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I made a push to finish this book on National Science Fiction Day, which was yesterday, and managed to do so. The first book I've finished for 2016 was A Call to Arms, the second book in David Weber's series set in the early history of Manticore, the setting of his Honor Harrington series of books. I found in engrossing, though there is a minor problem with the books. In the Harrington novels, you never know what the outcome is going to be, since you don't know the expected future history of the star systems. In this series, you know the long-term history, so you know the overall outcome. The surprises are in the details instead. Minor quibble. This book was solidly good and I enjoyed it.

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New Year's Day we watched the Rose Parade on KTLA; they have the best coverage, especially when you see it on HD. I like a lot of the floats, but I was really touched when one of them built by Fiesta Floats had a blue macaw, Sebastian, riding on it. Sebastian had been carried on floats for years by his owner, who died some months back; the owner was a float designer who rode in the parade every year with the bird. Touching.

Yesterday we had to go to the home of an aquaintance to pick up some Pampered Chef gear, so once out we prowled the area there. This included stops at Cook Books, a specialty used book store, Book Alley, another used book store, Comics Factory, and Off Kilter Kilts, a store owned by some friends where we stopped in to say hello. This took us along Colorado Boulevard, the route of the Rose Parade, so we saw the stands slowly being taken down, as well as the cyclone fencing that the store owners put up to protect their windows from the press of the crowds. On our way home, we called in an order for stuffed pizza from Nancy's, and it was waiting for us when we got to the restaurant. We took it home, and I shared the crusts with our pups.

We finished a couple of Netflix discs, completing season one of Justified, which we enjoyed very much. I find myself itching to start season two, which I know we could do if we sat down in front of a computer and accessed Amazon Prime, but I just haven't enjoyed doing that so much. Pending the discs.