Julie Powell Would Never Say Julia Child Was Adorable

I picked up a bargain-priced paperback version of Julie Powell's Julie & Julia during a midnight Wal-Mart run a few weeks ago. I wasn't sure if I would like it. After all, I'm not much of a blog reader, other than for a few friends and family.

Well, I should say I WASN'T much of a blog reader. That is, until I found a couple of good blogs via www.blogger.com's "Next Blog" feature. I began "following" them, for something interesting to read. Then I bought Julie & Julia. I didn't begin reading it until just a few days ago. In between the buying date & the beginning-the-book date, I browsed the web for Julie Powell's actual blog. I found her (now-defunct) original Julie/Julia Project blog. I wasn't really that impressed. Now, because I had neither read the book or watched the movie, I must admit I didn't have a vested interest in reading the blog. I was just browsing/ scanning.

Then I read a story on CNN.com about bloggers who were formerly anonymous and who were fired after they "came out," among them Heather B. Armstrong. So, of course, I googled Heather and found her blog Dooce. And started following it. And read about three months' worth of back blogs. Then I continued my blog-craziness by reading Jennifer Lancaster's blog Jennsylvania because I read her (very fabulous and funny) memoir Pretty in Plaid recently. So in short, I became very interested in not only writing a blog, but also in reading them. They're pretty good. You should try them out (especially the ones mentioned above!).

Anyway, after/during all of this blog madness (which I must admit, partially came because for a week or two I could just not find a book I wanted to read -- which KILLED me), I finally pulled the Julie & Julia paperback off the shelf and started reading. And loved it.

Julie Powell is intensely funny, extremely profane, and -- most importantly -- a "real" character. I suppose this might be because she is a real person... But in saying she's "real," I mean more than that she is simply alive. She's flawed, and she loves her husband but is annoyed by him, and she loves her mother but is annoyed by her, and she has wonderful (crazy) friends who she loves but doesn't always treat properly. She's stuck in a dead-end secretarial job and she feels sometimes that even though she has a good husband and an income and an apartment in New York, she might never want to get out of bed (or stop drinking gimlets). THAT is why I like Julie Powell. And it's also why I have been devouring her book, much as she devoured every meal Julia Child lays out in Mastering the Art of French Cooking during her year of cooking and blogging.

As soon as I'm done, I'll read the backlog of blogs on Julie's current blog What Could Happen?