A visit to Sim Lim was made, a card reader was purchased.
Leo asleep. All the cats have their own, er, paw placement. Leo is displaying how he can stretch out as much as he likes and no other cat will dare to make him shove over.
You’d think they’d just use the Obamicon maker, but no, they’ve also ripped off the Obama for America logo. Classy. God Forbid any of us should try and effect positive change in our lives for our own sake.
Our holiday has indeed been this exciting. Not counting the driving round and round for miles in circles in Malacca. That was heart-stoppingly thrilling.
Sleeping in is such a luxury, and I’ve got myself the new Snow Patrol and Take That (squee!) albums. As well as spending a hell of a lot less on replacing watch batteries. Pretty damned hot and sticky, though!
Note: I very rarely (willingly) read books that have been hyped up like mad — like many people, it actually kind of turns me off. The only exception I’ve made in the past is for The Silence of the Lambs. Neil was suitably impressed by I am Legend to get the book, and I’ve read that since.
I wasn’t keen on reading Revolutionary Road until I kept seeing references to Yates as this lost American literary legend, so I stuck it on my wishlist and my sister got me a copy for Christmas.
The book opens with a play rehearsal and within two chapters I’m already feeling the pain and the drain of a young couple settling down far too early.
This is one of those books where, in the grand scheme of things, nothing much happens (until the end). But it is Yates’ talent that makes this utterly staid suburban couple living a life they didn’t think they would, should, or could have so incredibly painful and (I’m going to say it) unputdownable.
Frank and April Wheeler inspire so much empathy. Although it’s set in the Fifties, people haven’t changed that much. Social mores are different (no pregnant woman would be seen drinking and smoking these days without attracting demon glares from strangers), but our childish hopes and dreams and the capacity to delude ourselves haven’t gone away.
How many of us have ‘fallen into’ careers or ended up with someone only because it seemed like the thing to do at the time? Can we truly make peace with this sort of pragmatism, all day, every day? How far will we go to follow our adolescent dreams?
Spoilers come next.
(Read more.)
… but my web host sent me invoices to renew my hosting that I never received so my account was suspended. But it’s fixed now (clearly).
In an attempt to make my Google Reader more realistic, I cut out almost all my news feeds, and was planning on posting short snippets of things I wanted to comment on. Now it’s late in the day and frankly I cannae be bothered to publish loads of short posts, so here’s one list. Imagine they’re four posts.
- Nurse suspended for offering to pray for patients (story 1, 2) is political correctness gone mad. As long as she wasn’t evangelising and forcibly dunking them then pronouncing them saved I don’t see what the harm is.
- I have received a flyer and e-mail from the Scottish SPCA about the RSPCA ‘stealing food from the mouths of Scottish animals‘. I’d rather volunteer my time but I ain’t got any.
- New .tel domain seems like a mad idea. Um, we already have Facebook and Plaxo and no one needs to be that contactable. Why not walk up to a hacker and give them our personally identifying information instead?
- Ah, protectionism rears its ugly head in a country where workers are too used to a cushy life. Yet more on this Total refinery hiring non-British EU workers. If the Brits were better workers they would be hired, because any company would want to get as much as possible for their money.
… not a spectre because these unions are being pretty militant about it: Nuclear power workers join wildcat strike action over foreign labour. From what I’ve read, the foreign labour is being employed under the same pay and conditions as local staff, and they were brought in under a European law that promises fair and equal treatment for EU workers in the UK.
Oh the irony.
I’m sure these workers’ families like their cheap fashion and Asda brand food. They can’t have it both ways. Protectionism is bad because it distorts the global trading system.
