Weekend Reading - Sarah's Key

If you haven't already read Sarah's Key by Tatiana de Rosnay

I recommend it highly.

It's a fast easy read about a serious subject.

I haven't seen the film yet but I'm looking forward to it.

It stars Kristin Scott Thomas, I love her don't you?

Also, when reading the book I noticed a strange coincidence.
The main character in the book is from the same town in Massachusetts that I lived in, she attended the same school that I went to...and she had a friend from that school by the same name as one of my friend's from that very same school, and the name was unusual. 
Isn't that weird?  

Books - Love and Louis XIV

I don't know what happened to Spring.
It was here, now it's gone
Temperatures have been well below normal
and Saturday night I woke up to the sound of rain...of all things
It was a good weekend to stay inside with a good book
But no, there were places to go and things to do
reverting to the norm, if you will.
Sunday morning at the gym and Sunday afternoon on a hike
both made palatable by this audio book on my ipod

Love and Louis XIV by Antonia Fraser

So far I've listened to the tale of interconnected relationships between Anne of Austria, Richelieu, Mazarin, The thiry Years War, Condé, Conti, Henriette-Anne Stuart, Marie-Louise d’Orléans, les Mazarinettes and La Fronde
and I'm still in the Regency Period.
It's a very interesting book and I recommend it.

Last night, a quiet dinner at home

I made an asparagus, roasted red pepper, spinach and feta frittata
and served it with Fino
it was delicious and healthy...well except for Fino

The week ahead will be busy
with beginning preparations for the upcoming Antique and Estate Jewelry Show
and watching the ongoing saga of DSK
could he really have been that stupid or was it all a set up by Sarkozy?

BHB Recommends - William Boyd's Any Human Heart and Brazzaville Beach

If you haven't already watched this Masterpiece Theater program I recommend that you do.
It is an excellent adaption of William Boyd's novel which tracks the life of a failed author, Logan Mountstuart, from his youth at Oxford through his old age in the south of France. 
Along the way the character has first hand experience with 1920s Paris, the Spanish Civil War, WW2 and Mid-Century Manhattan and 1960s-1970s London.
He also interacts with Ernest Hemmingway, Ian Flemming and the Duke and Duchess of Windsor who are absolutely vile. The Duchess was very well played by Gillian Anderson.

I am a big fan of William Boyd and I particularly liked his novel Brazzaville Beach.

Here's what Charles Michaud had to say about the book in the Library Journal
In a book packed with scientific and mathematical metaphors, Boyd explores how people create, defend, ignore, or subvert the belief systems that govern their lives. If on one level this is an intellectual thriller, on another it is very much an exciting and riveting adventure story, and on yet another a subtle examination of the power grid of personal relationships. Highly recommended.

So, if you haven't already read William Boyd's novels I suggest that you add them to your reading list.

Recommended Reading or How To Handle A Head Cold

Last week I thought that I was going to spend this weekend doing the domestic thing, like finishing my closet de-clutter project and cooking FF's lemon, chicken, potato dish that she kindly wrote the recipe for, thank you FF.
Well, I was right about being domestic, but wrong about getting anything actually done this weekend as I got  whacked with a nasty head cold with fever and have barely been able to extricate myself from my bed.
Thankfully I don't get sick often which I credit to clean living having limited interaction with other people, therefore cutting down my risk of being exposed to something contagious. Apparently my non interaction strategy hasn't been fool proof.

So what can I do besides spend the weekend in bed with these things.
I don't know about the Chai Spice Tea, the Evian or the Emergen-C
But I can vouch for the fact that the books do make me feel better.

Drink Play etc...by Andrew Gottlieb is a cute parody of 'Eat Pray Love' from the male point of view.
Here's the description from Publishers Weekly
As an impudent retort to Elizabeth Gilbert's best-selling Eat Pray Love, the book that swept book clubs and bestseller charts throughout 2006, this comic travelogue is nothing if not a conversation starter. Fortunately, it's also a dizzyingly fun parody that apes Gilbert in its premise (Ireland, Las Vegas and Thailand replace Gilbert's post-divorce destinations, Italy, India and Indonesia) and its particulars, mirroring plot developments and platitudes line by line (where Eat Pray Love opens with its protagonist contemplating a kiss with an Italian named Giovanni, Gottlieb starts moments from a liplock between his narrator, divorcee Bob Sullivan, and Giovanna. That kind of parody can wear over pages, but Gottlieb's protagonist is a likable and entertaining enough rascal to carry the story and, with the help of a happy-go-lucky personal trainer named Rick, do some good-humored philosophizing on the gender-trumping predicament of heart-break. Still, anyone who has suspected that boys have a bit more fun than girls will find their theories confirmed, as Gottlieb packs in just as much adventure as Gilbert, with a quarter of the self-seriousness.
Not serious reading but a cute book
and

Heresy by S.J. Parrish, is a 'Name of the Rose' type murder mystery thriller set in Elizabethan Oxford with an Italian ex priest/philosopher/astrologer/scholar, Giordano Bruno, tasked by Elizabeth to search for Catholic conspiracy amid the newly formed Protestants at Oxford.  The book isn't as linguistically or semiotically as exciting as a book by Eco...and who can write like Eco but Eco?  But is is a very clever story and I look forward to reading her next Giordano Bruno historical mystery Prophesy.

Next week when I feel better it will back to blogging.
Until then I leave you with
Colonel Qaddafi - A Life In Fashion
and
Qaddafi Kid Style
While these articles make fun of Qaddafi and his brood, Libya is no laughing matter.
I'm guessing that there's going to be a lot more bloodshed before all of this is over
and it's probably going to end up with that megalomaniac Qaddafi
and his utterly insane Little Green Book still in power.

The 4 Hour Body and The 4 Month Face

Even though I wasn't raised by a superior Chinese mother, I still make an effort at self improvement, especially at the start of a new year.

So high on my list is reading this book....although probably the only progress that I can make in 4 hours is to get the book read.  And if I am sedentary for the 4 hours that it will take for me to read this book, I'm not sure exactly what kind of self improvement I will actually be making.

But any book that tempts me with rapid fat loss, incredible sex and becoming superhuman is worth reading when self improvement is the goal.

The 4 Hour Body

A more realistic goal in my quest for self improvement than becoming superhuman is taking better care of my skin.  While not a product person per se, I do see the need to do something besides injections and laser to cope with ageing.

A very nice person sent me an article about the Lifeline products and their near miraculous results. 
All kinds of stem cell biotechnology has gone into creating these serums and they affect the skin by using messaging molecules or proteins.

Basically a bunch of smarty pants research scientists came up with this.

Another long story short, they came up with two solutions. One, they started using a technique from a Japanese nanotechnology firm that enabled them to encapsulate the proteins from stem cell extract inside a nanovessicle in order to keep them stable and give them the ability to penetrate the upper layer of the skin, and then they figured out how to "blow up" the cells in order to harvest the other 90% of the messaging proteins. That is very important, because cultivating stem cells is not easy-it takes time, some very expensive equipment, and cleanrooms. The cells are cultured in numerous batches, because if a batch goes bad it must be thrown out.

Then

And then they started rigorously, indefatigably testing it to get the right mix that produced just the effect they wanted. They conducted all official safety and efficacy tests according to the highest FDA standards, with independent laboratories and physicians. They confirmed the following anti-aging claims: moisture effect, increased skin elasticity, sun protection, decreased fine lines and wrinkles, improved skin tone.

This product doesn't claim to give you great skin overnight, but with consistent usage for at least 4 months one should be able to see positive results.

Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't, but I'm committed to giving it at least 6 months, alternating usage with Atralin, which is the latest and greatest of the new Retin A products. 

Very cleverly the makers of Lifeline, the International Stem Cell Corporation, have stated that the production is limited so only a very fortunate 4000 people will be able to try the product until manufacturing gets ramped up. 
Smart marketing...there's nothing like claiming scarcity to promote demand and justify higher prices. 

But it if works, I'm certainly willing to pay the price...god knows it's cheaper than the laser.