Review: The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America

The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson

My rating: 5 of 5 stars



Amazing. I've read a lot of nonfiction but I didn't know it could be like this. So storylike, so compelling, so captivating and shocking. The story of Chicago's world fair and the serial killer who emerged at the same time.

Another book I picked up because a book group was reading it. My fave Goodreads group "ladies and literature". It was about a week before the book discussion was about to start and everyone was complaining that it was too slow or they were afraid the murder chapters were going to be too gruesome. I love history and I tend to get really wrapped up in murder mysteries so why not! It was neither of those things to me.

I found the history fascinating, the architecture gave me such a clear image of this fair that took place almost a hundred years before I was born. The landscape was painted to clearly and the people became real to me.

"The knew he was a killer, but he was a charming killer." Man did this killer have confidence, that's what made it so scary. When was this going going to get caught? Why did people keep giving him loans and furniture? Why were there not regulations on buildings at the time?

I loved all the cameos by people who in the future will take cues from the fair- Disney, Frank L Baum, Frank Lloyd Wright! All the inventions we take for granted. This is history and yet so much of it is forgotten or unappreciated that it started somewhere.

I'm tempted to read one of his other books if they're all written like this, but like so many other author's I love I'll wait a bit and spread the wealth because if they're not as good it could sour my memory.



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My first duty as President...

I propose the day after the Fourth of July, when not falling on a Saturday or Sunday, to also be a holiday.  Or at the very least only a half day requirements.  (disclaimer: At employers discretion.)

I had a great Fourth of July in College Station! I spent the whole day with my boss and her family.  First we went to the Bush Library & Museum.  Here are a list of things I was reminded about 41 that we all know but probably forget:

1. He was in WWII (seriously I always forget this)
2. He and his son were in office 8 years apart! (it just seems so close together)
3. His passion for cancer research and the Human Genome project comes from losing his first daughter to leukemia
4. He has a million grandchildren
5. He too is episcopal

Super cool things to see at his museum

1. the Gulf war diorama (omg cool)
2. the Situation Room (Soooo coool)
3. Bush living room videos (omg Bar & Poppy- so much in love & hilarious together)
4. WWII wing (cause duh)
5. oh just go see everything

After the museum we chill'd ate yummy burgers and watched some patriotic movies...like A Good Day to Die Hard and A Few Good Men (had to wash the memory of A Good Day to Die Hard out of our brains).  Then we returned to the library to watch the fireworks.  The fireworks were so good! Super fun and a good 25 minutes worth.

All in all it was a great Fourth of July.  Had too much fun just relaxing but also getting to see a lot of great American history at the museum.  Next year the Fourth will be on a Friday I guess meaning I'll probably go home to San Antonio, but I'm sure this wont be my last 4th in College Station, just the first.

An Epic Battle

Tyler versus Sugar Ants from hell!!!

I have never been what one would call a "neat freak".  But I usually try to keep at least my living room and kitchen presentable at all times.  However sometimes when I'm really busy or distracted mess takes over.

During 9 to 5 rehearsals I may have let me kitchen get a little bit out of control.  There may have been like 2ish weeks where I didn't really go into my kitchen cause I was afraid.  Afraid of what had taken over the sink and afraid of the leftovers that had turned into science experiments in my fridge.  But then my mom and sister were coming into town and I knew I needed to enter the forbidden zone.  So I cleaned it all, top to bottom with bleach and lysol.  I love lysol I'd spray the world down with it if I could.  I go through like a bottle of it every two months- because when I'm sick I feel like the world needs a little more of it.  So I cleaned and swiffered and threw crap away and ran the dishwasher- TWICE!

The next morning I awoke- to ANTS.  Tiny black sugar ants EVERYWHERE.  WTF? I just cleaned you why are you attracting ants kitchen? They appeared to be coming in my front door crawling over my DVDs and slinking up the wall to get behind my microwave.  Well I know what'll work- Lysol! I sprayed those little devils with so much lysol I had to lock the cats in the bedroom and leave the apartment.  I came back to no more ants...well no more alive ants.  And all was good.

Until 2 days later they were back! And they were eating my sponges! Uhg! How dare they! I lysoled them.  And again they disappeared for two more days. Then they came back in both places!!!  Well lysol wasn't working maybe Off would do the trick.  Off in my kitchen where once I cooked.  I locked the kitties in my bedroom and fled the apartment again.  This time they stayed away pretty well.  Pretty much for my mom and sister's full visit.  Then they were back again after the first weekend of 9 to 5.

Dammit ants! So I went to our trusty friend Google and learned you can get rid of ants with Tea Tree Oil! I have a ton of that cause I use it for EVERYTHING.  (like coconut oil but foul smelling) So I put tea tree oil on cotton balls and strategically placed them near the front door and all the spots in the kitchen I'd seen Ants.  Vamoose!  Ants were gone!  Never to return!

For 5 days.  Well that worked better than lysol and I didn't have to flea my house.  So maybe I need to use more.  I put some tea tree oil in a spray bottle and sprayed the world! They didn't like it at all.  So what did those devilish little monsters do?  They found a new entrance.

That's it! I'm done being humane lets go get some REAL ant killer.  So I bought some Ant trap bait things.  I bought two packs! Spread them throughout the kitchen and nothing.  The ants laughed at my traps and brought their friends along to see me suffer.

I almost gave up and called the apartment people to get an exterminator out here, but then I was at HEB  yesterday and I saw Raid Ant Bait Gel.  Ooooh.  I'd read online that gel is a good way to kill ants.  It was on sale AND I had a coupon.  I bought the gel.  The instructions said to put pea size dots on the ant trails and that they'd carry it back to their nests.  The box also said it starts working within an hour!

So I put maybe dime size drops out for those ants and left the apartment to go to the liquor store cause what else can you do.  I came back and to my horror there were more ants than ever! They had swarmed the gel like they were at a picnic! WHAT???? Google help me wtf is going on?  Apparently the bait attacks all the ants and over 4 hours they'll disperse taking their sweet death back to their colonies.  Okay. Okay Google.  I'll give them another 3 hours to see what's up.  So I waited.  And watched.  And waited and got a little trigger finger itch on my lysol can.

I was having people over later in the day, I really didn't want my kitchen to be full of ants, especially since everyone was bringing stuff that would be sweet and sticky and only attract more.  Well almost 24 hours later there is nary an ant in my kitchen.  Fruit juice was spilt yesterday, a jar of salsa broke, all sorts of things spilt in that kitchen and the ants have disappeared.  It's still way to early to know if this is a true success.  But 24 hours later I'm super excited that they may have disappeared.  Go Raid Ant Gel!

They're Only Days Update- 286 days in the BCS

So I kinda forgot to write about my 9th month.  Partially because I was busy, partially because I was in a show but mostly because I was having entirely too much fun to give a damn that I've now been away from home for 9 months!  9 months! I could have had a baby in that time, but thank god I didn't.  So now we're at pretty much exactly the 9 1/2 month phase and I'm just so pleasantly surprised at how much I'm loving living here.

Don't get me wrong I still hate severely dislike that BCS is not San Antonio and that I don't get to see my family, friends and nephew all the time, but it's okay I've dealt with it and am moving on.  Not really, but trying to.  I no longer have debilitating homesickness.  I have people outside of work that are super friendly, supportive and fun/ridiculous.

So happy/crappy time or whoops & poops as my boss prefers.  Always start with crappy or poops because then you end on the high notes-

Crappy/Poops
I still always feel like my health isn't good here.  I wake up with a bloody nose at least twice a week and am unable to breathe through my nose a lot.  The air here sucks! I always have the strange remnants of a tickle in my throat and I've had a bad cough since I had walking pneumonia back in March- it will not go away.

This town feels empty in the summer and it freaks me out.  Where is everyone?

Sometimes I still don't sleep. And the cats don't like it when I talk to them at 3AM.

$4 Zombie movie viewing....bad idea.

A little bit of both
Drinks are cheap here y'all.
Snap Chat.
Drinks are cheap here y'all.
My cats are crazy.
Snap Chat.
Spamalot Auditions on Sunday.

Happy/Whoops
I never have to buy gas.  Seriously y'all I went all of May on one tank till I went home to watch the nephew for Memorial Day. Amazing!

I love the theatre company and the people within it.  Don't know what I'd do here without them.

I am no longer a flight risk, we can take the bed alarm off the hospital bed cause I'm not going anywhere!

I cut my hair. Well actually Amanda at Flux did.

Downtown Bryan. The Corner. Karaoke.
---------

I think those are the highlights- So it's almost July and I can't freakin' believe it!!!  How did that happen?  In just a few more months I'll have been here a year.  Super excited cause this year has been amazing.  Terrible, awful, no good but also wonderful, fun, scary and great.

Wishes for month 10!
Don't get sick.
Spamalot.
Don't get sick.
Snap Chat.
Don't get sick.
Work on my tan.
Read 3ish books.
Don't get sick.

So a much more positive "days" update than the previous ones that can be seen here, here and here. Yes?

Review: The Bling Ring: How a Gang of Fame-Obsessed Teens Ripped Off Hollywood and Shocked the World

The Bling Ring: How a Gang of Fame-Obsessed Teens Ripped Off Hollywood and Shocked the World by Nancy Jo Sales

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



Really more like 3 1/2 stars. I totally enjoyed this book because it reminded me of that time in my life where I too was a little obsessed with celebrity culture/lifestyle and spent my lunch hour reading Perez Hilton (no shame) and following Star and all those things. It was right around the time these burglaries were happening. I really read this book because I love Sophia Coppola and Bling Ring doesn't start showing in BCS till next week I think. So I needed something to hold me over.

I have a tendency to become very obsessive about some things. Books, movie franchises, music- whateves and that usually then is transfered to the artist doing these things and I go through a phase where I have to know EVERYTHING about that movie, author, musician. So I may have become a bit obsessed with knowing everything about this case and thank god Nancy Jo Sales does a great job going into ridiculous detail. But I also learned there was a reality TV show staring one of the burglars! OMG is it on Netflix? Yes, yes it is and I may or may not have watched the whole thing last Sunday afternoon.

So my experience cyber-stalking all the burglars is somewhat crazy for me to think about. I mean that's what they did to the celebrities they robbed right? They did their research online and found out everything they could about them. Scary. 15 years ago that would have not been possible. The book talks about teenage culture throughout our American history. Looking at the American revolution, Boton tea party and such and what the teenager's role was in those. She doesn't go into horrible detail, we're here for the gritty details of these crimes, but it's so interesting to think about when the obsession with celebrities and crime arose. She mentioned Bonnie and Clyde, those two brothers who committed murder because they wanted to be famous and the introduction of TMZ into our lives. People are obsessed with celebrities, people want to be famous. Reality TV, being spotted at the hot club, these are all things teenagers know about and think will get their foot in the door to becoming famous. Hell I've known people who want to be famous! If I could only get on this TV show, this is gonna be my big break.

I don't know, maybe this book does deserve the full four because it made me think so much. I found it really fascinating. And at the same time just totally fun to hear about these spoiled kids obsessed with celebrities and breaking into their houses.



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Review: How to Eat a Cupcake

How to Eat a Cupcake by Meg Donohue

My rating: 3 of 5 stars



This was a sweet little bubble-gummy book but I'm so glad I read it. It's about friends, friends who fall out and come back together- those are the best types of friends. Friends who fight and love like sisters. And eat lots of delicious cupcakes in between. I got this book cause it was on sale for super cheap at BN online and it just sounded fun. I've always liked books with food in the title [b:I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti|5996317|I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti|Giulia Melucci|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1344271778s/5996317.jpg|6170613] and [b:The Toaster Broke So We're Getting Married|6077049|The Toaster Broke So We're Getting Married|Pamela Holm|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347480736s/6077049.jpg|6253646] are two other cheapie books I got that I ended up loving too.

So How to Eat a Cupcake- first thing you do is take off the paper wrapper. This story is written from two points of view Annie's & Julia's. Each chapter alternates back and forth. These are the two childhood friends reunited. Both are dealing with their own pasts and moving forward and decide to open a cupcakery together. At the beginning they're more frenemies than friends but they make up for it quickly.

Maybe because I'm homesick, maybe because I miss my friends but this book just made me sigh and say "ahhh" a lot. Nothing was too shocking, no one got irreparably hurt and it was a super quick read. It's just a nice feel good book and a great book to kick off the summer with. So yay.



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Review: Dead Ever After

Dead Ever After by Charlaine Harris

My rating: 4 of 5 stars



The 13th book I finished in 2013 was also the 13th and final book in the Sookie Stackhouse series! Whoop!

Was it the best book ever written? No. Was it the best book in the series? Hell no. Was it still a good and satisfying ending o the series? Yes. What do you expect something Sookie changing forever? No. It wrapped everything up. Brought back some characters we hadn't seen in a while. And like all other Sookie books what you thought was the "main" mystery gives you a surprise twist at the end.

If you didn't guess she'd end up with Sam after the end of the previous book then you do not know our girl Sookie. She used the CD on him, of course that means he was her "true love" and HEA. There wasn't enough Jason in this book for my taste, it's the end of the frickin' series give us more Jason time. So glad to see Quinn back! He was always one of my fave supes and Alcide, Amelia, and Bob.

It was fine, it was a good logical ending to this series. She probably could have kept it going longer, but it wouldn't have been as satisfying. So good job.



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