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Humor

Bloomsday or Bust: What I’d Rather Do Than Reread ULYSSES

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Elizabeth Allen

Staff Writer

Lifelong book lover, Elizabeth Allen managed to get a degree in something completely unrelated that she never intends to use. She’s a proud Connecticut native who lives in a picturesque small town with her black olive-obsessed toddler daughter, her prom date-turned-husband, and her two dim-witted cats Penny Lane and Gretchen Wieners. She spends her days trying to find a way to be paid to read while drinking copious amounts of coffee, watching episodes of Gilmore girls until the DVDs fail, waiting for her husband to feed her, and being obnoxiously vain about her hair. Elizabeth’s work can be found at www.blackwhitereadbooks.com, where she is currently reading and reviewing all of the books referenced in Gilmore girls. She is also the cohost of two podcasts discussing the work of Amy Sherman-Palladino (“Under the Floorboards” and “Stumbling Ballerinas”). Basically, her entire goal in life is to be a bookish Lorelai Gilmore. She clearly dreams big. Twitter: @BWRBooks

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This past Bloomsday (June 16th), organizations all over social media were publicizing the events they were hosting to celebrate James Joyce’s confusing novel.  Hearing of these events and wishing I had any desire to attend a reading of Ulysses at an adorable bookstore with an organic cold-brew coffee in hand, I started to think about what I’d rather do than have to read about a single day in the life of Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus again.  And here’s what I came up with.

Note: I reserve the right to add to this list each Bloomsday. (Although I know myself.  As I get further away from reading it, I’ll likely eventually fool myself into thinking I enjoyed the experience.)

Literally anything having to do with thinking about, talking/listening to, or considering Donald Trump.

Wash my hair and not use any conditioner.

Tear my 6th row orchestra Hamilton tickets into a million pieces.

Turn my wifi off for the day.

Watch helplessly as the latest Urban Decay Naked eyeshadow palette gets crushed by a passing train.

Rip each of my eyelashes out, one-by-one.

Go to Target and only allow myself to buy the things I originally went there to purchase.

Allow my daughter to take a brush to my hair.

Give Jonathan Franzen a sincere compliment.

Pour every bottle of riesling within a 10 mile radius of my house down the storm drain.

Burn my beautiful Sourcebooks edition set of Anne of Green Gables.

Have a second child… preferably one that hates sleep.

Wake up at 3am each morning to do Crossfit.

Remove my ability to take too many a perfectly acceptable number of selfies by breaking the front-facing camera on my cell.

Throw my collection of washi tape in the garbage.

Call Lin-Manuel Miranda a horrible person on Twitter.

Cancel my Netflix subscription the day before the Gilmore Girls revival is set to be released.

Disable my Twitter and Facebook accounts.

Read the comments section of pretty much any site anywhere.

Be forced to give up all cheese and eat only locally sourced kale.

Tell my husband he’s right about something anything

Give away the gift cards to my local independent bookstore that I’ve been hoarding.

Delete the Starbucks app from my phone.

Allow my eyebrows to grow out and refuse to get them shaped.

Cancel my Wen cleansing conditioner QVC auto-shipment.

Let people call me “Liz” for a full day.

and finally…

James Joyce eyepatch bloomsday

Have to wear Joyce’s sexy, sexy eyepatch (do you know the havoc the elastic would wreak on my hair?)

 

What say you?  Do you plan on celebrating Bloomsday next year?