Vicki’s Comments (group member since May 01, 2018)

Vicki’s comments from the Nothing But Reading Challenges group.

I got FIG tree...figures since fig is a fruit/food. lol

Native to the Middle East and western Asia, the common fig is a giving tree;its fruit has been harvested since ancient times. Your friends and family consider you to be a generous person as well. Whether a neighbor needs to borrow a tool from your garage or a friend asks you for a ride, you're always there to lend a helping hand. You prefer to keep busy anyway, as you have numerous hobbies and actively volunteer to help others.

I had a lovely lunch yesterday with 9 friends of mine, and afterwards we went to one of the lady's homes and had dessert. Most of us are mothers with an exception or two.

In California it's almost like having 2 Mother's Days because we have a large Hispanic community and the Mexican families celebrate it on May 10, which was yesterday. Tomorrow is the regular one for the U.S., so I'm looking forward to going to one of my daughter's home where two of my adult granddaughters are making brunch for all of us. It'll be so fun to visit and be catered to! lol

Happy Mother's Day to all of you mothers, dog mothers, cat mothers, and so on. :) I say if you're a mother in any way that Mother's Day is everyday! :)

I am pretty sure I'm going to start with

@Stephanie, thanks for being our captain. I feel like I've played a version of this challenge before, but if I have it's been a while so it'll take me a minute (or two) to know what I'm doing. I think it's so fantastic that you're a kitty foster mom! We need more animal fostering/rescuing. I always own dogs and it's only been in the past year that I've gotten to where I'm not afraid of cats anymore. My aunt had a MEAN gray alley cat, the only cat I was ever around, so I never liked them until my daughter got 2 a little over a year ago for my two youngest grandkids, Lily (now 6) and Juju (now 4) and over time I have learned a lot about cats. They both like me and I am not afraid anymore of them, but still iffy on unknown cats.

@Melindam, I've seen you all over the place! (In GR, that is.) I've always wanted to play with you and I feel like we did play together in a challenge or maybe 2 but not a lot! I know you're a good player and that you're an excellent participant! If I remember correctly, you live in Belgium, right? I'm glad you have the means to get the books you want. I use my public library, Libby, Scribd, and Amazon's Audible for my ebooks and audiobooks. It's so good to have plenty of resources. What I can't get through one of those nor wait for a book I really want, that's when I buy books. Plus, I subscribe to BOTM so I still get hardback books but I don't read nearly as many of those as I do ebooks. Glad to have you on our team!

@Sophie, a doctor? Quite impressive! And I have always wanted to see London and the guards there. I only know what I hear and I've learned that's not always very reliable. Hopefully one day I can make it there.

@Lucy, I'm a mood reader too IF I don't have a book I have to read for a challenge but that's not very often! lol I do love just deciding on what I feel like reading, though. I feel like I probably should know or be able to figure it out but I don't know...what does SFF mean?

@Suzanne, one thing we don't have in common is a math brain! lol I used to tell my students something like, "Get into groups of 4" as I held up 3 fingers and then realized what I did and I'd say, "That's why I don't teach math." lol I taught seniors for 5-6 years and they had to do senior projects out in the community, and their papers were were 20%. What I could never wrap my brain around is WHY their grade would sometimes go down AFTER they turned in their papers. I always felt like if they had a zero score then why wouldn't it go up? One of the math teachers, Brad Garletts (who had previously been a student of mine) came into my class and showed me on the board how it worked. All I can say is thank goodness for programs because I never did get it! lol

@Ushashi, another brain in our group! YAY! (Not to say you aren't all brains, though!) I feel such admiration for people who have careers like yours and do such important work in fields like cancer. I hope you enjoy Boston. Just curious if you moved there alone or do you have family who also live there or moved with you? I'm glad you now have library access to so many more books! I have one library that I have a library card for but live too far away to get my physical books from...darn it! They allow 100 books for checkout and it's 3 stories high. It's the San Francisco Public Library. I only get their ebooks and audiobooks, but they still allow 25 at a time so that's not too bad. Good luck finding all the books you ever hoped to find!

@Cecily, I went to the most beautiful place ever last summer and I just loved it there! I went to Canmore-Banff, Canada! The waterfalls were the most beautiful I've ever seen! My daughter and her girlfriend went with us and they loved it so much that they went back in December to see it during winter. The Rockies there were so gorgeous! I will definitely go back! There were many things we liked about the communities there as well. You are a lot more brave than I am to have so many animals, but that's very cool.

@Lauri, aloha! Which island to you live on and were you born in Hawaii? We've been to Kauai several times, I was in Oahu WAY back in 1973. We've also been to the big island and Maui both once during the same summer. Thankfully we went before the volcano erupted and went on a tour to see it and we got to see it at night through a telescope and wow, it was beautiful to see! But so sad about the eruption and what some people went through. We miss Kauai, especially...so much greenery!

I think I responded to everyone, but if I missed you it wasn't purposeful. I did want to connect with each and every one of you, so hopefully I did. I'm so excited to play and get to know all of you a lot more. We have quite a diverse group of people, which I love. I've always loved different ethnicities, traditions, cultures, religions, etc. I find it all so fascinating. I happen to be Christian and I used to tell my students that one of my very best friends was Buddhist. All that matters to me is a person who's good-hearted, kind, respectful, and who cares about others. And, you certainly all sound like you're nice and caring people, too. :)

@Marty, yes, I keep very busy with my large family...always something! This year there are 3 graduation ceremonies: Kindergarten, 8th grade, and high school. lol I have 4 months that we have 4 birthdays, only 1 birthday in May and July, but 2-3 in most other months. But my BIG one is October with 7 and December with 6. That doesn't include all of their better halves, for those old enough. lol

Teddie wrote: "@Vicky - I know you and I have played on a team together before, but I can't remember which challenges :) How is Rocky dealing with the young pup Daisy? We recently introduced a feisty tuxedo kitty..."

Rocky is an old man now and not getting around as easily as before, but he's good with Daisy's playfulness 99% of the time. He's had a few "leave-me-alone" barks/growls and 2 (I think) "leave me alone or I'm going to kill you" more than bark/growl moments...thought he was going to kill her if we hadn't been there. But overall she's learning when she can or can't bother him. He likes to play too but not as rough as she does. lol

Hello District 7 Teammates. Following suit, I'm Vicki (she/her/Mrs.) and this is my first time playing with some of you (maybe all of you). I can rarely remember with whom I've played unless I play with specific people regularly.

I'm a retired high school teacher of 25 years. I taught English and yearbook. I'm happily married (most of the time lol), I have 3 daughters and 2 sons, 12 grandsons and 10 granddaughters, and 3 great grandsons and 3 great granddaughter...soon to be 4 great grandsons! I live with my hubby and 2 dogs, Rocky (border collie/lab mix 14 years old) and Daisy (AKA Crazy Daisy, Havanese, 7 months old.) I live in California, USA, in the PST zone.

Favorite genres: historical fiction (along with most any sub-genre), mystery, thriller/psychological thriller, romance (not erotica), some fantasy (Sarah J. Maas, Jennifer Armentrout), a few memoirs/nonfiction during the year, but sci-fi and horror are my least favorite...IF the horror is blood and guts or demonic.

I'm looking forward to this challenge. I've never done this one but I think it's new, right? I'm ready to play!

Laurie, thanks. :)

Jenny wrote: "This is not a TT challenge from what I gather. And, I assume that you have a shelf called "crazy-book-people" or something just waiting for the right circumstance, yes?

I don't honestly remember w..."

No, I don't have a shelf like that but I can create one. lol Thanks, Jenny. :)

I was wondering if anyone knows if this is the Tower Teams Challenge or a brand new challenge replacing TT since it usually starts mid-May. I don't know what to call my shelf. What are others doing for their shelf? What confused me is it said we could use a pre-existing shelf. Like what? lol

Not sure what I did wrong, but I signed up for GOTM but linked it to the wrong challenge and now I can't find it. Is there a GOTM in this group?

~ 111 pages
Personal Total: 111

Current Total: 1,891

Serious Readers Challenge 2024 - Level 1
Shooting to Read and Remember to Post Here

Progress: 23/100

💥1. Whisper of Bones 1/01
💥2. The Butcher and the Wren 1/04
💥3. Yellowface 1/07
💥4. Go as a River 1/16
💥5. Don't Let Her Stay 1/21
💥6. Did You Hear About Kitty Karr? 1/28
💥7. The Storm We Made 1/15
💥8. The Frozen River 1/25
💥9. No One Can Know 1/23
💥10. The Invisible Hour 1/17


11. Maame
💥12. Shark Heart 2/11
💥13. Someone Else's Shoes 3/20
14. The Bee Sting
15. The Collected Regrets of Clover
16. The Connellys of County Down
17. The Wishing Game
💥18. Tom Lake 2/26
19. Wellness
💥20. Banyan Moon 3/31


💥21. The Covenant of Water 1/06
💥22. Yours Truly 1/15
💥23. I Have Some Questions for You 1/11
💥24. Live, Local, and Dead 1/08
💥25. Bones Under the Ice 1/03
💥26. The True Love Experiment 1/06
💥27. Christmas Ever After 1/03
💥28. Dear Jane
💥29. Chasing the Boogeyman
💥30. Mercury


31. Hello Beautiful
32. Evil Eye

💥33. Love, Theoretically 1/30
💥34. Fragile Designs 2/01
💥35. The Lost Village 1/31
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.


41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.

51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.

61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.

71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
80.

81.
82.
83.
84.
85.
86.
87.
88.
89.
90.

91.
92.
93.
94.
95.
96.
97.
98.
99.
100.

YAY! I think this is either the first or second time I was on the team that won. I just love this challenge! Thanks again for hosting it!

Around the World 2024

Reserved

Around the World 2024
SS: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...

Travel Itinerary #23

1. Easter Island (CL) - Colorado Springs (US) Read a book where the kindle version is less than 300 pages
by Melinda Leigh 1/1 ⭐⭐⭐⭐
2. Colorado Springs (US) - St Lucia (LC) Read a book where a character is a demon
3. St Lucia (LC) - Glasgow (GB) Read a book with the name of the tarot card "The Star" in the text or title
4. Glasgow (GB) - Hurghada (EG) Read a book where the title starts with the letter C
5. Hurghada (EG) - Novyj Urengoj (RU) Read a book where a character's first name starts with the letter U
6. Novyj Urengoj (RU) - Tawau (MY) Read a book where a character is an undertaker
7. Tawau (MY) - Sunshine Coast (AU) Read a book where the title starts with the letter T
8. Sunshine Coast (AU) - Easter Island (CL) Read a book with a pink cover

Author Alphabet Challenge 2024
Duration: January 1 - December 31, 2024

Progress: 9/26

💥A - Abraham Verghese The Covenant of Water Read 1/06
💥B - Mercury 1/20
💥C - Christina Lauren The True Love Experiment 1/06
D - David Grann The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder
E - Emilia Hart Weyward
F -
G -
H - Heather Marshall Looking for Jane
I - Isabel Allende The Wind Knows My Name
J - Jessica George Maame
K - Kate Alice Marshall What Lies in the Woods
L - Lisa Jewell None of This Is True
💥M - Melinda Leigh Whisper of Bones Read 1/01
💥N - Nikki Knight Live, Local, and Dead Read 1/08
O -

💥P - Did You Hear About Kitty Karr? 1/28
Q -
💥R- Rebecca Makkai I Have Some Questions for You Read 1/11
💥S- Shelley Read Go as a River Read 1/16
T- Tananarive Due The Reformatory
U -
💥V - Vanessa Chan The Storm We Made Read 1/14
W - William Kent Krueger The River We Remember
X -
Y -
Z -

BOOKS READ:

New 2 U Authors 2024
Duration: January 1 - December 31, 2024
Level: Devil May Care

Progress 5/25

January
💥1. Author: Alaina Urquhart
Book: The Butcher and the Wren
Read: 4 January 2024
💥2. Author: Marie Benedict
Book: The Personal Librarian
Read: 1 January 2024
💥3. Author: R.F. Kuang
Book: Yellowface
Read: 7 January 2024
💥4. Author: Vanessa Chan
Book: The Storm We Made
Read: 14 January 2024
💥5. Author: Shelley Read
Book: Go as a River
Read: 16 January 2024
6. Author; Nicola Sanders
Book: Don't Let Her Stay
Read:

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

BOOKS READ

Oh, Tammie, you just might be sorry you offered! lol I won't forget!

That is fantastic, Rebecca! I read so much more when I am doing a challenge like this one and I rarely am on a team that wins first place either. But I definitely am pushed to read a lot more because for the most part I don’t like reading at my fastest speed I am capable of, especially if I am reading a book that is not what I call a fluff book! Anyway, it was nice having you on our team and I hope to be on another team with you in the future. Hopefully this one next time.! 😂

M I hear ya! Me too! lol Happy New Year to all of my Classical teammates! :)