I do admit that I’m slow. Lord knows I have all the momentum of a drunken stumblebum crossing the street. It took me two months to finish watching an early forties programmer, The Falcon’s Brother, an odd film in the series with original star, George Sanders, passing on the baton to his younger (and better looking) brother, Tom Conway, who would ultimately star in ten more Falcon films. The movie was all of seventy-five minutes. Two months it took me. Every night. Of course, I used it to pacify those pesky demons, to lull me into some semblance of safety, enough to let go and sleep. Each night I’d fast forward to the scene I best remembered from the previous bedtime, inching closer and closer with the speed of fattened spider to its already forgotten conclusion.

It has been months, months, since I received my copy of Chloe, Queen Of Denial by Naomi Nash. I’d loved the last book by Nash, You Are So Cursed, though, when it comes to reading, I’m especially slow since my lips don’t move all that fast or my tongue gets sore from being bitten. I had been looking forward to its release and was joyous when my Amazon package finally arrived. And there the book sat -- first on the trunk that serves as my coffee table until the book was shuffled around, finally landing on the side table where it got buried under weeks worth of Entertainment Weeklys. I’d dig it out every so often, read a chapter, which would have me giggling as if Dorothy Parker had just whispered a wisecrack in my ear, then, I’d put it down, or worse, fall asleep.

I’m out of practice when it comes to reading. Watching TV is so much easier. But when I do make the effort or, as I like to say, “find the time,” it is very rewarding, this weekend being no exception. Nash had me rolling again for three chapters straight until a shiny object came along, diverted my attention, and I laid the book down, on the side table, precariously close to the new Vanity Fair. It won’t get lost this time, however. It’s coming with me to St. Elmo for Thanksgiving. Chloe and her adventures in Egypt will be the perfect cure for the turbulence of an aircraft.