Sunday Summary Monday Missive

Hello to you!

Yes, 'fraid your weekly dose of Bethy's Brain Deposits has been shunted back a day but good things come to those who wait, n'est-ce pas, especially if you've been observing Lent and yesterday was the first day in two months that chocolate has entered your digestive system...

Anyway.

This week (and a bit), I have mostly been...

Reading | The Trial (still)

The clue to the ease of reading of this novel is in the title...

Finishing | The End of Everything

An enjoyable yarn, though everything fell into place around Evie's disappearance much too easily; and Evie's family needn't have got the police involved at all because Evie's best friend Lizzie was apparently psychic enough to dream and sense Evie's fate and whereabouts. Or something. Still, I recommend The End of Everything as well as Dare Me, Abbott's catty cheerleader novel which reads a little like Bring it On Gone Bad. But in a good way.

Watching | Frozen

and Untouchable

Both very different films. Both superb. I don't need to roll out the plot intricacies of Frozen for your good selves, do I. ;-) It did remind me greatly of Return to Oz in parts -- the frozen landscapes, Sven the reindeer/the Gump, the lavishness of Elsa's/Mombi's palace..., Marshmallow/the Nome King...

And my heart belongs to Olaf the snowman. Sven's cute 'n' all, but Olaf won me over. (Closely followed by Oaken.)

Untouchable is something else. Based on a true story and a true friendship, it focuses on the unlikely friendship and mutual respect of two very different men: millionaire Philippe, paralysed in a skydiving accident, and his reluctant new live-in carer, Driss. It's French, subtitled, and its lead man, Francois Cluzet has more than a touch of Dustin Hoffman about him. It's also charming, funny, and has a delicious soundtrack by Ludovico Einaudi, one of my favourite contemporary composers. Win-win.

Also watching | Vimeo shorts

These ones caught my discerning, short-film-loving eye (those Vimeo staff have good taste):

 
Les Pyramides d'Égypte from Kheops Pyramides on Vimeo.



Still Life from ZANDRAK on Vimeo.


Returning | to Facebook

All right so maybe I did clock up my first live post in seven weeks at 8am on Easter Morning, as if I couldn't wait to break the Lenten fast. The post simply said Happy Easter -- I didn't try to encapsulate seven weeks in one post, don't you worry. What would be the point of that, eh?

And it was lovely to be welcomed back onto the platform! While my FB Fast may not have been the most enlightening move a person has ever made on a journey through Lent, it has given me some much-needed perspective. As has deleting every post and almost every photo I've posted in seven long FB years. I just don't need to be that present on Facebook any more.

And yes, admittedly, there is a dreg of truth in this meme:

but I see nothing excessively self-indulgent in making a pinboard of one's aesthetic pleasures. We're appreciating the inherent beauty and creativity in the world -- is how I justify spending hours poring over another 'Nostalgia from the 1980s' board that has somehow managed to unlock a gallon of suppressed memories. 

Some more welcome than others.

{Stuff of NIGHTMARES.}

And now... for your Weekly Weblinks

Following on from last week's post on 4WAAF {Four Weddings and a Funeral}, BBC Radio 4's 'The Reunion' programme focused on the film in this broadcast

Hesperus Press reveal plans for new-look Little Women 

University of Leeds' flummoxing restaurant signage

Baz Lurhmann's stage production of Strictly Ballroom opens in Sydney, as reported by a journalist who needs to work on their fact-checking skills... [I would still see this, especially to witness The Flying Doctors' own Robert Grubb as Barry Fife...]

The BBC's new adaptation of Daphne Du Maurier's Jamaica Inn begins tonight -- here, and here (for a special BBC blog feature)

And finally...

I'm in love with Mini Moderns and their Dungeness-themed furnishings -- check out their Look Book here

C'est tout -- a la prochaine...

Sunday... oh, wait, no, it's Monday... Summary

In a slight change to the belatedly published programme, I have decided to recount my week using the medium of interpretive dance as channelled through this awesome squirrel:

No? Nope, that's not going to work.

This week, then, I have been mostly...

Designing Wrapping Paper

{via webstagram}

which, while being quirky and individual, was time-consuming and ergo not sufficient for the ensuing task of:

Wrapping Christmas Presents

{Disclaimer: I do not own, nor have I bought for anyone, a cat. I just found this gif amusing.}

Singing in our Nine Lessons and Carols Service

Our Nine Lessons and Carols Service takes place on the last Sunday before Christmas, and is an atmospheric candlelit service of carols and read lessons telling the Christmas story. I'm in the robed choir, and between the congregational carols and readings we sing selected anthems. This year's selection:

Break Forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light | Bach {unaccompanied}
Adam Lay Y Bounden | Setchell {unaccompanied}
A Tender Shoot | Bartholomew/Goldschmidt
On Christmas Night All Christians Sing | Ledger arrangement
In Dulci Jubilo | Archer arrangement
Christmas Lullaby | John Rutter
The Coventry Carol | Shaw arrangement {unaccompanied}
On this Day Earth shall Ring | Hylton C Stewart arrangement

It all went well, I thought, with the exception of the final piece, above, which we hadn't rehearsed in weeks... Anyway.

Almost-full playlist {albeit not sung by my choir!} here on Spotify:

Celebrating Christmas with Kith and Kin (and Kolleagues)

As a little treat to celebrate Friday being many of our last day in the office, my team and our friends in Sales threw a cheeky little champagne brunch complete with smoked salmon, blinis (not Bellinis), crackers, mini cheesecakes... and Prosecco + OJ Bucks Fizz. 'Twas a veritable feast. Hic.

{this is a visual representation, not the real meal...}

We then proceeded to the most local pub (which smelled ever so slightly like sulphur until the reasonably cheap wine numbed our nasal passages) for an afternoon of libation and revelry.

And Christmas jumpers.

Monitoring my Zzzzs... | with Sleepbot

A couple of weeks ago I spied a blog link by Joanna Goddard of A CUP OF JO on a sleep-monitoring app she's been looking to try (Sleep Cycle) -- this app isn't available yet for Android devices but I was fascinated by the mechanics so I downloaded a free, decent equivalent: Sleepbot.

How it works: Sleepbot records and monitors your movement and sound patterns when you place your phone beside you in bed. (Admittedly this is a questionable practice if you suspect that mobile phones do untold damage to our brains while in close proximity...) It wakes you up at your designated time if you need to wake with an alarm (so, very much like an alarm clock then!!), and records your hours of actual sleep and tallies this up to your required hours and tells you your nightly sleep debt.

{screengrab from online Sleepbot account}

I sleep alone (well, if you don't count the lavender-scented Bagpuss heat pillow as company...) but always wondered if a) I snored b) I sleeptalked and c) I really thrashed around in my sleep as much as my twisted duvet of a morning would indicate. Sleepbot will tell you this.

{via Google Play}

This is probably of no interest to anyone but me but the app revealed that, incidentally, a) no, b) not usually* and c) not especially.

I say not usually... one recording last week featured a whispered voice at about 4am that only sounds a little bit like mine... Spooky.

Rewatching | Pitch Perfect

Not a Christmas film by any stretch (unless you, like me, are able to draw parallels with the choir politics around this time o' year...). I love Rebel Wilson in this. (And in Bridesmaids.)

Mermaid dancing, that's a thing. Yep.

Other gems found on the internet (not always by me -- workmates Evie and Nick are also solid contributors!):

The Santa brand book -- keeping Christmas on-brand

10 common Christmas card dilemmas

What does the X in Xmas symbolise?

Bilbo Baggins is a girl -- redefining gender in popular literature

Rediscovered this great article in my Evernote archives -- Why YA isn't taken seriously

10 bizarre items found in cool offices (a slide and a plastic llama would definitely make me more productive)

Michael Morpurgo to be Booktrust President -- yay!

I think this has been kicking around on the internet for a while but still: Dad illustrates the bizarre things he says to his children

That's all for now -- so it just remains for me to wish you a very QUIRKY CHRISTMAS, reader(s)!

xxx