Some time ago I came across a set of audio books online for the Harry Potter series. I am a big fan of the movies but have been told by many that (as any other movie made from a book) the movies don't do the stories justice and that a lot of interesting things get left out or changed somewhat. I am, however not a big fan of reading. No matter how hard I try, i can't read anything that has too many words on a single page followed by hundreds of pages. Let's just say my kids don't get much of bedtime stores from me. I can'thelp it, I just don't like reading books much. On the other hand, I can ready many things online; blogs, articles from techonlogy websites, news, etc. I don't know why but I just can't do it. I tried getting a book from the library once, figured I could get something I was currently interested in, so I got me a copy of Bernard Golberg's book " Crazies to the Left of Me, Wimps to the Right: How One Side Lost Its Mind and the Other Lost Its Nerve". I could not get past the first few pages when I dropped the book
Well, lately during my work, I was getting a bit too distracted with all the talking the goes on. Our Dept is a bit open when it comes to interacting with others and sometimes we get caught up in the moments and fall a bit behind on work. To solve that I started listening to movies on my PC. As oppose to watching the video I would simply eliminate the video portion and simply play the audio of the movie as I worked. It worked wonders; I was able to concentrate more on my work and at the same time was able to understand many of the movies better after hearing all the details rather than depending mostly on visuals. I cold have listend to music while at work but considering i hear music while drivig and sometimes at home, I just didn't feel like listen to music at work as well.
About a week ago I was uploading music to my new iPod and I added the Harry Potter audio books I had. Since then when ever I went to the iPod to play music I kept seeing the Harry Potter audio book playlist and eventually brought myself to listening to them. Since I had already seen all the movies up to date, I chose to start off with Harry Potter and the Half Blooded Prince. So far am on chapter 4 and I have to say the guy who tells the story is really good at making the story come alive with just words. I actually enjoy trying to picture the movie based on what he reads and what I remember about the previous movies. The experience is absolutely entertaining. But as much as I enjoy the audio book, I can't bring myself to read the books. I may, however, find myself looking for other audio books. At least I can educate and entertain myself like many others with books if only I get to listen to them rather than read them myself.
So how many of you enjoy audio books? It would be nice to know I am not the only one around here who would prefer a audio book over reading. Although if we ever end up without power someday, I'm sure books will become very interesting.