Alien Spouse

Driftwood for Christmas.

I mis-spoke when I said that Eva hadn't had a Christmas gift from my Father-in-Law - He actually sent her a lovely illustrated book of fairy tales last week.  I regret the error (Additionally I note that my own Dad has yet to acknowledge her existence, much less sent her anything for Christmas. So. Father-in-Law is ahead on points here.)

Doc C and I got our presents yesterday:

That's one rather nice piece of driftwood, and a bit of palm tree that has had a glittery green pompom and a pipe cleaner glued to it.  Both of these were given to us along with very specific details of where they were found.  I think we're going to keep the driftwood but maybe we can return the bit of palm tree.  Of course we don't have a receipt for that, so maybe we can get credit instead of a refund.

A Weekend in November.

On Saturday morning Eva and I went with Doc C to do the laundry, which is more fun then it might sound because the laundrette we frequent also combines a bar and used bookshop.  Doc dealt with loading up the washing machines (he has a system) and I took care of Eva who slept for the entire time, so I got to browse the books.  

Last time we were there last time I found a book entitled "The Womanly Art of Breast Feeding" which was published in the early 80s if the hair and fashions in it are any indication, it was still there but Eva and I seem to be doing pretty well so I didn't bother with it this time.  Instead I flipped through a much more up-to-date copy of "What to Expect in the First Year", and it actually had some interesting information so I bought it for the bargain price of $2.

On Sunday we took Eva for a drive, because she was feeling a bit screamy and we thought the neighbours could do with a break frankly!  Plus, of course, driving in a car puts her to sleep after about 10 minutes on the road, because she is very much my daughter.  We turned the trip into a lovely Sunday drive on the parkway and picked up doughnuts as well to make it really decadent.

As you know I'm currently job hunting, and so every moment that I'm not taking care of Eva should be spent looking for something that might be a productive means of earning some money.  To help me with this Doc C has downloaded a super fun game that I've wanted for ages called "Quantum Conundrum".  It involves flipping between four different dimensions and the opportunity to actually use my brain to solve some nifty little logic puzzles.  It is really quite addictive, and I am trying my best not to get totally sucked into it.

Resuming Broadcast.

Doc C borrowed a lap top for me, so that I'm able to access the internet and blog, isn't that sweet of him?  He is the very best of husbands in my completely unbiased opinion!

To recap the last few days:

• On Friday we took Eva to get her first round of vaccinations - There was, of course, screaming but the nurse was very efficient and got the shots done really quickly.  Eva soon recovered her equilibrium and is her usual (mostly content) self now.
• We went to the storage unit and dropped off the Halloween decorations and picked up warmer clothes, boots and bedding.  I resisted bringing home the Christmas baubles for now.
• Doc C finished "Bioshock", and we found a second-hand copy of "Bioshock 2" for $8 so the adventure continues!
• I've been reading a lot on my Kindle,which is just an absolute necessity for bookworm mothers in my opinion. It is so easy to hold and "turn pages" with one hand whilst feeding Eva, or holding her, or whatever else she needs at that particular moment (although I haven't yet worked out how to read even the Kindle whilst changing her nappy though, that task requires complete attention).
• I considered buying new jeans on Friday, but as I can easily fit into my old jeans now (if you kindly gloss over the slight muffin top...) so I'll wait to buy more clothes when I have a found a job.
• Speaking of which, I updated my CV and Doc C printed off some copies so I can start handing them in to local businesses and applying for jobs.
• The weather is still quite pleasant but it is colder, so I don't like to have the door to the balcony open all day.  The cats have learned to miaow at the door when they want to go out, and then tap on the glass with their paw when they want to come back in.  They tend to want to go in or out every ten to fifteen minutes and are therefore driving me potty.

Eva's Transportation Options.

Today Eva and I tried out both of her carriers (she has a Moby, which is essentially a long strip of fabric, and one of those backwards backpack types too) and walked around the apartment with them on.  Actually we did try leaving the house for a walk, I'm trying to get a walk in every day, but it started to rain almost the moment we got outside.

Still, it was good to try out the carriers, and I think it's going to be really useful to have different transportation options for Evalyn Alice.  Particularly on a day like today when I realised that we'd left the wheels to her pram in the boot of the car, which is only a problem because it's one of Doc's teaching days so the car, and therefore the wheels, are with him!

Never mind though, there isn't anywhere either myself or Eva need to be right now; except snuggled up at home reading Agatha Christie (Me) and being super cute (Eva).

Scream-Fest.

Today Eva decided that it was about time she started to exert her dominance over us through the simple, yet effective, means of screaming almost inconsolably.  For hours.  It hasn't been constant by any means, she's given us breaks ranging in duration from a few minutes to a couple of hours, but the intermittent tantrums through out the whole day still clearly demonstrated just how difficult she can make life for us if she so chooses.

I understand, from my new favourite parenting guide, that it's usually around the two week mark when babies stop sleeping all day and start to express their dissatisfaction with no longer being in the nice comfy womb, so Evalyn is spot on target for that.  It's reassuring to know that, because otherwise I'd be wondering what the hell happened to my sweet little baby and possibly considering that whole demonic possession angle (I joke!  But I am aware that sometimes child abuse has been explained by people apparently believing that of their children, that's at least one thing that having an atheist for a mother will protect her from.)

Eva's quiet right now, but I'm nervous that it's merely another temporary lull.  Please keep your fingers crossed she's got her frustrations out for today and will sleep well tonight.

Parenting Guides : French Edition.

Fairly early on in my pregnancy I read Pamela Druckerman's book "Bringing Up Bebe", which is about her experience as an American starting a family in Paris.  It's a really interesting look at the French style of parenting and there were several things I found particularly appealing; however Druckerman is a journalist not a doctor or an accredited expert, so I was reluctant to go purely on her findings.

Fortunately she is very good at providing solid and credible sources, which includes Dr Michel Cohen who wrote a parenting guide called "The New Basics".  I bought that book last night and started reading the relevant chapters whilst my daughter was fussing about being put to bed.  There are a couple of pieces of advice that are mirroring pretty much exactly what my instincts are; in particular feeding Eva when she demands to be fed instead of forcing her onto a schedule, and not waking her up to feed her at night.

It makes me feel more confident in trusting my instincts, and that is immensely comforting at this point.  I don't necessarily want a little Parisien running around the house (perish the thought! I am British after all!), but I would like the calmness that both Druckerman and Cohen describe.  Keep your fingers crossed.

Polka Dots and Bad Seeds.

Before Evalyn was born we put together little gift packages for our neighbours, and we tied those underneath the mailboxes in our hallway when we brought her home.  

It's just a mini take-out style box with a couple of pairs of hot pink ear-plugs wrapped up in tissue paper.  We attached postcards with a note saying that we had brought Eva home and that we hope Evalyn'll be a good neighbour, but she's a new-born... So, ear-plugs for all!

The cards were really hard to choose - but we went with postcards of a 50's cover of William March's The Bad Seed.  The book is about a murderous little girl and the havoc she wreaks; the book is ok, but the film based on that book is a camp classic and well worth watching for the central performance of Patty McCormack as evil little Rhoda.

Yeah, we don't really do "sentimental" about our daughter.

 

Cheese-Fest.

Doc C has to go to campus tomorrow for some start-of-the-semester stuff, so he had to make sure he'd done all of his homework today.  Whilst he was doing that I read and tried to find a comfortable position to sit in, because my lower back is killing me.  Ahh, the last couple of weeks of pregnancy!  So much fun!

The book I grabbed off the shelf was Jacqueline Susann's "Once is Not Enough", and it is unbelievably tacky and entertaining.  There is more plot in the first fifty pages of this paperback than in a year of any soap opera you care to mention, and I've just discovered there is a film version starring Kirk Douglas!  OMG!  Well, I'm going to have see that now clearly, I can't imagine it being anything but fabulously dreadful.

Homewares.

Whilst I'm not entirely sure whether or not I'm nesting at the moment, I am definitely invested in getting the flat thoroughly organised and so today we went out in search of those canvas storage crate things.  I specifically wanted two large ones (one for my bewilderingly large collection of belts and one for my entirely necessary assortment of bags) and a small ones (especially for headscarves), and it was but the work of moment in the home goods section of Target to find exactly what I wanted in a jaunty multi-coloured polka dot canvas.  Score.

This means that I've emptied the top drawer of the small chest of drawers and Evalyn's socks now have a designated home.  Eva's not even born yet and she's already got an entire (although small) chest of drawers to herself, whilst Doc C and I are sharing the large one.  I decided this was necessary when I was packing her hospital bag, because I couldn't find her red socks and the Wonder Woman onesy will look so much better with red socks!

We carried on with the home improvement shopping by purchasing some outdoor furniture in the form of two cheap-and-cheerful plastic (but entirely recyclable) adirondack chairs.  These are surprisingly comfortable, and I've spent a lovely late afternoon sitting in the shade of a tree, drinking lemon barley water (Thank you World Market!  You are magnificent!) and reading some essays by G.K. Chesterton on my Kindle.  The cats are very taken with this novel development and love having us outside with them, Edith in particular is ecstatic and has been perched on the railing right next to the chairs just gazing at us lovingly.

At one point Edith moved along the railing a bit to get a better view of something, and her profile was beautifully framed against the sky.  She looked like she was composing poetry, and I was irrestibly reminded of Jordan Catalano from the nineties teen drama "My So-Called Life" .  Edith, I feel sure, would lean beautifully if she were a human.

Vodka, Vodka, Bacardi, Vodka.

Today Doc C booked us a moving van and started to round up some willing student manual labour via Facebook.  We are officially moving on Friday the 13th.  Good thing we're not superstitious, huh?

In the mean time we need to pack, obviously, and so today we went to get some boxes.  The Doc had been looking at storage units (we've decided that $55 a month is an acceptable cost for retaining a few things that we won't need day-to-day, but don't want to get rid of quite yet, like the grill and 2/3 of my books), and found that they had cardboard boxes for sale for $1.25.  I didn't understand why we needed brand new boxes, so instead I suggested a trip into town so that we could ask for boxes from some of the local shops.

We wanted small boxes, because we'll be mostly packing books and it's so tempting to over-pack larger boxes, so my first suggestion was the local ABC (British translation: Off-Licence) and we got such a great haul there we didn't need to go anywhere else.  We probably got a dozen or so, which means we saved about $15.  Not a huge amount of money certainly, but still worth it.

So, when we move house next week, the new neighbours are going to see box after box being carried into the house, most of them labelled "vodka".  Yep, the heavily pregnant lady and her husband are going to make quite the first impression as chronic lushes.

Last Day = Ice-Cream.

Today was my last day at work until... Ummm... I've had the baby and find another job, so... my last day at work for a while.  Naturally I celebrated with Doc C by going for an ice-cream after work (I had a scoop of cheesecake ice-crem with mixed-in raspberries in a waffle cone; Doc C had amaretto ice-cream with mixed in pecans in a cup) and will shortly be eradicating all the alarms in the house.  No more getting up at 6 in the morning for me (unless the Baby Overlord decides it is to be so)

I don't really know how I'll be spending my time until the due date, I mean obviously we'll be moving house and getting prepared for Eva, but it's more the day-to-day thing.  It's just so unusual for me to have that 8 hour block of time that usually gets devoured by work back at my disposal, and I can't quite grasp that yet.

Let's hope I use the extra hours in the day productively, and don't disappear into a detective novel rabbit hole.

 

Eva's First Toy.

How adorable is this?  The Very Hungry Caterpillar is such a classic of children's literature, so of course it was the first book I added to our Amazon baby registry and I added the wooden pull-toy Hungry Caterpillar because it was just so cute - And my Mum snapped them both up!

Yesterday Doc C picked up some packages from the post office, and in one of those were our caterpillars. Squee!

It is so simple and so beautiful, and I love the way it moves when you pull it along.  My only concern now is that I'll be so attached to this little guy by the time that Eva is old enough to play with him that I'll be reluctant to hand him over; if that is turns out to be the case we may need to look into getting a stunt caterpillar.

 

Technical iSsues.

For the past few days I've been coming home, writing a blog post on the iPad, hitting publish and watching as absolutely nothing happens.  It doesn't save the post, it doesn't publish the post and the rest is silence (or blank screen to be more accurate). Inevitably I forget that until the next time I sit down to write a blog post and... Nothing happens... I think it must be something to do with the iPad's Typepad app since I can publish from other computers, but I don't know what that problem might be or how to fix it.

Not to worry, you haven't missed anything earth shattering - Last night's lost blog post was all about FINALLY finding a book of knitting instructions that could coherently explain Kitchener Stitch (why is this so difficult? Mostly the other instructions I found never mentioned when I was supposed to drop the damn stitch I was working on and move onto the next.  ugh.) and I know how desperate you must be to read all about that!

Still, it's annoying.  After sitting at my desk all day, I don't want to go into the study to turn on the desktop and sit in there - I want to be blogging whilst I recline on the sofa with at least one cat settled on me and a police procedural on the television.  That is how you are supposed to blog. It is the industry standard, damn it!

Phriday.

Friday and I'm in Philadelphia! Yay!

I started off my day with a forty minute walk uptown to get to the book fair, with a couple of detours to Lush (Fresh Farmacy soap & Imperialis moisturiser) and H&M (nothing in my current size). The books were ok, but nothing amazing. I bought an anthology of Campion murder mysteries & a trashy murder mystery set in Philly, with some nice over art.

By this point it was lunch time, so I re-traced my steps to a falafel place I spotted earlier. I had forgotten how much I like falafel. I finished my lunch,and bought three falafel balls to tide me over for the rest of the walk back to the hotel. And I stopped at a different falafel place a bit further on, because they had juices as well and I thought a nice vegetable juice would be a good counterpart to my plans to get ice cream later.

Obviously by the time I got back to the hotel there was just time to say hi to Doc C, have my after lunch nap and then go out for ice-cream. What? The baby needs calcium! Ok, she perhaps didn't need that calcium to be covered in hot fudge sauce, but that was just how it came! In an appealing rum-raisin / pistachio flavored format!

Doc still had some conferencing to do, so I came back to the hotel to wait for him, and then took him to a martini bar nearby that had good reviews for food. Those reviews were well earned.

So yes, I ate my way around town today and I'll probably do it again tomorrow!

Sunny Philadelphia.

We are in Philadelphia! Yay!

We were in town for no more than three hours before we found ourselves a cup of coffee, a park bench and then a really good second-hand bookshop (I cleaned them out of Nero Wolf mysteries and Doc bought a couple of philosophy texts). Doc C doesn't start conferencing until tomorrow morning, so we spent the afternoon strolling around some beautiful sunny parks, full of flowers and leafy trees. For dinner we had curry, which was delicious.

Tomorrow I intend to go to a huge book sale which the nice lady in the bookshop gave me a flyer for, as well as the obligatory visit to Lush and maybe H&M. I have also just discovered there is an old fashioned soda fountain just around the corner from the hotel, so I suspect there is a banana split in my future.

As for as my plans for Saturday, I got really excited when I saw that both "The Artist" and "We Need To Talk About Kevin" were playing, but the first ended it's run this afternoon and the second is only screening across town. The cinema around the corner is a really good art house cinema with five screens, but I just don't fancy any of the films they'll be playing this weekend.

So far the only disappointment has been that the fantastic deli diner I found last time we were here has closed, and I was planning to take Doc there on Sunday! Oh well! Still, it's just so lovely to be in a beautiful and historically rich city. An urban setting is simply my true mise en scene.

Recent Adventures in Reading.

I am reading tons of books (both paper and kindle) at the moment, and yesterday I finished reading "The Bat".  

It's a fairly standard issue country house mystery, but it doesn't particularly distinguish itself except for having been one of the inspirations for Batman.  The Bat in this case is a infamous villian, and he leaves drawings of bats or dead bats at the scenes of his crime; he actually projects a bat's shadow onto a window at one point in the story, which is clearly a pre-cursor to the bat-signal.  So that's fun for Batman fans, but otherwise I wouldn't bother.  I'll probably still watch the film, because it stars Agnes Moorehead and Vincent Price so it's bound to be a feast of over-acting!

After that potboiler I decided I wanted something a smidge more literary, so I moved onto "Geek Love". I am quite sure I must have read a description of it at some point, but I didn't bother to re-read it before I picked it up this time.  It's good, really it is, but it centers around a family of circus freaks who were deliberately created by their parents using various cocktails of dangerous substances during pregnancy. That part is fine, a little disturbing but the parents do adore their carefully manufactured freaks so I didn't find it horrifying at all; except that I stupidly didn't think about what might have happened to the mutated babies that weren't viable... and, yeah, I've decided to read that book some other time now.  Probably after I've given birth myself and everything is fine, you know? (Actually I'm also not reading pregnancy manuals either, for pretty much the same reason - They just love to scare you and I don't need that, thanks!)

So now I'm reading "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", and I know there is bound to be a lot of substance abuse in this too, because the drug-addled misbehaviour and hallucinations are pretty notorious, but I think I can also be fairly confident that Hunter S. Thompson didn't have a pregnancy to worry about at the time. Right?  You'd tell me, wouldn't you?

Literature and Vintage Bling.

This photo combines two of my very favourite things, which are reading and shiny things.

As you can see my Kindle is clothed in it's own leather case, which just happens to be a muted green. I was hoping when I bought my bag that the two would match, or at least co-ordinate, but actually the different shades of green hate each other and clash in a rather sickly way. No matter, I am still fond of both of them. 

As I am sure I've said before (and will probably say again), it took a while for me to come around to the idea of a Kindle, because I adore books as objects almost as much as I love reading them. However, my Mother was right to suggest I would like the format and the Kindle is a prize above rubies for a voracious reader.

Of course if I were to be offered rubies in addition to the Kindle I would not turn them down, because PRETTY!

Kindle and Bangle - Action shot.

I am extremely fond of classic jewellery, and I sporadically, as dictated by my bank balance, collect vintage costume jewellery. This bracelet is a thin slice of tortoise shell plastic (probably it's lucite, definitely it's man-made & not real tortoise) with a simple pattern of diamante studs on both sides.  It's unusual to have the decorative edge be the one vertical to the wrist, whilst the edge which is horizontal to the wrist is so slim and plain; this means it would get lost in a stack of bracelets but works really well alone for some under-stated glitz. In other words, it is dreamy and it was only $18 on Etsy. What is not to love?

It's surprisingly difficult to get a good photograph of a bracelet whilst you are wearing it, so I thought I'd take a picture of the bangle held up to the light to catch the textural translucence of the lucite. Isn't that lovely? 

Examining the Boiler Entrails.

This morning we were woken up about an hour before the alarm went off by the sound of rushing water. I immediately thought that one of the cats had jumped into the kitchen sink and somehow knocked the tap on, if only it had been that cartoonish a solution. What had actually happened was a pipe on our hot water boiler had burst, and was busily flooding the downstairs bathroom and study.

I sleepily turned to Doc C and asked if he thought it was an omen. "An Omen of what?" was his response, and I had to admit I didn't really know because I'm not au fait with omens as such. Probably the fact that I'm re-reading Douglas Adams' "Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul" put such a notion in my head, the plot mostly involves Norse gods, so there are a fair amount of portents in it.

The boiler flood was very exciting, but once we had the water turned off at the mains there wasn't much else to be done and I still had to get to work. With no shower to be had, I tied my hair up in a scarf (it would appear that two days of dry shampoo is pushing the boundaries) and went with a slight Rosie the Riveter vibe to my clothes (red t-shirt, jeans, blue canvas jacket and brown Doc Martens) to make the head scarf look intentional. My fashion theory is that you can get away with nearly anything, as long as it looks deliberate.

Doc drove me to work (only to turn round once he got there to come back home and tend to the boiler), and I made it safely to my office; where I switched on my Mac. I've set it up so that images are selected at random from a file of photos and wallpapers to display as my desktop background. The first one this morning was this flowchart:

OMEN!

And that is a whole hell of a lot less ambiguous, isn't it?

(Update on the boiler: It's been replaced already, but can't be switched on until tomorrow - So we get to use the shower in the house next door, which is vacant. This is a bit weird, but I've been dying to nosy around the place, so, actually, kind of cool)

Spring Break Tuesday.

I feel like we've got a lot of stuff done today; the cats are brushed, the living room is vacuumed, the kitchen is clean, the bathroom is well-scrubbed (the wooden floor has even been hand-waxed), Edith has been outside, pre-natel Pilates has been done, and a slightly crappy murder mystery has been finished.

Now I'm sleepy.

Weekend in the House.

It's Spring Break - And I've taken the week off. There will be a lot of sleep.

This weekend Doc was getting over a cold, so we spent two days in the house. I had a bath, napped (a lot), watched some great television mixed with some fairly awful horror films, and I read a bunch of books.

Doc is feeling a lot better, thank heavens, so we did leave the house today.

2012.

Happy New Year!

We spent yesterday evening at Randy and Laura's house with a small grop of friends. It was a very nice way to end 2011, and start 2012.

Today I slept late; finished playing "Arkham Asylum"; got half-way through "Genius Wars" and had a most satisfactory afternoon nap.

Doc started playing "Arkham City" (Catwoman! Squee!); made vegetable stock form the HF-W cookbook; looked on-line at houses for sale and has now settled in for a "Star Wars" marathon.

2012 is off to a cracking start!

Asheville Saturday - December.

Journey - We drove to Asheville today for my haircut, on the way we stopped in a shop that we've been interested in going to for a while because it also serves slices of pie with coffee. The pies are baked in house and are really delecious; we both got pecan pie this time, but I'm going to have to try the coconut cream pie next time.

Shopping - Even with a stop for pie, we still were 45 minutes early so we shopped for books. I scored two kids books by Catharine Jinks and "Kitchen Confidential" by Anthony Bourdain. Doc C was giddy to snap up a $2 copy of a Bertrand Russell book, so that was good too.

Haircut - Seeing as I won't be at work for a couple of weeks, I asked Naomi for a slightly edgier cut than I usually get and I think she enjoys having a bit of creative freedom! She took a couple of photos with her phone for her portfolio.

Food - Sushi! We ate miso soup and seaweed salad, then an excellent selection of sashimi and sushi. So delicious.

After that we came home.

It was a good day.

Students: Compare and Contrast.

 

Doc C checked Facebook last night and found this video on a friend's wall. I have watched it a couple of times this morning, posted it to my own wall and even listened to students in the hallway outside my office apparently prepping together to have this conversation with their professor en masse.

sigh.

Then a student, whom I know slightly, came into my office carrying a paper sculpture that she had made for an English class project, and was now giving to her professor.

It's Alice talking to the Caterpillar in Wonderland, and it was made from a maths book (which is genius in itself). There are different types of flower, different sizes of toadstools and a butterfly covered in calculus.

This makes me very happy.

 

Toning Down Christmas.

It occured to me this morning that I had not yet decorated the house for Christmas, but at the same time I'm right in the middle of reading "Miss Minimalist" (on my Kindle) and it just feels wrong to glitter the whole house.

So I compromised and hung up the faux vintage ornaments I bought in Boston last year on the twig arrangement from Halloween, then I added in a couple of other ornaments to balance those out and that's that.  

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

 I love the faux vintage ornaments almost more then I did when I bought them last year, they are delightfully tacky and rather adorable in their own very plastic way. Doc C is a particular fan of the angels, who are all holding their hands out in front of them in the manner of fisherman describing the one-that-got-away. They also all have black eyes, which gives them quite a creepy alien-being ambience.

Finally, on the dining table, I've put up the sad little Christmas tree beloved by Charlie Brown and all those who get a bit tearful when watching "A Charlie Brown Christmas" (1965) ...*cough*Doc*cough*...

Vintage Crime Spree.

One of the joys of the Kindle shop(Oh hey, have I mentioned that I have a Kindle?) is that there are vast quantities of Victorian and Edwardian detective novels available for little to no cost and that means I will never be short of something to read.

I downloaded half a dozen of them only yesterday, and I anticipate going back for more once I've skipped through these.  I selected these six with a very definite research purpose in mind; I read Agatha Christie's "Partners in Crime" years ago, which is a cracking collection of Tommy and Tuppence short stores, however each story pays homage to a popular fictional detective that readers of the period would be familiar with. I wasn't, and I know I missed out on some of the references. So I pulled up the "Partners in Crime" Wikipedia page and systematically went through the Kindle bookshop looking for the authors and detectives being pastiched - And I found all of them! Usually for free, but in one or two cases I had to pay a whole 99 cents. 

I'd already downloaded volume one of the "Dr. Thorndyke Mysteries Collection" and I've just finished "The Red Thumb Mark" the first book in the series. These are a delightful mix of very precise scientific analysis of the fictional evidence and a less condescending version of a Holmes and Watson pairing.

The primary function of all fiction is to furnish entertainment to the reader, and this fact has not been lost sight of. But the interest of so-called "detective" fiction is, I believe, greatly enhanced by a careful adherence to the probable, and a strict avoidance of physical impossibilities; and, in accordance with this belief, I have been scrupulous in confining myself to authentic facts and practicable methods. The stories have, for the most part, a medico-legal motive, and the methods of solution described in them are similar to those employed in actual practice by medical jurists. The stories illustrate, in fact, the application to the detection of crime of the ordinary methods of scientific research. I may add that the experiments described have in all cases been performed by me, and that the micro-photographs are, of course, from the actual specimens.

Freeman, R. Austin (2008-09-05). Dr. Thorndyke Mysteries Collection, Volume One (Four Books in One Volume!) (Kindle Locations 3110-3116). ignacio hills press (TM)IgnacioHillsPress.com. Kindle Edition. 

(I also LOVE how easy it is to pull nice chunks of text from the Kindle, with the source reference already attached. Happy sigh.)

And the Kindle edition still has the illustrations! Yay!

 

Book Box.

Have I mentioned that I bloody love my Kindle? I've been curled up with it for pretty much the whole of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend and, since it arrived a week ago, I've read three novels on it. Well, a novel and two vintage murder mysteries, if you're being pedantic about genre differences - but I'm not too much of an intellectual snob to say that I far preferred the company of Tommy and Tuppence, or Nero Wolf and Archie Goodwin to the miserable Anthony and Gloria of F. Scott's "The Beautiful and the Damned".

I've sort of given up on Goodreads, since the book swap feature has been closed, but I've set up the Kindle to prompt me to tweet a star rating when I've finished a book.

Oh, I've also re-named my Kindle from the out-of-the-box "Jennifer's Kindle" to "Jennifer's Box of Delights", after the John Masefield book. It is somewhat ironic that after I did this I discovered that "The Box of Delights" itself is one of the only titles I've looked for that doesn't have a Kindle version available.

Black Friday: Cleaning Day!

Today I have been in organisational mode, which wasn't entirely my plan for the day, until I found myself cleaning the stove and then the upstairs bathroom in my pajamas. Then I changed into some comfy work-out clothes before taking on the major job of re-shelving my library, whilst also removing everything that was not a book from the bookshelves.

Then I had a cup of coffee and read an Agatha Christie mystery on my Kindle.

At this point I decided I needed to re-fold and re-classify all of my tops, so now my t-shirts are stored by sleeve length, colour and then by how much I like it. It's a complicated system, and it took me 2 hours (whilst watching a cheesy thriller) to get it properly done. I also packed my summer clothes and shoes into suitcases then put them in the loft.

Doc decided to vacuum the living room, so the cats and I retreated to the bedroom and read some more Christie.

Finally I cleaned the downstairs bathroom, including the litter trays (by the way, I use Dr Bonner's liquid soap to clean the litter trays - which is Gwyneth Paltrow's shower gel of preference. That is how fancy my cats are.)

By this point I was completely sick of cleaning, so I had a shower and put on some clean lounging pajamas and made myself a gin martini, with a splash of angastora bitters and an olive. Because, omg, I deserved it!

Book Bites.

I'm sorry, I can't blog at the moment, because I'm reading book samples on my new Kindle. Usually you get a chapter or two, which is quite a delicious amuse bouche for a reading glutton such as myself. It's my new favourite thing.

A Kindle's Journey.

For my birthday Moth gave me some Amazon gift tokens, so I could buy a Kindle! I ordered it on my birthday (along with a olive green leather case, and a book for the Doc) and have been tracking it's progress ever since. Wheeeee!

That's really been the focus of this week for me, so I've found it very hard to write blog posts that weren't just detailing the Kindle's journey from Amazon's mysterious seller facility, the location of which is merely given as "US". The first stop on the trek was Hebron, Kentucky, which gives us a clue as to the seller facility's location because it only took an hour to get to Hebron from there. We can also deduce that Hebron must be delightful, because the Kindle spent 7 hours there. What do you think? Brunch with some of the other parcels, maybe a mini spa day?

Happily refreshed the Kindle spent the next day travelling from Kebron KY to Charlotte NC, where it checked in for the night. Kindle left Charlotte for Alienspouseville at 2 o'clock this morning, and I kept checking the shipment tracker, and when it's arrival was logged I got VERY excited; so I walked to the post office at lunch time.

Did I mention that today has been the first day we've had proper snow? And, naturally, the heaviest flurry was at lunch time, so I walked to and from the post office - in the snow - to get my Kindle and...

...The delivery it was on hadn't been unpacked yet, so I have to go back tomorrow.

It'll probably snow again, and there will be some sort of geological event that will mean I'll have to walk up hill both ways. Actually it was quite a nice walk really, and it wasn't an entirely unfruitful trip, the birthday present I'd ordered for Doc C (and the t-shirt I got at the same time) had arrived, so that was something. Doc's present was an apron in suitably drab colours, the man lives in drab, with the slogan "I (pictogram of a loaf of Bread) Bread"! "I Loaf Bread"! Love it!

Alcohol and Comedy.

You know what rocks? Martini and a collection of P.G. Wodehouse short stories that you haven't read before. That delightful combination totally restores one's jolly old equilibrium.

Clearance.

Yesterday I decided to move the bookcases on the mezzanine; at the same time I also decided to get rid of some of the books that I'd read and was unlikely to read again. I lugged a laundry bag full of books into work this morning and left them on the giveaway table, by the end of the day only a few of the really cheesy looking detective novels were left.

The main reason for re-organising the mezzanine is to clear the floor space, because I've found a really nice rocking chair on sale on the Urban Outfitter's website, and I think that plus a nice rug would make that area a perfect place to curl up with a book and a cat.

I am never going to be a shining proponent of minimalism, but it's actually kind of relaxing to reduce the amount of STUFF in my home. Actually, whilst Doc's away, I think I'm going to go through my wardrobe and thin that out too. Maybe. I'm not promising anything here.

Plans for the Weekend.

I went to work today, because I was feeling a fair bit better and I knew that there was work to be done on next semester's schedule. I feel very noble, particularly as since I got home this evening my sore throat seems to be bent on developing into a full-on head cold.

On a more positive note Doc C also picked up a large stack of brown paper parcels from the post office; books I'd requested from Goodreads.

So this weekend will probably be spent curled up with a book, as I sit in front of the fire with a never-ending mug of tea.

Mmm... Garlicky...

I have finally got the hang of baked aubergine (it's a very American dish, so it's usually called "eggplant parmesan" - I just can't do it myself), thanks to Sophie Dahl's first cookbook, and Doc C even likes this version where as he could never see the point of this particular meal before.

One of the best parts of making this is that it's really delicious with home-made garlic bread, and that's a treat we've not had for a while. It isn't that we're totally eschewing carbs, but equally we aren't training for any marathons in the near future, so there's absolutely no need to carb-load on pasta AND bread.

So garlick bread is back in the meal plan! Hoorah! I use a loaf of fresh French bread baked that morning at our amazing local bakery, and that bread is delicious in itself, so it's hugely tempting to eat the whole baguette in one meal - but I've been freezing half, which is hugely restrained, don't you think?

Weekend Status Report.

The Good: I am reading Donna Tartt's "The Secret History" and loving it. It's sort of a murder mystery with academic overtones, but whodunnit is never any sort of a puzzle. It's gripping.

The Bad: The weather this weekend has been really humid and sticky, my least favourite kind of weather personally. I cannot wait for Autumn proper to kick in with some nice crisp mornings.

The Ugly: The cream that the dermatologist prescribed causes a rash to flare up on my chest, and so it suddenly feels as though every single t-shirt I own has a scoop neck to it which hits me in just exactly the wrong spot. Yesterday I discovered that wearing a scoop neck backwards creates a boatneck at the front which conceals and protects the itchy bumpiness. This will look intentional with most of my tops; the exception being henleys, so if you should happen to notice that I have a row of buttons down my back, can we just pretend it's a new fashion trend from Europe or something?

The Fabulous: Monday is Labour Day, it's like Bank Holiday Weekend, and I have finally treated myself to a copy of "Portal 2" so I intend to be spending several hours of my day off in my pajamas playing that, with occasional breaks for coffee and toast.

Book Pile-Up.

I love books, but I especially love second-hand books. When I discovered Goodreads I was immediately smitten by the swap feature, which allows users to list books they no longer want and then other readers can pay the shipping and get the book.

It does still cost $3 or $4 in postage fees, so I try to limit how many books I request, but occasionally a glut of titles that I want happen to be listed in close proximity. This is how I ended up receiving Donna Tartt's "The Secret History", Sarah Waters' "The Little Stranger" and Tim Gunn's "A Guide to Quality, Taste and Style" in the post this morning, whilst I'm still only about half-way through "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson.

Books! FOR ME!

Unconscious Repetition or Homage in Blogging.

The post I wrote yesterday about quickly skipping through a book you don't really care about seems oddly familiar. I mean I know I wrote it so it shouldn't feel completely alien to me, but it feels like maybe I've written it before maybe, or perhaps that someone else wrote something similar that I read ages ago.

Of course if I've written this before that isn't a huge problem, because it's the nature of blogging, and writing in general, to re-visit ideas; but if it did come from somewhere else then I want to be able to properly attribute it with links or something. I'm usually pretty good at remembering were I've read something, because usually I can place the authorial tone of whatever snippet I remember; but I have no idea where this might have come from if I did read it somewhere else first.

Where would I have read about a sort of messy speed reading though? It's most perplexing.

Speed Reading for Lesser Works of Fiction. *

That book I didn't finish reading has been snapped up on Goodreads, along with two others so I sent them off in a nice neat package this morning. I was intending to send them at the weekend, but then I realised that I hadn't actually read one of them so I had to give it a quick squiz.

I read really quickly, for example as a teenager I sat down and read "Wuthering Heights" in a single day (I remember feeling very stiff when I eventually finished, and I'm sure I can't have absorbed every single word but this was the required summer holiday preliminary read-through before we actually studied it at school, so that was fine); so it didn't seem unreasonable to try and read 288 pages over a weekend but I didn't get around to it until Sunday afternoon. Fortunately it didn't really grab me, so was able to employ my "I don't love this book and I want to be able to read something else, but I suppose I want to know what happens" reading method. It goes like this:

1) Read a good chunk of the start of the book, ideally to the point where you have met all the main characters and can keep track of them

2) Open the book every 10 pages or so, read whatever seems interesting and seems like it might help to follow the gist of the plot.

3) Read the final chapter. If that doesn't make sense for some reason, then repeat step two backwards and in smaller increments until you find the pertinent detail that clears the fog for you.

4) Job done.

I wouldn't recommend this as a method for reading non-fiction, or fiction you are supposed to be reading for academic purposes, but if you have a limited investment in the book and are only vaguely interested in finding out how a story ends, well then it's sufficient.

 

* By the way, by "lesser works of fiction" I mean whatever doesn't grab you personally as an enjoyable book for what ever reason, I am increasingly of the opinion that there are too many good books out there to waste too much time on books I'm not enjoying. Move on!

Migraine Avoidance Techniques.

Today I sat quietly at home, read a couple of chapters of a nice soothing murder mystery and drank mug after mug of tea.

I successfully avoided getting another headache that made my teeth feel like they were throbbing, and I'm celebrating by introducing Doc C to Russian horror sci-fi.

Dubious Books That You Can Have!

I've been doing a lot of reading this summer, and I tend to stockpile books because we don't have a big bookshop in town, and certainly not a good second-hand bookshop; this means I have a shelf full of pre-selected but unread books to browse through whenever I finish whatever I'm reading.

Earlier this week I started reading one of these stockpiled titles that I taken a risk on because it sounded interesting and I liked the cover art. Yeah, I know the axiom about not judging a book by it's cover but that is just not true, cover art is actually a reasonably good guide to what you can expect from a book - It's like that maddening "Forrest Gump" quote; you DO know pretty much exactly what you are going to get in a box of chocolates because there is a little guide on the lid, and most chocolates are shaped to give you some sort of clue anyway. Except for Revels, I will concede that they are tricky to identify without biting them, and it is always a shock when you are certain that you are about to eat a Malteaser and then it turns out to be a really large coffee cream. Ok, I'll give Gump Revels, but other than that it is a very unsatisfying analogy.

What was I saying?

Oh, right, so the book I started reading had very mixed reviews on GoodReads, it was a real Marmite debate between those who adored it and those who loathed it. I read three chapters and decided that I didn't want to spend anymore time with the title character and narrator of the book, so I stopped reading it and got another book from my stash. This is a very liberating feeling, to simply decide that my time is more valuable than this particular story, and move on without guilt. ***

If you'd like to see if you love this book or hate it, then I'm giving it away on GoodReads along with 11 other corkers, and you can peruse the list here and guess which one it is (Hint: It was added to the list today). Please note the list is not for mocking, it is purely to find new homes for books that I don't want, so they aren't my favourites but that doesn't mean they are bad; except not that etiquette book, that is rubbish.

 

*** Postscript - The book I'm talking about here is "Mathilda Savitch" by Victor Lodato. I did pick up the book again to skim read the last couple of chapters backwards, just to see whodunnit, or if anyone did anything at all really. There was a fairly pedestrian plot twist that any one reading a book about teenage girls should really be half expecting, and an icky description of Mathilda first experimentation with sex - It's like Judy Blume re-wrote "Catcher in the Rye" whilst in a particularly foul mood.

Third Day of the Weekend.

Today I did a zumba routine, cleaned both bathrooms, battled gladiators (and won! Roar!), washed three loads of laundry, played petanque with Doc C, read half a book, "walked" the cats, and helped to recapture the cats after they both escaped in separate prison breaks.

Not bad considering it was the first day we've felt the need to turn the ceiling fan on, because it was the first warm summer day and I do not do well in heat.

All in all, an memorable Memorial Day -slash- Bank Holiday Monday.

Mystery Book.

When we got home this evening there was a package sitting on the chair next to the front door, and it had Doc's name on it. This was mysterious as he never uses our home address for deliveries; we both get stuff sent to our PO box or our offices.

It was quite clearly a book, and when he opened the padded envelope it turned out to be a new book on Hume that had been sent by the publishers. That isn't unusual in itself, publishers send free copies of books to academics in the hopes they will add them to a class reading list, but you do usually have to request them. And, again, that is exactly the sort of thing that would normally be sent to Doc's office. There was a dispatch receipt in the envelope too, and I noticed that had our PO box address on it, not our home address.

So now we are very confused, and still no closer to working out who sent this to Doc or, rather, suggested the publishers should. Would anyone care to take credit? We'd be most interested!

I was toying with the idea of telling him there was a magical creature, like the Easter Bunny, who brought nice new books to good little Doctors of Philosophy, but something tells me he probably won't fall for that one.

Cookbooks.

Whilst I was at Mum's I phoned all of my aunts to say hello, and, after I'd rhapsodised over M&S food halls, Waitrose supermarkets and Pret a Manger Sandwiches, one of them said "It's all about food with you Jen!" Which, it has to be said, is true. Hence the need for calorie counting, Zumba and Pilates; so I can have my cake, eat it and fit into all my clothes still.

Mum's cooking has always been great, and I love visiting so I can try out her new favourite foods and read through her cookbook collection, on this visit she had three or four new ones that must be added to my next Amazon order. Fortunately I already have the Jamie Oliver book she particularly likes, but I hadn't actually been using it. Tthe main problem problem was that a lot of the recipes I liked the sound of called for creme fraiche, and that's quite tricky to find over here, in fact after some internet research I tracked down a supplier in North Carolina - But it's Dean and Deluca in Charlotte, which doesn't seem a very practical option for such a simple ingredient. I followed one of Jamie's recipes to cook a really nice pasta with a dead easy cheese sauce this evening and that called for a creme fraiche base. I swapped in sour cream instead, and that was fine; but it wouldn't have occurred to me to try that if I hadn't read it in Sophie Dahl's recipe book when I was browsing in Norwich. Sophie has a transatlantic background, so she's got quantities in both metric and cups, plus she makes excellent substitution suggestions, naturally her book is also on the list.

Another cookbook score from Mum's house was a small book on sweets and pastries that she hadn't found useful, but which Doc has been drooling over ever since I handed it to him. Today we bought a mini-muffin tray, an icing bag (with 28 different nozzles) and some tiny cup cake cases. So far Doc's made lemon shortbread, but I think there are mini lemon meringue pies in the not too distant future, Yum.

A Cure for Colds - Hot Drinks and Good Books.

Today I still felt awful, so I stayed at home to drink hot drinks, take DayQuil (We've run out of the gel capsules, so now I'm onto the syrup and it is disgusting) and read. I am feeling so much better this evening, so I should be able to go to work tomorrow.

For the book portion of the cold cure I've been reading my way through Jaclyn Moriarty's Ashbury High series. I bought the fourth, "Dreaming of Amelia" (American Title: The Ghosts of Ashbury High) in England and read that in a day and a half, yesterday I read the second in the series "Finding Cassie Crazy" and today I'm powering through "Becoming Bindy Mackenzie" (American Title: The Murder of Bindy Mackenzie). I've read the first one in the series "Feeling Sorry for Celia" so many times that I didn't need to re-visit it, but the others have only been read once and were perfect for a sick day entertainment; absorbing, witty and with just enough substance. Perfect. I have always particularly loved young adult novels from Aussie and Kiwi writers, such as Margaret Mahy, John Marsden and Ruth Park, and I think Jaclyn Moriarty does them proud.

The other essential part of the cure for colds is to have a cat that adores you, and doesn't move more than three feet away from you all day. Edith has been very diligent in this respect, and is clearly living up to her name sake Edith Cavell's nursing legacy.

The Past in Boxes.

This afternoon Mum suggested that I look over the stuff that was put in storage in the attic when Doc C and I left for America. It's all those things I haven't seen for three years, some of which I've missed desperately (all of my earrings!), some of which I frankly had forgotten I owned but have fallen in love with again (a pair of trays decorated with girly playing cards!), then some stuff that could immediately be put in the charity shop pile (I love Calvin and Hobbes, but they are big books to pack and imminently replaceable) and still more stuff that I was bemused by (I found three odd socks carefully packed in a lovely gold box. What was I thinking there?)

It was definitely a good thing that I looked over what I already owned before I went shopping in earnest, because I already have more belongings than I can carry onto the plane, so adding to it seems like a fool's errand. Being an ex-bookseller it is hardly surprising that my biggest problem is my beloved collection of books, some of which I've read and re-read a hundred times since I was a kid, and I've done well to reduce it down to just one medium size box - but in all honesty I can't actually close the lid on that already, and there are more books that I still want to bring. Mum's point about the usefulness of a Kindle is well timed, because I can see the benefit of having everything reduced down to a compact tablet. That still wouldn't be entirely sufficient, because a lot of my books are second-hand copies with great covers, or books that have fallen out of publication, or they've been signed by the author and how can you get that type of thing on a Kindle?

Anyway I have some time to further curate the collection before I go back to North Carolina, so in the mean time I've arranged it around the bedroom; so I can look at it at my leisure and make some difficult decisions. I suspect the framed photo of the 38 bus might just have the edge over the framed photo of seagulls on the Palace Pier, but we shall see.

Jet Set.

I've packed a variety of clothes and a crochet project, selected three books (Smiley's People; Hons and Rebels; Neuromancer) and cleaned the cats litter tray.

My work here is done for now. Time to catch a plane.

Book Choices.

My suitcase is packed and, as usual, I have a major dilemma over which books to take on the plane with me.

I've narrowed it down to:

• The Great Escape - Anton Gill
• Young Men in Spats - PG Wodehouse
• Hons and Rebels - Jessica Mitford
• Neuromancer - William Gibson
• The Oxford Book of Victorian Detective Stories
• Smiley's People - John Le Carre

 I've made a stack of these books next to my traveling clothes and I'll choose the finalists in the morning.

Catty Critiques.

The only problem with exercising at home is knowing that the cats are judging me. It's not quite so bad with Zumba, because they just run away and quite clearly think I've gone insane; with yoga or Pilates though there is a distinct air of smothered giggles as they watch me move into the required poses. Edith usually comes over to have a good look, and has been known to try to snuggle down on the yoga mat itself, but then she'll get annoyed with my feet bumping into her. It's not easy to keep your movements controlled when you have a cat rabbit-kicking your bare foot.

Still I have persevered every evening this week (alternating Zumba with Pilates), and that's a step towards the 66 daily repetitions that are (apparently) the average number it takes to form a habit. The trickiest bit has been timing it with dinner, but that's not insurmountable by any means.

I've also finished reading "The Virgin Suicides", and whilst it's a tough book to enjoy as such I did think it was well written and thought provoking. On now to "The Diving Bell and The Butterfly" an auto-biography by Jean-Dominique Bauby which he wrote after a stroke which left him paralyzed and "locked-in" to his own body. The only way Bauby could communicate was by blinking his left eye, so that was the only was he could indicate each character in the book. I suspect that it's going to be one of those stories to remember whenever I'm feeling a bit sorry for myself, and I already have a strong urge to break the fourth wall, so that I can lend it to the Lisbon sisters.

 

Pretty Good Tuesday.

Today I have been to work, did an upper body Pilates routine, read a nice chunk of "The Virgin Suicides", watched "RuPaul's Drag Race", cooked twice-baked potatoes with gruyere and mushrooms and now I'm watching "Tabatha's Salon Takeover" before bed.

Monday Morning Summary.

Yesterday sort of got away from me, I'd done my boring stuff for the day (Pilates and cleaning) in the morning, we'd had lunch and shopped for house stuff, then Edith and I had a nap. I'd only intended to sleep for half an hour, but it turned into three hours, which really wiped out my plans for the afternoon.I still had time to make dinner (roasted brussel sprouts with pecans and gruyere, I liked it but Doc didn't and who knew that pecans were so ridiculously packed with calories? What are they made from, lard?), so I did that and then went to bed with a raging headache.

I thought I'd feel better this morning, but I really didn't; so I took some advil, slept some more and came in to work a mere three hours late. I stopped briefly on the way to pick up the rocket fuel coffee that caused me to reorganise and clean the office on Friday, but this time I got a medium so hopefully this will be just enough to get me through the rest of the day without the hyperactivity associated with the large cup I had last time.

In other news I am doing really well with my intention to read more books this year, this weekend I polished off a ridiculous murder mystery, "Dorothy and Agatha", which was fun but as light as the Christie and Sayers' mysteries that it was inspired by. Now I'm moving the brows a bit higher with Jeffrey Eugenides "The Virgin Suicides". Last time I tried to read this I only got half-way through, mostly because I wasn't really in the right frame of mind to read about teenage suicide; the other reason was much more prosaic, there are no chapters and my usual method of demolishing a book is to read complete chapters every time I pick up the book until it's finished. This time I will finish it. No book shall defeat me in 2011!

***Post Script*** I tell a lie, "The Virgin Suicides" actually has 5 chapters, it's just the third chapter is much longer than the first two and that's where I got bogged down last time. Clearly I need to just power through those 92 pages, maybe with some Kendall Mint Cake to hand or something.

 

Geek Love.

I may have mentioned before I love reading, and I'm keeping track of all my books past, present and future, on Goodreads (oh hey, friend me on Goodreads!)

As a child I would read everywhere; whilst eating; when watching TV; as I was walking; Whilst getting dressed; in the car; up trees and even in the shower (it helps to have long arms for that one), but even for a seasoned compulsive reader it is really quite difficult to hold a paperback book and knit at the same time.  And, believe me, I have tried.

So I looked into book holders, and noted down several different designs as being of interest. I eventually decided on the Paperbax, not the cheapest but certainly not the most expensive, and with a very utilitarian approach to the problem. There is a rigid shelf from the center of which two spring-loaded arms are attached and these hold the pages back for you. Both the arms and the shelf have a rubberised back to them, so there isn't any slipping. Should you want the book to be free-standing, as in the photo, there are fold out wingy things on the back.

It's very simple but it works really well, and so far even the 737 pages of Sherlock Holmes didn't present it a problem.

I love this thing. Love it.