Posts Tagged ‘list’

2

The Great Book Project

Friday, April 2nd, 2010

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‘Mon the books!

I don’t read a lot of books. I’ve always felt like I’m missing out on things when people talk about ‘chilling out’ in front of a good book. In the last few days I have decided I’m going to rectify this.

How am I going to do this? Well. I love having myself a target, I’m the kind of bloke who needs a bit of structure to his day/life/thoughts. I thought the best thing to do would be to I get a list of books to read and then go through them and have a bit of extra interest by blogging about them as I go.

I had a surf online for some book lists but most of them struck me as a bit too heavy going and a bit Too Much Too Soon. I finally came upon a list on the Times website called The 100 Best Books of the Decade. Suits me as all the books are modern and a bit less heavy on the old nut.

I’m not going to read all 100 of them. My target is the top 20:

  1. The Road by Cormac McCarthy (2006)
  2. Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi (2003)
  3. Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance by Barack Obama (2004)
  4. Masterworks of the Classical Haida Mythtellers trans Robert Bringhurst (2002)
  5. Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky (2006)
  6. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell (2000)
  7. Life of Pi by Yann Martel (2002)
  8. Payback: Debt and the Shadow Side of Wealth by Margaret Atwood (2008)
  9. Atonement by Ian McEwan (2001)
  10. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown (2003)
    One Fine Day in the Middle of the Night by Christopher Brookmyre *As suggested by Colin in the comments
  11. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy, in a new translation by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky (2007)
    The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler *As suggested by Steve in the comments
  12. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers (2000)
  13. Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald (2001)
  14. Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi (2003)
  15. The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins (2006)
    Animal Farm by George Orwell *As suggested by Jaggy in comments
  16. Rapture by Carol Ann Duffy (2005)
  17. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling (2007)
    The Average American Male by Chad Kultgen *As per Jen’s suggestion in comments
  18. Bad Science by Ben Goldacre (2008)
  19. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen (2001)
  20. White Teeth by Zadie Smith (2000)

Now here is where I take some liberties on my original concept. I’ve taken out The God Delusion and The Da Vini Code because I’ve already read them. Harry Potter is a gonner because it would require me to read parts 4, 5 and 6 (read the first three) and War and Peace has been dropped because I want to finish this project in the next 50 years.

So to replace the 4 dropped books I thought, in the true spirit of the internet, I would ask the world to tell me what to read. So here it is, dear reader, I’m asking for your input here. I would be really grateful if you could suggest some great books for me to grip my teeth into.

Thanks!

PS. I’m away to start on White Teeth now, which I bought yesterday!

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Posted in Books, The Great Book Project | 26 Comments »

26

iPhone – The Religion

Sunday, October 26th, 2008

iphone

The amazing iphone

Hot Damn!

Last week I was in town. Decided, on a whim, to go into the O2 shop to see what was happening in the mobile phone scene. A few months ago my phone was run over by a bus and have been using a dead simple phone since. As soon as I walked in I was immediately drawn towards the ‘iPhone’ stand, having seen them in action before as one of my mates has one. Had a look at the tariffs and couldn’t believe how good the deal was. I called one of the salesmen over asking “This can’t be right?” to which the salesman replied “Yes sir, it is, but only if you run a business”. Oh sweet joy. “I own a business” I tried to spit out, but instead I think I shouted “YABA-DABA-DOO!”. So 10 minutes later I walked out the shop with a new phone.

And boy is it worth it.

Let me tell you, the iPhone is not just a phone and an iPod, as what the layman might think. Its complete access to all information you will ever require. And it fits in your pocket.

Each iPhone has access to various applications that basically supply you with intuitively organised information. I’m telling you. Anything you need is available either free or at a very reasonable price. Of-course all you techno geeks out there will be shouting a resounding “DUH!”. But I didn’t really realise the power until recently. Even some of my mates I have shown the apps to have been really surprised.

I thought I’d compile a wee list of my favourite iPhone applications. So here you go:

tvGuide – First Up, an application that shows you all the shows and listings of your favourite channels. Doesn’t matter where you are. You can see what’s on and when .

MovieStar – Perfect. When I first got the iphone I was going onto Safari and looking up IMDB information, which was a bit of a pain. This app sorts out the information into a nice readable format for your iPhone. Everything you ever needed to know about movies and actors at your fingertips.

AirSharing – The iPhone doesn’t allow you to use it as an external drive to store files…until now! AirSharing lets you to Mount your iPhone as a wireless drive on any Mac, Windows, or Linux computer. Now you can drag-drop files between your iPhone and your computers. You can view common file formats such as Excel, Word and PDF documents on your phone.

My Football – Wherever you are, whatever you are doing, get this app and get instant access to the worlds football results, fixtures, live scores, match statistics. A must.

Pocket Guitar – Use your iPhone as a guitar. No I’m not joking. This app is way too cool. Especially if you are Jimi Hendrix, like me.

Shazam – Ever been somewhere, you hear a song and don’t know what it is or who sings it? Have no fear. Just get your phone out, turn on Shazam and you’ll find out. It works.

Live Trains – So you get out of bed on your way to work. Launch ‘Live Trains’ and have a look at how your train is getting on. Will it be on time this morning? What time does it arrive then? Its that easy. You get live information on any train, train times, length of journey, how many stops etc, etc, etc.

Around Me – Ever been in a strange city/town and what to know information about local hotels, pubs, nighclubs? Just open up Around Me, it will detect your current location in the world, and give you a nice set of results. See information on a pub you fancy? Just click ‘show route’ and it will bring up an map and show you how to get there.

I could go on, but there are the ones I would shout about til the cows came home.

I’m smitten. Oh iPhone how I worship thee.

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Posted in Life in General | No Comments »