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I do have a couple of Whitby pictures, but they are very poor. I really am awful at taking "photographs" when I feel I 'must" take them :/
Yesterday marked, actually, the beginning of a chance to relax a little and unwind. Ian came and picked me up with Chewbacca (yes, the Volvo is back for a short while!) and then I gave him a lift to get his recovery truck, and the stricken Astra is now in Lauder waiting to be plugging into a diagnostic computer. Seems that the pump doesn't want to deliver fuel at all, and this type is all electronic. I could, perhaps, be rethinking my desire to upgrade the Delica to a '98 MY onwards one with electronic diesel system.
Of course, once this was done I could go "ahhh", and get it out of my head. So I called![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
ailska, whom I haven't seen in months, then took a trip to Edinburgh to take her some chocolates from Whitby. Since I was there, I went to Kinnaird and Borders, bought some books (£85!?!) and had a Gingerbread Latte and a gingerbread bearista (oh dear. Yes. They have toy "Bearistas"). I bought Watchmen, having looked at it many times and never gone for it, The Push Man and other stories (a collection of Manga strips from 1969 by Yoshihiro Tatsumi), Making Money, The Gum Thief (but a special signed one since it was on the pile I saw when I went in), and a couple of books Siani wanted.
I put back "The Adventuress". A quick glance did not grab me the way the initial glance last year had, so I suspect I had to be in a certain mood.
Having done this, I also popped into Toys R Us; the standard of toys depresses me, always. I did see radio control K-9s for half-price (£19), and gleefully grabbed on... carried it around as I studied the mediocre selection of "interesting" toys and the utterly bizarre existence of a "toy segway", and a loop about a model kit of a Delica I saw on eBay ran though my head. "You don't need it. It's just more stuff. You won't get any pleasure out of it, and it'll just be more stuff to move or get broken". The Delica, being a kit, would of course never be made, or would be made to such a poor standard I'd be disappointed, or I'd get around to making it when I'd lost all interest in ugly 4x4 MPVs.
And so, with only a couple of Matchbox Hearses in my hands, I put the K-9 back. And I did feel very much like I had just taken something shiny away from my inner child, who is rather obsessed with K-9 and would have utterly loved a 1/4 size one when he was 1/4 size himself. (The best compliment I got with the stolen Aidan-hat was that I looked like I needed a scarf and should be the next Doctor. The appeal of being the Doctor would potentially have driven me to acting school just in the hope of taking that role - to be not only a hero, but to actually have some control over time and events...)
I felt bad for not gettingjenova_red a Ben Elton book after I realised she didn't have it, but all his books look the same cover-wise.
Today I read. Sat on the bed with the cat on my lap, and read all of Making Money (blah, Pratchett is still distracting, but I think I only sniggered once. He has become more akin to a familiar editorial columnist than a creator of fantasy worlds), all of The Push Man (very... disturbing, in a sneaky way. Ed is NOT getting this book as the concepts and emotional knowledge required to fully appreciate the strips should not be available to a 12 year old, even though I am sure he could "handle" them, I don't think he'd "appreciate" them fully), and all of Watchmen. I regret that I missed out on Watchmen when it was current, it's a good story, although I think I would NEED to have been about 13 or so (when it came out I'd have been 12) to have "got" the same effect it seems to have had on true aficionados of the genre. 32 is too damn old to be "finding" such classics. Ed will be getting a copy; if there is a hardback or otherwise "arty" copy to be had used or new, I shall give him this functional paperback one.
So. Here's a question.
What's the 2007 equivalent of Watchmen. There must be new comics, new stories, new artists. What can I get Ed to drop into his library (and indeed, Tom, who would be into something darker but with a more satirical/funny slant) that in a few years, will be the buzzword, the common reference point - in short the Watchmen of 2015. I figured that I first was really aware of Watchmen around 1990-95 and all my peer group appear to have read it around this era - let's get him something with he can be first with, like I got the chance to be with Maus. To tell people ABOUT something they will enjoy.
The Push Man, incidentally, was re-released as this compilation in September 2005. I have never seen in on UK shelves before, but I recommend it if you do see it.
It's been nice to just relax for once. It happens very rarely. Tomorrow, chaos will once again return - I have to pack up some bullbars and some brochures, decide on a pattern (£94) or genuine (£160) exhaust for the Delica (and on other repairs I need to make :/), and start work on another magazine.
Yesterday marked, actually, the beginning of a chance to relax a little and unwind. Ian came and picked me up with Chewbacca (yes, the Volvo is back for a short while!) and then I gave him a lift to get his recovery truck, and the stricken Astra is now in Lauder waiting to be plugging into a diagnostic computer. Seems that the pump doesn't want to deliver fuel at all, and this type is all electronic. I could, perhaps, be rethinking my desire to upgrade the Delica to a '98 MY onwards one with electronic diesel system.
Of course, once this was done I could go "ahhh", and get it out of my head. So I called
ailska, whom I haven't seen in months, then took a trip to Edinburgh to take her some chocolates from Whitby. Since I was there, I went to Kinnaird and Borders, bought some books (£85!?!) and had a Gingerbread Latte and a gingerbread bearista (oh dear. Yes. They have toy "Bearistas"). I bought Watchmen, having looked at it many times and never gone for it, The Push Man and other stories (a collection of Manga strips from 1969 by Yoshihiro Tatsumi), Making Money, The Gum Thief (but a special signed one since it was on the pile I saw when I went in), and a couple of books Siani wanted.I put back "The Adventuress". A quick glance did not grab me the way the initial glance last year had, so I suspect I had to be in a certain mood.
Having done this, I also popped into Toys R Us; the standard of toys depresses me, always. I did see radio control K-9s for half-price (£19), and gleefully grabbed on... carried it around as I studied the mediocre selection of "interesting" toys and the utterly bizarre existence of a "toy segway", and a loop about a model kit of a Delica I saw on eBay ran though my head. "You don't need it. It's just more stuff. You won't get any pleasure out of it, and it'll just be more stuff to move or get broken". The Delica, being a kit, would of course never be made, or would be made to such a poor standard I'd be disappointed, or I'd get around to making it when I'd lost all interest in ugly 4x4 MPVs.
And so, with only a couple of Matchbox Hearses in my hands, I put the K-9 back. And I did feel very much like I had just taken something shiny away from my inner child, who is rather obsessed with K-9 and would have utterly loved a 1/4 size one when he was 1/4 size himself. (The best compliment I got with the stolen Aidan-hat was that I looked like I needed a scarf and should be the next Doctor. The appeal of being the Doctor would potentially have driven me to acting school just in the hope of taking that role - to be not only a hero, but to actually have some control over time and events...)
I felt bad for not getting
jenova_red a Ben Elton book after I realised she didn't have it, but all his books look the same cover-wise.Today I read. Sat on the bed with the cat on my lap, and read all of Making Money (blah, Pratchett is still distracting, but I think I only sniggered once. He has become more akin to a familiar editorial columnist than a creator of fantasy worlds), all of The Push Man (very... disturbing, in a sneaky way. Ed is NOT getting this book as the concepts and emotional knowledge required to fully appreciate the strips should not be available to a 12 year old, even though I am sure he could "handle" them, I don't think he'd "appreciate" them fully), and all of Watchmen. I regret that I missed out on Watchmen when it was current, it's a good story, although I think I would NEED to have been about 13 or so (when it came out I'd have been 12) to have "got" the same effect it seems to have had on true aficionados of the genre. 32 is too damn old to be "finding" such classics. Ed will be getting a copy; if there is a hardback or otherwise "arty" copy to be had used or new, I shall give him this functional paperback one.
So. Here's a question.
What's the 2007 equivalent of Watchmen. There must be new comics, new stories, new artists. What can I get Ed to drop into his library (and indeed, Tom, who would be into something darker but with a more satirical/funny slant) that in a few years, will be the buzzword, the common reference point - in short the Watchmen of 2015. I figured that I first was really aware of Watchmen around 1990-95 and all my peer group appear to have read it around this era - let's get him something with he can be first with, like I got the chance to be with Maus. To tell people ABOUT something they will enjoy.
The Push Man, incidentally, was re-released as this compilation in September 2005. I have never seen in on UK shelves before, but I recommend it if you do see it.
It's been nice to just relax for once. It happens very rarely. Tomorrow, chaos will once again return - I have to pack up some bullbars and some brochures, decide on a pattern (£94) or genuine (£160) exhaust for the Delica (and on other repairs I need to make :/), and start work on another magazine.
