All posts by Beth

I'm a Canadian crochet-obsessed mum living in the UK who used to make a living teaching English to teenagers. Current distractions: babies, baking and baby sign language!
Beth's Reading Log

Fortean Times

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OK, now I love this magazine. I first discovered it when visiting Krista and Carson, and hanging out in Chapters one fine afternoon. Carson was looking for the latest issue – and he was kind enough to give me a whole stack of back issues that he had lying around the house.

What’s not to like about a magazine whose regular features include ‘Strange Deaths’ and ‘The UFO Files’? I received my first subscription issue today, and am relieved to find that the quality has not dimmed over time. One of my favourite bits of the magazine is the ‘Sidelines…’ sections on a few pages, that contain some odd, bizarre, or wacky stories. This month?

During rehearsals for a new show at the Ahmanson Theatre in Los Angeles, actress Sutton Foster fell and broke an arm while she sang a song. The song’s title was: ‘I’m An Accident Waiting to Happen’…

…or…

A 35-stone (220 kg) bear became an unwanted guest in Gerovo, western Croatia, after learning to knock on doors. “I opened the door and saw him standing there and I didn’t believe my eyes at first, then I ran for it as he walked in as if it was the most natural thing in the world,” said Nevenka Loknar. After this happened three times, the Loknar family refused to open the door.

Really? Whyever for?? 😮 Ahhh – hours of surreal fun to look forward to this weekend…

Church

Moodles and you…

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Yay!! I’m excited!! I’ve just started the Portfolio process for the Diocese of Oxford, and I’ve just discovered that they have a moodle!

What, you may ask, is a moodle? Well,

Moodle is a course management system (CMS) – a free, Open Source software package designed using sound pedagogical principles, to help educators create effective online learning communities.

And it’s great! I’m also excited because we’re currently trying to set one up at school, and I’ve got myself involved in the thick of things again, as usual. So, I get to see it at work from both a student and a teacher point of view. Mostly, it allows the student to access course materials and activities from anywhere. We’re looking at using it at school because we can’t allow remote access to our website for security reasons, so we’re using it to make homework assignments and things available at home. We’re also looking at doing things like starting a homework forum which could be monitored by 6th formers to help the younger years…

I’m excited that the Diocese has started one though; it seems the perfect solution for those of us who are pread far and wide, and doing courses and things on our own time. Well done, Oxford!

Writing

et Uxor inaugurates…

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OK, so I’ve decided to move my writing – toast haiku and all – to a new blog. I’ll still appear here, but I think that my tiny poems do tend to get lost amongst the posts and occasional rants that Richard and I have about things… So, they now have a new home. I hope you’ll join me there!

Toast

There are toasters, and there are toasters…

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I made a slight detour via Reading and Debenhams on the way home today. I had to buy a new toaster because last night I cleaned mine too hard, and it broke. (Ooops.) It’s not very often that I have broken things by cleaning them too much, but hey…

Anyway, I decided to see what was on offer. After looking after our current toaster, a Morphy-Richards brushed-steel model (that was also a wedding present – more oops…) for several years, I decided not to go for chrome this time, as it is actually fairly difficult to keep clean, and also seems to add about £20 to the price. But I did look up some popular names – and got quite a shock.

Now, before I unleash my outrage and amazement, I have to say that I think everyone here knows I like toast. I have it every morning, I consider it a main comfort food; in fact, sliced bread was invented, I believe, in order that man (and woman…) could Toast. So, I want you to take a look at this picture:

This looks like a fairly normal, if colourful, two-slice toaster. But when this is attached to it:

The price goes from between £20 and £50 to £109.00! (Oh, sorry – 10% off today, which means it’s only £98.10…) I thought asking for a £35 toaster for a wedding present was cheeky – but £109! And that’s not all. In-store, the same model, in chrome, is £130. I can think of many things to spend £130 on besides a toaster… And most of them involve taking home more than one item! Yikes…

So, I decided to go for the Prestige toaster…

…but not this chrome version, the soft-sided version, which was a respectable £25. I liked its swooshiness, as well as the not-£130 price tag…

Long may it toast!