An elephant never forgets....

I am a creature of habit. I make goals and plan things, get pumped up about them and then...........get lazy.

Exhibit A: Promising you, my faithful readers, that I was going to turn a new leaf. I was going to write to you everyday, or at least every other day. Lofty declarations of expanding the horizons of this blog...etc, etc....
Well, as you can tell from my "February 25, 2010" date stamp....I have once again been derailed by my own complacency.

There will be no excuses. I am just going to ignore this gap in time and continue on. What better way to do that then with a post about my first book club meeting?

So Monday night was the beginning of a beautiful thing. I didn't know what to expect since, I have never attended, nor lead a book club before. But I was excited about all the possibilities and pumped ever since I sent out the Facebook invite a month before. On multiple occasions before our meeting, my friend S and I had clucked about how much we missed intellectual stimulation and how conversations shouldn't solely revolve around who got married, wow, those are nice shoes, I got this on sale, did you hear about [insert celebrity name here]...

Once you leave college, you are kind of left to your own devices. You need to create a stimulating atmosphere that will mold your brain and opinions as time goes on. So, I guess you could say I was providing a service to all my intellectually stunted friends (and myself) by enlisting them to a monthly round table where we get together to stretch our minds through deep conversation and debate...which then gets sprinkled with who's getting married, can you believe these cost $X, we need to get dates, let's go out, are you going to this party, etc.....

Our first pick for book club was: Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen

An intriguing love-story with the unexpected and majestically cruel lifestyle of the circus in the 1930s. This novel is definitely worth your time. I devoured it in two nights. At our meeting, one of the ideas we kept coming back to was passion. There was much debate about whether or not the love between Marlena and Jacob was passionate enough. You'll have to read the book to make your own assessment, but I think that sometimes the things left unsaid and undone are the most powerful when faced with a delicate situation, such as theirs. Their passion laid beneath the quick (but pulsing) glances, the cautious "unintentional" brushes, and the quick and stolen meetings. Being showy and overly affectionate does not necessarily translate back into genuine desire.

When I told my roommate, L  about my plans for a book club, she shared that her book club always tries to meet in a location that goes with the theme of the chosen book. Luckily, I live in the best and most eclectic of cities, and I was able to find this gem on the Lower East Side to meet with my friends:

(The Elephant, 58 E 1st Street, New York, NY 10003)

Google is a wonderful thing, when you are looking for different restaurants, you can type in anything, and eventually you will find what you're looking for. I was a little worried, because most of the reviews said this place was always very crowded and that the service wasn't that great. I opted to force my brave friends (coming from all points of the Tri-State area) to come out to the LES on a Monday so that we wouldn't have to deal with the weekend crowds. And I'm thankful we did. We basically had the place all to ourselves.

This self-proclaimed French/Thia fusion restaurant had really good Pad Thai, Chicken Curry and a kick-ass pitcher of sangria ($28/pitcher). The prices were a little steep, but if you order wisely and family-style the dinner, you'll get the most bang for your buck.

I would say our first meeting was a success. Even if it was mainly just a good excuse to get together with wonderful friends, eat delicious food, explore new places and expand our minds. It also gave me a good enough reason to bust out my craft making skills because no nerdy book club is complete without a:

"First Book Club Meeting Gift".

These little elephants kept me up until 2 a.m. on Sunday night, but I just couldn't resist impressing my friends with my superb sewing skills :)