A passage by Neil Gaiman (..from American Gods)

~I believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny and the Beatles and Marilyn Monroe and Elvis and Mister Ed. Listen - I believe that knowledge is infinite, that the world is run by secret banking cartels and is visited by aliens on a regular basis, nice ones that look like wrinkled lemurs and bad ones who mutilate cattle and want our water and our women.



~I believe that the future sucks and I believe that the future rocks and I believe that one day White Buffalo Woman is going to come back and kick everyone's ass.



~I believe that all politicians are unprincipled crooks and I still believe that they are better than the alternative. I believe that California is going to sink into the sea when the big one comes, while Florida is going to dissolve into madness and alligators and toxic waste.



~I believe that antibacterial soap is destroying our resistance to dirt and disease so that one day we'll all be wiped out by the common cold like Martians in War of the Worlds.



~I believe that the greatest poets of the last century were Edith Sitwell and Don Marquis, that jade is dried dragon sperm, and that thousands of years ago in a former life I was a one-armed Siberian shaman.



~I believe that candy really did taste better when I was a kid, that it's aerodynamically impossible for a bumble bee to fly, that light is a wave and a particle, that there's a cat in a box somewhere who's alive and dead at the same time (although if they don't ever open the box to feed it it'll eventually just be two different kinds of dead)



~I believe in a personal god who cares about me and worries and oversees everything I do. I believe in an impersonal god who set the universe in motion and went off to hang with her girlfriends and doesn't even know that I'm alive. I believe in an empty and godless universe of causal chaos, background noise, and sheer blind luck.



~I believe in absolute honesty and sensible social lies. I believe in a woman's right to choose, a baby's right to live, that while all human life is sacred there's nothing wrong with the death penalty if you can trust the legal system implicitly, and that no one but a moron would ever trust the legal system.



~I believe that life is a game, that life is a cruel joke, and that life is what happens when you're alive and that you might as well lie back and enjoy it." — Neil Gaiman (American Gods)


~

Matilda

Roald Dahl is the grand-daddy of children’s fiction. And weirdly enough, I hadn’t read a single one of his books. Eventually, good sense prevailed and lo!......there’s Matilda.

Matilda is a child-prodigy. Barely five-years old, she is wise and articulate. She is blessed with a thirst for reading and is also cursed with the vilest excuses for parents. They are self-absorbed, mindless twits who could have crushed the will of a lesser child. But for Matilda, exacting revenge on the Wormwoods (aptly named) is literally child’s play.

School however is a whole new-ball game. Enter Miss.Trunchball (gnnnnnh!!!). Humoungous, horrifying to behold……she cusses like crazy …snorts and snarls like an enraged rhino and has all the students & teachers alike, crapping in their pants. There’s also the ethereal Miss.Honey, Matilda’s class teacher. Kind to a fault and poorer than a church-mouse, she hopes to develop Matilda’s astounding talent. But Miss.Honey has a secret…a sad, tragic past…a past which Matilda can rectify; thanks to her brains and a newly discovered power.

Dahl’s writing style is addictive…it is dark, humourous and non-condescending towards children. No helpless billy-goats here. Matilda may be a wee lil thing…but she displays a maturity and soundness of thought that would put most adults to shame.

Yep, loved the book. Definitely heading out for The BFG now.

Am not given to gush-fests and rantings about shoes. Not much into bling-gg either. But there’s something about this(these?) super-classy pair of sneakers in fire-proof, gold-plated kevlar.....that gets me right there. :)

Indians are world's greenest : Survey

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Indians-are-worlds-greenest-Survey/articleshow/4527041.cms

The Tao of Pooh

...it means nothing......I swear!

.....I haven’t mused and murmured in quite a while.....and my Blog is fully justified in being miffed...there is someone else! (*g-asp*) (*NO!*) (*who?*)…..oh, don’t get your knickers in a twist. Am talking about the omnipresent…the all-pervading Grand Poobah of Social Networking:FaceBook. Yes, I am a compulsive status-message changer…yep, I comment like a fiend and YES! I tag like there’s no tomorrow. There I said it…I am not ashamed…I am a FB addict.

So what…may you ask, made me turn back to my much-neglected blog? A book…a sweet, funny crackhead of a book that goes by the quirky name of BIG WOO-My not so secret secret teenage blog by Susie Day.
Getting back to the book…the title is self-explanatory, so I won’t expound on it’s many delights. (I WILL ofcourse write a long, tedious review once am through…so ya-ayy!!! something painful to look forward too.) But the book got me thinking that I should blog…I need to blog…before my poor, neglected blog gets relegated to that happy place where all the other shunned blogs romp about in mock-glee.

So here’s a few topics to get back in the loop:
NEWS THAT I CAN USE: Today is International Children’s Book Day. It usually coincides with Hans Christian Anderson’s birthday, 2nd April. So I did my bit…and went to my sweet-spot: CrossWord and picked up five, luscious books. One even happened to be Anderson’ s Fairy Tales. I took it as a sign. (am a great believer of the 'signs'. I am known to smile like a prat when I see the 'signs'. The 'signs' are the bedrock of my miserable existence.) So imagine my surprise when I look up a review on GoodReads which claims that Hans Christian Anderson DID NOT write any children’s stories. His books were meant for adults and he would most probably have a hissy-fit at the comment that his books were meant for children!!!.....go figure

NEWS THAT MAKES ME SWEAT (literally and profusely) : The heat: it is bad…it is hell-filled-with-sweaty-ill-mannered-tourists- BAD!! I would have gotten all whiny and cribby and crotchety…but I am slowly but steadily wiliting…and *g-asp*…can’t………talk………anymore.

NEWS THAT IS TOTALLY IRRELEVANT BUT GRABS MY EYEBALLS, NEVERTHELESS :on Yahoo!Filmy Masala: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie's relationship has hit rock bottom after an explosive row……AGAIN!!!. Seriously Angie baby, you make it very hard to stay a dispassionate observer. You steal a supremely fine man from his lovely wife….and then proceed to turn him into a glorified nanny. He does more than his fair share…but it’s never, ever enough for you. So the guy grabs a beer and puts up his feet for awhile. Stop acting like a twonk and give the man a break

Seriously...put her on the line. We need to exchange words!


So there you a go…a personal, filled with gratuitous -bile post at your fingertips. I feel good and virtuous and am waiting to be knighted any day now! :)

My Family and Other Animals

~a wine…like the blood of a dragon and as smooth as a fish

~Albatrosses flapping around the house making noises like defective plumbling

~A giant watermelon with an inside like pink ice

~chaffinches were pinking like a hundred tiny coins among the leaves

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No one makes sigh-inducing comparisons quite like Gerald Durell. Rich and varied…these and many more generously pepper the pages of My Family and Other Animals.

Gerry has been blessed with a truly eccentric family : a long-suffering mother, a pompous elder-brother Larrie (who later becomes the eminent Lawrence Durrell), a gun-crazy brother Leslie, an acne-inflicted sister Margo…and bringing up the rearguard; a budding naturalist,Gerry himself. The story is a rambling, autobiographical account of the family’s five year stay in the picturesque Greek island of Corfu, told from a 10-year old Gerry’s point of view.

As the family hops from one villa to another…we are treated to an oddball mixture of rustic pheasants, quirky instructors and garrulous guests. And then ofcourse, there is the over-abundance of animal life…many of whom find their way into the Durrell household as Gerry’s pets. So we have: the two pups, prodigiously named; Puke andWiddle…Quasimodo, the pigeon (who discovers to his embarrassment that he is infact a ‘she’ )...Madame Cyclops, the one-eyed, pregnant turtle…the wicked pair of magpies known simply as The Magenpies…and the sardonic seagull, Alecko. Many more whacky and weird creatures make an appearance and all are described in loving-detail by the wide-eyed Gerry.

The book is tailormade for plant and animal lovers. Each page is a tribute to the beauty of Corfu and it’s innumerable treasures. You can almost savour the warm sun on your back and the frothy waves tickling your toes. You wish you had a fat bottomed boat called ‘ The Bootle-Bumtrinket’, which would sail along merrily as you tried not to turn an unbecoming shade of green with all the rocking and rolling! You can feel the restful shade of the gnarly olive-trees, the tartness of the small grapes and the headiness of a hearty-wine. Weaved in with the antics of the Durrell menagerie, the story makes you smile and even have a hearty laugh occasionally.

Bless you, Mr.Durrell, for creating such a marvellous and memorable gem.

...yet another HAPPINESS quote

For most of life, nothing wonderful happens. If you don't enjoy
getting up and working and finishing your work and sitting down to a meal with
family or friends, then the chances are that you're not going to be very happy.
If someone bases his happiness or unhappiness on major events like a great new
job, huge amounts of money, a flawlessly happy marriage or a trip to Paris, that
person isn't going to be happy much of the time. If, on the other hand,
happiness depends on a good breakfast, flowers in the yard, a drink or a nap,
then we are more likely to live with quite a bit of happiness.

~ Andy Rooney

FUZZ THERAPY

Got the proverbial blues? Need an instant pick-me-up? Have a quick look at the following strips. Calvin & Hobbes can always be counted on to make you forget your dreary moments!

'Nevertheless'

by

Catherine Widgery