it's been forever since I had a real, live update. Even the one in February doesn't count. So, here's another life update for the morbidly curious.
I've been on Tysabri for 6 months now, and I've had nothing but good experiences with it—medically, that is. Every single month is an adventure in pincushionhood, on the other hand. But what can you do? It's like one of those silly stupid hypothetical half-drunk questions: "would you rather suffer more MS symptoms ... or get poked with needles for hours, one day a month??" I guess I've learned the answer to that one.
Other things in my life have been greatly affected by my choice in medication. For one, it causes birth defects, so I can't decide to try to have kids until after I'm off it—if I was planning on trying anyway—which, shockingly, scarily, and horrifyingly enough, it seems I may be.
My mother has also wanted to be present for my infusions every month. This hasn't always been possible, but when it is, I absolutely hate it. She gets far more upset about bad pokes than I do, behaves embarrassingly (ie, acting out her parade stories as she's telling them to me... in the infusion room), and, most frustratingly of all, answers questions that nurses ask ME.
(Days Later) Whatever. Moving on.
Branden and I celebrated our 2-year anniversary a bit ago, the last weekend of May. It was very relaxing, romantic, and awesome. On the way home from Denver, we got a call from Branden's mom telling him that his brother Aaron had been sending her disturbing text messages about how she was going to lose a son, and other suicide-sounding messages. Now, Aaron had just spent a week or two down in Pagosa with her, attempting to work for her boyfriend's raft service. He had to go back up to Fort Collins for a parole meeting. On his way up there, his motorcycle broke down. So, he missed his meeting and was stranded in Fort Collins with no money and no place to stay. He had a sort-of girlfriend and his (and Branden's) brother Griffin up there, but for one reason and another he couldn't stay with either of them. Cutting out the details and intervening events, we got ahold of Aaron and offered to fix his bike for him if he would bring it down to Boulder and take it to a mechanic's.
The saga of the motorcycle is long and convoluted, but that isn't the important part of the story, so I'm going to condense it down: we got the motorcycle fixed, a couple of days later it caught on fire while he was driving so he parked it somewhere "temporarily." Then he finds out from the person who actually owns the bike that he is going to report it stolen to get out of paying it off, etc. So, the bike is gone and honestly, I'm relieved.
So, come to find out, Aaron's stay with Deb turned out about as well as his entire childhood with Deb... which is to say, not very well. So he decided not to go back to Pagosa. We offered him room on our couch while he found a job and saved up enough money to get his own place. So, he's been living with us since May 31.
A week or two later, Griffin came down and also started sleeping on our floor, looking for a job.
Condensing again: They're both gainfully employed now, saving money to get their own apartment together in the Boulder area. They both feel like they're getting a new start to life and that the situation in Fort Collins was terribly toxic. It seems that Aaron may actually be getting free of the witch. And, all is good in Conley boys land.
Branden and I lived in the Habitat apartment with them until June 23rd, when we got the keys to our new apartment in the Horizons, where I work. However, ON the 23rd, the day we were supposed to start painting and moving, I woke up with a terrible stomach ache. Branden took me to the hospital, and 12 hours later, they took out my appendix. It basically decommissioned me for the ENTIRE MOVE. This would have been great except that, of course, I spent the whole time feeling frustrated and guilty that I wasn't helping more. I'm still not supposed to lift more than 25-30 pounds for another week or so.
But, we got moved (mostly). We have a few more carloads, and our house is quickly filling up (yikes!), but it looks great. We're starting to feel like real grown-ups, and I don't know how I feel about that. But, it does feel nice to not live in chaos anymore. The Habitat apartment is Griffin and Aaron's until August 9th or so, when they have to be moving into their own place so that we can start cleaning and getting it in order for move-out.
We lived at Habitat for 4 years, so this transition is quite a shock for me. I had forgotten how to move, which seems to be mostly okay because I think I've broken some of the more horrible habits I have about it. I'm going to miss it, but the new place really is vastly more awesome, with better amenities and the whole bit.
Also, my whole repertoire of friends is moving up here. Dan and Carlie and Chris Rossi are already here, Joe and Sarah are moving in this weekend, Steph and Ian will be moving here in August (probably), and there may be a slow trickle of other friends, depending on how taken they are with the place when they come to visit. Shad won't be joining us, unfortunately. That actually makes me sad because we used to hang out a lot, now we probably won't anymore.
I'm not a total convert to the area. I hate Safeway (as compared to King Soopers). I don't like suburbia. It feels ungenuine, because it's all apartment complexes or condo communities, and chain restaurants / retail stores. There're no small, long-established local businesses. No cozy nooks. But the price and location is right, for now. We'll see for the long term.
Well, that's all for now peeps. Talk at you later!
Friday, July 10, 2009
Thursday, July 9, 2009
*meanders into the room*
My long-lost best friend from middle school is an amazing blogger, an inspiration to single moms and married childless couples and anyone else in the world in my opinion... and she gave me this award. I'm not sure I deserve it, and I'm even less sure that I have the nerts to say 10 things that are difficult for me to share... 1) because I feel like I share almost anything under the opinion that if I'm not proud of thinking it then I shouldn't be and 2) because if I'm not sticking to that opinion then it's REALLY something I shouldn't be sharing. But I'll give it a shot, eh?
The Honest Scrap award is given by other bloggers who consider a blog’s content or design to be brilliant. The awardees must then post ten honest things about
themselves and pass the award on to other bloggers who fit the bill – in other words, whose blog is brilliant.”
I think honesty is put to the test when you tell people things you’d rather not share. Things that scare you. So here’s 10 painfully honest / potentially disturbing things about me (proceed with caution):
So, while my life is not exactly boring right now, I don't think I have the time to type about it right now. I'll post at a later date, I promise.
Tag, crazy people!
Adventures in Domesticity
Stargazer's Observatory
Tea Party With the Hatter
Burning Tree
K.D. Bryan
The Honest Scrap award is given by other bloggers who consider a blog’s content or design to be brilliant. The awardees must then post ten honest things about
themselves and pass the award on to other bloggers who fit the bill – in other words, whose blog is brilliant.”
I think honesty is put to the test when you tell people things you’d rather not share. Things that scare you. So here’s 10 painfully honest / potentially disturbing things about me (proceed with caution):
- I think I've lost the capability to express myself artistically. I tell people who say this sort of thing to me, "that's ridiculous, just make yourself do it!" But I can sit and stare at a blank page for hours, feeling more and more frustrated and helpless. I don't want to give up but repeatedly trying and failing makes me feel worse than not trying.
- I fear, often, that I've made all the wrong decisions in my life. Yes, I'm happy, but I'm not doing all the things I dreamed of doing--or any of them really. I'm too old, and too young.
- I really really hate it when people suggest to me that I do something that I was already planning on doing. I don't know why, but it immediately makes me want to refuse.
- My sex drive is all but gone. Sixteen, where did you go?
- I think I might be a mean person. At least judgemental.
- I deeply resent having to work full time to earn insurance for my chronic illness. Seems bass-ackwards to me.
- I MS'd out of Grad school without even finishing 1 semester after doing a ton of work and 6 years of planning and longing. I don't think I'll ever go back.
- I believe that a few generations after I'm gone, it will be as though I never was.
- Most of my friends call me a "badass" or "courageous" or "amazing" because I don't let things stop me. I call that celebrating mediocrity. If I was those things, I'd still be in Grad school, or have something published, or be accomplishing anything at all.
- I think I might love my cats more than my (future) kids. This sucks, because they almost certainly have a shorter lifespan. But I can tell them what to do forever, and they can't throw screaming tantrums in grocery stores.
So, while my life is not exactly boring right now, I don't think I have the time to type about it right now. I'll post at a later date, I promise.
Tag, crazy people!
Adventures in Domesticity
Stargazer's Observatory
Tea Party With the Hatter
Burning Tree
K.D. Bryan
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Valentine's Day
Valentine's Day is a scam. It was entirely fabricated by greeting card companies, flower companies, and chocolate companies for the purpose of sucking poor schmoes' wallets dry out of the sense that their significant other would kill them if they didn't buy such things for them for V-Day. These companies either didn't stop to consider the feelings of single people, or just don't care.
Of course, this stupid holiday is insidious. When a person in a relationship (myself) says the above paragraph, the secretly (or openly) bitter single people think (or say), sure, that's easy for you to say, you have the option to be arrogant and laissez-faire about it... and etc. and etc. and etc.
When a single person says it, other single people and people in relationships think, sure, rationalize it away, pretend you don't wish you had someone to pamper you. We get it. It hurts less if you pretend you don't care.
But I would like to say, here, now, and without any arrogance or laissez-faire attitude, that I hate Valentine's Day. Everything you might get your significant other is 3 times more expensive around this time of year than any other time. It universally makes single people miserable, or at least single-conscious. Plus, by its very nature it implies that there's no real reason to be romantic and loving with your significant other any other time. "This is the time when it means something." It seems to say.
And yet, even so, every year it comes around and B and I agree to ignore it. Yet, as the day draws closer I get more and more nervous, thinking he's going to surprise me with something, thinking I should surprise him with something. V-Day is the absolute best for guilt-tripping perfectly happy people into spending money. >_<
Of course, this stupid holiday is insidious. When a person in a relationship (myself) says the above paragraph, the secretly (or openly) bitter single people think (or say), sure, that's easy for you to say, you have the option to be arrogant and laissez-faire about it... and etc. and etc. and etc.
When a single person says it, other single people and people in relationships think, sure, rationalize it away, pretend you don't wish you had someone to pamper you. We get it. It hurts less if you pretend you don't care.
But I would like to say, here, now, and without any arrogance or laissez-faire attitude, that I hate Valentine's Day. Everything you might get your significant other is 3 times more expensive around this time of year than any other time. It universally makes single people miserable, or at least single-conscious. Plus, by its very nature it implies that there's no real reason to be romantic and loving with your significant other any other time. "This is the time when it means something." It seems to say.
And yet, even so, every year it comes around and B and I agree to ignore it. Yet, as the day draws closer I get more and more nervous, thinking he's going to surprise me with something, thinking I should surprise him with something. V-Day is the absolute best for guilt-tripping perfectly happy people into spending money. >_<
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
It's been a while, hasn't it?
Erf. Long time is long. Okay so...
November 24th I saw a new neurologist. Timothy Vollmer, one of the leading neurologists in the field of MS. It was at an intimidatingly huge medical facility in Denver. Talking to the man was like reading a research paper, he had so many facts and figures. He was scary knowledgeable, and refreshingly take-charge. There was no "so what do you want to do? What do you feel comfortable with?" He told me what my best options were and started the process of getting me on a new medication. He was like a steamroller. But, it was so very encouraging.
I'm going to be getting on a medication called Tysabri, which blocks the immune system from accessing the brain at all. This means that, for a year, I shouldn't be having any MS symptoms at all. Why stop after a year, you say? Because there is a virus that lives in all of our bodies that will build up in the brain when it's sheltered from the immune system and han be fatal if not stopped; even if it's caught quickly it can cause permanent damage. However, there are 5 reported cases in 40,000 patients on Tysabri, and not one happened before the patient had been on Tysabri for a year.
I started a new job on December 10 ($4.35/hour more than I made at ListenUp!!!), and aside from the pay increase there's a lot of really awesome bennies. Excellent health insurance (+ vision & dental), 401k, life insurance, disability insurance, on and on. A positive and busy workplace and the days go quickly, even if I am tired at the end. However, I was (mis)led to believe that the insurance would be active the day I started, when actually, it's active the first day of the month following the beginning of employment. That left me insurance-free for 21 days, and we couldn't get the ball rolling on the Tysabri until then. And now that the ball is rolling, it's going to take up to 4 weeks to actually get my first dose.
In the meantime, my hands are still 90% numb. That's not likely to get any better until I'm on this new medication (if even then... there's always the thrilling chance that the damage may be permanent. However, that's not likely). Blech. I go through cycles of preemptively getting excited about having my hands back soonish and being depressed because I think that I've forgotten how to type, use screwdrivers or pliers, be a normal person with normal hands in any way. I've discovered that I cannot put on post earrings...though I wear earrings so rarely I wouldn't be surprised if I'd forgotten how to do that before now.
In other news, my best friend Carlie and my good friend Dan (one of B's groomsmen) have found love, happiness and bliss in each other's arms. They are both vomiting slimy pink fluff (contradiction in terms, I know... picture fluff made of gak) everywhere. Congrats to them, they deserve all the happiness in the world ^_^
And...that's all folks. =)
November 24th I saw a new neurologist. Timothy Vollmer, one of the leading neurologists in the field of MS. It was at an intimidatingly huge medical facility in Denver. Talking to the man was like reading a research paper, he had so many facts and figures. He was scary knowledgeable, and refreshingly take-charge. There was no "so what do you want to do? What do you feel comfortable with?" He told me what my best options were and started the process of getting me on a new medication. He was like a steamroller. But, it was so very encouraging.
I'm going to be getting on a medication called Tysabri, which blocks the immune system from accessing the brain at all. This means that, for a year, I shouldn't be having any MS symptoms at all. Why stop after a year, you say? Because there is a virus that lives in all of our bodies that will build up in the brain when it's sheltered from the immune system and han be fatal if not stopped; even if it's caught quickly it can cause permanent damage. However, there are 5 reported cases in 40,000 patients on Tysabri, and not one happened before the patient had been on Tysabri for a year.
I started a new job on December 10 ($4.35/hour more than I made at ListenUp!!!), and aside from the pay increase there's a lot of really awesome bennies. Excellent health insurance (+ vision & dental), 401k, life insurance, disability insurance, on and on. A positive and busy workplace and the days go quickly, even if I am tired at the end. However, I was (mis)led to believe that the insurance would be active the day I started, when actually, it's active the first day of the month following the beginning of employment. That left me insurance-free for 21 days, and we couldn't get the ball rolling on the Tysabri until then. And now that the ball is rolling, it's going to take up to 4 weeks to actually get my first dose.
In the meantime, my hands are still 90% numb. That's not likely to get any better until I'm on this new medication (if even then... there's always the thrilling chance that the damage may be permanent. However, that's not likely). Blech. I go through cycles of preemptively getting excited about having my hands back soonish and being depressed because I think that I've forgotten how to type, use screwdrivers or pliers, be a normal person with normal hands in any way. I've discovered that I cannot put on post earrings...though I wear earrings so rarely I wouldn't be surprised if I'd forgotten how to do that before now.
In other news, my best friend Carlie and my good friend Dan (one of B's groomsmen) have found love, happiness and bliss in each other's arms. They are both vomiting slimy pink fluff (contradiction in terms, I know... picture fluff made of gak) everywhere. Congrats to them, they deserve all the happiness in the world ^_^
And...that's all folks. =)
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Hair curler warnings
Well, first and foremost, I don't think I'll ever curl my hair. Which is a bummer because it's super-long and looks badass when it's curled. I just don't have the arm-strength, endurance, or skill for it. Oh well.
But in any case, there's something ominous and faintly disturbing about the warning "this product can burn eyes." I mean, it's got a little bit of mysticality and magic about it when we're talking about some substance that can burn your eyes at range without ever coming into contact with them, like bleach or ammonia. But it's somehow much more terrible when this warning is on a hair curler. It makes me want to stop, go "what? Huh? Really?" and question what way a hair curler can burn your eyes that is somehow different from the way it burns everything else.
That is all.
But in any case, there's something ominous and faintly disturbing about the warning "this product can burn eyes." I mean, it's got a little bit of mysticality and magic about it when we're talking about some substance that can burn your eyes at range without ever coming into contact with them, like bleach or ammonia. But it's somehow much more terrible when this warning is on a hair curler. It makes me want to stop, go "what? Huh? Really?" and question what way a hair curler can burn your eyes that is somehow different from the way it burns everything else.
That is all.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Long-awaited, most tedious update
I say tedious because I'm having to type with 2 fingers, deleting typos at least once or twice a sentence. My hands have gotten progressively worse since my August flare-up. I got on steroids at the end of September (oral, rather than IV) which actually helped quite a bit on all of my other symptoms (fairly standard Elly-MS-flare-up symptoms). However, my hands are now nearly useless. I drop everything I try to hold including phones, butter and needles. I can't open jars or my medication bottles. I can't put my hair up in an elastic. I can hardly go to the bathroom w/o help.
I'm getting on a new primary medication, b/c a blood test was done and they found that I've built up antibodies against my meds. But there was a paperwork snafu and I'm not getting it as fast as I should be (which was apparently supposed to be 2nd week of Oct).
I've come to realize that I'm a Darwinist, or whatever you call people who believe in survival of the fittest more than anything else. I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that I don't really believe in social programs that care for people who can't care for themselves. So, my moral beliefs are actually conflicting with my existence ATM.
It's just an uncomfortable place to be, morally, emotionally, physically. I don't know what I'm going to do if it doesn't pass. Aside from basic functionality, everything that I do that I love, arts & crafts & etc, require hands. :-&
So yeah, I'm in a little bit of a dark place right now. I made Branden and Carlie some kick-ass Halloween costumes, and consequently, didn't finish my own. My house is so messy I can't stand it. I haven't had time to eat "real" food since October started. All of a sudden, I can understand why 15% of all deaths in MS patients is suicide.
I can only hope that the party tonight makes up for all of it, and afterwards the stress level declines and I get my new medication and my hands magically get better. >_< Cross your fingers for me.
I'm getting on a new primary medication, b/c a blood test was done and they found that I've built up antibodies against my meds. But there was a paperwork snafu and I'm not getting it as fast as I should be (which was apparently supposed to be 2nd week of Oct).
I've come to realize that I'm a Darwinist, or whatever you call people who believe in survival of the fittest more than anything else. I'm somewhat ashamed to admit that I don't really believe in social programs that care for people who can't care for themselves. So, my moral beliefs are actually conflicting with my existence ATM.
It's just an uncomfortable place to be, morally, emotionally, physically. I don't know what I'm going to do if it doesn't pass. Aside from basic functionality, everything that I do that I love, arts & crafts & etc, require hands. :-&
So yeah, I'm in a little bit of a dark place right now. I made Branden and Carlie some kick-ass Halloween costumes, and consequently, didn't finish my own. My house is so messy I can't stand it. I haven't had time to eat "real" food since October started. All of a sudden, I can understand why 15% of all deaths in MS patients is suicide.
I can only hope that the party tonight makes up for all of it, and afterwards the stress level declines and I get my new medication and my hands magically get better. >_< Cross your fingers for me.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Books
The Big Read reckons that the average adult has read only 6 of the top 100 books they've printed.
1) Look at the list and bold those that you've read.
2.) Italicize those you intend to read.
3.) Underline the books you LOVE.
4.) Reprint this list in LJ
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger [HATED it]
19 The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood [another fave]
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
I've read over a quarter of these books--what was surprising to me was how few of the remaining books I have any interest in reading. This is of course not taking into account which movies I've seen and either: enjoyed enough to feel like reading the book would be redundant; or disliked enough to turn me off the book. Like, the BBC broadcast [approx. 6 hours] of Pride and Prejudice was SO FREAKING AWESOME that I'd just probably watch that again and again rather than read the book; while Grapes of Wrath movie was so excruciatingly boring I couldn't imagine willingly reading the book. It's likely that I'll end up reading some of these just cause I don't have anything else to read, but as of now I'm not really planning on reading more than the ones I have italicized
1) Look at the list and bold those that you've read.
2.) Italicize those you intend to read.
3.) Underline the books you LOVE.
4.) Reprint this list in LJ
1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger [HATED it]
19 The Time Traveler's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood [another fave]
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones's Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
I've read over a quarter of these books--what was surprising to me was how few of the remaining books I have any interest in reading. This is of course not taking into account which movies I've seen and either: enjoyed enough to feel like reading the book would be redundant; or disliked enough to turn me off the book. Like, the BBC broadcast [approx. 6 hours] of Pride and Prejudice was SO FREAKING AWESOME that I'd just probably watch that again and again rather than read the book; while Grapes of Wrath movie was so excruciatingly boring I couldn't imagine willingly reading the book. It's likely that I'll end up reading some of these just cause I don't have anything else to read, but as of now I'm not really planning on reading more than the ones I have italicized
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