More books!

I have not done well with reading lately, need to get back into it! Have been on the same two books for quite a while now not because they are not good but it seems like I'm never in the right mood to read at the mo, hopefully that will change soon. 

Dirk Gently by Douglas Adams is brilliant. I loved the very underrated tv show with Stephen Mangan and Darren Boyd and the book is just as good. He manages to connect several different stories and characters that you don't imagine are possible and I'm itching to find out what happens in the end. 

Rhys Darby: This Way to Spaceship is ridiculously funny. Half way between a biography and an end of the world guide This Way to Spaceship takes you through everything from pretending to be a dinosaur to his brief time in the New Zealand army. I bought this book after I saw him in Edinburgh last year and I even got him to sign it for me. This book is just as fantastic as his stand up and a must need for any Rhys Darby fan 

 

Tea/Wine Crawl in York

One of my friends was up for the weekend so we decided to go on a tea/wine crawl in York as there are many nice cafes, pubs and bars some of which not all of us had been to. We then decided we would each give them a rating out of ten based on niceness of tea, atmosphere and customer service. Kind of like a come dine with me for tea/wine lovers in York.

So here are the places we have been to so far, hoping to do some more in the future.

Tea Places;

Cafe 68 Gillygate: A nice modern little cafe situated on Gillygate (no shit sherlock!). We had Yorkshire breakfasts and two big pots of tea. I thought the breakfast was good, finished off every bite and the tea was very nice and refreshing. I even spoiled myself and put a little sugar in it! We stayed a little longer as it started pissing it down outside hence the extra big pot of tea, and it wasn't too crowded so I felt rather relaxed. They also had free samples in the form of brownies at the till. I thought that was a nice touch.
Scores: Me: 7 1/2       Dan: 7     Vicki: 8     Total: 22 1/2
I think the only thing that let it down in general was that the big teapots leaked out when you poured and some of the cups were a bit mucky. But overall, very nice place indeed.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Cafe-68-Gillygate/130510630340080

The Earl Grey Tea Rooms: This is situated in the shambles and is a place I've been to a couple of times, but Dan and Vicki hadn't, so I already knew I liked the place and that even on a busy saturday there would most likely be a table free. Me and Dan went for the Royalty Tea (in preparation for our impending move into the royal family) and Vicki went with the traditional breakfast tea. It's a very old fashioned place, with very quick service and a lot cheaper than we were expecting. Whilst in there we had a massive dream wedding discussion, even though none of us have secured a man yet but there is no harm in planning ahead. Especially a royal wedding ;)
Scores: Me: 8     Dan: 8    Vicki: 8 1/2    Total: 24 1/2
http://www.earlgreytearooms.co.uk/


Costa Coffee: After all that tea we needed a good walk to stretch our legs and to walk off the tea so we decided to go to the costa all the way on the otherside of town attached to the premier inn near the Reel Cinema. I had an iced latte, Vicki had a chocolate cooler and Dan stuck with tea. The service was good but I didn't really like my iced latte that much, I felt it was lacking in taste a bit. I don't think Vicki enjoyed her cooler either, from now on at Costa I will stick to regular hot lattes. Or mochas.
Scores: Me: 6      Dan: 6     Vicki: 7    Total: 19

Wine Places;
Lendal Cellar: This place has recently reopened. It looks pretty much the same on the inside, but the outside has changed a fair bit. We came here for a spot of late lunch, although only me and Dan ate. I had ham, egg and chips and Dan had some sort of beef dinner/yorkshire pudding wrap that looked very nice. The food was very good as always and at a good price. We had a nice rose white zinfadel wine, that was very tasty and fruity. Service was quick and good but I never like the atmosphere in there when its too crowded, especially when it is full of very loud drunken women. Maybe I'm getting too old for Lendals.
Scores: Me: 7     Dan: 7     Vicki: 7   Total: 21
http://gkpubs.co.uk/pubs-in-york/lendal-cellars-pub/


City Screen Bar: This is part of the cinema in the centre of town, in which a couple of our friends currently work at. It is usually busy on a saturday, due to its nice drinks and good atmosphere and also has a nice terrace area that looks out onto the river. We decided to share another bottle of Rose, and luckily since City Screen is a bit more expensive we got a little bit of a staff discount (thanks Amina!) A whole £7 off the bottle we got. This wine was very fruity and delicous, and by this time I was begining to feel a bit merry since I am quite a lightweight.
Scores: Me: 9     Dan: 9    Vicki: 9  Total: 27

Golden Lion: We texted our friend who works there prior to coming to save us a bottle or two of Rose. By this time we had been home and had another bottle from the spar and we now all a bit more merry. The Golden Lion was busy (it usually is) but we managed to grab a table. Verdicts on this wine was that it was a little dry and not as fruity as the others but it did share quite nicely between us all, especially now our friend Sophie had joined us!
Scores: Me: 7       Dan: 7        Vicki: 7        Total: 21

So overall, we had a very good day and hopefully we will do more tea/wine tasting in the future!

Books, books and more books!

I do love a good book, here are some of the ones I've read recently

The Hunger Games are a brilliant read, so good they only took me about a week to get through them all! I enjoyed the film as well, I thought the casting was perfect!

Karlology is a fantastic insight into the mind of Karl Pilkington, who is undoubtably one of my favourite people on the planet, he never fails to make me chuckle. In this book he visits a lot of museums and exhibits and finds out facts that I didn't know either! For example did you know that a lungfish can survive out of water for 3 years?!

The good, the bad and the multiplex is the book I am currently reading. It's about how cinema has changed so much since the beginning and what this means for the future of film making. I have to say I am really liking this book even if I don't agree sometimes with taste of films/actors. He loves Zach Effron!

I rescued some books from my mums house (she is having a massive clear out) so I've got plenty more books to read, it will probably take me till Christmas!

No more Glee...for me

It has finally happened. I've known it for a long time but tried to stay strong but I cannot go on any longer. I have stopped watching Glee.

It used to make me happy inside, I enjoyed their silly story lines and outrageous characters but alas no more. It all happened last weekend.

I hadn't seen it for a while but had found out via Facebook of a certain characters comeuppance (thanks to a certain friend who apparently said if you weren't always up to date with glee it meant you weren't a real fan) so I had a few episodes to catch up on. I already had a feeling I wouldn't like the episode as they were singing Grease in it but I thought I would give it a go anyways.

It was hideous. I grew up watching Grease and their version made me cringe. They couldn't even do John Travolta's ridiculously high note at the end right. I was disappointed. I was annoyed. I had given up. I'm surprised I made it through past that number but I didn't last much longer. I got to "the first time I saw your face" and then turned off.

I then re-watched Game of Thrones instead.

I think the only thing I will actually miss from Glee is Chris Colfer and Darren Criss, but I'm sure they will both move onto to better things in the future I can watch instead.

Books of late

I recently had a lot of spare reading time on my hands and managed to get through some quite good books, one of them being The Coma by Alex Garland who wrote The Beach, 28 Days Later & Sunshine all which were made into films by the amazing Danny Boyle. The Coma is a short, very well story that explores the fragile ness of reality and the often very realistic dreams and the all round confusion one has when trying to tell the difference.

The book I am currently reading is a strange one, it's called The Road to the Sea written by Ciara Hegarty who is a cousin of one of my family members. It's set in 1940's Ireland and centres around a young girl growing up on a farm whose just recently lost her twin sister. I initially thought it was just going to be a simple boy meets girl story but it turned a lot darker than I could have imagined, so much so I wanted to put the book in the freezer like joey does in that episode of friends. But at the same time I really want to know what's going to happen next.

Also when I finish that book it means I can start on The Hunger Games which my dad got me for Christmas which I have been looking forward to for quite a while!!!

Dream Diary: I

*WARNING! THIS DREAM CONTAINS SCENES OF HORRIBLENESS AND A CRAZY GRANNY!*

I've always been told that I have quite strange, interesting dreams but I find that I forget them so I thought I should start writing them down. So this will be a current feature in my blog.

I'll try and keep it linear, but I already don't remember how it started.

so I've decided to move to London, living with one other girl (don't know who she is) and having a good time. Then old lady starts creeping around and leaving stuff outside the house. I think one of the items was some toilet paper. She kind of reminds me of the old lady from Drag Me to Hell.

*Dream jumps* Old lady is now my granny and is living upstairs, I am downstairs and have also turned into one of the sisters from the head-teachers family off Waterloo Road. I wake in bed when I swear I see granny opening my door and staring at me, looking for something. But a second later, she is gone. I get up and search my bag to find I have hidden a pair of scissors and other pointy objects away from her. I don't want her to get mad with me, so I open my door and shout her, but she doesn't answer and seems to have disappeared. It is then that I discover she has been sick outside my room. I shift most of it out of the way (not sure how) and go to the kitchen where my auntie and cousins are getting ready to leave. I beg for them not to leave me in the house alone with granny. Cousins ignore me. I then go to wish auntie a happy birthday and say her present is in my room. I tell myself its winnie the pooh knickers. On the way back I bump into David Mitchell. He is wearing monks robes. He tells me to read his book.

*Dream jumps* Granny appears and auntie tells me to let her hug me. I dont want her to but I let her. She now looks like one of those frost people from Thor. She then runs away to her room, I follow her with my sister (other Waterloo Road character) and notice the house is now ruins, and her bedroom is on the top of one, we can see her sitting up there under her bed which mattress is half way off the bed. Then look round to see (now this gross bit) that granny has made a monument entirely out of feces. Lovely. There is also a sword sticking out the side of it. Granny appears again and murmurs that she needs another sword as she walks past us.

*Dream jump* The house is suddenly full of people who are all trying to escape, we open the huge wooden doors that leads out to a rainbow road bridge similar to Thor (and Mario Kart Wii!) and underneath is the sea. We attempt to cross to the reach an island on the other side but the enemy approach from the side blocking the bridge off with arrows and throwing swords. They have also managed to tie a few people up who I simply pick up rather easily and through the wooden doors retreating backwards. I save a worm and a bishop.

DREAM ENDS...

I wake up in real world thinking...WTF?

ebay part II

well just an update really, since the last ebay update I have sold 3 more items. Those two nintendo ds games and another one.

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince went for £6, Pokemon Pearl Edition went for £13.

And I just sold Lego Star Wars for about £6 as well.

Bit annoyed as am still waiting on feedback for one of orders, esp I paid extra for special delivery. It's just rude lol.

Might try and have a break from it, see how well that goes..