Books are my escapism. I love them. They are life. Except...

I've been currently reading the same book for what feels like ages, well for the whole of December, so really only a couple weeks. It isn't as if I don't like the book. I have no idea why I procrastinate something I love so much! I go through spurts of reading 20+ books in a month, and then reading like 2 and sometimes nothing at all!

I recently found out some of my "quirks" come down to autism. Shocker. 33 and I'm only now finding out who I really am, or at least understanding more why I do things the way I do them. The more correct term would be ASD or Asperger Syndrome Disorder.

People can call me a special snowflake all they want. I finally have a term, or label (if you will) that helps me understand my head a little better. I did not get it officially told to me by a doctor, either.

First I got advice from a friend who has it and she gently told me to look more into it, because apparently aspies are really good at recognizing each other. What she did not know was that I had already been wondering about it and when she gave me this long message talking about her experiences and relating them to what she has seen me do, I just couldn't control the melt down I had while reading it.

Like I feel ashamed and broken, but rationally, I know there is nothing to be ashamed of and I'm not broken. It is just another part of me. One that 90% of people won't take seriously because I'm a grown woman, and I didn't get a "Doctor's Note."

This hardly has anything to do with books. I was wondering if non bookish blogs are fine, considering this blog site is called "booklikes"

Anyone else share non bookish stuff? Is that frowned on here? I sometimes have things I want to blurt to people and nobody to blurt them to.

Oh, I wanted to share my current saving grace is the La La Land soundtrack. I put that music on full blast when I am having "moments" where I want to ignore the world. Go see the movie and make the music your life!! All music is my saving grace, but I really love this soundtrack. I'm really into the music I grew up with, the 90s/early 00s, plus a few more modern things. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that some people are calling the 90s the oldies now.

I hope everyone is having a great holiday season!

Leigha~

It has been a long time since I have been able to write poetry. It is an art form I don't always understand. I like to read it, but it is usually hit and miss whether I like it or not. So I've been going through stuff, so I wrote some poems recently. I'm sharing them with you.

---

Agonizing, Torment, Panic

All this because the Internet went out

Bored, Lonely, Sad

All this because the Internet went out

What to do, What to do?

Why are we stuck in an age

where Wi-Fi breathes us life

defines us, controls us?

The minute it goes

we freeze and

forget how to live.

---

too much

suffocating, surrounding,

desire owning, having

overwhelming, intoxicating

unable to toss it away

too many leftovers of a past

unwanted memories of a life

struggling

let it go, go, go

get away

usefulness

dried up, gone

not needed

trash it, give it, clean it up

not only physical,

in the mind

as well

memories with people

not things

go ahead

take pictures

take videos

try

device down

once in a while

enjoy moment

record everything

forget to

really live it

pictures and video

are things too

 ---

music, loud, love

headphones, my friend,

savior, comfort me

thank you

scary, too crazy

ouch, pain

people

hide, be quiet,

shh

better to, like to,

want to, hate to

ignore the world

confusing, conflicting

wants, desires

"Like many major museums all over the world—including the National Gallery, the Rijksmuseum, The British Library, and over 200 others—the [Smithsonian's] Freer/Sackler [Galleries] has made its collection, all of it, available to view online. You can also download much of it. [...]

As Freer/Sackler director Julian Raby describes the initiative, “We strive to promote the love and study of Asian art, and the best way we can do so is to free our unmatched resources for inspiration, appreciation, academic study, and artistic creation.” There are, writes the galleries’ website, Bento, “thousands of works now ready for you to download, modify, and share for noncommercial purposes.” More than 40,000, to be fairly precise.

You can browse the collection to your heart’s content by “object type,” topic, name, place, date, or “on view.” Or you can conduct targeted searches for specific items. In addition to centuries of art from all over the far and near East, the collection includes a good deal of 19th century American art."

Direct link for the Freer & Sackler collection - http://www.asia.si.edu/collections/edan/default.cfm (hint: always "clear search", before browsing e.g. by name)

Hello everyone.  I finally got around to making a page on different sources for free images that you can use on your blog.  I don't currently have too many of them yet because I just haven't been using a lot of images but I plan to do more with them soon so I'll be adding them as I go.  

Here's the page at: http://jamiesbookblog.booklikes.com/Source-for-images

I hope these help some of you and I'll be adding more soon. Sorry it took me so long.  

Jamie