Category: Reasons to be cheerful

Tree!

On By Laura MorganIn Christmas, Reasons to be cheerful

I was all set to resurrect last year’s minimalist white and gold decorations in my egg, but when I took them out and plugged them in none of the lights were working properly, and it all looked a bit sad. Elegantly understated only works when it – well, works.

So I ventured out in search of replacements and, without quite knowing what I was doing, found myself buying a real tree. This is the first real tree I’ve ever had of my own, so I think I must definitely be grown up now. It’s decorated with coloured lights and blue lametta and there isn’t really space for it in the front room, but I love it all the same.

(This photo was taken on the beloved’s phone, hence the slight abstract electro quality.)

Happy Thanksgiving

On By Laura MorganIn Reasons to be cheerful

I wanted to post a clip of this song, but YouTube only has a dreadful-quality clip from the film or a choice of lots of high school productions, which are sweet but kind of awful. So I’m sacrificing video for the sake of a proper recording, because it’s a good song and you need to be able to hear the words. Turn up the volume and enjoy.

New books!

On By Laura MorganIn Books, Reasons to be cheerful

I’ve proudly stuck to my two-year-old resolution not to buy new books, but I make an exception for book club books, because it’s not always possible or practical to get hold of a library or second-hand copy in time.

As a result, today for the first time in, ooh, ages, two shiny new books have arrived on my desk (literally: we have a very obliging postman at work). The first, Global Women: Nannies, Maids and Sex Workers in the New Economy, looks interesting and thoughtful, but the one sending anticipatory shivers up my spine is Come Closer by Sara Gran, about which I know almost nothing except that it’s scary. I like scary books, and the cover blurb is enough to make me want to feign sickness, go home and read the whole thing in one sitting:

Hypnotic, disturbing… a genuinely scary novel

and

Deeply scary, blurring as it does the bounds between everyday life and the completely unthinkable. Just don’t read it alone.

and

Sara Gran’s swift, stylish narrative quickly leads to a terrifying place where anything at all might happen

and

The sly little novel…slides its icicle shard into the warm, pulpy flesh of your dark desires. Gran’s swift finale is very, very cool.

Doesn’t it sound exciting? Fortunately I am sharing both books with other people, and for reasons of timing must read the first one first, so I can prolong the anticipation for a little longer.

I shan’t start either until after I’ve finished my current book, which is When We Were Orphans by Kazuo Ishiguro.  I’m not sure why I haven’t read it before, since it has everything I like in it, but now I’ve picked it up I’m enjoying it very much. My one small criticism, and that’s too strong a word, is that there is slightly too much of this sort of thing (not a quote, but a composite example from memory):

As I sit here pondering the events of this morning, it occurs to me that my curious conversation with Sarah last night might not have happened at all had it not been for an incident which took place a week ago, at the Palm Hotel.

We then get the story of what happened  a week ago at the Palm Hotel, followed by the curious conversation with Sarah and finally the events of this morning. I suppose it’s a trick or gimmick designed to draw the reader in with the promise of secrets yet to be revealed, and it’s quite effective, but it does require the reader to do quite a lot of work (“what day is it now? Is this happening before or after the scene I’ve just read?”) and I think it’s slightly overused here.

Still, it’s a detective story set in inter-war Shanghai, which is so much my bag that when I’ve finished reading it I shall sling it over my shoulder and keep my lunch in it.

The Proclaimers

On By Laura MorganIn Football, Music, Reasons to be cheerful

In honour of tonight’s trip to see the Proclaimers, here’s my favourite song of theirs (even though it’s about god, sort of):

Edit: oh boo, sorry, you have to click through to YouTube to watch. It’s worth it, though!

The comments below are almost as much fun as the song. These were my favourites (in case you didn’t already know, Sunshine On Leith is to Hibs fans as Glad All Over is to Palace fans):

Rfc1Darryl
This song is for all scots, not jus hibbs fans, n not jus cause am a rangers man, am probably the only rangers fan ye would ever meet that doesnt wave a union jack, scottish independence 2010 !!

Duncsta22
Good on you man. There is a bit of work to do with the rest of your crew though.

Paris photo, and a miniature railway

On By Laura MorganIn Public transport, Reasons to be cheerful

Here is my photo of Paris in the Schmapp Guide:

http://www.schmap.com/paris/tours_tour1/p=7992/i=7992_110.jpg

I notice they didn’t straighten it out. Never mind.

We’ve just got back from a wedding somewhere in deepest Sussex: I didn’t concentrate too hard on where it was precisely, because my dad was driving and my beloved was navigating, so my mother and I sat in the back and ignored the road.

Anyway. The wedding was lovely, as weddings are, and especially lovely because the couple in question had fought for years to be allowed to live in the same country, and spent many months apart over that time. I don ‘t know how they did it, but I’m so pleased for them now they have overcome every last bit of red tape and can get on with normal life like the rest of us.

But really, I wanted to tell you about the miniature railway which we took a damp ride on in between the service and the reception. The wedding was held at Bolebroke Castle, which is an attractively rundown sort of stately home (I wouldn’t really call it a castle: no turrets) set in rolling grounds, with lakes and bowers aplenty, and the aforementioned miniature railway which, the railwayman told us, runs for some three miles into the surrounding countryside, though most of the line is only open to members of the associated club (if you’re keen, you can find out how to join here).

The route we took ran around the side of a lake, over a bridge, through a tunnel and alongside an enormous uprooted tree which must have shaken the castle”s foundations when it fell (perhaps that was the reason for the leaking roof which dripped into the main hall during our meal).

It started to rain as we arrived at the departure point, and got a bit heavier as we started out, but since we had a two-year-old boy in our party we persevered, and it was well worth it. The ride takes under ten minutes, but it’s very picturesque and mildly thrilling in a very tame funfair ride sort of a way. Our party consisted of self, beloved, parents (mine), an old school friend, her husband and their offspring; said two-year-old. In our cocktail dresses and suits, and clasping glasses of champagne, we probably weren’t a typical group of passengers, but the taciturn operator of the train took it all in his stride.

I’m not sure I’d suggest a trip into Sussex just for the railway, but it’s just up the road from the Ashdown forest, where you can play Poohsticks on the original Poohsticks bridge, and the surrounding villages are acceptably pretty, so if you’re in the area, you could do worse than to drop in. Accompanying child not essential, but you might feel a bit less silly clambering on to the tiny train if you have one with you.

Bolebroke Castle, incidentally, is where Henry VIII met Anne Boleyn. We all decided this should be interpreted as a good omen for the marriage.

Smug

On By Laura MorganIn Food, Reasons to be cheerful

I think today might have been my highest-achieving day ever. This morning I got up and made Glamorgan sausages, washed up, and cleaned the kitchen; all before I left for work. At work, I did loads of work. At lunchtime I went to the bank and paid in a cheque, and went to Morrison’s and bought toothpaste, tissues, a mixing bowl, cling film, teabags and a tray for collecting rain water*, which list constitutes everything I needed and didn’t have in my egg. Then I went back to the office and did loads more work, before zooming off to the gym, and finally home for the sausages. Now I am heating up the remains of Sunday’s apple crumble and thinking about how grown-up I am.

It could only have been improved had I remembered to get travel insurance for our Norwegian fjord cruise next month, and to ring up and renew my library book. But you can’t have everything. It leaves me with something to achieve tomorrow.

* Congratulate me, please: I am the proud new mother of a Sarracenia flava, which in return for a constant supply of rain water promises to rid me forever of flying beasties and similar horrors.

In other news

On By Laura MorganIn Films, Music, Reasons to be cheerful

Apologies for the long silence. I have been getting to grips with my new job; which doesn’t give me much time for thinking, let alone writing. I’ve got a nerdy-obsessive Michael Jackson post fermenting, but in the meantime here are a couple of my highlights of the last few weeks, presented in the style of a tabloid newspaper.

SPOOK

Last night I went to a Ghostbusters-themed comedy night, to celebrate 25 years since the original film’s release. I know what you’re thinking – and, well OK, you’re right; but it was still lots of fun. The highlight was a passionate, witty and informative set from Paul Gannon, who is a bigger fan than I have ever been, and from whom I learned the following new facts:

  • The follow-up cartoon was called “The Real Ghostbusters” because a company called Filmation (makers of Masters of the Universe, among other things) had sometime in the 1970s produced eight episodes of a truly awful live action TV show with the name “Ghostbusters”. When the film was being made they threatened to sue, but they agreed in the end to allow the film-makers to use the name so long as they (Filmation) retained the rights to use the title for any future animated series. So when the film was turned into a cartoon, they had to give it a new name.
  • The scenes between Pete Venkman and Dana Barrett in Dana’s apartment were all improvised by Bill Murray and Sigourney Weaver.
  • There is Ghostbusters porn. It isn’t very sexy, but it’s fabulously funny (he had a selection of clips for our viewing pleasure).

UKE

I am now a world record-holder (along with 850 others).

DUKE (grant me literal poetic license on that one, please)

We went to see Bobby McFerrin at the Royal Festival Hall as part of Ornette Coleman’s Meltdown. I am devoutly atheist, but the closest I’ve come to believing in something higher than humankind is when I watch him perform. It’s just insanely brilliant:

PUKE

I have seen Jeremy Clarkson twice in the last fortnight.