Spring Break Day 4 (+ Book Review)

Well today was every bit as interesting as yesterday. Which is to say I did so much yard work that I can't really lift my arms to type this. Or to eat. Or to fix my hair, as you will soon see.

Most of the front yard went from this:

To this:

The top soil we bought last night didn't go very far, so guess what? That's right! I had to bribe G with Chili's when he got off work, then it was...back to Home Depot.

When I say "bribe G with Chili's" that's code for chugging down copious amounts of liquid dinner while he enjoys his burger or whatever. Like my yard hair? It's the same as my Africa trip hair (see blog home picture at the top). It's called no bangs in my face or I'll rip my own hair out.

 

And then...12 bags of dirt and a small start on the mulch. G's expression says it all.

 

OK, Book Review!

I'm late to the party yet again for this one, but in my defense, when books/movies/stories get super popular, I'm usually less interested in them until the hubbub dies down. I'm cool like that.

But! This book is every bit as awesome and unbelievable as everyone says.

Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand

All I can say about this book is that it's truly stranger than fiction. If this had been just a story - and not the truth - I would have read it and been disappointed because it's so unrealistic. But, knowing that it's all true, and Louie Zamperini actually survived all of this craziness is insane.

The writing is descriptive and suspenseful and intimate. I felt like I knew the characters (well, people) and was going through these WWII events with them. Louie was a trouble maker raised in nowhere, California, with his Italian family. He ended up running (like, the sport, not running from the law) and made it into Hitler's Berlin Olympics. Shortly after that, he joined the Army Air Corps in WWII, got shot down in the Pacific, survived the crash and then survived on the sea for over forty days, fighting off sharks almost nonstop from his raft. Sharks. On his raft. Fighting them off as they tried to climb on. Or surf on, or whatever sharks do. Only to survive and be found by the Japanese. He ended up in POW camps for years before the war ended.

Un. Believable.

Between reading this and doing the yard work, I'm completely exhausted. (<---- though it did score me some wife points as I nonchalantly rattled off airplane facts and war info to G. He listens to me much more closely when I talk about B-29's and stuff.)

Must go eat pie.

Read the book, though. It's good.