Tickets, Money, Passport?

402 years ago today Elizabeth I died. I know this because today, despite having had it on the pile of books to read for six months, I picked up Elizabeth & Mary to read. Co-incidence? I think it was a sign.

I must say it has been a complete delight catching up on reading lately. I've been fairly indiscriminate, just picking books off the pile and reading them. The Promise of Happiness, Small Island, The Secret Life of Bees, The Scent of Dried Roses. Thoughtful & insightful they've taken me to 1960's Deep South America, Post-war Britain, suburban London life through the 1900's, biographies, historical biographies, the mundane and the shocking. By no stretch is my reading diverse, I still err on the side of books I am certain I'm going to like. A little bit of history, a family tree, a saga, some truth, ordinary people but still through all of this you get to lose yourself in a world so alien to your own, a place that makes you think about your own life, mortality, history.

Oh but it hasn't all been eyes down in a book I've seen a few films also: Kinsey, Hostage and The Life Aquatic and along with that something in between a play at The Old Vic with Kevin Spacey, National Anthems. All of which were interesting, diverting and entertaining in their own way.

What isn't entertaining are the sodding sea monkeys that refuse to die and keep coming back from near extinction. There are now never more than a couple swimming around in the fetid water they call home. One eventually gets quite big, ends up a bottom feeder and by this I mean he feeds of the carcasses of the dead critters then dies himself. I think 'hurrah, that's them done then' when suddenly you spy another couple of little ones. Talk about a never ending cycle. I wonder if it's supposed to symbolise anything. My career probably.