February 29, 2020.
My exact magic number is 99.0833. I need to read ~100 chapters a month, and in January I read 112 chapters. So today I ran some end-of-February numbers.
In the past 28 days I’ve read Leviticus (1-27), Numbers (1-36), Deuteronomy (1-14), and Song of Solomon (1-8), which means that (a) I read 85 chapters this month, and that (b) I’m now officially behind schedule.
Not as bad as it could be, but I didn’t get out the party hats.
I sat for awhile thinking: I need to do something. It’ll be three things, actually.
First: I’ll try adding a daily Psalm into my reading mix. (From Day One I’ve had a niggling I-don’t-really-want-to-have-to-read-150-psalms-consecutively-between-June-14-&-July-12 feeling. So this was an easy change.)
Second: I really have to catch up – being a bit behind feels more correctable in November than it does in February. I’ll aim for ~125 chapters to get back to even. [My quick calculation for doing that? There are 100 chapters between Deuteronomy 14 and the end of 1 Samuel. If I also read one psalm a day I’ll be adding 31 chapters. 100 + 31 = 131.] So I’m resetting my plan: 1 Samuel 31 by March 31.
Third: this means I’ll be kissing my online Reading Plan good-bye. Too bad, really, but today is a kind of low-level Disappointed Day in mhj country so I’m thinking: if-something-isn’t-working-quit-trying-to-work-it.
Note: the extra day in Leap Year didn’t help me. I ran numbers: a 366-day year saves me about ¼ of a chapter each month. What’s that? Half-a-verse a day? Ten seconds saved doesn’t help my 25-chapter deficit.