My new love

I have a new, favorite hobby. It's been around for ages. My oldest boy fell in love with it before I did. But now I am hooked, completely. It's reading. I admit, I have enjoyed a good book on occassion, but honestly the television usually won the battle over my free time at night. About a month ago, we finally bit the bullet and cancelled cable. As a result, I have become a complete nerd.
I think the summer was the perfect time to cancel cable. Without HGTV or TLC, what is there to watch at night on the local channels? After reading The Well-Trained Mind and LOVING it, I decided that I, too, wanted the classical education that I missed. (I was exposed to a better-than-average, public high school education. Unfortunately, I studied enough to make good grades and did not care a bit about what I was learning. I was too interested in boys, popularity and the dance team. :) Any way, for whatever reason, I am interested now. I am deeply interested, actually. I want to read the classics again, learn more about world history, and learn how to record what I am learning. I need to learn how to think more logically. Consequently, I am reading The Well-Educated Mind: A Guide to the Classical Education You Never Had(Susan Bauer) . After a few wonderful chapters of explaining how to read good books, she suggests a chronological book list from each of the five genres of literature. Tomorrow I start my first book, Don Quixote. The genre that she begins with is the novel. I will read 31 novels.
As I stated before, I have become a nerd, and here's the proof...I am so excited!
If you want to join in on the reading, and I know you mamas are busy so only a few if any will be excited about reading the old classics in your precious spare time, but if you do...please let me know. I would love to have a partner. My man says he'll read along with me. We're going to read a little simple historical information along with each book to "set the scene" for the author's "world". Anyway, it will probably take me at least a year to read all of the books in each genre. I am setting aside 40 or so minutes a day. My goal at the end is to feel like I have at least listened to the "human conversation". I want to know more about the past 400 years and what has shaped the world that I live in today. I want to see how God has been at work. I want Him to be glorified as I study His story. So, here goes...