Every summer, I feel compelled to go through what I term "Operation Attention Span." After too many skimmed abstracts, half read papers, and Times articles read during lecture, after too many decompression sitcoms and youtube videos, I feel the need to learn how to behave like a proper, educated adult again, to read magazine pieces in one sitting, hold proper conversations without chatting on instant message, and perhaps read a book or two.
With a cold to nurse (thanks, Immune System, you have the best timing!) and no work this weekend (rather, no motivation to work), I dipped my toes of the endeavor yesterday afternoon and managed to read Much Ado About Nothing in one sitting. What little progress that slim play was though, took a step backward in the evening as I managed to simultaneously keep my eyes on the Sox-Yankees game, the Bruins-Penguins game, a random movie on Comedy Central, as well as several games of Sudoku. Not attention span's best moment.
Still fighting the cold today, I decided the gradual approach wasn't going to work and instead, since I was taking a sick day anyway, devoted myself to the copy of Cutting for Stone that had been sitting on my shelf the past few months, waiting for a moment such as this. I finished all 657 pages today (paperback version- I imagine the hardcopy has fewer pages). Congratulations. I think my attention span is back. I also think I need a more exciting life.
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