03 August 2008

 

Books, Books, and Books

Today I finally managed to complete my BookMooch inventory update. I went back and added condition notes to all books and a little review to most of the book that didn't have one. I also synchronised my BookMooch inventory with my LibrayThing books tagged bookmooch me.
So now I have a few more things in order. :-)

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30 January 2008

 

Birthday Presents

Today I received a huge package with birthday presents from my Dad. He said that he would send some small things, so I wasn't at all prepared for the size of the package.




When I opened it, this pretty card slid out along with a bunch of styrofoam packaging peanuts.








Along with many good and important birthday wishes and an explanation about how women don't get any older onced they passed 30, the card said that the package contained 7 things, one of which was a substitute for something he couldn't get.
I imagine that each animal is the bringer of one gift, but I couldn't figure out the connections between them - if there is any at all.



The first two presents I had a fairly good guess about, since we already talked about them at Christmas - two books: Gilgamesch and Die Heimkehr des Odysseus. The third one was also a book: Ein Elefant im Mückenland. (hmmm :-) - More books. I love books.)



The fourth present I recognised imediately. This silver plated plate and candle holder is a family heirloom. I am both proud to get this and chocked, since I feel that I have no adequate place for them in my (at times messy) apartment.
(I found out later that this is the joker (substitute present) which I don't think it is at all.)







This alabaster pencil holder is actually a toothbrush cup for people who have everything. ;-)
I don't own a toothbrush cup, and I don't think that I will be using this toothbrush cup as a toothbrush cup. I don't have any room for it in my super tiny bathroom, and I don't need a toothbrush cup. So, in my houshold it will be a pencil holder. :-)









The glass jar contains nougat with 34% haselnuts. I haven't tried it yet, but boy, am I excited! :-)
I don't know if I can be so disciplined as my grandma was. My Dad told me, when he was a child, they used to have some nougat too, which they only occasionaly were allowed to have. I also remember my grandma having (and guarding in a fun way) treats. ;-)

The jar on the right contains walnut oil. This has probably something to do with the fact that I tend to eat lots of whole-grain bread dipped in walnut oil when I am at my Dad's house. ;-)

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24 January 2008

 

Idling in front of the Computer

The last few days I used most of my time on either sleeping or idling in front of the computer. It is amazing how much time you can use doing "nothing". Well, actually, "nothing" amounted to quite a bit:

All in all quite a lot. And fun. I don't regret anything. Especially not getting more books! ;-)

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09 December 2007

 

Things I find in my Closet...

People who come to visit me are often stunned by the large number of books I own. I like books. Books are my friends. Most of my shelves are stuffed with books. Especially because I also consider throwing books away a capital crime. Unfortunately, I also started to accumulate quite a number of DVDs over the last year. So, no surprise, I ran out of shelf space. I have been thinking about all kinds of possible ways to sort out my problem (move to a bigger apartment, throw away things which are not books, put some books into storage, etc.). The solution I settled on was to buy some more boards to the shelves I already have, and make them fit (which involves different kinds of saws).
I don't know what made me look into my closet, but there, in the back most corner was one (already finished) board hiding, trying to look innocent. It is not in hiding any longer. It is not going to last, but right now all my books and DVDs fit neatly onto the shelves without being double stacked. I will savor the moment as long as it lasts. :-)

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04 December 2007

 

"It will be more fun if you take the small packages last."

That is what Terese said. So I go after the big packages in my calendar. Today I grabbed a big and heavy one. Turned out it was a book: Samurai William. (I am wondering if she is secretly trying to feed my lurking book addiction?) Actually I've haerd quite a bit about this book, and I am looking forward to reading it. :-)

Out in the country we learned a new word. We were supposed see "bedriften" together with grandfather. We were a little scared and kept a tight grip on grandfathers leg but couldn't spot any "bedrift". At last we asked what a "bedrift" looked like. Grandfather explained, and we learned a little more about danish farm vocabulary. ;-)

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01 December 2007

 

First Package Opened

First of December. Christmas on its way. The first package of my advent calendar may be opened. The only one that has a date.

I now know why:
It is an advent book: "Mig og bedstefar - og så Nisse Pok" (Me and grandfather - and elf Pok) with 24 chapters - one for each day.
In today's chapter the me of the book (an 8 year old boy) arrived at his grandfathers farm. His grandfather looks a lot like Santa. ;-) After saying hello to the dog Sophus and the horse Lottie (who loves chewing gum) they receive a letter from elf Pok, saying that he will visit this year. I got the impression that visiting elves is a normal thing at grandfathers farm...

A note about Scandinavian elves ("nisser" in danish):
They are not your classic fairy like "dancing around half naked" elves. I am still a little hazy on the subject, so please fill in the blanks. As far as I found out, they are small people. I am not quite sure if they can do magic, but I wouldn't be surprised. They tend to wear red caps, and if you treat them well they will look after your animals and farm. They can be quite nasty if you upset them, and they like rice pudding with butter on top. The butter is apparently very important since there are tales about elves (nisser) getting very angry because the butter on the rice pudding was missing.

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14 October 2007

 

301 books and many more

Today I've entered book number 301 in my catalogue at LibraryThing. I know that I have a lot of books, but still, I am amazed. Especially since I have mostly only entered the "easy" books. Those which I have read and are at my place right now. (Easy books are those which have an ISBN and pop up at once when you search for them on amazon.de or amazon.com...) There are still shelves of books I haven't even looked at in connection with LibraryThing.

Now that I think of this, I notice that I only ever counted shelves of books. And I am obviously not very good at counting. I count a little like a troll. I can count to 10 and then it's many, many many, many many many, etc. OK - let me try again... I have about (depending on how you count shelves) many many many many many many many many many many shelves of books.


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03 October 2007

 

Books on LibraryThing

I have decided to register the books I own on LibraryThing. I am hoping that this will help me to get an overview and, thus, not as often get me into the situation where I cannot remember if I own this really good book or if I just read it somewhere. This project (registering) will take a while, since I owm many books...

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