Nothing But Reading Challenges discussion
The Floor is Lava
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Team Krakatoa Go Go
I am wondering if we should bother with Safe Zone 1, depending on whether it would get us more points to use those 4 slots for an extra word (with difficult letters) in Zone 3. Need to do the math!
You guys seem to have a better grasp of it then me - just point me in the right reading direction and I'll catch on :)
I think I understand it but I thought that before and had parts wrong so....,
Not gonna lie, I'm confused as well, but I haven't really looked into the rules as much as I want. I was going to wait until later in the week at Brown runs down. I do know I'm reading Lolita and have a copy waiting in Libby from the library. Oddly had two people in line in front of me on the hold.
I scoped out some books for the first 10 tasks. I have something for every task (a couple of my books work for more than 1) and I figured I'd see who calls dibs on what tasks and then fill in as needed. The only spell out books I really looked for were for harder letters like X.
I also perused the BOM list and jotted some books down that I'm willing to read if we do the LAVA spell out. 2 have to be former or current BOM reads. I did not look and see if any of those actually work for LAVA.
I'm hoping this starts out early on Monday in my time zone so I can start an audio on my morning walk. I have a meeting Tues and Wed night but I should still be able to get a couple of task books in by Friday. I normally get the bulk of my reading done Friday-Sunday.
Is someone going to make us a tracking spreadsheet? I could try to do one if no one else can. I'm not the best at setting them up and I'm more proficient in Excel than google docs. Or do the formulas work the same?
I was planning to just copy & paste the official spreadsheet, add some columns for notes and planning and such.I don't think actually we need any formulas, because the official spreadsheet will tabulate our points and our total # or books.
I don't have a lot of time online today but will update all sorts of stuff this evening -- Lava, Brown, etc.!
Sounds like a good idea to me and probably what I would do. I would say as long as it's up by this weekend so we can claim spots and know what to start reading when it officially starts. And thanks for volunteering to do the spreadsheet.
Here is a link to the Planning spreadsheet!As with the official spreadsheet, it is currently set up for anyone with the link to be able to edit. If we want to turn that off, you will all need to PM me your email addresses. (We may want private "view" permissions anyway, to keep some of our book ideas a little more private until they go on official spreadsheet. Then I think we would just have to give the Mod account viewing permission too.)
[ETA: Link removed for privacy! Let the rest of us know if you didn’t save to your Google Drive...]
I added a "Notes" column for, well, notes! Of any kind you want! We can also create tabs for our individual book ideas, which helps some people to feel more organized. But I don't think we should start officially claiming stuff yet. Let's give ourselves a few more days while Wheel dies down. ;)
Thank you, Alysa :)
Thanks for doing that Alysa, looks great.
I don't know what to fill in because I have something for pretty much everything. So for now I just put in that I have a short book for #4 where the audio book has as least 4 narrators. I think I need to scope out some shorter audio books for the top 10 tasks. I get very little ebook/print time M-Th. Most of the audios I have on hand for those tasks are 8+ hours although I don't mind speeding the narration up a bit.
Yeah, I can find something for any of the top 10 tasks as well. Should we all just reserve one book for now and then see where it goes from there? Once one is finished, another can be grabbed up? This way it's finished as soon as we're done reading, and we don't have readers sitting there finished with their tasks while waiting for others to read for reserved spots.
One idea is to put one’s name next to each task that you are most excited to read for (can start with multiple names in for the same task), And then we can narrow down accordingly. I still don’t wanna put book titles in until we decide whether to make the spreadsheet private...
I now have stuff for 6 of the 10 tasks (and many of them are shorter books) so I can put my name next to each of those.
I also have a good book for one of the tasks in Safe Zone 2, if/when we get there. :)
Alysa wrote: "One idea is to put one’s name next to each task that you are most excited to read for (can start with multiple names in for the same task), And then we can narrow down accordingly. I still don’t w..."
I just put my name under “Book” for my possible stuff, as proof of concept. And I added Mary’s name to the one that she had marked with a note.
All this will start to run more smoothly once we get into I think...
Alysa wrote: "I am wondering if we should bother with Safe Zone 1, depending on whether it would get us more points to use those 4 slots for an extra word (with difficult letters) in Zone 3. Need to do the math!"Can somebody verify my math re the word ideas I put on the planning spreadsheet for Safe Zone 3 (bottom of column H)?
If we do Safe Zones 2 and 3, I think these words would get us to 40 books and more points than spelling LAVA (i.e., we skip Zone 1 in favor of a better 4-letter word).
If somebody thinks of something better, I am all for it. There are no Captains here. 😁
It sounds like you are getting it more than me already, so I'm not sure yet on the number/strategy. I'll be more confident as I get into it and get it, I think (hope)
Someone earlier suggested we spell out the word text but I don't see that as word in the 10 initial tasks.
Alysa's plan gives us 39 books (if we also did Zone 1 or 2). But we can read 40 right? If we swapped out NINE (worth 150 pts) for AUDIO-(worth 190 pts) we'd get our max of 40 and 40 more points.We could just do Safezone 3 and spell out NINE and AUDIO.
(points wise it's better to spell one less word and do zone 2.)
Just a thought.
Also the links to the tracking spreadsheet could be messaged to Meghan if you want to remove them from the post.I can't see what the points are for the first 10 tasks. Or do we not get points for completing them and only docked points if we don't?
Also I put an altered version of Alysa's spellout plan on my sheet.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "Someone earlier suggested we spell out the word text but I don't see that as word in the 10 initial tasks."It’s not there. That was a mistake. ;)
My plan on the 1st tab has 40 books, no?
10 : main tasks
4 : Safe Zone 2
26 : Safe Zone 3 (see list; post clipped for secrecy ;D)
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "Also the links to the tracking spreadsheet could be messaged to Meghan if you want to remove them from the post.I can't see what the points are for the first 10 tasks. Or do we not get points for..."
Once everybody has saved the spreadsheet to their Google Drives (including Megan) I will remove the link from previous post. And send link to Mods, I guess. I’m not sure whether we’re obligated to do that.
The first 10 tasks get “countdown points” but I’m not sure of the amount. And I am assuming the amounts get subtracted (“burned feet!”) if we don’t complete in time.
I forget: once we finish the 10 tasks, can we start safezone books immediately after, or are we supposed to wait until a countdown? I hope we can start immediately, else we will potentially be waiting for other teams to catch up!
You get 40 if we use Audio instead of Nine. I didn't see the plan on the main page, I was looking at your page.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "You get 40 if we use Audio instead of Nine."Yep, that’s what I have on there.
[ETA: I think my spreadsheet hadn’t updated in the cloud when y’all first looked, due to my getting kicked off the wifi]
Nine + A = 5 books
Audio = 5 books (greater point value)
I think we should skip Safe Zone 1, as it’s only 30 points each for 4 books.
ETA: my solo tab is crap for now; don’t mind it. 😉
I wish there was a way to sort Kindle Unlimited audio books by length.I agree with the current spell out plan and then doing safe zone 2.
I'm scrolling through my short Kindle freebie books to see what I have.
I'll go ahead and plug in our words/letters for Safe Zone 3 (on first tab of planning).We can always change later as needed, but it'd be nice to start claiming a few letters and see where we're at.
I'll list them in order of total word value.
Which, as it happens, also corresponds to total word length.Nifty!
A little confused as to how you entering books. Is the task # you put there because you can also use it for that task?
Line 37 (or 36 in official version) says to input "WORD NAME and countdown task #"
I filled in a couple of books for the spell out but I have more. I have an X book but it's not short. It's not super long either so I can read it if necessary. Normal spell out rules apply right? Characters count?
I deleted my comment because I figured it out afterwards.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "I filled in a couple of books for the spell out but I have more. I have an X book but it's not short. It's not super long either so I can read it if necessary. Normal spell out rules apply right?..."
Yep!
Pasting again here for easy reference:
SPELL-IT-OUT RULES
Spell out the word(s) using the first letter in the book's title, the first letter in the author's first or last name, or the first letter of a character's first, last, or nick-name, or the first letter of the series name.
As always, if the first letter of a title starts with an indefinite or definite article ('A', 'An', 'The', etc.), you may use the first letter of the second word in the title to spell out your chosen word.
If the first letter of a title is a numerical digit, then you use the first letter of that digit for your spell out (i.e. 1984 is N; 2046 is T; 1Q84 is O)
If you are listening to an audiobook, the first letter in the narrator's first or last name also can be used.
We're also allowing for Translators names, as long as the edition you are reading is a translation version.
I put in a spot for "Notes/Additional letter options?"though I'm not sure how much we'll be interested in moving stuff around, what with the tighter timeline and different rules than Wheel.
It will probably be better to pick letters to read for, rather than reading a book and hoping it fits somewhere. BUT we can certainly move things if a teammate finds something better/shorter to use for a letter we've claimed, assuming our book (esp if we've started reading it already) also fits somewhere else nearby. :)
Erin and Alysa snagged all the first tasks for where I have really short books. We also need Meghan to read at least one. So I might hold off on looking for another task spot to fill.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "Erin and Alysa snagged all the first tasks for where I have really short books. We also need Meghan to read at least one. So I might hold off on looking for another task spot to fill."I'd really like to do the "10th of the month" one, but I am totally open to swapping out some of the others. Which ones do you want? :D
Also, there's no real snag yet -- we can all put our names down in the same boxes for those tasks for now, and then see how many of us have the same, and how many are unique to one person!
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "Erin and Alysa snagged all the first tasks for where I have really short books. We also need Meghan to read at least one. So I might hold off on looking for another task spot to fill."I thought we were putting our names by tasks we are most interested in covering when we did decide what to reserve later, but that more than one could put there name there. It's mentioned here
Erin *Proud Book Hoarder* wrote: "I thought we were putting our names by tasks we are most interested in covering, but that more than one could put there name there."Yes, exactly!
OK. I 'll put my name on a couple of marked ones too and then once Meghan comes we can see who wants which ones definite.I am loaded with short spell out books so I just put a couple in for letters for which we need multiples.
Time to clear out some Kindle Freebies.
And sorry if I sounded snotty before. It wasn't meant that way.I think Meghan asked for the 1950's task earlier. I realized the ones I had were 60's and one was over 700 pages.
Nice. I should also clear out some Kindle Freebies, but since I usually end up DNFing like half of them, I end up wasting time during challenges which is not good.
To avoid confusion I just put my name in notes on if it would be easy for me to cover it when we do decide.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "And sorry if I sounded snotty before. It wasn't meant that way.I think Meghan asked for the 1950's task earlier. I realized the ones I had were 60's and one was over 700 pages."
No problem, I completely understand. No offense taken.
Mary, Mary, Just a bit contrary wrote: "And sorry if I sounded snotty before. It wasn't meant that way.I think Meghan asked for the 1950's task earlier. I realized the ones I had were 60's and one was over 700 pages."
No worries, you didn't sound snotty at all!
I remember Megan mentioning using Lolita for the 1950s task. Not sure if she still wants to do that. I actually also found something quite short for that task, but I would need to request it from offsite library storage ASAP if needed.
On my "planning tab" I filled in some books I could use if I need to cover something, but they of course don't mean I want to read all of those books. This saves me from hunting later if we need a spot covered suddenly. I saw Lolita on my TBR shelf too when browsing for 50's tasks, but just not in the mood to read that one right now.
Yes, I volunteered for Lolita. Other than that I have no preference. I enjoy the hunt.
megan wrote: "Yes, I volunteered for Lolita. Other than that I have no preference. I enjoy the hunt."How long do you think you will take to read Lolita? I know you generally read less than the rest of us, but then there is "Challenge Mode"... and then there is the fact that Lolita might be slow ;D
The trick is just gonna be for all of us to finish all of our Countdown Task books at the same time, so nobody is waiting around reading nothing before we can start the Safe Zones...
I keep noticing things about that tasks that I missed before. Like the book with something hot on the cover and also has word "lava" in the text. I'm wondering if we should do Safe Zone 3 first. Then if someone realized their book works for Zone 2, they can put it aside and finish it after we're done with Zone 3. I think that's allowed. Or am I making zone 2 out to be harder than it is?
I will do my best to read my top 10 tasks books quickly. But it's starting on the worst part of the week as far as reading time for me. But I know I can knock out task #4 quickly because it's only a 5 hour audio book.
Crossing my fingers that it starts early my time on Monday.
Nothing But Reading Challenges
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I am getting excited though — I have found some good stuff for a number of the initial tasks, plus some possibilities for a couple of tasks in Safe Zone 2 🙂