Ben’s first thunderstorm last night. At around 4am, two HUGE cracks of thunder woke A and I up (actually A says there were 4, so I must have missed the first 2), really rumbly ones that went on for ages.. We lay in bed waiting for Ben to start crying.. and waited.. and .. nothing at all!! I even went in to look on him to make sure he was ok. Quite amazing – I make the tiniest creak on the floorboards outside his room and he instantly starts crying, but thunder so loud that I nearly fall out of bed, and he stays fast asleep.
Strangely billed as a children’s book, Mark Haddon tells the story of
Christopher Boone, a 15 year old with Asperger’s, who finds a neighbour’s
dog murdered, and sets out to solve the case.
The book is written as Christopher’s diary, and gives a real insight
into the mind of a child with this condition. There are frequent forays into
maths and logic, but the emotional detachment is extraordinary – Christopher
is seemingly incapable of understanding what other people are feeling.
Oliver Sachs (who turned his wife into a hat, or something) found it very
funny – I’m not sure funny is a word I’d have used, when I found it quite
moving; sad even – but it is brilliantly written, and hugely engaging.
It is a book of surprises too – the journey does not end up where I was
expecting at all, but the book is all the better as a result. However
in my opinion this is a book fairly and squarely for adult readers, or
at least late youth – I can’t imagine (early) teens getting a lot out of it.
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G’rrr – two very interesting looking films that aren’t (at present) going to be released in this country – Garden State, and Danny Deckchair. Import DVD it is!
The street bible
by Rob Lacey is a complete
reworking/summary of the Holy Bible in modern (street) language for
those who “have never read the Bible, or have read it too much”.
I have personally found it quite inspiring, particularly how he works the
four gospels into a single narrative (although the disciples being called
“Drew”, “Jim”, “Jonno”, etc was a litle disconcerting at first!!)
The book kicks off in the Old Testament, with a whistle-stop tour of
the books of the Bible, in canon order, but with the relative timings of the
events in the book explained. I thought this was great – all the boring
numbers and geneologies have been dumped, leaving stories, history, and
prophecy.
A good half of the book is based around the New Testament. The four gospels
are squelched into a single narrative, and the remaining books are
presented as e-mails to the various churches from the various authors.
But it must be said, it’s hugely enjoyable to read (which is not always true
of the Bible), and helped me think about things in a new light. Buy this book on Amazon
Actually, I’ll add a link to him under my “friends” links to the left (aren’t I nice?). Just found another friend is doing a weight watcher’s journal! I’ll add her too.
A sadness – my “to-see” list keeps getting longer, not shorter. Recently caught the trailer for Spiderman 2 which looks like an absolute stonker. Mind you, I just loved the first one!
Films recently added are: King Arthur, Anchorman, Farenheit 9/11, and probably Wimbledon, although I’m reserving judgment on that a little. Mind you, off to see Harry Potter next week, which I’m really looking forward to.
A pleasing enough film – can think of many worse ways to spend a couple of hours of an evening. Once again I am not a huge Jim Carrey fan (although I was hugely impressed with The Truman Show), and I found his character – Bruce Nolan – very unbelievable. That said, the premise is great, Morgan Freeman does a very good interpretation of God, I just love Jennifer Aniston (appropriately named Grace), and I found this film to be both very funny but also quite subtle, in terms of the collatoral damage done by Bruce weilding his power to further his cause (e.g. a ‘headline’ meteor strike causes power cuts, or lassoing the moon causes floods in Korea), how even when he gets what he wants he’s not happy, and how answering yes to everyone’s prayers is an utter diaster. Still, it’s ultimately just a popcornfest, and Bruce is just a little too selfish and Grace a little too long-suffering to really be believable. (Oh yes, and the dog is real star of the show!)
Well, the last ever episode of Friends just aired, and like a thousand and one other people in the UK I’m blogging about it.
Friends has been a part of life for as long as I can remember – when it first came out I wasn’t into it (mainly because everyone else was), but when I saw an episode – probably late into series 2 – I got completely hooked. At one point I had several series on video, but that fad died away.
Wouldn’t claim to have seen every episode – for me it went off the boil as something to watch every week (something the Simpson’s has never done), but still great to catch occasionally.
I think it’s time had come – most of the cast have moved on to other things, and have really got to old for the comedy of Friends (funny to think Jennifer Aniston used to be an unknown!), but there’s still a part of me that got a bit sad watching this evening’s episode.
Fitting somehow that it should be followed by Big Brother 5’s launch – another show that’s passed its sell-by date! And it will be interesting to see what the Joey spin-off show will be like…
Did a New Scientist Enigma yeserday, for the first time in ages. I literally did on the back of an envelope too, which was cool. It was all about combinations, which I’ve only just finished teaching to our undergrads, so I jolly well should have been able to solve it!!
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