This week’s Top Ten Tuesday topic from That Artsy Reader Girl invites us to share ten books guaranteed to put a smile on your face. I am a sucker for a happy ending, so here goes:

1. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Anne Shaffer and Annie Barrows (Epic post-war love story. The movie isn’t as good as the book. Does one even need to say that?)
2. The House in the Cerulean Sea by T.J. Klune (Are you a hard-hearted jerk? No? Then this will make you smile.)
3. The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (I bought, but haven’t yet read, her sophomore novel because I so loved her debut.)
4. Pumpkinheads by Rainbow Rowell and Faith Erin Hicks (Combine a love of fall foods, farm life, and friends falling in love in this adorable graphic novel.)
5. Jo & Laurie by Margaret Stohl and Melissa de la Cruz (I mean, it’s in the name.)
6. Bandette by Paul Tobin & Colleen Coover (Who doesn’t love a Hepburnesque Parisian cat burglar/righter of wrongs who loves chocolate bars?)
7. A Year in Provence by Peter Mayle (If you can read this without laughing, you may need to get your funny bone looked at.)
8. The Sun Is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon (The movie is almost as good as the book, but not quite.)
9. The Remarkable Journey of Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart (You’re going to bawl before you get to the smiles, though.)
10. Mama Makes Up Her Mind by Bailey White (I’ve said it before: anything that has me cackling on an airplane is a winner in my opinion.)

How about you? Are there books you’ve read that you’d prescribe for someone feeling down?

Today, I spent time at the farmers market, at the pool, and at the garden. I also fit in a nap on the couch, doing laundry, reading and eating pizza in the park, and talking to Karen on the phone.

I could get used to this…

Another belated post. This time, I’d forgotten to recharge the computer, and I decided rather than posting from my phone I’d just wait and post in the morning.

Yesterday was a very nice start to the three-day weekend. I slept in and then took myself out for a mobile brunch (a bagel with cream cheese from my preferred local bagel shop and tea from the coffee house) on my way to the library-garden-pool loop.

Then in the evening, I met up with Anna and her boyfriend, Greg, for a nearly perfect evening at the ballpark. (Perfect would have involved the Mets winning.) The weather was ideal and the game was followed by fireworks. Anna is one of my long-time volleyball teammates who’s currently recovering from an ACL tear that happened during a game this spring, so I hadn’t seen her in quite some time. But we enjoy each other’s company and always have lots to talk about. And Greg is also great, although we’ve had fewer opportunities to get to know each other.

I’m looking forward to seeing what today holds (I’m about to feed the cat and hit the farmers market.) Scattered showers are predicted, which won’t affect my ability to swim, but may make lounging poolside less desirable. We’ll see.

Have a great Sunday!

The computer and I dozed off together last night, so I’m posting this this morning instead:

It’s a long weekend this weekend, meant to honor laborers. I don’t begin to think I have a hard job. No one asks me to run into burning buildings, nurse sick children, stand next to speeding cars on triple digit days, teach those who don’t want to learn, or deal with irate members of the public. I get to do interesting things that let me learn and that help people. But the work dynamic has been changing this summer, and while I have been trying to breathe into it, like a challenging yoga pose, I am tired and I am emotionally sore, and I am tempted to spend the weekend in the mental equivalent of child or corpse pose, disengaged from everyone and everything.

And while some of that is necessary, I don’t think three whole days of it really benefit me in the long run. I should get outside and get some fresh air. I should tend my garden and spend some time seeing the things that tender, careful nurturing have brought forth. I should get some exercise, either on a bike, or swimming at the pool. I should eat a ton of vegetables (and maybe some pizza). I should lower the height of Mount Laundry and do some more cleaning.

I have plans to go to the Mets-Nationals game tomorrow and will bring a volleyball teammate whose been out of commission for a while and her boyfriend. I will visit the library and escape into some novels. And I will knit those six rows of ribbing so I can get back to the part of the shawl that interests me. And I will get lots of sleep.

What’s on your radar for this weekend? A last trip to the beach? Recovering from the first week(s) of school? Hiding from the hordes?

Three beautiful things from my past week:

1. The washing machine has been fixed. The technician wasn’t sure he’d figured out what was wrong, so he programmed both the washer and dryer to give me a free load to test it out.

2. Thunderstorms rumbled through the wee hours of a night earlier this week as the remnants of Hurricane Ida pushed her way past us. While this kept others awake for hours, Corey and I were happy to note it didn’t sound like we were personally under attack and easily went back to sleep.

3. The upside to water dripping through our light fixture is that our landlord decided it was simpler just to buy a new one rather than trust that this one wouldn’t set the building ablaze. The new one doesn’t flicker and crackle (the light bulbs on the old one lasted decades, but made you wish that they hadn’t) and gives off a nice, bright light. Overall, an improvement.

How about you? What’s been beautiful in your world lately?

I was going to take a photo of the shawl, but it’s only six rows longer than it was last time I shared a picture. In six more rows, I get to leave the ribbing section behind for now and go back to the mosaic design. So, hopefully next week there will be something discernible to show.

On the bookish front, I’ve picked up Pride and Premeditation, Tirzah Price’s riff on Austen’s most famous novel. In her version, Mr. Bennet is a Cheapside solicitor and Lizzie occasionally helps look into cases for him. Mr. Collins is his self-entitled barrister and Charlotte Lucas his secretary. Hoping to convince her father to officially hire her on as a barrister, Lizzie pursues a murder case, in which one Charles Bingley is accused of murdering his no-good brother-in-law, Mr. Hurst. But Lizzie must contend with the most irritating barrister already on the case, a Fitzwilliam Darcy.

I’m also still listening to Queen Elizabeth and her assistant private secretary, Rozie Oshodi, work out a murder mystery. (Or, now, it seems we might be up to three, although only one of them has happened on castle grounds.)