You know I love books and stories, but I've found there's one situation in which I must shun them, and that's whilst driving. There are some amazingly good audio books out there, but if I use them in the car I risk rear-ending someone's BMW at the traffic lights. I don't know what goes on in other people's heads when they read, but I have a full-scale movie going on in mine. I fill in all the details the author didn't mention, apart from faces. My characters never have faces. Strange one there, but quite normal in my fictional mind-productions. Anyway, I do get quite involved in my mental movie-making, and if I re-read a book the images are identical: the same houses, costumes etc as when I first read it. All very good for getting lost in a book. But not when I'm driving. I even have to be careful when listening to musicals in the car. It's good when I'm a passenger as I can watch the whole of Chicago in my mind on a dreary drive to the coast, but the other day, whist driving into town, I realised my mind kept getting dragged back to the 1920s. While Richard Gere and Rene Zellweger were both reaching for the gun, I realised I was sat at a roundabout waiting for the car on my left to go first. Fortunately, the driver just had a bemused 'typical woman driver' look on his face, and didn't get cross with me.
Damn, how long have the traffic lights been green??
So I have vetoed musicals when I'm driving and daren't even try audio books. Maybe I can enjoy them on the journey down to Cornwall to see the Daughter in the Summer. As long as the Husband doesn't mind me not pointing out the right exit off the M25 - heck, it's a big circle, we can just go around again.
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