Good Omens has to be one of my most favourite books in the entire universe. That's pretty high praise considering all the books there are in the universe and considering how many books I've actually read over the past 23 years of my reading life, but it's justified, I think.
My paperback copy gets read at least three times every year and I never get bored of it. It's my go-to book when I'm having a sick day, it comes with me on holidays, it's the first book I reach for when I want to read but don't really know what I want to read. It covers all the bases. Considering how many times I've read it, it never gets old and it never dates.
My paperback is battered now and the pages are loose...so to stop any further deterioration (the pages are yellowed and it's been dropped in the bath before today too!) I bought a copy for my Kindle. What a brilliant decision!! I really can read it everywhere now.
Buying my Kindle was also a brilliant decision. I got it almost a year ago so I could keep all my journal articles all in one place without printing them or dragging my laptop everywhere, and she's been invaluable. Did I say she? Well, my Kindle is a girl - I named her 'Ziyal' because there were all these hand-wringing reports that eBooks would be the end of 'real' books...and while I was using my Kindle I realised that it's not a book replacement, it's a hybrid. I could have named my Kindle 'Spock' after the most famous hybrid in Trek history, but I chose Ziyal because as an artist from a mixed heritage I think she'd have appreciated the mixture of print with technology and understood.
I've been a bit naughty, buying Kindle books and downloading the free ones (I bought the Hunger Games books, and I now have the entire catalogue of Oz books!), but I know the train journey to London is going to take a while and B is going to need sleep after all the hours he's been putting in finishing his essay and researching for his dissertation. These will keep me occupied while he rests up!
Wednesday 21 March 2012
Tuesday 13 March 2012
Morideryn
Here is Morideryn! She should be celebrating because I started a layaway for her real body today!
I did want to get her an Ariadoll Elegance 14yrs body, but Ariadoll are closing on the 31st of March and Switch are taking over their moulds and sculpts after that. I didn't know whether to rush and get an Ariadoll body now, or wait and see what Switch would do...but I could end up not liking the new things they do with the sculpts.
Eventually I saw a Volks SD13 girl body on the MP at DoA at a really good price and decided that was the right body to get.
While I really love the Aria body and think it is very elegant, I did worry about if I ever was able to go to a Volks Dolpa (a dolls party held by the Volks company), I wouldn't be able to bring Deryn because she'd be on another company's body. This way, I know that the resin-match would be perfect and she'll be a full Volks doll, rather than a hybrid, so if there ever was any chance I could go to a Dolpa, I wouldn't have to leave her behind.
The other consideration is Deryn's actual character. She is the daughter of the chief of a nomadic, forest-dwelling tribe and a crack-shot with a bow and arrow and a sling. Princesses are supposed to be willowy and lithe, like the Ariadoll body, but a tribal princess who herds reindeer and lives off bread and stew isn't going to be a skinny minnie. She's going to have some meat on her bones and the Volks SD13 body is like that. It has soft curves and some musculature, which is perfect.
Here is Morideryn's backstory;
Deryn's full name is Morideryn (a Welsh-Japanese portmanteau meaning 'forest bird') and she comes from a northern nomadic people called the Mori, who are all red-haired, raucous and brave. They move from high-ground summer lands in the north to low-ground and sheltered winter lands in the south every year and drive their herds of reindeer and well-trained herdwolves with them.
Deryn is the daughter of a chief, Moribran, and his wife, Alis, who is an outsider to the tribe. As Deryn is only half-Mori, her father decides to send her to her mother's people to be educated at a very posh school called Graiglwyd College for Young Ladies, where they speak her mother's language.
Deryn is a very sweet-natured girl, but this is sharply contrasted with her abilities to hunt things single-mindedly - she can kill, skin and joint a rabbit inside ten minutes and she's a crack shot with a sling. She never forgets she's a Mori princess and although she's never snobbish about it, she does expect to be treated with respect.
Her prized possessions are her reindeer hide boots, decorated with hand-carved buttons and leather cord by her Mori grandmother, and her lucky wishbone and pearl necklace which is the inheritance of the eldest daughter of the Mori chief. She is supposed to have traditional tattoos of birds in flight on her shoulders, (I haven't done this yet because she's sharing another doll's body!)
In Mori culture, it is more important to be brave and strong than pretty, and although she is flattered that her new school friends think she is beautiful, Deryn thinks it's the least important thing about her.
Monday 12 March 2012
Busy busy
Busy week has begun! I've got a lot more overtime at work this week (6.30am starts! Argh!) but right now I'm relaxing at B's while he is off attending a warden meeting.
My spending control has gone a little awry again, but I'll get back into my good books soon. There really were things I couldn't live without!!
Dr Marten boots I've been looking for since 2009 came up on eBay brand new, so I couldn't not buy them. It was a tense battle, but I finally won my dream boots - RRP £140, price I paid, £70! I'm so pleased with them!
So, that's been a fun part of the naughty shopping!
What else? Oh, I bought two new books for my Kindle; The Red Tent and Living a Jewish Life by Anita Diamant. The Red Tent is fiction, it's about Dinah, the daughter of Jacob and Leah, and her life after the Shechem incident, where her brothers, Simeon and Levi slaughtered every man in the town of Shechem after Dinah attracted the attentions of the prince. It's a sad story anyway, I'd never have forgiven my brothers for committing murder, especially in my name. The Red Tent does a good job of fleshing out a lot of characters you only really know by name in the Bible, but there's some bestiality and totem worshipping going on that doesn't really sit quite right!
I'm enjoying reading Living a Jewish Life more than The Red Tent. Possibly because it's a fun reference book about including more Jewish things into everyday life. I already try keeping kashrut, I don't eat pork and shellfish anyway, but I keep forgetting about separating meat and dairy - so far this has extended to having pizzas with no chicken on them, but I seem to forget when it comes to cheeseburgers. I have a long way to go!
I bought a Mori Girl skirt today from a shop in Conwy - it's a sweet little shop full of boutiquey things like bunting and hand-made ceramic doorknobs. There's a small selection of clothes, but everything is so perfectly Mori Girl I wanted to buy it all! The skirt is a beigey-undyed linen colour and it'll go amazingly with my new DMs. I'm wearing Mori Girl right now, my new skirt, some crochet tights, some old brown boots, a teal top and a cream cardigan. I have a rope of beads around my neck and a ribbon in my hair :) I really like Mori Girl style, it's so relaxed but also fairytale/artisanal. B said I looked like an artist dressed this way :p
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)