Melodious

I love Wes anderson films. Have you seen Moonlight Kingdom or The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou? Check them out if you haven't. Very quirky, great cinematogrophy and good humour. Many actors appear in the same films too like Tilda Swinton, Edward Norton and Bill Murray.

Ooooo a tea thread My kinda place. The tea I get usually is from Germany (friend lives there), its a loose leaf but I always forget the name of it. When money is tighter I like Tea pigs breakfast tea bags. Very nice and smooth. Budget wise I go for Twinnings Assam strong & mighty or Tesco finest assam. I use agave nectar as the sweetner and soy milk. Sometimes I use honey too. Great tea website if you are in the UK or Edinburgh: http://www.eteaket.co.uk/

Coffee? Bleugh! Tea all the way (as you can probably tell from my avatar). I do like the smell of coffee but never could get into the taste. Despite the UK having the reputation for being a tea lovers country we don't do tea well. It's all low grade tea bags that taste like the shavings off the shop floor. I think we lose so much in the name of convienience.

Yeah I am the same. I don't like to be the center of attention so I never really celebrate my birthday. I always find opening gifts really awkward and I don't do Christmas at all. I'll get my mother something as she will get me something but everyone else I tell them not to bother as I'm not. To be honest it works out great as there is no stress for Christmas (except the family dinner) and I don't have to frantically trying to buy people something when I have no clue what to get them anyway. @Kell - I'm the same about being late, I hate it and often arrive very early for things. I do get anxious about it. Your description about job interviews is me too, arriving well ahead of scehdule and pacing outside the building for half an hour or trying to call someone to calm myself down. I don't eat on the interview day either until it's over. I do quite well in interviews though but nerves before hand are terrible.

I LOVED Norweigan Wood and The Wind Up Bird Chronicle, particulary the latter. His writing style is so compelling even though I often find his characters numb with little strong emotions either way. I found his last book Colourless Tsukuru Tazaki disappointing. It seemed like a poor imitation of Murakami, some of the translation was sloppy and his metaphors and descriptions very cliche and weak. There certainly is a lot of repeated elements in his books (cats, jazz, weird sexual encounters, lonely disconnected men) that sometimes he seems like a one trick pony but his trick is very, very good when he gets it right. I will get around to IQ84 (I love 1984 so a Murakami take on it has me interested.) and Kaftka on the Shore but given the repeated elements I don't feel the urge to rush out and get them. A nice period netween books seems like a good idea.

My only Camus book to date but I loved and certainly felt a connection to Mersault in some way. I often find myself with a disconnection from other people and society with the values and norms that are accepted without any question or reason. I will have to revisit it at some point to try and take a deeper look into the book's character and message as well as his other works.

Thanks bobblybear I've had some laptop troubles this past week so I haven't been on lately.

Princess Mononoke. Miyazaki, you will be sorely missed...

29, just about holding on to my 20s

I loved this show when I was younger. I never did see the last series though. I'll have to get the DVDs one day.

There used to be an amazing second hand book shop in my town. It was a huge attic full of books and you could spend hours in there but it closed down about 10 years ago. All we have is a little Waterstones now My town isn't much of a reader town I think. Thanks Athena I'll take a looksy on those shops.

Ohhh some more came up on my FB feed today http://www.buzzfeed.com/ailbhemalone/british-bookshops#3q02cy9

I wish I had something like that near me. The Inverness one looks amazing just to sit for a few hours and read.

Wasn't sure where to put this but some of these look amazing. http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/gallery/2014/oct/10/weird-and-wonderful-bookshops-worldwide-in-pictures Anybody have anymore unusual/amazing bookshops to show?

Yield is where it all started for me. The last 3 albums have been hit and miss for me but they never fail to bring it live. Vs was my favourite for a long time but now I couldn't pick one or two that stand above the others. It is a shame they don't go to Finland but they do seem to stick to the 'money centers' these days. I've met a lot of friends through Pearl Jam so travelling to see them is second nature to me now.

Ha ha ha thanks Karsa All in good time Frankie

Well both actually, favourite band to listen to and see live. I've had the pleasure of seeing them 15 times now. It will be worth the trip believe me. I've travelled to a few places to see them, France, Germany, Ireland and Poland. Happily do so again. I know how you feel though. I REALLY want to see Tom Waits live before he dies (he's getting on a little and touring isn't a priority for him).

I do and I will. I see you like Pearl Jam My favourite band to see live. I have no gigs at the minute but I will be seeing Mark Lanegan in the new year.

I was looking at maybe picking up the first book of the trilogy and giving it a go. I think this is definitly one of those cases of being enticed by a book cover.

I am I listen to a lot of genres, mainly rock and jazz but anything from heavy metal to classical. I guess music was my first love and hobby that really took hold. Reading has been catching up these past few years after a bit of a absence.

One of my all time favourites

Thanks Kay (Who doesn't love tea?) I've only just dipped into the first pages of Dalloway so can't say too much at the minute. It's my first book by Virginia so I'll see how I get on. Waiting on the wings is The Bell Jar by Slyvia Plath. Crime and Punishment is another on the TBR along with The Brothers Karamazov. So MANY books, to short a life span

Thanks Frankie and Signor I will get around to setting up a reading blog in the next few days once I've got further with Mrs Dalloway. I checked out your blog and it's really good. I may visit again when I need some suggestions for fantasy. I struggle sometimes with that genre as it can be too much about the dragons and wizards than a good plot with decent characters. I love LOtR though and I aim to re-read it at the end of the year as it's probably been about 8 years since I last did.

Thanks Athena. Favourite 'classics' would be 1984 - Orwell, East of Eden - Steinbeck, Time Machine - H.G Wells, All Quite on the Western Front - Remarque and MacBeth - Shakespere. I guess I tend to be more toward modern classics than ye olde ones for the same reasons as you Athena. War and Peace is certainly on my TBR. I have a friend who has read a lot of Russian literature so I aim to pick her brain about a couple of novels. I do tend to like novels that have a philosophical slant or about society in general. I like my brain to be engaged while reading so 'light' or reading for pure entertainment purposes are few and far between. That's not to say I don't though as I still love to read the Asterix comics and I've had the itch to re-read Matilda by Roald Dahl again. Request accepted

Hello all. I'm Dave from north west England and since I don't really have any reader friends I thought i'd sign up here. It will be nice to talk to people about literature and get some recommendations (not that my 'to read list' is big enough already) and some general chit chat. In terms of what I like to read I guess I've been reading a lot of classics lately as well as some non fiction about the environment, space that kind of thing. Some examples of what I've read this year can be found on my Goodreads page (feel free to add me if you like) https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/3084339?shelf=currently-reading Thanks and happy reading. Dave