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Book a Week in 2014 - BW16


Robin M
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I know, I know. Yes, *good* chocolate is a staple food in our house. (Dh & ds are complete & total chocoholics. I'm not much of a candy-eater, but have become more of one over the past 20 years.)

 

That's not even the good stuff. And those candy stores in Brussels that cater to the tourists don't even sell very good chocolate. Fortunately, my in-laws (who live right down the street), go back to Belgium a couple of times a year & bring us back a supply. Unfortunately, our 'supply' never lasts more than a few days as dh's insistence that Belgian chocolates must be eaten quickly as they are made w/ real butter, real cream, etc.... (No artificial stuff to preserve it.) :lol: Basically, it's his excuse to snarf down an entire box of chocolates in about 24 hours.

 

Anyway. Belgians do have some benefits. They know their chocolates & their diamonds (Antwerp). ;) :D  (That's why I told my dh that I guess I would keep him.)

 

P.S. Prior to meeting him, I was perfectly happy with Hershey's chocolate. Dh was like :eek:  when he found out that I actually liked Hershey's & considered it to be chocolate. And I, in return, was :eek:  the first time I saw him make a sandwich for dinner: bakery bread, generous slathering of butter, covered in chocolate sprinkles. He considers that a meal. :lol:

I am a bit late Stacia but Happy Anniversary!!!!  Those chocolate sprinkles make amazing brownies ;)  dd's Dutch friends bring her sprinkles from Holland and she uses some with peanut butter and the rest go in brownies.  The sandwiches are odd concept for the rest of us to get used to and definitely an acquired taste.  

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Now for gardening.  After being without a garden for 7 years I have one again.  So far I have tripped and fallen while planting it, wrenched my elbow which is now almost completely better.  Too embarrassed to mention it a couple of weeks ago when I did it.  Spent part of today watering, with a watering can, the whole thing.  No outside tap because I live in England so mother nature is supposed to water for me.  Hasn't rained properly for a week. I am starting to remember how much work a few flower beds are!  

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Perhaps you don't read the right books!

 

I've drooled over just as many pictures of straw bale houses as I have over quince chocolates.

 

But you can't eat straw bale...unless you're a ruminant. And while I clearly have my ruminating moments they tend to the mental variety not the pastured variety.

 

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But you can't eat straw bale...unless you're a ruminant. And while I clearly have my ruminating moments they tend to the mental variety not the pastured variety.

 

 

You have to keep your book collection somewhere, and straw bale is sexier than weatherboards.

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The reason I can't read Gone with the Wind again is because the ending is too sad then I have to read the sequel because that has a happy ending, but the sequel is so awful it should never have been written. The sequel to Les Mis is probably worse though.

 

But now I think of it, I believe I deserve the postcard because I *have* read it. It would go into our Couchtop College collection so I might make dd watch the movie. That kid sat through over three hours of Audrey Hepburn in War and Peace, so she'll probably *love* Gone with the Wind!

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Why, yes m'dear, it was in the South (at a historic home). Of course, my dh is Belgian (& from northern Belgium at that). LOL. Our invitations were written in English & Dutch. So, not a completely southern wedding. ;)

 

Enough of this silly talk about chocolate and diamonds ... how is he at solving mysteries?

 

You say that like it isn't a meal. Silly.

 

 

 

 

 

That looks like a meal to me!   :lol:

 

Also, I've gotten a few books read this week. I'll come back in a bit and talk about them.  

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Well, I finished The Goldfinch. I'm going to be mulling over this book for a while. I'm not sure what I think of the idea of Boris as a role model, moving through life by embracing the chaos with open arms. And I like to think of art as magnifying the beauty of life, rather than distracting us from the meaningless brutality of it.

 

 

And I'm sort of in love with that little bird now.

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Thanks.  I've got a couple more days of drinking Hemingways.  My aunt's best-friend from when they were 3 years old was the lady killed at the Jewish Community Center shooting a few days ago.  My aunt is devastated over it.  I've known Terri my whole life but wasn't close to her like my aunt was.  Today is the visitation and tomorrow is the funeral. I'm so sad for her family and so angry. Just so incredibly bitterly angry over the senselessness of it.  Terri had been visiting her mother (who is 92 years old and was my grandmother's best friend) at the nursing home when she was killed.  

 

Oh, Amy.  I am so sorry.  

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Thanks.  I've got a couple more days of drinking Hemingways.  My aunt's best-friend from when they were 3 years old was the lady killed at the Jewish Community Center shooting a few days ago.  My aunt is devastated over it.  I've known Terri my whole life but wasn't close to her like my aunt was.  Today is the visitation and tomorrow is the funeral. I'm so sad for her family and so angry. Just so incredibly bitterly angry over the senselessness of it.  Terri had been visiting her mother (who is 92 years old and was my grandmother's best friend) at the nursing home when she was killed.  

I am so sorry.

 

 

 

 

 

I can't keep up with you all and you are not helping my recent decision. I had a really odd stomach bug and so I decided to give up sugar and other things that probably are not good for me.  Somehow a couple handfuls of chocolate covered pretzels flew into my mouth today and then I come on here and see chocolate.  My resolution is fading.

 

The Language of Baklava is waiting for me.  Kids are fighting bedtime and there's a blizzard in the dark giving us the perfect snow for making snowmen.  Perhaps school will be canceled tomorrow.

 

See....I need chocolate....and wine.

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Aggieamy, that is terrible.

 

Stacia, Happy anniversary!!!

 

Now, I'm craving dark chocolate... instead of finding some, I'm going to head to bed to finish off Love Wins by Rob Bell. He has some interesting ideas. I wanted to finish the book during nap time today but small children had other ideas.

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I can't keep up with you all and you are not helping my recent decision. I had a really odd stomach bug and so I decided to give up sugar and other things that probably are not good for me.  Somehow a couple handfuls of chocolate covered pretzels flew into my mouth today and then I come on here and see chocolate.  My resolution is fading.

 

See....I need chocolate....and wine.

 

There's no sugar in chocolate if you eat it in the right frame of mind. True!

 

Puh! (again)

 

Just finished 'Tales of Ancient Egypt' compiled by Roger Lancelyn Green. I've been reading that to dd also and enjoyed it so much I've ordered a copy for my grandmother.

 

We are big RLG fans here. His Tales of the Greek Heroes are great as is his King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. Padraic Colum is another good one for the Greek stories. Wonderful writer.

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I am so sorry.

 

 

 

 

 

I can't keep up with you all and you are not helping my recent decision. I had a really odd stomach bug and so I decided to give up sugar and other things that probably are not good for me.  Somehow a couple handfuls of chocolate covered pretzels flew into my mouth today and then I come on here and see chocolate.  My resolution is fading.

 

The Language of Baklava is waiting for me.  Kids are fighting bedtime and there's a blizzard in the dark giving us the perfect snow for making snowmen.  Perhaps school will be canceled tomorrow.

 

See....I need chocolate....and wine.

Happy Spring??

 

What is with this wackadoo weather?  I am going off to the Midwest soon to visit family and I cannot figure out what in the heck to pack!

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Today I finished and loved Divergent by Veronica Roth.  Starting Insergent next.

 

 

1. The Wednesday Letters by Jason F. Wright

2. Winnie Mandela: Life of Struggle by Jim Haskins

3. Herbal Antibiotics by Stephen Harrod Buhner

4. When Did White Trash Become the New Normal? by Charlotte Hays

5. Family Herbal by Rosemary Gladstar

6. Romeo and Juliet by Shakespeare

7. Medicinal Herbs: A Beginner's Guide by Rosemary Gladstar

8. The Hot Zone by Richard Preston

9. War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells

10. The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

11. The Telenovela Method by Andrew Tracey

12. Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman

13. The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean

14. Divergent by Veronica Roth

 

 

 

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I had to google 'fairy bread'. :ack2: is right.

 

fairybread1.JPG

 

 

Gross!  So Gross!

 

 

Just finished Flames of Rome!

Now onto Pilgrim's Progress. Do you read the original or the revised for modern readers?

 

The version I read was free and I don't think it was revised much if it all.  It was  incredibly wordy.  I'm not the most attentive reader and probably would have done better with a more modern version.

 

 

Happy Spring??

 

What is with this wackadoo weather?  I am going off to the Midwest soon to visit family and I cannot figure out what in the heck to pack!

 

Our final blizzard last year was in May so pack everything. :lol:  I felt the same way about packing to go south earlier in the winter so I clung to this packing guide and was fine:  http://www.adventure-chic.com/packing-guide-for-warm-weather/

 

It's missing the winter coat and boots that took up a good chunk of my packing space.

 

 

 

Happy anniversary Stacia!

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After reading a little in Travels in Hyper Reality, I started Sold to Miss Seeton. It is not written by the original Miss Seeton author but I thought I would try it anyway. I was pleasantly surprised that it is at least as good as the original, maybe even a little "cozier." I realized I don't live in Flufferton Abbey but in a cozy cottage down the road, very often on the coast of Cornwall.

 

P.S. The "hyper reality" in the first book is how Umberto Eco sees the tourist culture of the West Coast of the US. It is a little disconcerting and embarrassing to see it as he sees it.

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Jenn, my ds finished Pratchett's Raising Steam & really enjoyed it. His rankings  :lol:  for the Pratchett books he's read are:

 

First tier:

The Wee Free Men

Reaper Man

Raising Steam

 

Second tier:

The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents

 

Third tier:

the remainder of the Tiffany Aching books (A Hat Full of Sky; Wintersmith; I Shall Wear Midnight)

Hogfather (it's still a little too scary/creepy for him to fully appreciate at this point, I think)

 

Stacia, I was getting on this morning to ask if I needed to read Pratchett in any kind of order?  I downloaded an audio of Wee Free Men but didn't know if I could start with it.  I keep seeing it is the second book in the Disc World (?) series but the first book doesn't seem to tie in.  

 

I'll gladly send a postcard to anyone without a reading challenge, but I can also send out postcards for Wisconsin authors in general and Laura Ingalls Wilder specifically. Maybe even something for those who've read some Michael Perry.

 

Oh my goodness.  Dd19, the nanny, has introduced her two little girls to Little House.  They would LOVE a postcard.  

 

The reason I can't read Gone with the Wind again is because the ending is too sad then I have to read the sequel because that has a happy ending, but the sequel is so awful it should never have been written. 

 

I absolutely LOVE Gone with the Wind.  It was my favorite book and movie as a teenager.  I always said that Scarlet got Rhett back eventually.  When in high school I wanted to write a sequel to Gone with the Wind.  It was on my list of things "to do."  I agree with you, Rosie, that the sequel left me wanting.  

 

I am excited about the postcard thing.  I don't have any literary people from my area that I'm aware of, but we have lots of plane paraphernalia.  And we do have a local chocolate shop.  

 

(((hugs))) aggieamy!  Dh was out of town for a few days so I am blessedly allowed to revert to being an ostrich and hadn't heard any news.   

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Stacia, I was getting on this morning to ask if I needed to read Pratchett in any kind of order?  I downloaded an audio of Wee Free Men but didn't know if I could start with it.  I keep seeing it is the second book in the Disc World (?) series but the first book doesn't seem to tie in. 

 

I've never read his books in order. (And there are so many of them, there are still oodles of them for me to read.) I don't think you really need to read them in order. He has various overlapping characters, so some stories focus more on particular characters or groups than others. If you enjoy his stuff, you'll soon discover your preferences & probably seek out those books first. Some focus on the wizards of Unseen University (love those guys), or the witches (the Tiffany books, plus many others -- love them too, they're so practical & down to earth), or the watchmen/police type force, or Death (one of my absolute favorite characters), etc.... Characters pop up here & there in various books (sometimes just making cameo appearances) & I'm sure there's an overall arc that some may argue requires reading them in order, but I've never had a problem just reading whichever ones & totally enjoying them.

 

I think The Wee Free Men is something like #30 in the Discworld series, but it's really the first book that focuses on Tiffany Aching. Plus, Pratchett wrote it more for young adults, so imo that is a good one to start with. If you decide to read the other Tiffany books (4 total), I would read those in order because that storyline does develop throughout the four books: The Wee Free Men; A Hat Full of Sky; Wintersmith; I Shall Wear Midnight.

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Rosie & Angel, you're making me rethink trying Gone with the Wind. I've seen the movie (even saw it at the historic Fox Theater in downtown Atl), but just couldn't get into the book. The irony is that my dh (when he was in his late teens & his family moved here to Atl), read Gone w/ the Wind & loved it.

 

I guess I find it funny that I was born (& sometimes-raised) in the South, yet haven't made it through the book; yet the teen dude from Belgium read & loved it. :lol:  (He & I don't really share reading tastes, though, so I'm not sure him loving it is a mark in its favor...???)

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Yeah, that totally looks like a meal in our house. (Usually a gouda cheese sandwich first, then a chocolate sandwich after.) I will even eat the kind you picture because the bars of chocolate don't require butter to make them adhere to the bread. You can just hold the pieces of chocolate on, lol. (The butter is why I don't like the sprinkle sandwiches. Dh, otoh, even puts butter on Nutella sandwiches. :svengo: )

 

Forget the postcard swap ... I think you should go on a vacation to Belgium and send us all chocolate.  

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Yeah, that totally looks like a meal in our house. (Usually a gouda cheese sandwich first, then a chocolate sandwich after.) I will even eat the kind you picture because the bars of chocolate don't require butter to make them adhere to the bread. You can just hold the pieces of chocolate on, lol. (The butter is why I don't like the sprinkle sandwiches. Dh, otoh, even puts butter on Nutella sandwiches. :svengo: )

 

As much of a chocolate lover as I am the Nutella fascination has passed me right by. Blech. I know there's a lot of love for it on the WTM but I can't get on board. The thought of Nutella with butter... shocked-smiley-emoticon.png

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Stacia, I was getting on this morning to ask if I needed to read Pratchett in any kind of order?  I downloaded an audio of Wee Free Men but didn't know if I could start with it.  I keep seeing it is the second book in the Disc World (?) series but the first book doesn't seem to tie in.  

 

 

 

I've never read his books in order. (And there are so many of them, there are still oodles of them for me to read.) I don't think you really need to read them in order. He has various overlapping characters, so some stories focus more on particular characters or groups than others. If you enjoy his stuff, you'll soon discover your preferences & probably seek out those books first. Some focus on the wizards of Unseen University (love those guys), or the witches (the Tiffany books, plus many others -- love them too, they're so practical & down to earth), or the watchmen/police type force, or Death (one of my absolute favorite characters), etc.... Characters pop up here & there in various books (sometimes just making cameo appearances) & I'm sure there's an overall arc that some may argue requires reading them in order, but I've never had a problem just reading whichever ones & totally enjoying them.

 

I think The Wee Free Men is something like #30 in the Discworld series, but it's really the first book that focuses on Tiffany Aching. Plus, Pratchett wrote it more for young adults, so imo that is a good one to start with. If you decide to read the other Tiffany books (4 total), I would read those in order because that storyline does develop throughout the four books: The Wee Free Men; A Hat Full of Sky; Wintersmith; I Shall Wear Midnight.

 

I have read more than a dozen of the Pratchett books but have yet to read Wee Free Men!  You absolutely can start the books anywhere you like.  Let's see if I can make a short list...

 

Favorite stand alone stories:

Going Postal which, to me, has the most spot-on zany satire of all the books.  There are appearances by lots of recurring characters, like Death.  My single favorite out of a slew of favorites!

The Truth is also a stand alone, this time a satire on newspapers with a vampire who is trying to abstain from biting necks.

Reaper Man, I think makes a good stand alone book, too.  It has a more surreal flavor to it. It also introduces all the Unseen University characters

Hogfather, just because of Death and Hogswatch (Discworld's Christmas).  

Interesting Times was a kick because it was a good send up of all things Chinese (my academic background was Chinese history...)

 

Favorite character and series = Sam Vimes and the Night Watch books:

Guards, Guards! is the first, and is a favorite.  The beginning chapters are a Monty Python script in print.

Men at Arms

The Night Watch 

Fifth Elephant

Thud

Snuff

 

I think I've read about 16 or 17 of the 40 Discworld books.  

 

I've given Going Postal and Guards, Guards! together as a gift to introduce Discworld to friends.  

 

Oh, and if you like audio books, you'll love the Pratchett books on audio.  The audio quality of the earlier titles isn't always great, but the reader, Nigel Planer, is fabulous. The more recent ones have Stephen Briggs as the reader, and he is also fabulous.

 

One last Pratchett plug.  Dodger is a recent title that is not set in Discworld but in Victorian England with real historical figures, like Charles Dickens.  I loved it, thought it would make a great introduction to a high school unit on Victorian Literature.  

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Rosie & Angel, you're making me rethink trying Gone with the Wind. I've seen the movie (even saw it at the historic Fox Theater in downtown Atl), but just couldn't get into the book. The irony is that my dh (when he was in his late teens & his family moved here to Atl), read Gone w/ the Wind & loved it.

 

I guess I find it funny that I was born (& sometimes-raised) in the South, yet haven't made it through the book; yet the teen dude from Belgium read & loved it. :lol:  (He & I don't really share reading tastes, though, so I'm not sure him loving it is a mark in its favor...???)

 

I read Gone with the Wind when I was 16, while spending the summer traveling around the South visiting relatives.  We made a visit to an Antebellum plantation house where the guide told us the house was heated by the wood they got chopping down the pantries. Why, I thought, would they destroy their kitchen cabinets year after year just to heat the house?  Then it dawned on me. She said pahn trees, as in pine trees.   :lol:

 

Anyway, I can't stand the book or the movie now!  

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I read Gone with the Wind when I was 16, while spending the summer traveling around the South visiting relatives.  We made a visit to an Antebellum plantation house where the guide told us the house was heated by the wood they got chopping down the pantries. Why, I thought, would they destroy their kitchen cabinets year after year just to heat the house?  Then it dawned on me. She said pahn trees, as in pine trees.   :lol:

 

Anyway, I can't stand the book or the movie now!  

 

So you'll be wanting one of those GwtW postcards too, eh, Jenn? LOL.

 

About the southern accent thing.... GA is known as the "peach state" (even though, I think SC actually grows a lot more peaches than GA does or ever has). I've always heard that the nickname was a mistake (by whom, I don't know), mistaking when people said 'pitch' trees (pine trees -- Loblolly pines are prevalent here), thinking they were saying 'peach' trees. Btw, the city of Atl has close to 40 streets that all include the name "Peachtree" in them. Makes driving directions SO easy for everyone. LOL.

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About the southern accent thing.... GA is known as the "peach state" (even though, I think SC actually grows a lot more peaches than GA does or ever has). I've always heard that the nickname was a mistake (by whom, I don't know), mistaking when people said 'pitch' trees (pine trees -- Loblolly pines are prevalent here), thinking they were saying 'peach' trees. Btw, the city of Atl has close to 40 streets that all include the name "Peachtree" in them. Makes driving directions SO easy for everyone. LOL.

Stacia, you just made me think of the giant peach sculpture/statue on I75 somewhere in south Georgia.  The Dc's loved the giant peach when they were little and had to stay awake to see it.  We had way to many long drives on that road when they were little.  I hope it is still there.

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I saw that Márquez passed away and then was disappointed that I hadn't read any of her works before now. More books on my TBR pile.

 

I finally finished "The Language of Baklava' and loved it to pieces...crunchy pistachio, honey, phyllo pieces of course. I also started Eloisa James' "Paris in Love." The author literally took all her short little blurbs that had posted on Twitter and Facebook, organized them into groupings and published that. I've heard of blogs being turned into books, but tweets and Facebook? It's supposed to be a memoir of a woman who had breast cancer and then after treatment took a sabbatical from her job as a professor and moved her family to Paris. It's a shame she didn't write that book. I'd be all over that book. Two pages, that's all it took to know it was over.

 

I did start another Phryne Fisher book to ease my disappointment. Worked like a charm.

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I can't keep up with you guys!

 

Stacia - Happy Anniversary! That is a beautiful wedding photo!

 

I would love to be involved in a postcard exchange, but I don't have much that is interesting out here.

I would love to receive chocolate, but alas, it would melt long before it arrived at my house.

So, phooey.

 

On the book-ish front - I started Sarah's Key the other night, but in light of recent news stories, I just don't think I can read it right now. I also started Monument's Men, but I have fallen asleep twice in a row when reading it....  :glare: I decided today I don't want to read any World War books right now anyway. Need something light.

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I also started Monument's Men, but I have fallen asleep twice in a row when reading it.... :glare: I decided today I don't want to read any World War books right now anyway. Need something light.

That bad? I requested it from the library in January and just now got the email to say it's waiting for me at the library. There are quite a few other holds so I won't be able to renew it and will have one shot to get through it. Hmmm...

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