smile at da birdie

I used to be a sucker for a good romantic tale with a hero, usually a complete prick, who treats the heroine, a beautiful young nubile wide eyed innocent,  like shit all the way through to the end where he declares he's loved her all along and she falls into his arms.  Yes the good old mills and boon, sillouette, or as we used to call them, the love book.  
I've also always thought I could write one, easily, as I'd read hundreds of them in my lifetime.  "Paperback Crack" is what I nicknamed them a few years ago.  
They were an addiction, along with Agatha Christie, Ruth Rendell and Marian Keyes.  (Also pinky bars and diet coke but thats another story)
I've read every Agatha Christie, Ruth Rendell and Marian Keyes ever written now.  So I've had to move on to very different literary beasts, Jodie Picoult, Ian Rankin and JK Rowling in her many different guises.
But I think now I am beginning to suffer from that thing that the young are afflicted by, the inability to tolerate things that takes time.
I, who used to wait patiently at the Happy Valley burger bar (wainuiomata) for up to half an hour for an egg, cheese and pinapple burger, fat freshly fried chips and a banana milkshake now gets pissed off if there is a two minute delay at Mackers (which we are boycotting at the moment for political reasons, for information, ask our son)  
I am now finding it really hard to read a book, unless the first page is so rivetting it pins my eyes to the paper or the e-book page.  (E-books give me a headache, I don't think retinas are meant to operate with so much light burning holes in them.)
So I have read the first pages of a lot of books and then just done 'nuh' I can't be arsed.  Which brings me to the first page of my next novel...shit...no pressure or nothing.