The Book Thing

As nicked from Liz.

The Big Read reckons that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they’ve printed. Well let’s see.

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.2) Italicise those you intend to read.3) Underline the books you LOVE, or strikeout the books you read but didn’t like.4) Reprint this list with your take so we can try and track down these people who’ve read only 6 or less and make them read.

1. The Lord of the Rings, JRR Tolkien
2. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen
3. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman
4. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
5. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, JK Rowling
6. To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
7. Winnie the Pooh, AA Milne
8. Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell
9. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, CS Lewis
10. Jane Eyre, Charlotte Brontë
11. Catch-22, Joseph Heller
12. Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë
13. Birdsong, Sebastian Faulks
14. Rebecca, Daphne du Maurier
15. The Catcher in the Rye, JD Salinger
16. The Wind in the Willows, Kenneth Grahame
17. Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
18. Little Women, Louisa May Alcott
19. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, Louis de Bernieres
20. War and Peace, Leo Tolstoy
21. Gone with the Wind, Margaret Mitchell
22. Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone, JK Rowling
23. Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets, JK Rowling
24. Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban, JK Rowling
25. The Hobbit, JRR Tolkien
26. Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
27. Middlemarch, George Eliot
28. A Prayer For Owen Meany, John Irving
29. The Grapes Of Wrath, John Steinbeck
30. Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
31. The Story Of Tracy Beaker, Jacqueline Wilson
32. One Hundred Years Of Solitude, Gabriel García Márquez
33. The Pillars Of The Earth, Ken Follett
34. David Copperfield, Charles Dickens
35. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, Roald Dahl
36. Treasure Island, Robert Louis Stevenson
37. A Town Like Alice, Nevil Shute
38. Persuasion, Jane Austen
39. Dune, Frank Herbert
40. Emma, Jane Austen
41. Anne Of Green Gables, LM Montgomery
42. Watership Down, Richard Adams
43. The Great Gatsby, F Scott Fitzgerald
44. The Count Of Monte Cristo, Alexandre Dumas
45. Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
46. Animal Farm, George Orwell
47. A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens
48. Far From The Madding Crowd, Thomas Hardy
49. Goodnight Mister Tom, Michelle Magorian
50. The Shell Seekers, Rosamunde Pilcher
51. The Secret Garden, Frances Hodgson Burnett
52. Of Mice And Men, John Steinbeck
53. The Stand, Stephen King
54. Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
55. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
56. The BFG, Roald Dahl
57. Swallows And Amazons, Arthur Ransome
58. Black Beauty, Anna Sewell
59. Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer
60. Crime And Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky
61. Noughts And Crosses, Malorie Blackman
62. Memoirs Of A Geisha, Arthur Golden
63. A Tale Of Two Cities, Charles Dickens
64. The Thorn Birds, Colleen McCollough
65. Mort, Terry Pratchett
66. The Magic Faraway Tree, Enid Blyton
67. The Magus, John Fowles
68. Good Omens, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman
69. Guards! Guards!, Terry Pratchett
70. Lord Of The Flies, William Golding
71. Perfume, Patrick Süskind
72. The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists, Robert Tressell
73. Night Watch, Terry Pratchett
74. Matilda, Roald Dahl
75. Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding
76. The Secret History, Donna Tartt
77. The Woman In White, Wilkie Collins
78. Ulysses, James Joyce
79. Bleak House, Charles Dickens
80. Double Act, Jacqueline Wilson
81. The Twits, Roald Dahl
82. I Capture The Castle, Dodie Smith.
83. Holes, Louis Sachar
84. Gormenghast, Mervyn Peake
85. The God Of Small Things, Arundhati Roy
86. Vicky Angel, Jacqueline Wilson
87. Brave New World, Aldous Huxley
88. Cold Comfort Farm, Stella Gibbons
89. Magician, Raymond E Feist
90. On The Road, Jack Kerouac
91. The Godfather, Mario Puzo
92. The Clan Of The Cave Bear, Jean M Auel
93. The Colour Of Magic, Terry Pratchett
94. The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
95. Katherine, Anya Seton
96. Kane and Abel, Jeffrey Archer
97. Love In The Time Of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez
98. Girls In Love, Jacqueline Wilson
99. The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot
100. Midnight’s Children, Salman Rushdie

23 read. But I'm not convinced about that, because most of them I read when I was a child (and it might not even be true, I have trouble telling real memories and not real ones apart). And Harry Potter's in there 4 times. Rubbish. I could have read more. I'm not sure.

Maybe I'll try to work my way through it. Not a bad idea. But there are some I don't want to read, and there wasn't an instruction for that. Grrr!

Magical weekends

Today my horoscope said:

"A dreamy end to June, full of fluffy bunnies, sparkling rainbows and other dreamy stuff. Very nice. Entirely impractical and quite infuriating for those trying to get any sense out of you – but very nice for you. Bless."

I like it. I have been living in a bit of a dreamy world. It's been lovely. I wonder if it's been pissing anyone off.

This weekend Carl came to visit. He stayed with Nikki, but I saw a lot of them both. Friday was impromptu drinking with Caroline, incorporating Simon's leaving do. Saturday was Crammond and pink lemonade and Dave Gorman. Sunday was a duck race and A Film with Me in It at the Film Festival. Overall there was lots of laughing and nettles and randomness and loveliness.

The weekend before was my birthday so included family and the beer festival and Katherine and hangovers. The theme* was rainbows. We also didn't have orchestra that week, but had skittles instead. I was full of cold, but until the actual snotty bit it was quite fun being delirious.

The one before that was Band Camp, which was pretty surreal for a newbie. G&S fans in a field. Mismatch of buildings and furniture, that aren't purpose built/found, but work perfectly well. Spiders. Eccentric but lovely people. Out of my depth and perfectly at home.

Before that was Kate and Ant's wedding - just lovely. Couple looked amazing and loved up. Lots of nice friends at reception. Lots of nice other families around. Plus I met a boy on a train, which was pretty fun.

In between I've been to Inverness and Wick and John O'Groats and the Falls of Shin and Bonar Bridge and Grantown-on-Spey and Kingussie for work. Lots of good sights and long drives.

*A theme has to come up at least 3 times separately, but it cannot be preempted. The only themes I've had are rainbows (for my birthday, as seen in my horoscope, out the window, on a card, cake, and specially crafted jumper) and the conga line (last festival - 2 shows and some drunk people in the street).

Weekends

I just found this 'draft' blog, and felt the need to publish it to remind everyone.

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I love weekends.



This weekend I went to Manchester for Kate & Ant's Wedding. Lovely. Just lovely.
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Transitory

I feel nowhere at the moment. And I'm quite fine with that. Just haven't felt like writing much... So here's a summary:

• Work - is going ok. Am enjoying travel. Am feeling good in the team. Have had nice interactions with everybody, some of which were surprising. For example, I'm surprised at how interested some people were in my hippo dress! Random. But I'm still not sure if this job is pointful enough for me personally to stay much longer term.
• Home - is fine. It's strange getting used to living in a new place with a new person. And because I've never shared with just one person before, it's new to me. If something's been left out, we know who did it. If I lose my keys and Eoin is in a different country, I can't get in*. If we need to be home for the gas man, someone has to take time off as we both work. But Eoin is a great housemate - doesn't mind mess or washing up or anything. I just need to be more disiplined with myself to be tidy and find corners for things to live in!
• Orchestra/'cello - is getting there. Need to sort out the insurance, etc. and see if I can afford the 'cello I'm currently borrowing to be mine. Then he will need a name. I'm not sure the whole broken 'cello story is on here (very likely not!) but I'm not going into it now. I'm also going to music camp soon, and playing in a folk festival. That's new.
• Costumes/crafting - are good. I am officially not involved in any shows, but will help out with 2 in the festival, should they need it. I'm doing things for me - making dresses - which is both improving my skills and giving me cool dresses. I think I want to do some courses and learn more. But I don't know what to do and how it could fit into my life.
• Holidays - are ACE! I've just got back from a short break in Barcelona. I'm quite in love with Gaudi. I want a house to decorate. I'm trying to go round Scotland for a week at the end of the festival, but not sure if I can do it, because I need to save all my holiday days and money for AUSTRALIA in January!!! Wheee!
• Boys - are useless. I have no interest in pretty much any of them at the moment. (This does exclude anyone who lives over 100 miles away, but are also useless.)
• Friends - are all too far away. I certainly do have some exceedingly close and speical ones here. I just miss others too.

I think that's all.

Overall, everything's fine. I still LOVE Edinburgh, but just don't know what I'm doing here or what to do next.

*This has not happened yet, touch wood, but is making me surprisingly more anxious!