What are you going on about today, I hear you ask and why are you speaking in capital letters?
Books. That's what I'm talking about -BOOKS.
I make the remark due to my butterfly brain. You see I have a veritable mass of books beside my bed. Books on Russian history, books on rock music, books on British politics, a murder mystery and a US courtroom drama. So many books. If I was to shut myself away in a room for a year I wouldn't even scratch the surface of all the books I want to read and that's not even taking into account e books of which I have what seems like hundreds on my Kindle/mobile phone.
I make the remark because yesterday I represented Hethersett Library at a Friend's of Norfolk Libraries meeting in Norwich Central Library. A number of Norfolk Libraries have Friends groups. Some people think this is the thin end of the wedge with volunteers staffing library to the exclusion of paid staff. This is absolutely not the case.
Friends do exactly what it says on the tin. They are supporters of local libraries who organise events in support and also promote libraries as essential community hubs.
It was good to find out what other Friends groups are getting up to. At Fakenham they put on an event with poet laureate Simon Armitage. He's visiting a number of libraries in the UK each year, selecting them by alphabetical order. So in 2023 it was letters D,E and F and of course Fakenham starts with the letter F. Next year it's G,H,I and J and we all know what letter Hethersett starts with. So I came home in feverish expectation only to have it dampened when I found out submissions had to be in by August. It's a shame we didn't know about this earlier.
We gave a presentation about everything going on at our library and how it has definitely become a focal point of the local community since the post office moved in just a couple of weeks short of a year ago.
After the more formal part of the event, we had a tour of the American Library and that's where I just saw so many books I wanted to read but know damn well I'll never get round to. Every time I go to a library I take out more books. I start reading one, then go to another library and take out another which I start reading instead of the previous one. It can all lead to confusion and explain why I currently have an American lawyer serving as the President of Russia and an American rock star being tried for murder in France.
And so the problem is how do you chose what to read and what not to? Looking at the pile on my bedroom floor might suggest I haven't been very wise in choosing.
And of course the avalanche of books continues with seemingly hundreds if not thousands published every month. Every time I go to Waterstones there's a new display of recently published books. There's veritable piles of them.
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Are we being targeted with adverts? I have mentioned this before. Turn on the television and all the adverts seem to be about releasing equity on homes, the menopause (shouldn't that be the womanopause or the personopause), leaving money in a will and how to have the best possible funeral.
There have been suggestions that people are individually targeted according to their age and other data. That certainly could be the case. I can't see younger people being targeted by the advertorial dross we are subjected to, particularly the idiot who smiles his way through talking about his own demise whilst cutting sandwiches and trying to flog you insurance policies..
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I dislike The One Show on BBC One but there was a funny remark on a recent edition from comedian Jason Manford that I enjoyed and which meshes in nicely with previous comments. He was talking about the lengthy life of a tortoise, a pet he recently bought for his family.
"A friend said I needed to remember the tortoise in my will, but what on earth am I expected to leave it," he said.