Wednesday, August 14, 2013

Bout of Books Read-a-thon Goals



Goals are good! They help us accomplish things but I also think they help me keep track of stuff I need to do and be conscious of. In order to get the most out of the upcoming BoB readathon, I'm going to set some loose goals. And let me emphasize LOOSE here. There is no telling what the week of the 19th will have in store for me, but I know the weekend (24-26) I'm traveling to Upstate NY in order to prepare for my wedding on September 1. Now, that could either provide a lot of free, relaxing, reading time before the wedding ORRRR it will be chaotic and I won't get a page in. Who knows! Keeping that in mind, I may adjust as needed. Here goes:

Time Devoted to Reading:

I would like to read at least an hour a day during the week and squeeze in at least 2 on the weekend. Some days this will be easier than others but I think this is my average for a normal week (M-F) and then low balling for the wedding prep weekend.

My Goals:

This year, I'm keeping track of how many pages I read (my fiance has always wondered what this number was and I thought it would be cool to find out). I've set a year long goal of reading 30,000 pages. How did I get to this number? I have no idea and there's a good chance I overshoot it (I'm already at 20,500 +) but it was just a starting point.

With that in mind, I would like to read at least 100 pages a day during the week and aim for 200 on the weekend.

I would also like to participate in a handful of the challenges and social hours but I'm going to set my goal to at least 3 challenges and one social hour.

Books to Read:

Since I love challenges, I'm actually already participating in one on goodreads. This is my second time doing this particular challenge and I won the last one! Winning meant I got to choose a task for the next challenge so that was very cool. This time around though, I'm near the top but definitely not in first place (or 2nd, or 3rd etc.) I think this is mainly due to the fact that I didn't connect with a lot of the tasks but I also tend to make the books I read fit a certain task rather than the other way around. At some point, I realized I was not making much progress on this challenge so I started choosing books that are on my TBR list or already on my nook and plugging them in for the tasks. I've made some headway with this strategy but I think the readathon is a great place to finish off the remaining ones that I've already picked out since the challenge ends September 1. If you are interested in the full list of tasks or more info on the challenge, go here.


 
 








 
Will I read all of these books? No! Absolutely not. But it's a good way for me to remember which ones are left and keep me on track to my goal of finishing this challenge. I'll update to let you know which I'm reading when the actual readathon starts. Which brings me to:
 

Updates:

Throughout the week of the 19th I'm going to post daily (or try really, really hard to...) updates to let you know the progress I've made on my goals as well as any challenges or social hours I've participated in. They will look something like this:
 
Number of pages I read today:
Total amount of time I read today:
Books I'm reading:
Books I've read:
Challenges:
Social hours:
 
Remember, all of this info is mostly to keep me accountable to myself but if you are participating in BoB or just following along with me, I would love to hear from you! I think this is a great way to start some conversations about books and book related things so feel free to comment at any time.

Now, we wait for the 19th when the readathon and serious book reading will commence!!!

5 comments:

  1. I really need to set up my goals. Problem is, I have no idea what the non-reading portion of my week is going to be like. I hate when things are up in the air anyway, but the timing makes planning for the readathon extra difficult.

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    1. I hear ya! With the wedding planning and everything else going crazy, it definitely makes it hard. I set my times based on the fact that I usually read for at least one hour during lunch and try to fit in as much as possible. I am also fully aware that all of these goals could go out the window... but I'll try not to let that happen!

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  2. what a fun challenge, it's very unique! I take it its not solely for college students since your profile says you're a therapist? :) wish I could join but it's been several years since I graduated college.

    Looks like some great books on your list to read. I recently bought Fault in our Stars and can't wait to read it but gotta get my ARCs done first, otherwise I'll never get to them! I loved The 5 people you Meet in Heaven and was kind of meh about Mindy Kaling's book. I loved the parts about her childhood because I'm an Indian-American as well so it was like reading about my childhood in many ways. Hope you enjoy your reading next week, glad to have found your blog! Here are my Bout of Books goals and hope you'll stop by.

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  3. You caught me! I'm definitely no longer a college student but I joined while in graduate school and never left the group. The moderator actually just sent out a message noting that a lot of people were no longer in that age group but the topics and group reads could still be relevant. So if you would like to join, GO FOR IT!

    I just bought Fault in Our Stars and can't wait to read it! I hear such good things! I'm about 25 pages into Mindy's book and so far, it's entertaining but I find that a lot of the "memoirs" I read tend to drop off at the end. I'll definitely review when I'm done though. Thanks for stopping by!

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  4. Loose goals are good, it's meant to be fun after all. Get the hankies ready for The Fault in Our Stars! nd I love the Percy Jackson books.

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