worst. week. ever.

I know there's no excuse for my utter lack of posting. Having said that, this week was the worst work week ever in my 10 months with The Company. It wasn't even because anything catastrophic happened this week. Instead, it's been an issue of momentum. Day after day, the things I work on (that everyone in my area is working on) are so close to falling apart and I can barely hold it together. I am so tired that I can't get through ballet class without feeling so incredibly fatigued that it frustrates me beyond words. I think it's a bad sign when there is an enormous difference between classes I take on weekends and classes I take on weeknights. Anyway, I'm off on a tangent...

I finished a book this week and it was sans blogging, unfortunately. I'm going to try to avoid that from now on. It was Such a Pretty Fat by Jen Lancaster. I had read her previous book Bitter is the New Black and I liked it. It was an interesting style of chicklit. It's about how she left her high-paying job and had to relearn what's important and what isn't. While you can say that's cliche, I think seeing these lessons through real examples still makes a good story. Lancaster's newest book seemed somewhat funny, and my friend whole-heartedly endorsed it, so I picked it up and started reading. It had 4.5 stars out of 5 on amazon, so I felt like it'd be a pretty sure thing and they said she was like David Sedaris. They were so wrong.

As you may have noticed from the title, this could be considered a weight-loss story. Yes, Lancaster has funny insights. Yes, there were moments where I laughed out loud and that was embarrassing, but there were moments that were forced. Her frequently used footnotes were often irrelevant asides and seemed a little desperate for a cheap laugh. Humor's hard and obviously I'm a critic and not a writer myself, but I feel like the writing wasn't stellar, and definitely wasn't on par with Bitter. Not to mention the fact that she readily admits she was under the gun to write this particular memoir. I mean, everyone needs a paycheck.

On top of that, it's hard to conjure empathy for someone who has such a hostile edge. The book starts off with someone calling her a fat bitch, and, unfortunately, that's right on the mark. She approaches everyone and everything, whether they are friends or family, with anger and resentment. She lashes out verbally while shoveling down whole bags of Raisinets, butter-lathered pork chops, and Olive Garden dinners. Does she think that those people she's lambasting don't also want to guzzle wine, cupcakes, and chocolate-covered raisins? I feel that's pretty universal... but at the end of the day, it comes down to making yourself stop. It was the infuriatingly simple cure to her anger that made her unsympathetic. Obviously it takes awhile for her to figure this out, but that amount of time was enough for her personality to be so off-putting that I just couldn't keep myself reading. It took 10 days for a single piece of chicklit. It was hard to swallow. It wasn't 4.5 stars to me. Maybe I'm just bitter.

Anyway, time for a cure. Lauren Weisberger released her newest book Chasing Harry Winston. Obviously, she's best known for her book The Devil Wears Prada, which I still contend is better than the movie adaptation. She followed up with Everyone Worth Knowing which was above average, but a far cry from Devil (probably because it was actual fiction instead of being based on her life). I decided to give her another shot with Chasing Harry Winston, intentionally ignoring the 3 star reviews on amazon.com. I mean, honestly, these people thought Pretty Fat was good, so maybe I'll differ in my opinion on this one too.

I'm starting it tonight, so I'll repost tomorrow night... as for right now, a Bachelor marathon is on. And then I'm going to the pool. Yup, at 9pm. The one benefit of living in Ohio.