The Book List

Apparently the BBC reckons most people will have only read 6 of the 100 books here.

Instructions:
1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Add a ‘+’ to the ones you LOVE.
3) Star (*) those you plan on reading.
4) Tally your total at the bottom.


1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien +
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling +
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee +
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell +
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman +
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott *
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy *
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller *
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien +
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger *
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens *
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy*
25 The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams +
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky*
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy *
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens*
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini *
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres *
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden *
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne +
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell +
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown *
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez*
44 A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving*
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins*
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery *
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy *
48 The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan *
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel *
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons*
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth*
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon*
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon *
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez*
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov*
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt*
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold *
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy*
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding*
69 Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie*
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker +
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson +
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath *
77 Swallow and Amazons - Arthur Ransome +
78 Germinal - Emile Zola*
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray*
80 Possession - AS Byatt*
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell*
83 The Colour Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro*
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert *
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry*
87 Charlotte’s Web - EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom*
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks*
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole*
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute*
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas *
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo +

Only 6?! I don't consider myself particularly well-read. I just don't have the time right now. But 6!!!!

Sorry is the easiest word to say

It seems that the bankers have apologised, and that's apparently what the public wanted, so that's all right then. problem solved, everyone happy, and 4 "unemployed" men get to keep their million pound bonus and golden handshakes and sidle off into retirement with clean consciouses.



I am not a great believer in this modern concept that one person must be responsible for all bad things that happen, and that the best solution to any incident is to sack the person at the top, but neither do I believe that saying sorry solves anything.



I don't accept that from my children, and they are all still in primary school! They have to apologise if they hurt others, but they also have to do something to make it up. As a member of the public, I do not feel at all pacified by hearing 4 rich men apologise. Especially as they don't seem to have any idea what they are apologising for>:(

A little bit of politics

well, it has been a while....

Barack Obama's meeting with Tory leader David Cameron in London earlier this year left the Democratic nominee "distinctly unimpressed", it has been claimed.

According to diplomatic sources Mr Obama, now the president-elect of the United States, emerged from the meeting in July with the words: "What a lightweight."

Mr Obama met Mr Cameron following brief talks with Tony Blair and Gordon Brown in Westminster two days after addressing 200,000 people in Berlin.

According to the Conservatives the "really positive" meeting had seen the two men discuss the "long-term underlying problems" in Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq and the Middle East.

But, according to the New Statesman, it was the conversation that followed in Mr Cameron's Commons office that caused Mr Obama to make the "lightweight remark".

A source told the magazine that Mr Cameron's "anti-European diatribe" had not impressed Mr Obama.

Two days earlier the Democrat had championed internationalism in his Berlin address.
"Partnership and co-operation among nations is not a choice; it is the one way, the only way, to protect our common security and advance our... humanity," he said.

Another reason to like Obama......

The richest country in the world

has just released details that it is ranked 42nd in the "development index"

you can read some factoids here, or the full report here but below are some interesting snippets about the civlisation that the whole world is apparently stiving to emulate!

health
The U.S. ranks #24 among the 30 most affluent countries in life expectancy - yet spends more on health care than any other nation.

The U.S. infant mortality rate is on par with that of Croatia, Cuba, Estonia, and Poland;

education
By age three, the children of affluent mothers have vocabularies twice as large as those of the children of low-income mothers.

Twelve percent of Americans lack the literacy skills to fill in a job application or payroll form, read a map or bus schedule, or understand labels on food and drugs.

More than one in five Americans - 22 percent of the population - have “below basic” quantitative skills, making it impossible to balance a checkbook, calculate a tip, or figure out from an advertisement the amount of interest on a loan

wealth
The top 1 percent of U.S. households possesses a full third of America’s wealth.

Households in the top 10 percent of the income distribution hold more than 71 percent of the country’s wealth, while those in the lowest 60 percent possess just 4 percent.

In 1980, the average executive earned forty-two times as much as the average factory worker; today, executives earn some four hundred times what factory workers in their industries earn.

The real value of the minimum wage has decreased by 40 percent in the past forty years.

equality
In every racial/ethnic group, men earn more than their female counterparts.

In 2004, median net worth was $140,800 for whites, and $24,900 for nonwhites.

In 98 countries, new mothers have 14 or more weeks of paid maternity leave. The U.S. has no federally mandated paid maternity leave.


crime

Premature death by homicide is more than five times higher in the U.S. than the OECD average; 68 percent of U.S. homicides in 2006 were committed with a firearm.

In absolute numbers and as a percentage of the population, the U.S. has more prisoners than any other country, including China and Russia.

Hitting home

Mstr A was suspended from school yesterday. He's not allowed on the school premises until Tuesday morning, which means he is missing the end of term party for his after school club (which he absolutley adores and was really looking forward to), and the school fete today.

Yesterday was not a happy day:(

I don't think he's grasped the severity of suspension, despite the fact that I have tried in every way I can think of to explain it, and terrify him into believing that school is his best option by far....

I was at work. I KNOW that nothing would have been different if I'd been at home. But I was at work. He's 7 years old, suspended from school, and I wasn't even there to talk to the teachers.

I spent the afternoon adding up the sums every way possible. If I leave work we would have to sell the house. Renting a property would be more expensive than paying the mortgage, but welfare benefits only cover rent, so that would be the only way to have a roof over our heads. So I'm staying at work. I'm quite concerned about the summer holidays, but.....

I'm all for workers rights but

They want £40,000 BEFORE overtime to drive a bloody lorry?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7447548.stm

That's FOUR TIMES my wages, and I don't have the option of overtime to top it up (theirs is compulsory).

I'm off to get my tanker licence.

I am so glad I don't live in London any more

If the Evening Standard is right and Boris has won. I'm no great fan of Ken the man, but Ken the politician has improved Londoners lives twice now, both times against the will of the ruling politicians. Whereas Boris the man may be funny on TV, Boris the politician is as scary a prospect as possible in today's Britain. Anti-Europe, anti-immigration, anti-welfare state, pro-imperialism, pro-hunting, pro-lbertarianism, i dread to think what his legacy wil be to a city of 14 million people.


I offer, for your opinion, some of Boris' most well know quotes:

The proposed ban on incitement to “religious hatred” make no sense unless it involves a ban on the Koran itself.
Daily Telegraph

Both the minimum wage and the Social Charter would palpably destroy jobs.
Lend Me Your Ears

That is the best case for Bush; that, among other things, he liberated Iraq. It is good enough for me.
Daily Telegraph

I can't remember what my line on drugs is. What's my line on drugs?
"The Genelection Game", Sunday Mirror,

Voting Tory will cause your wife to have bigger breasts and increase your chances of owning a BMW M3.
Said in April 2005 during the general election


And finally, from a man who knows him well....
He may seem like a lovable buffoon but you know he wouldn't hesitate to line you all up against a wall and have you shot.
Jeremy Hardy on Radio 4.

Out of the mouths of babes..

The queen is coming to Mstr A's school next week.


My boss asked if we wanted the afternoon off to go see her, which me & colleague thought was hilarious - although oviously we haven't actually turned him down. an afternoon off may be useful;-)


I tried to catch Mstr A's taecher to ask him about it, but he's off on a course all week! As I've got the time availabe, I was going to offer to assist with Mstr A during the visit. we don't need a repeat of his first school harvest festival in the church..... All the children trooped in, sat quietly, listened to the sermon, and then the vicar?priest? said "let us pray", and all the children bowed their head readfy to sit & contemplate their toenails in silance for a few minutes, except Mstr A who jumped up & called out "I don't need to pray, I don't believe in od" and wandered off to play:-) I mean, full marks for making your own decisions and standing by your beliefs, but possibly a little more social awareess amy ahve been in order:-)



Or when Germaine Jackson came to visit. Big kudos to the school - he only went to half a dozen around the whole country, but Mstr A wouldn't shut up about how he talked funny (US accent) and who was he anyway? It took me WEEKS of explaining that once he had some pop hits, but mostly he was the brother of someone else, who once had some pop hits but was mostly known for doing dodgy things with little boys, and no, i don't really know how that makes him a spokesperson for an anti-bullying campaign, and no, you can not watch the big brother programme they were all talking about!


So without any advice available form the school, I decided to broach the sunject with him. He had been told, so happily entered into conversation about it...

"Mummy, the queen is coming to my school next week"

"I know darling. Will that be fun?"

"yes, it's very exciting"

"Do you know who the queen is?"

"yes!"

"who is she?"

screws up face. Taps teeth. Stares upwards for a while.

"it's quite difficult to explain"

"Do you know what she does?"

"she lives in a palace"

"Do you know what she looks like?"

"no. But I can imagine...." (I feel he is likely to be disappointed)

"Do you know why we have a queen?"

"no"

"do you know why she is visiting your school"

"no"



Me neither!

feeling better

It's always good to have an argument debate - and you can always guarantee a good response by slagging of that old queen of tarts hearts, lady Diana Spencer, (she wasn't Princess Di, they took that title away from her, along with the right to be called "your highness" when she was divorced - I've always wondered how pissy Charlie got when he heard she'd managed to get herself killed, just after he'd put all that effort into being allowed the divorce, and then painstakingly PR'd himself out of being a shit and her into being a wacko.....He could've just waited a few years and been rid of her easily whilst gaining public sympathy!), and I've managed to get the most comments for ages on my joke post about festivals. feel free to wander down there and villify me for my callousness and heartlessness because I JUST DON'T CARE that she's dead. Still, I didn't much care that she was alive either.

Now the Queen mum - that was a much sadder day. the day she died I was travelling across London to go and identify my baby brother's body. He was 25. He worked for the council and was involved in many large projects that have made 10'000's of peoples lives that little bit better. I can't think of many more revolting ways to "celebrate" the 5th anniversary of his death this year than to invite a bunch of people who did not know him to a party!

Anyway, things are starting to get back on a bot more of an even keel for me now. Nothings really changed, but I'm feeling more like interacting with the world again. Nanny A is back from her holiday, and out of hospital! She ended up there with a serious chest infection just a day after arriving home! We went to see her at hospital at the weekend, and have just got back from checking in on her at home this evening. She's looking much better - there is still a way to go, obviously, but she's on the mend. I've finally started sorting out all my out sports stuff. I'm offering it to Mstr A's school first - if they don't want it I might ebay the lot:-) I've finally booked in for next years college course.

Work is picking up again. Both types - employed work because the system is changing (again) which means it looks like I'm going to get a lot more responsibility a lot quicker that I thought. Which is good, cos I'm not good a keeping my head down and shutting up. I try, but then things happen, and I have an opinion...... Self employed work because I'm an idiot who apparently can not count to three any more - I still have over a year left on my current tutoring qualification, so have been catching up with a few courses and making a bit of money ready for our holiday in August.

Mstr A got invited to a birthday party. That's two this year!

LMB adored "big" school and wants to go again every day:-)

LMD has finally grown her legs a bit and is now out of her 12-18 mth clothes, and into the prettier older stuff - although she is 2 1/2 going on 16 at the moment in attitude!

Generally, things feel like they are moving again. I'm not sure where, but moving is good:-)

Truth, Justice and the American way

I'm confused (OK, I know it doesn't take much, especially when talking about our USA cousins, but .....)

Can anyone explain to me how a Democracy, a world leader of freedom and personal responsibility (certainly in their own eyes), a country based on the fact that all men are equal in the eyes of the state, where the leaders are the loudest denouncers of dictatorship or tyranny in any form, can anyone explain to me how the president of THIS country has the ability to completely ignore the rule of law and due process and can apparently just turn round to the entire judicial system and stick to fingers up at them?

HOW does the president have the power to commute Libby's sentance? It was arrived at following all the corrrect procedures, using all the correct channels and people and systems, yet after the fact, Bush can change it? What?!

One has to ask, does he have the power to do the opposite? When someone had been found innocent in court, could the president decide that actually they were guilty/deserved a prison sentance anyway? Surely it is the same power?

Surely that is something only dictators do?

Isn't that what we condemn China for doing? And others?

I am NOT a media whore

But me and Mstr A are apparently going to be on the radio this afternoon. I'm not too sure how this happened - I really didn't court the publicity this time! In fact, I don't really want it - I like the school, Mstr A is getting on really well there, LMB will be starting there in September. I don't want to antagonise them, or start getting into arguments with what they are doing - i think they are a very good school, and the Head teacher has worked brilliantly with us as a family to help Mstr A settle in well and to really enjoy going there!

But Radio Bristol have been trying to get hold of me all weekend! They really want to do this interview, and it is an issue that I think is important. Which is why I felt compelled to comment on the original story (now changed to include the schools rapid back-peddalling statements). There are few things that I feel are both importnat enough and that i have the knowledge to comment publically on (not publically like this blog - which has a readership of a dozen or so, but publically like on the BBC!), but this is one. It is the only time I have put a comment on the BBC website! and it would be wrong to NOT put my opinion forward when asked for it now.

Plus, there seems to be an element of sleaze entering into this story now - with the school apparently claiming that Mstr A was upset & crying when walking alone - and that other 6 year olds would be OK to walk to school, just not Mstr A. Which I had not heard from anyone before - not from the other parents, not from Mstr A and definitely not from the school. If he was upset, and they failed to tell me, surely THAT is a breach of their duty? Still, I find it extremely unlikely thta he was. He was certainly upset when I told him he was not allowed to go on his own. And today when I said that the school had decided that 6 was old enough, he immediately asked if he could go on his own from now on.

I suggested he wait 'till September when he is a junior - which was always my intention anyway! Oh well, as Radio Bristol want to speak directly to him, and I am confident that he will both be able to explain road safety and describe his route to school and how he wants to go off on his own - in fact the problem might be getting him to stop talking:-)

"Nil Points"

It's Eurovision time again. A great British tradition celebrated around the country the way we will be doing tonight - with plenty of alcohol, good friends, Sir Terry Wogan's bemused commentary, and a whole load of laughs. The Brits see Eurovision raher like a Gay Pride march. Colourful, fun, and totally camp.

Unfortunately, the rest of Europe doesn't seem to share our views.

Well, the Germas seem to think it's a good excuse to be as outlandish as possible - which is always fun. Most of western Eurpoe sees it as a song competition, and take it deathoy seriously. And Eastern Europe seems to think it's a political statement of some kind.

As most of the contest is stacked with old Eastern Bloc countries now, I confidently expect to do atrociously with our spectacularly camp novelty song by total unknowns.



But as we bankroll the whole thing we get a free pass into next years competitonanyway, so it will continue to be an annual tradition.

Plus, I bet we'll have far more fun watching our lot lose, that many other countries peoples will have watching their people do well:-)

What to say?

I am a bit lost for words at the moment. I havn't even found anything of use in the news - usually a good fount of rants and raves.

But what can you say about the events in Virginia yesterday? 32 people dead for no reason whatsoever. My thoughts go out to their friends and reatives. I wonder how come the first information that was released about the gunman's identity was that he was an immigrant. He moved to the US aged 8. That makes him an American to all intents and purposes. i wonder about the fact that despite his know metal instability, worries about his comprehension of reality and previous compliants against him, he was able to buy a gun & ammunition without anyone blinking an eye. But more that anything, I wonder what you can say in answer to the assertion that it was not his having a gun that was the problem, but the fact that all the other students didn't, and therefore we should be arming all our students in order to ensure there are less shootings!

What can you say as yet another day brings yet more deaths in Iraq? When even the most optimistic reports put the death toll at 60,000 Iraqi's in 3 years, how can we even start to comprehend what is happening there? How can we justify what is happening there? How can we claim that Iraq is better now than it was before? Will we stay until the death toll surpasses that under Saddam Hussein - because right now we are easily equalling it on a daily average!

Even on a more personal note I am lost for words today. Mstr A has been showing every sign of being two years old - with the size and strength of a large 6 year old. He can be so wonderful at times, still hugging and kissing me, but as soon as I tell him to do something he turns into a screaming demon. It's exhausting.

I'm trying to work out how to tell my mother that I don't want to go to my second cousin's wedding in a couple of weeks. She got so excited when I said it would be nice to attend that she went off and made special arrangements. But I'm not happy about leaving Aggie on his own with the kids again for the weekend. He found it hard going last weekend, and is in a lot of pain now. And I'm not that bothered about attending the very religious Jewish wedding of someone I have not seen for ten years. In london. Over bank Holiday weekend. It would be nice, but not something i'm desperate to do.

Oh well. Enough words seem to have come to fill up a post. Perhaps I will feel more optimistic soon. At least I have some nice stats to back up my reasons for not wanting to return "home" to London and my mother. Where she lives has just ranked second from bottom of the best places in the UK for family life:-0

Woo-Hoo!

We got our money out of the bank! (if you don't know what I'm talking about, see Aggies blog here and here). They agreed to settle for £30 less than we claimed - the £30 court fees we'd paid to show that we really were serious about going all the way:-) that's the mortgage sorted for the next couple of months:-) Plus one over on the banks. Woo hoo! Of course, it was coupled with a very stern letter saying it wasn't their fault, they weren't a ccepting liability or admitting fault, and that if we ever deign to even sneeze in the bank's direction again the will close our account. but that's OK, we've been wanting to close our account for years - ever since they were taken over by RBS and became shit. It's just that we were alays too overdrawn for anyone else to take us on. Now we've got an extra couple of grand in the bank, our overdraft is low enough to move. we're changing banks next month anyway.

Mstr A started swimming lessons again on tuesday evening. it's a bit of a rush for me, but he managed to almost participate in the whole lesson. Also, when I spoke to his teacher (10 secs before the lesson started - even though I wrote to the pool weeks ago) about him having aspegers, she said her day job was working with autistic children, so at least she knew what I was talking about, and did a good job of keeping him with the rest of the group.

I have decided not to attend the interview for the PGCE course tomorrow. despite having put in the effort to write up my notes of Dracula:-) Bath is really a bit far, and I like what I'm doing. If this had come up two years ago it would have been different, but I'm going to stick with law for now.

And on a totallydifferent note: I see that Cadbury's schwepps are going to split into Cadbury's and schwepps. Umm, wasn't that what they were originally?

And how come the gov't regularly complains at how much the olympics is going to cost us, and is appalled that the bill for new roads, public transport, houses, facilities, total regeneration of some really revolting slums, and unimaginable PR across the world is nearing the £10 billion mark, but the same gov't is telling us that we desperately ned to spend TWICE that much on a couple of new Trident nuclear weapons, which will be aimed out into the middle of the ocean for the next twenty years?

Education, education, education

If my kids attended this school I would withdraw them immediately. Not only do I not wish them to learn how to kill others, I'm not keen on them attending a school where others are taught to do so!

I can't believe the DfES are apparently happy that developing children are being rountinely beaten in school, under the teachers supervision! Because that it what boxing is - regular beatings, aimed specifically at the head. It is an established medical fact that blows to the head can cause brain damage. Children's brains & skull's are still developing & so are more prone to damage.

I was hit by a boxer once as a child. He was the same age as me. I was knocked out cold. That is NOT something to teach children to do!

Boxing is criminally wrong imo. I know it's a "way out" of some of the nastiest parts of the UK. So is drug crime. It doesn't make it desirable. I would support a ban on the whole "sport" as is currently exists. I am shocked and very concerned that it is being re-introduced to schools.

Taking what I can get

I'm all for reducing the NHS costs with a bit of lateral thinking, and a bit less medical intervention. For years I've been saying it would be cheaper and more medically effective to send Aggie of to somewhere hot for a couple of weeks two or three times a year than to pay out £10k+ on drugs for his psoriasis and depression (although the new expensive drugs work even better thanh ot climates), but this story just made me wonder......

Can I turn up at my local clinic and claim that I am a drug addict, get a clean blood test and go shopping? Cos I sure as hell can't afford to actually become a drug addict! Or go shopping:-(

Here be pirates

It's wot made Britain great y'know - piracy & smuggling. Our great & glorious history in action:-)


My advice is...... salvage two BMW's, report one of them, claim the reward. It should be just about enough to pay the road tax on the other one;-)

mmmm, Devon's not that far - I wonder what will be left by tomorrow;-)