Scattered Strawberry Summer

Merde Actually

Synopsis:

I've finally bought a book that has been on my amazon wishlist for a very long time Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon. 

It's a short book, but rather engaging and thought provoking and to the point. It's full of quotes, lists, graphics and diagrams.I enjoyed  reading it and I feel inspired to get creative. 

One of my favourite advice was to choose an artist, a thinker or a writer you love and study everything about them. Then select 3 biggest influences on the person and study them. And so on and so on.

I'll end with a quote from the book: "Start copying what you love. Copy copy copy copy. At the end of the copy you will find yourself".

Blood, Sweat and Tea: Real Life Adventures in an Inner-city Ambulance is a book by ambulance technician about life in the London Ambulance Service.

The book is compiled from blog Random Acts of Reality. Kindle edition is free which is what I got after I saw a recommendation on reddit.

The book is funny, intriguing, sometimes sad but  easy to read. Whether or not you had read the blog previously(I hadn't), this book will certainly keep you entertained. It is very eye opening whilst being comical and also inspiring. It is a honest account of work at London Ambulance Service, how the crews constantly put themselves in danger to saves lives. I have so much more respect for all emergency workers than before.

There is also More Blood, More Sweat and Another Cup of Tea, I will put this on my reading list. 

My Sunday morning started very early. I got up before 6 o'clock to go to boot fair. This is the first time I went to sell rather than to buy things. I'm not going to lie, I hate getting up, especially because it's only a weekend when I can sleep in thanks to a full time job, however it was quite fun day. I didn't only sell things, as you can imagine...

Total money spent: £6.90. Quite a bargain, I'd say. I'm especially happy with getting Rosetta Stone. When I was little a had a similar program for English and it helped me immensely, I hope Rosetta will help with my Spanish.

We're going next Sunday as well. It would be nice to get rid of some of the stuff that we have managed to acquire living in this flat for 5 years.It will be easier to move. 

Black shirt dress

I recently received an email from The Works about an opportunity to write a review of a book. You get to keep the book too, so naturally I applied. I'm not sure which book I originally selected, it was one of Karl Pilkington's, they didn't have that in stock but they send me " Further Adventures of Idiot Abroad". It is based on the second series of An Idiot Abroad. 

If you know who is Karl Pilkington, you know what to expect. I'm quite a fan of Karl Pilkington and his ramblings so I was looking forward to reading this book.

Ricky Gervais and Stephan Merchant sent off Karl to  experience what other's may put on a "bucket list", he gets to travel to wonderful places to do very exciting things and yet he moans and whines most of the time. He chooses which things to do and gives reasons why he is not interested in doing the others,  his reasons are rather funny. Ricky tried to make him to do bungee jumping but Karl went out of this way to avoid this to the point that he had to spend £2500 and make a member of the crew to jump for him with this hat and lie about it to Ricky. It was hilarious!..

 Good thing about the book is that rather than just plainly retelling the things that were in the show, Karl has fill in the gaps about things that weren't shown, more thoughts on his adventures.  It is very easy to read and it's not hard to imagine Karl writing it as the editors have chosen to leave the accented writing style. The book made me chuckle quite a few times, Karl views world differently than most people and he often comes with very funny insights. It's a good read but I'm not sure if it's not just easier to watch the show, they tried to bridge the gap between the book and show by including many pictures from his adventures but not sure if it was enough, I think some of the comic effect has been lost as a lot of it comes from his face reactions.

When reading his books or listening to Ricky Gervais Show podcasts, it's hard to say is Karl truly an idiot or just genius. I'm not sure. But what I'm sure about is that he's quite extraordinary.

The book is only £4.99, I think it's a steal! If you also want to review a book for  The Works, apply here

This week I'm reading The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. More accurately, I'm rereading it, I had to read it for literature classes but that seems to be have been ages ago and I don't remember much about it except that it definitely struck a nerve with me at that time unlike other books that we were assigned to read. 

On its publication in 1774, The Sorrows of Young Werther gained an instant cult following. European readers were captivated by the rapturous ruminations of Werther, Goethe's typically Romantic protagonist whose extreme passion leads to self-destruction. Public fascination gave rise to a fanatical copycat culture, in which men dressed in Werther's signature outfit, women wore "Eau de Werther", and at least one person committed suicide with a copy of Young Werther in her pocket. The sensational novella united people in self-obsession and a desire for a sublime sense of individuality. 

 source: Guardian

It still relevant,after over 200 years, but be warned, it's not for recently broken hearted.

Available on Gutenberg.