Today when I went to the library I found a whole display of F.Scott Fitzgerald books. It was a wonderful moment. I checked out "This Side Of Paradise" which I've been wanting to read for ages and "The Short Stories of F.Scott Fitzgerald" Did you know that F.Scott wrote "The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button"??? I didn't.

One of the short stories was called "The Offshore Pirate" It's now my favorite piece of literature that I have ever read, even beating out "The Great Gatsby" largely because (1) it's set at sea, and (2) because (spoilers) it ends happily. I think it's the only one of F.Scott's stories that I've ever read that has a happy ending. Needless to say the mixture of the haunting beauty of his writing with the intrinsic romance of the sea had me long before the end, even when I was still expecting tears on the last page...but when I found myself laughing over the conclusion...well.

Plus Ardita (the main character) reminds me of what I would rather like to be; rich, beautiful, graceful, clever, completely unafraid. And Carlyle (the guy) is totally perfect. Handsome, imaginative, clever, a musician, and just that dash of devil-may-care piratey-ness that spells absolute heart-throb and yet also a perfect gentleman. And just to top it all off a large piece of the story is set on the most wonderful island and the bits that aren't are set on a yacht. Not one of those half motor boat, half dark cabin things like in "Sahara". No this is a good old fashioned 1920's pleasure yacht, like a mini cruse ship. In short, awesome.

So...yeah...my day's been pretty great =)