I’ve been thinking more and more lately about the ways people read—partly because of the continuing conversations around e-publishing / e-readers / e-books, and partly because I realized the other day that my husband and I have completely different reading habits.

To be fair, I knew that he was one of those “weird” people who doesn’t re-read books. The only time I consciously don’t re-read a book is when I hated it upon finishing…and even then, I’m likely to give it another try after a handful of years have passed. But he rarely re-reads books, and this boggles my mind. What about all the things you might miss the first time around? What about that chance at a different experience with a book, or a deeper understanding of character motivations? I love seeing what I discover in a second (or third or fourth) reading, but for him, once is enough.

This I knew. But this past weekend we got into a debate about the number of books read at a time. He will choose one book and devote himself to it entirely until he’s read the very last word. I tend to have a few books that I’m reading at one time. Sometimes I’ll read a book from cover to cover in one sitting because it’s just that good. But usually my books fall into categories like my “just before bed” book, or my “read it in snatches of time like when I’m waiting for a coffee date to show up” book. Sometimes I feel like reading a short story and other times I feel like reading a novel. So I pick and choose depending on my mood.

And this is why my husband now considers me one of those “weird” people who doesn’t read one book at a time. His argument is that I am losing out on the experience that comes from a one book commitment, that something is lost in the time I spend fraternizing with other books. I’d never given it much thought before, if there was value in book monogamy. But the back and forth debate got me wondering about the reading habits of others. So please share—how many books do you read at a time? Do you re-read books? What are your reading habits?

When I added “11. Make homemade bread” to the Twenty-five To-dos (Year 28) list, what I meant was that I wanted to make bread that required yeast and lots of kneading. I have made cinnamon rolls and quick breads in the past, but nothing that I thought of as “from scratch”. So a couple weekends ago, I decided to spend an afternoon up to my elbows in flour after being inspired by Megan to try my hand at bagels (she makes everything look easy). I also had recently learned the Japanese equivalent of tahini and was anxious to make hummus again, so I found a recipe for pita bread to try out at the same time.

The bagels required the most attention between rising, kneading, rising again, shaping, rising a third time, boiling, and then finally baking. My dinky micro-oven limited me to baking only two bagels at a time, and since each “batch” took 30 minutes, there was plenty of time to switch gears to pita bread in between. The pitas didn’t turn out quite like expected, in that they were supposed to rise enough to allow for pockets. But since we were going to eat them with hummus, that didn’t matter.

There is truth to the saying that kneading dough is therapeutic. The combination of the smell of the yeast and the repetitive movements was relaxing, and I spent the time lost in creative daydreams, mostly writing related. But the best part was eating the results. I’m a bread lover, and so homemade, freshly baked bread? Heaven. I will definitely be doing this again.