This holiday weekend finds my older son, Greg, on the Isle of Man. I asked if he was opening an offshore account. He remarked no worries; he instead was looking for Jeremy Clarkson from "Top Gear," the British car show that the boys and my husband think is soooo clever and funny. (The kind of show that will drive me out of the room when the theme music comes up.) He also reminded me that Thomas the Tank Engine (whose theme music also can drive me from the room, but also makes me wistfully remember Greg’s toddler years) and his friends live on the Island of Sodor and that Rev. W. Awdry took the name from the Isle of Man's diocese, which is 'Sodor and Man'. See what traveling is teaching him? It makes me wonder WHY I am paying for college. Maybe I should just send him on vacations. And Greg, that is a joke.

I feel like I live in Seattle these days. The rain has left the New York metropolitan area in a perpetual state of damp. Yesterday I got so wet walking just a block that my shoes were squeaky for the rest of the day. We opened the pool a month ago, and it was beautifully crystal clear within a day for the first time in years. And it has stayed that way. I think it’s too cold for algae to grow! Of course, it has been so cold that I hopped in and out just twice and both times decided that I am not a 60-degree water kind of girl.

Sometimes it seems like even my non-comics reading involves comics. That probably says a lot about my taste in books, but in this case, it's because of someone else. My book club decided to read Beautiful Children by Charles Bock. It's a good book, and Bock is a great writer, and it pertains to comics: One of the characters is a writer and illustrator, and, without giving away too much of the plot, two teens go to see his signing at the local comic store. Reading it took me back to my days as a young fan, when I rode my bike downtown to a store called Worlds Beyond several times a week (weather permitting). It was a small store in a small town, so they never had any signings, but still...I could relate.

Last weekend the weather was amazing, so it was time for outdoor reading. I started with PERFECTION, a memoir by Julie Metz. After her husband’s sudden death, Julie learned that for years, unbeknownst to her, he had been having affairs with women, one of whom was the mother of her daughter’s best friend. In the days after his death, her brother and some friends learned his story, but no one wanted to tell her. Little by little it came out, and instead of burrowing herself in sorrow, Julie contacted these women. They had the story that Henry had never told her --- and through these conversations she learned a lot about the man she had loved and the double life he led. She writes with honesty, but there is no "woe is me" on these pages, which keeps it interesting. If you are in a book group, you may want to check out a contest we are running on ReadingGroupGuides.com in which 10 book clubs will have the opportunity to win a copy of the title. Click here for more details.