Saturday 6 September 2008

What I have done today


I may start a new sort of diary posting.

Last night Holly stayed over night at our house because Eleanor has fallen out with Eden (girls of this age seem to fall in and out with each other very quickly). I said that I have a picture of Eden on my blog and Holly requested to see it but started pulling faces at the picture lol. I am sure that will all be friends with each other eventually and I reminded Holly and Eleanor that they have been known to fall out with each other on a number of occasions. They went upstairs to watch some children's DVDs which they had obtained from 'the Chinese bloke at the hairdressers'. They have some caterpillars from the garden which they are looking after and which they let move about in a dolls house by the corner of the bed. I have found out from this that caterpillars must sleep because sometimes in the morning the a caterpillar has been very still, lifeless even, and I have been alarmed but it can be 'woken up' by being picked up in the palm of Eleanor's hand and seems to be perfectly alright.

We went into town to buy some trousers for school and pick up Eleanor's new glasses which are little brown square ones, which are quite fashionable now and are like her teachers. Jack said they were 'Peter Parker glasses' and this started a general conversation about comic heroes. Jack has picked up from somewhere that Heath Ledger took an overdose because he was traumatised by playing the really scary new joker in Batman. I was curious about this and took the opportunity of having a look at his biography in HMV. Not true at all. However, I looked at some of the pictures of the new Batman film in Waterstones, and it does seem unnecessarily black and nightmarish, like a lot of films now.

We get the sweat shirts from Rawcliffes but it is always a good bet to get trousers from somewhere like BHS. There was a great sale at BHS on and Mark got me a sheepskin coat £75 reduced to £15 so I can wow them at the school gates. Jack was fingering a Simpsons T-shirt for a long time so we got the hint and bought him it.

The we went for dinner at The Subway. I love the Subway and had steak and melted cheese, with lots of salad. Got a shock to my tastebuds when I ate a guerkin, however. I should really not ask for everything but I like my money's worth. I like the way you can choose what bread you want and it is toasted and it is a sort of conveyor belt of sumptuous things added to your sandwich in quite a theatrical way. It's a bit of an improvement on MacDonalds, and I imagine it must have started in somewhere like New York as a delicatessan.

Then we went to Waterstones. I got the Life Of Pi because it is famous and I want to know what it is all about. The kids got comic sort of books. When we got home I covetted Mark's books because he always get more interesting ones and I get the pretentious ones lol

We also went into HMV and I got the 'Electric Light Orchestra' which I have always thought were great, tuneful and cheerful and am not afraid of admitting this. We put it on in the car and the kids thought it sounded old-fashioned and tinny (the quality of sound is nowhere as good as you get now) but were soon jigging about to 'Sweet Talking Woman', when they thought I wasn't looking. Great melodies always stand the test of time.

Then we went to Hessle Road to get some new shoe shoes for Jack. We have always bought expensive Clarks shoes (up until recently £40 ones) while he was growing up but it seems less important now and this shop was cheap shoes par excellence. I can never buy any shoes from here as they last a few weeks what with the distances I travel on my dogwalking. Jack has wide toes and there was some debate about whether his feet would be crushed by the narrow shoe. However, the argument that won it was mine that the shoe would very quickly loosen up because it was made of cheap material, and would probably fall to bits soon anyway LOL

Well, I have already read 'Life of Pi' quickly. Some of it is quite interesting about animal behaviour, and it seems to be some sort of allegory. I think the different animals he is in the boat with stand for different aspects of the psyche or different religions. I think what has happened to him is so traumatic that he can only write about it allegorical terms, possibly, but can't see how it all fits in. Can't make head nor tale of it to be honest. Started reading Mark's book 'Will' about Shakespeare and the bawdy goings on. That's more like it LOL

Read a bit more of Life of Pi last night and it is really a very uplifting and humanist tale which turns horrific events into a poetically written encounter between a man and a tiger in a small boat. Maybe a sort of allegory of the human condition in which people use their skills, intelligence and tenacity
to fight back against impossible odds. So that's why it won the Booker Prize. While I am trying to write this Eleanor keeps pushing in to see clips of the X Factor on You Tube. LOL

4 comments:

Irene said...

A very entertaining post, Bev. You sound like I write. Sort of rambling on about your day. Very informative. I like that. I tried to read The Life of Pi, but couldn't get into it. I didn't like the alligorical part of it at all. It is too unrealistic for me. Some people just read books, because convention tells them they must be read.

lebanesa said...

I was just thinking the same, your post is lively and hyper and full of detail, just like Irene's most recent one, something in the air maybe?
Hate to admit it with you two saying what you did, but I really liked the Life of Pi when I read it a while ago. I even recommended it to my hubby as I found it so fascinating and weird. Sometimes it is better to read things before they are hyped up - I was thinking of blogging again and saying something about the books I've been reading recently... but maybe I won't - for fear of sounding poncey. LOL You were successful in your shopping trip. I spent 5 hours in Bristol yesterday and managed to buy a clothes horse, some picture frames (not what I went to IKEA for!) and a blouse. I think I'm a difficult age for clothes - everything I find attractive seems inappropriate for an old lady. LOL

Bev said...

I enjoyed writing this posting, but it is nowhere as good as the master's lol

Frances, I think you should write about the books you have been reading and people would be very interested to hear what you have to say. I don't think you need to apologise for being well read. I just feel some sympathy for you, living among the philistines as I do. As for poncey, let us be the judge of that LOL

I do like the Life of Pi and have written another paragraph about it at the bottom of this posting after I had read it properly.

Bev said...

Frances, never let the opinions of others put you off. Quite often people don't know what the hell I am going on about but it has never stopped me LOL