I read a LOT. I had the bad habit of reading a book WHILE walking to school, and then back home again. Can't remember if I ever walked into anything.

When I was eleven and twelve, I read while cycling to and from school.

After being stopped by the police a couple of times (my route took me past the loacl cop shop) for having both hands up in front of me holding the book and neither hand on the handle-bars steering the bike, I saved up and bought a basket to fit on the handlebars and would have the book propped open in there where the policemen couldn't see it when I rode past. I remember I had to ride crouched forward towards the handle-bars so I could see the book properly. I remember The Mouse and his Child as the last book I read before getting the basket fitted.

It's a wonder I didn't end up under the wheels of a car. There's no way I can have been paying much attention to the other traffic on the roads.

Teddy

{grin!} Appart from the huge expanse of wet stuff and a rather large quantity of Canadian landmass between our respective schools, there wasn't much preventing it....

Teddy

... Ending up wandering off reading the wrong book...

Teddy

Yay Chaos!!!!

Teddy

That trip over to England you were talking about wanting the other day - when that happens we could arrange something....

I find the thought kind of scary, but it has possibilities - possibly of us getting arrested and you being deported.

Teddy

You are also as mad as a stick, but I like that in a person.

Teddy

From Acres at Strands:

Each morning I pass through Penn Station
Reading and walking my way.
I don't even know where I work, though
I seem to get there every day.

Yep, I've tried to read and walk at the same time. My sister Eileen somehow convinced my parents to let her read at most dinners when she was 10. But the worst—the absolute worst of bad-reading behavior—is the acquaintance in college who apparently, without being given massive numbers of tickets by cops and without being in an accident that makes him eligible for the Darwin Awards, still drives to work with a book propped on the steering wheel.

I was lucky in that respect. We never had formal sit-down meals. The closest we got was all sitting around in front of the livingroom TV with our plates on our laps... mostly that was just a coinsidence of timing, however. So reading during meals was no problme (come to think of it, back then, reading, watching/listening to the TV, knitting and holding a conversation all at the same time wasn't much of a problem. Probably the reason, however, that my knitting never progressed beyond glacial in terms of speed, though my elder sister is greased-lightning with knitting needles)

Teddy

Are you sure you aren't an evil older sister? I refer to the knitting needles - jwordsmith knows what I'm talking about!

when you were 10

you haven't changed a bit since then

no really you haven't

no really

- seriously - you actually haven't.

honestly - not a bit changed

not one iota

no they've not changed either - tat's an illusion

you are completely unaltered

caught in amber

untouched by time

(jeepers - look how one can milk such a small idea)

totally as you were

really

Last year I caught one of my students reading Harry Potter under his desk during my math lesson. After a second of annoyance I immediately flashed on a memory of me reading Tolkien under my desk during the occasional math lesson in high school :). And my teacher instincts were caught between "Hey, kid, you're supposed to be listening to this math lesson, you may -need- decimals someday." and "Ya know, if choosing between Harry Potter and this decimal lesson, I'd go with Rowling, too." and "Ya gotta love a kid who loves to read this much.".

And then I gently took the book away from him and made him learn decimals. Hogwarts wasn't going anywhere.