Yesterday (Jan. 27) was Family Literacy Day, “a national initiative that promotes the importance of reading and learning together as a family.” I celebrated by reading while Son #2 studied for exams today.

I’m a big reader so it’s especially important to me that our two sons are readers, too. When they were small, I loved to have one or both on my lap reading a treasured book. They delighted in finding the gold bug hidden on pages of a Richard Scarry book, or tracking the little mouse in Goodnight Moon. We read together until they were past being able to read themselves; Son #2 could have read the early Harry Potter books himself but we read them together for the pure enjoyment of it. Plus I do dramatic voices and accents. And when we came across big or unusual words, they could check the meaning. Their teachers always told me they could tell which parents read to their children, and one of the clues was a well-developed vocabulary.

The funny thing is that my husband is not a reader. He reads work-related stuff of course, but you will seldom see him with his nose in a book just for pleasure. The rest of us just don’t get it!

Like many households, ours is on Harry Potter alert. The (perhaps) final book in the series is due out this Saturday, and we’ve had it pre-ordered for months. The reading plan has been discussed and settled. Because mornings find Son #1 at work and Son #2 asleep, that’s when I can have a half-hour or so to read it before starting work. When Son #2 gets up, the book is his. When Son #1 gets home from work, it’s his turn. We’ll have to use Post-Its to make sure our places stay marked, but if it’s anything like the last book, we’ll burn through it in no time.

And we’ll have to, because apparently already the book has been leaked and the entire thing is online, uploaded by some heartless and thoughtless idiot. I’m doing the equivalent of putting my fingers in my ears and singing loudly. I don’t want to have a good read spoiled. Wish me luck. I may have to take next week as vacation just to read!

You just never know what you’re going to learn from reading. Today I found this interesting tidbit in Natalie MacLean’s well-researched, informative and often quite funny e-newsletter:

Researchers at Glasgow University have discovered that if you consume two glasses of wine, members of the opposite sex appear more attractive by about 25%.

(From Nat Decants, free wine e-newsletter at www.nataliemaclean.com)

Of course, we’ve all observed that same phenomenon in the local bar! I wonder how they measure the exact percentage?