A review of the book within the book

The End of Mr Y (Scarlett Thomas)

Ok when I started this book I instantly thought ooooh this is going to be really clever and exciting and gripping.  I did from the start think it was bizarre and to be honest it is not an easy story to explain but i’ll give it a go.  Ariel (our heroine) comes across a mysterious book, extremely rare and rumoured to be cursed to those who read it.  So obviously she reads it.  The book is called the End of Mr Y.  In this cursed book she comes across a recipe which in the story allows Mr Y to travel to some other world (alternate universe?) where he can jump into other people’s minds (amongst other things).  Ariel has her suspicions (valid) that this might be a real recipe and so tests this out.  There then follows a long and winding string of consequences which form the rest of the book (the one i’m reading) does this make sense? Not really? Neither does the book...

I did enjoy it and it suggests some interesting things to think about, sub consciousness, thought process and various science stuff but it delves a tad too deep for me, I did get lost quite a few times and to be honest I was very disappointed with the ending, well I’m not really sure what happened exactly.  But if you want something to read that taxes the brain then go for this.  Some great ideas and very original but i’m not sure it altogether makes sense,  but that could just be me being a bit dense.

My question is this...If the book ‘The End of Mr Y’ is cursed to those that read it, then by calling the book the same title as the book in the book are they trying to make me think I’m now cursed?     

Oh the picture? Yeah there are talking mice in the book too...

Week 15 - Painting like a crazeee lady

Easter break for me has meant lots of time off, but although it’s been time off work I’ve been busy at the house.  In between eating chocolate eggs,  I’ve been working my socks off to get the front and back rooms painted, glossed and all ready for Danny to fit the laminate flooring! And I’m nearly there, front room is finished and the dining room will be finished tomorrow... (Apart from a bit of wall papering, this will happen at a later stage).  I spent hours varnishing the window frames and the wooden cabinet and am so pleased with it, it looks wicked! It was so nice to get rid of the nasty net curtains too!  Although I have now got varnish on my hands as well as gloss that won’t come off!   

This week we have had a visitor...

The Heron has been eating all the neighbour’s fish and we caught him staking out our pond! Luckily Graham was round at the time and managed to construct some mad looking rope/stick/mesh contraption to cover our pond while the Heron is about (I should have taken a picture of that) but we might have to get something more permanent if he sticks around as otherwise our little fishes will be munched!!  It’s such an incredible looking bird though, can’t believe how big they are, and he was just perched on our roof!

Had a couple of the neighbours pop in for a sneaky peek today, they seemed impressed (and also a little jealous of our giant cooker).   I’ve been trying to persuade Jamie to move in, the last week I’ve been whispering in his ear, complaining, talking really loudly about it, writing it in my blog on the internet for all to see... but now I guess *sighs* it would now make sense to wait for the floor to be done before we move in, which is being started on Friday.  But I don’t know how long it will take or if it will all get done over the weekend we shall have to wait and see.  The drum kit has moved in all on its own ahh bless.  I have been packing stuff up and sorting out my things at home and my room already looks a bit empty, very weird indeed.  I just want to move in now!!!! I have been very patient (for me) up until now. Come on little house not much to do now, I can’t wait to see everything finished.   

Week 14...Coffee deprived Carpet Fitters

Our house finally looks like a home, hoorah! I haven’t blogged for ages, for one thing I’ve been so busy over at the house that I’ve just not had time and for another all the painting we had done was, yes you guessed it...white, so the photos would not have been very exciting.

But still, after looking at the pictures I last posted and looking at some I took today it really does look different, all these hours slogging away is going to be worth it. 

The carpet is ridiculously light, it looks amazing but I’ve decided no one is allowed to walk on it!

The front bedroom as of today...all done and dusted, mattress was delivered today aswell, just waiting on the bedstead on Friday and we can actually sleep in our house! Yippee!

Second bedroom we’ve painted the chimney breast black and glossed everything although some will need a second coat. 

Jamie’s Dad Danny has been working really hard every weekend, fitting skirting’s and door frames, the cooker and all sorts of stuff for us! He is also going to do all the laminate flooring downstairs, the next big job on the horizon!

Hall way and staircase are all done now...apart from the hand rail, didn’t manage to get that painted in time for today.

I was so excited to see the carpet down today.  I did however piss the carpet man off as he wanted a coffee and it hadn’t even crossed my mind...we don’t actually have a fridge plugged in so no milk, oh and I don’t really drink tea or coffee so although we had a kettle (which was still in the box) we had nothing to put in a cup, he was a tad grumpy after that!

Downstairs looks much the same as it did before as we’ve been concentrating on the upstairs but the cooker is in and looks very posh ooooh I wonder how you use it?

There is just still more painting to be done downstairs now, argh I used to love painting, I think I will be very relieved when I put down my paintbrush for the final time, in fact I may throw it down and dance around it in joy.

Over Easter we will hopefully start moving our things into the house and we may move ourselves in too depending on how things go!

It's...nearly...in...reach..............

Week 12 - A splash of colour & some tiles

This week feels like it has literally dissappeared.  The house is not finished but after what seemed like slow progress all week, tonight after clearing out some of the rubbish and washing some of the dusty floors I actually felt like we are getting there.  Our goal now is to finish the upstairs so that we can get the carpet fitted before the bed arrives so that we can finally sleep in it!! So this weekend and next week will more than likely be painting every night again in a last dash to get it ready for mr carpet man.

The kitchen has a few more bits done, jays dad is going to fit the oven for us soon.  We did however have a small disaster last sunday night when we popped over to find water leaking out of our ceiling and dripping down the kitchen wall.  Unfortunatley the plumber has been back in and can't seem to find a leak anywhere...so tonight we have left the heating going full pelt to see if it happens again.  So that is still a bit of a problem.  This is what the kitchen looks like now it has been tiled :o)

The bathroom has also been tiled and am really pleased with it! We will have the plumber back for one more day next week to finish the bath, fit the shower, screen and panel and that will be it, the bulders will be no more.  So really it's all up to us now to jump the final hurdle.

Our first splash of colour! Soooo nice to see some colour am fed up with painting everything white, although it looks so clean and bright.  We went for a dark midnight blue on our bedroom chimney breast! The bedroom is now pretty much fininshed, I've even painted the skirtings and the door so once the carpets it'll be the first room to be complete, hoorah!

Tommorrow Jenny is coming to help me with yet more painting, lets see how much we can get done...

Memories of Krakow...

Krakow April 2008

Memorable Moments:

The Horse and cart ride around the main market square ‘Rynek Glowny’

Lisa’s obsession with cheeto’s! Cheeto’s for breakfast, cheeto’s for lunch…

Having lunch outside surrounded by pigeons, Hayley’s favourite bird…

The Party Tram! While walking down the road in the evening we heard music getting closer and closer.   Then a tram fit to bursting with people dancing up against the windows, loud pumping music and disco lights flashing went past us with a sign saying Party Trams!

The ‘Alkohole’ shops

Trying to pull off ‘jump’ photos where everyone was in the air at the same moment

Arriving at our hostel, whose walls had bullet holes on the outside, it was pretty gloomy looking and had 4 beds literally next to each in a tiny room, but it did what we needed for the few days we were there.

The beer man! Who we stumbled upon three times in one day around the city – although we couldn’t be sure it was the same one…

Lisa studying for her ACCA exam on the aeroplane

Our trip to Auschwitz.  I have many memories from this trip to the concentration camp.  The image which will always stay with me was the room full of shoes.  Just hundreds and hundreds of shoes filling an entire room from top to bottom.  Shoes worn once by real people who were stripped of their belongings, even their shoes.  There were other rooms which had collections of spectacles, clothes, suitcases there was even a room full of hair.  Inside the buildings were photos of the people who had lived there.  It was an emotional day, incredibly sad, we all felt outraged, angry and upset.  At the same time it was very informative and although seeing all this was distressing for some reason I felt it was important I had seen it.  It was unsettling walking and standing where people slept and lived in such awful conditions, their beds were like bunks just hard wood with a few strands of straw.  I will never forget Auschwitz.  

Architectural genius:

Wieliczka Salt Mine, one of the oldest working salt mines in the world.  The lift down into the mine seemed to go on forever, very claustrophobic and had so many people crammed in to the cage.  The mine itself was incredible full of statues and a whole chapel carved out of rock salt.  We each got a piece of rock as a souvenir and the tour guide dared us to taste it!

Wawel Castle was surrounded by a big courtyard where we sat and ate Jazz lolly ice creams and watched people passing by.  There were flowers and blossom in bloom which were really pretty.

Little houses along cobbled streets with painted fronts to look like bricks.

Culinary Delights:

There was this amazing Ice Cream parlour in the square and the queues went outside the shop even though it was so cold!  There were no seats inside so we sat outside eating huge ice creams smothered in fruits and sauce shivering in hats and gloves with silly grins on our faces.

I honestly can’t remember what and where we ate in the evenings! I’m sure we must have had some local traditional foods at some point.

What the Weatherman says: (April)

Freezing cold most of the time, we did have good weather though and sometimes the warm sun came out.  The only rain we had was whilst we were at Auschwitz quite fitting for the mood.

Arty Fartyness:

In the main square there is a huge bronze statue of a sideways head called Eros Bendato which we had a lot of fun with…

We visited some parts of the old Jewish quarter known as the ‘ghetto’ where parts of the film Schindler’s List were filmed.

Walkometer/Exhaustion Rating: 5/10

There was lot’s of sights to see but we made use of the transport, the trams were very handy for getting around so we didn’t tire ourselves out with too much walking.  If it were warmer though I could imagine you’d do a fair bit of walking.  The journey to Auschwitz was a hefty amount of time spent on a very rickety old bus!