Gratuitous plugging? Not so much

Der Fuhrer has had his blog plugged on The Guardian's website. They must be pretty desperate. I don't think I want to work for them anymore.

PATTOTE: Better living through having your ego trampled upon.

I'm writing to tell you...

...I have nothing to say. I haven't had anything to say in quite some time.

PATTOTE: Better living through um. Well. I'm not really sure.

Open Question

Is it or is it not crazy(ish) to need to wait for the phone to ring at least twice, four times for a double ring, before picking it up?

PATTOTE: Better living through ringing twice - and then switching the lights on and off at least ten times before leaving a room.

Raunchy Regency Reads

I like bodice-rippers as much as the next person. Who hasn't flicked through a Mills&Boon equivalent to get to all the lascivious bits? But I thought that a book based on Pride and Prejudice, a novel I love, respect, and re-read at least once a year, would be a little more, hmmm, what's the word? Good? Readable? Enjoyable?

Instead, Mr Darcy takes a Wife is pretty gross actually. And cliched. There should be a limit enforced as to the number of times the words "carnal pleasure", "carnal desire" and "carnal knowledge" can be used per page. Three is too many.

It's rare for me to dislike a book enough to stop reading it. I'm a literary masochist, I can't help myself. So in the spirit of masochism I am going to find and read as many of these sequels (and there are a plethora) as I can find.

Carrie Bebris, you'd better not disappoint.

PATTOTE: Better living through bodice-rippers, as long as they maintain their decorum.

Booker Longlist 2007

The Booker Longlist for 2007 has been released. According to an article on GuardianUnlimited, most of the books focus on history and memory as a theme. I'm ashamed to say that other than On Chesil Beach, I don't recognise many of the titles. I'm setting myself the goal of reading them all in the next year.

The longlist in full:

Darkmans by Nicola Barker (Fourth Estate)

Self Help by Edward Docx (Picador)

The Gift Of Rain by Tan Twan Eng (Myrmidon)

The Gathering by Anne Enright (Jonathan Cape)

The Reluctant Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid (Hamish Hamilton)

The Welsh Girl by Peter Ho Davies (Sceptre)

Mister Pip by Lloyd Jones (John Murray)

Gifted by Nikita Lalwani (Viking)

On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan, (Jonathan Cape)

What Was Lost by Catherine O'Flynn (Tindal Street)

Consolation by Michael Redhill (William Heinemann)

Animal's People by Indra Sinha (Simon & Schuster)

Winnie & Wolf by AN Wilson (Hutchinson)

PATTOTE: Better living through book challenges - I'm itching to get going.

What's a Marrow With You?

Standing at Nottinghill Gate station the other day, a chap shambled past me with the most enormous marrow I have ever seen under his arm. He seemed quite unperturbed. I wonder where he got it from. A shop devoted to the care and sale of immensely overgrown vegetables? A caring granny with too much time (and fertilizer) on her hands? Oh, I know what it was. It was an animatronic marrow. Yes! It was a robot marrow and he was taking it to the set of it's new movie "In the Marrow: A diary of dicing, julienning, and sir-fries". I'm so glad I figured it out, it was bothering me.

PATTOTE: Better living through giant vegetables. Especially potatoes.

Turning One

Curtis-the-Fetus is officially a year old today. He's a walking, grinning, trouble-making, tiny person now. A year old and he has a personality. A year old and he already has his own little quirks. A year old, with all the potential in the world. That makes me happy.

PATTOTE: Better living through the heir to all I survey and intend to own.

Unspoilt

It was an all-Harry Potter weekend. The Sister and I queued for the last installment and then raced to start reading. She admitted defeat at about 2am but I managed to finish it. I wanted to get it read before the end got leaked. I'm not going to go into it, because I'm waiting for The Best Friend to read it, but I really enjoyed it.

The movie, however, was not as great as it could have been. Prisoner of Azkaban remains victorious as far as I'm concerned.

I'm glad there are more movies to look forward to, cause otherwise the end of this wonderful, imaginative, heartbreaking series would be a lot worse.

Escape

There's something soothing about the world created in books, something comforting about the reality we inhabit while we read. Coming out of one of my recent reads, I found myself quite upset that my interlude with that other world was over. I know, I know, pick up another book and you're back in that other world almost immediately. But that's the thing, isn't it? Why the eagerness to constantly enter that other world? That other world is full of demons, monsters, horrible people and horrible situations, just like this one. That other world is full of funny situations, quirky people and brilliant inventions, just like this one. Reading is not really any kind if escape. It's more a suspension of present, a brief period of standing still, a much-loved and welcomed moment of peace. It's not what you're reading that matters, it's the act of reading that does.

Book Bargains

I ended up at a carboot over the weekend - one man's junk and all that. The quest to replace my lost treasures (my sorely missed collection of books) is well on its way.

I managed to find:

The Malory Towers series by Enid Blyton
The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, The Hobbit, and Roverandom by JRR Tolkein
Notes on a Scandal by Zoe Heller
Third Girl by Agatha Christie
Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
King Solomon's Mines by H Rider Haggard
Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer
The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe by CS Lewis
My Friend Flicka by Mary O'Hara

PATTOTE: Better living through CHEAP books and the people who sell them.

The Tale of the Dead Duck

A woman brought a very limp duck into a veterinary surgeon. As she lay her pet on the table, the vet pulled out his stethoscope and listened to the bird's chest.
After a moment or two, the vet shook his head sadly and said, "I'm so sorry, your Duck, Cuddles, has passed away."
The distressed owner wailed, "Are you sure?"
"Yes, I am sure. The duck is dead," he replied.
"How can you be so sure," she protested. "I mean, you haven't done any testing on him or anything. He might just be in a coma or something."
The vet rolled his eyes, turned around and left the room, and returned a few moments later with a black Labrador Retriever.
As the duck's owner looked on in amazement, the dog stood on his hind legs, put his front paws on the examination table and sniffed the duck from top to bottom. He then looked at the vet with sad eyes and shook his head.
The vet patted the dog and took it out, and returned a few moments later with a cat.
The cat jumped up on the table and also sniffed delicately at the bird from head to foot. The cat sat back on its haunches, shook its head, meowed softly and strolled out of the room.
The vet looked at the woman and said, "I'm sorry, but as I said, this is most definitely, 100% certifiably, a dead duck."
Then the vet turned to his computer terminal, hit a few keys and produced a bill, which he handed to the woman.
The duck's owner, still in shock, took the bill. "£150!" she cried, "£150 just to tell me my duck is dead!!
The vet shrugged. "I'm sorry. If you had taken my word for it, the bill would have been £20, but with the Lab Report and the Cat Scan it comes to £150."

Words I like

Glum
Triskadeskaphobia
Coalesce
Acquiesce
Numbnuts
Vindictive

PATTOTE: Better living through trawling the dictionary for good words.

Accidents and Emergencies

The best part about sitting in casualty is the people. People have some fascinating problems, and they discuss them very openly in front of the twenty other people sitting on the hard benches or buying unhealthy stuff from the hospital vending machines. I just wish that they'd speak up a bit. I'm listening over here people. I'm trying to eavesdrop and you're not cooperating.

Yes you, lady with the blood on her sleeve and the bandaged arm, who looked like she'd come straight from a high-falutin' do, except for her truly crappy shoes. Or you, kiddie with the smashed nose. Your mother says you whacked yourself in the nose with a plank, but you look more like some bullies set on you after school and your mum is trying to cover up. And you, chickie with the hurt back, why were you telling your mother that they kept making you push it in, even though you didn't want to?

Enquiring minds want to know.

PATTOTE: There was another kid in there with a broken collar bone who claimed to have fallen off a mountain. There are no mountains in Reading.

Ahem

My new supervisor has Project Management for Dummies lying on her desk. That's like having a neurosurgeon read Nerves for Dummies right before an operation.

PATTOTE: Better living through Dictating for Dummies

Clicky

Something I found on the 50books blog that I thought you might like:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFAWR6hzZek

PATTOTE: Better living under a rock.

Spice up your life!

Of all things, the Spice Girls are coming together for a reunion tour. Do you think their horrible platform shoes will make a comeback too?

Ok, I'll admit it, I'm the teensiest bit curious to hear what they'll come up with. And yes, I've got Wannabe stuck in my head. I'm feeling nostalgic. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Blackwell's

I'm still working on finding a job, but since arriving in this damp and misty land I have comforted myself by enjoying the great bookshops - second-hand, new, antiquarian, bizarre. In addition to the ubiquitous Waterstones, I've also found Blackwell's, which focuses on fantasy, sci fi, with a heavy dollop of manga. I'm pretty meh on the manga, but fell in love when I found the final installment of a trilogy which hasn't actually been released back home yet, Voice of the Gods by Trudi Canavan. Admittedly it has the tawdry US cover, but still! (Aside: Dear US publishers - tawdry covers are what gives fantasy such a bad name. She's a priestess, not an Orion slave girl.)

They also have some really great miniatures and models. Would you like a phaser for Christmas? Would you like a Dalek as a doorstop? Want a life-size cardboard cut-out of David Tennant to kiss goodnight? Blackwell's is for you!

PATTOTE: I wish I had never discovered Dr Who. Do I really need another obsession? Not so much.

Up, up and away.

Hello, my chickens. All those loyal readers out there. All two of you. I've been out of touch again, like the bad blogger I am. My only excuse is that I was pinned under the weight of my belongings all week and couldn't get to the computer. It's true - the Complete Works of Jane Austen pinned my left arm, while the Complete Gilmore Girls Season 2 DVD Boxed Set held down my right. I flailed awhile but I was fighting a losing battle with the cupboard eating my clothes and I decided to give up. I was liberated eventually and have been staying with The Sister and her family. It was brilliant, despite sundry nappy-changing traumas. Who knew so much crap could come out of one baby? I didn't.

Over the weekend I went helicoptering with Kristy and Alison. It was totally awesome. We flew from Maidenhead, over Leavesdon studios, where they film the Harry Potter movies. I saw the Privet Drive set, and what looked like The Burrow. The weather was predictably horrible but the flight was totally worth it. And don't I look awesome in my headphones?



PATTOTE: Better living through being high. Off the ground, you ingrates!

This is the first day of my life

I arrived in England this morning at 6:55 on an overcrowded plane from Johannesburg. Virgin provides so-so food, fantastic entertainment and the smallest economy-class seats ever.

I only told The Sister I was arriving today, so I could make it a surprise for the The Parents. It was worth it to see their faces. And now I'm here. And strangely, it doesn't feel strange at all. I had a pang as the plane landed. "I don't live in South Africa anymore." Maybe as the excitement wears off and I start looking for a job, reality will beat me over the head with a mace. But for now I'm just fine with being excited.

PATTOTE: Better living through world domination. I have to start somewhere.

Free at Last!

I got my passport!
Free at last, free at last, no thanks to the Home Office, free at last!