Booking Through Thursday: Volume

Yes, it’s Friday, and late on Friday at that. But the question was posted late (belated Happy Birthday to Deb!) so you can blame the time zones and my Plant Biotech exam.

Would you say that you read about the same amount now as when you were younger? More? Less?
Why?

A little difficult to answer, since there’s not a great deal of younger to cover and remembering isn’t one of my talents. My records show a reasonably steady devouring of around 2 - 3.5 books per week from 2004 onward. My capacity for reading has an almost magical elasticity; no matter how much I have to do at uni, or how many reviews I have to write, or how many hugely time-consuming books I read, I still manage to read a LOT. And the two years before were probably much the same. I can definitively date my current addiction to 2002, thanks to an accommodating quirk of my timetable which gave me a free period after lunch on Fridays - time enough to take a bus to the Belconnen library and stock up. Every single week. And you can stop thinking whatever you’re thinking; in Canberra when you hit Years 11 and 12 the rules are dramatically relaxed and students are allowed, among other things, to wander off school grounds as they please. (Though preferably not when they’re meant to be in class.)

Before that I always read, just not (quite) so much. Precisely how much I don’t recall, but the bookcase in my room seemed to be always more or less full. And soon (well, hopefully soon) we’ll all get to see what happens to my reading after uni. I can say that after my last exam I shall be reading and reviewing like mad in order to make up for future lost time, because I suspect that once my career is underway I won’t get through anywhere near as many books as I do now. Either that, or I’ll learn to be really efficient at reading and reviewing :-)