An interesting girly reading challenge

I have a long time goal of reading over 1000 books, and this year I finally exceeded my Goodreads yearly challenge - so far 30 books over the initial goal of 24, with a little help from my daughter bedtime stories reading.

I also, re-kindled with the television show: Gilmore Girls, thanks to Netflix, so when I discovered the Rory Gilmore Reading Challenge, it turns to be the perfect way to enhance my initial dare and combine various interests of mine.

So thanks to Patrick Lenton for compiling this list of all 337 books:


1) 1984 by George Orwell
2.) The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
3.) Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
4.) The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
5.) An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser
6.) Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt
7.) Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
8.) Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank
9.) Archidamian War by Donald Kagan
10.) The Art of Fiction by Henry James
11.) The Art of War by Sun Tzu
12.) As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
13.) Atonement by Ian McEwan
14.) Autobiography of a Face by Lucy Grealy
15.) The Awakening by Kate Chopin
16.) Babe by Dick King-Smith
17.) Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women by Susan Faludi
18.) Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie
19.) Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
20.) The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
21.) Beloved by Toni Morrison
22.) Beowulf: A New Verse Translation by Seamus Heaney
23.) The Bhagava Gita
24.) The Bielski Brothers by Peter Duffy
25.) Bitch in Praise of Difficult Women by Elizabeth Wurtzel
26.) A Bolt from the Blue and Other Essays by Mary McCarthy
27.) Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
28.) Brick Lane by Monica Ali
29.) Candide by Voltaire
30.) The Canterbury Tales by Chaucer
31.) Carrie by Stephen King
32.) Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
33.) Charlotte’s Web by E. B. White
34.) The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
35.) The Children’s Hour by Lillian Hellman
36.) Christine by Stephen King
37.) A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
38.) A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
39.) The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse
40.) The Collected Stories by Eudora Welty
41.) The Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare
42.) Complete Novels by Dawn Powell
43.) The Complete Poems by Anne Sexton
44.) Complete Stories by Dorothy Parker
45.) A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
46.) The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
47.) Cousin Bette by Honoré de Balzac
48.) Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
49.) The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber
50.) The Crucible by Arthur Miller
51.) Cujo by Stephen King
52.) The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
53.) Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
54.) David and Lisa by Dr Theodore Issac Rubin M.D
55.) David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
56.) The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
57.) Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol
58.) Demons by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
59.) Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
60.) Deenie by Judy Blume
61.) The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America by Erik Larson
62.) The Dirt: Confessions of the World’s Most Notorious Rock Band by Tommy Lee, Vince Neil, Mick Mars and Nikki Sixx
63.) The Divine Comedy by Dante
64.) The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells
65.) Don Quixote by Cervantes
66.) Driving Miss Daisy by Alfred Uhrv
67.) Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
68.) Edgar Allan Poe: Complete Tales & Poems by Edgar Allan Poe
69.) Eleanor Roosevelt by Blanche Wiesen Cook
70.) The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
71.) Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters by Mark Dunn
72.) Eloise by Kay Thompson
73.) Emily the Strange by Roger Reger
74.) Emma by Jane Austen
75.) Empire Falls by Richard Russo
76.) Encyclopedia Brown: Boy Detective by Donald J. Sobol
77.) Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton
78.) Ethics by Spinoza
79.) Europe through the Back Door, 2003 by Rick Steves
80.) Eva Luna by Isabel Allende
81.) Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer
82.) Extravagance by Gary Krist
83.) Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
84.) Fahrenheit 9/11 by Michael Moore
85.) The Fall of the Athenian Empire by Donald Kagan
86.) Fat Land: How Americans Became the Fattest People in the World by Greg Critser
87.) Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas by Hunter S. Thompson
88.) The Fellowship of the Ring by J. R. R. Tolkien
89.) Fiddler on the Roof by Joseph Stein
90.) The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
91.) Finnegans Wake by James Joyce
92.) Fletch by Gregory McDonald
93.) Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
94.) The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem
95.) The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
96.) Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
97.) Franny and Zooey by J. D. Salinger
98.) Freaky Friday by Mary Rodgers
99.) Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut
100.) Gender Trouble by Judith Butler
101.) George W. Bushism: The Slate Book of the Accidental Wit and Wisdom of our 43rd President by Jacob Weisberg
102.) Gidget by Fredrick Kohner
103.) Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen
104.) The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels
105.) The Godfather: Book 1 by Mario Puzo
106.) The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
107.) Goldilocks and the Three Bears by Alvin Granowsky
108.) Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
109.) The Good Soldier by Ford Maddox Ford
110.) The Graduate by Charles Webb
111.) The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
112.) The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
113.) Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
114.) The Group by Mary McCarthy
115.) Hamlet by William Shakespeare
116.) Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling
117.) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J. K. Rowling
118.) A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers
119.) Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
120.) Helter Skelter: The True Story of the Manson Murders by Vincent Bugliosi and Curt Gentry
121.) Henry IV, part I by William Shakespeare
122.) Henry IV, part II by William Shakespeare
123.) Henry V by William Shakespeare
124.) High Fidelity by Nick Hornby
125.) The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon
126.) Holidays on Ice: Stories by David Sedaris
127.) The Holy Barbarians by Lawrence Lipton
128.) House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III
129.) The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende
130.) How to Breathe Underwater by Julie Orringer
131.) How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
132.) How the Light Gets in by M. J. Hyland
133.) Howl by Allen Ginsberg
134.) The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo
135.) The Iliad by Homer
136.) I’m with the Band by Pamela des Barres
137.) In Cold Blood by Truman Capote
138.) Inferno by Dante
139.) Inherit the Wind by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee
140.) Iron Weed by William J. Kennedy
141.) It Takes a Village by Hillary Clinton
142.) Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
143.) The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
144.) Julius Caesar by William Shakespeare
145.) The Jumping Frog by Mark Twain
146.) The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
147.) Just a Couple of Days by Tony Vigorito
148.) The Kitchen Boy: A Novel of the Last Tsar by Robert Alexander
149.) Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain
150.) The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
151.) Lady Chatterleys’ Lover by D. H. Lawrence
152.) The Last Empire: Essays 1992-2000 by Gore Vidal
153.) Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
154.) The Legend of Bagger Vance by Steven Pressfield
155.) Less Than Zero by Bret Easton Ellis
156.) Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke
157.) Lies and the Lying Liars Who Tell Them by Al Franken
158.) Life of Pi by Yann Martel
159.) Little Dorrit by Charles Dickens
160.) The Little Locksmith by Katharine Butler Hathaway
161.) The Little Match Girl by Hans Christian Andersen
162.) Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
163.) Living History by Hillary Rodham Clinton
164.) Lord of the Flies by William Golding
165.) The Lottery: And Other Stories by Shirley Jackson
166.) The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold
167.) The Love Story by Erich Segal
168.) Macbeth by William Shakespeare
169.) Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
170.) The Manticore by Robertson Davies
171.) Marathon Man by William Goldman
172.) The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
173.) Memoirs of a Dutiful Daughter by Simone de Beauvoir
174.) Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman by William Tecumseh Sherman
175.) Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
176.) The Meaning of Consuelo by Judith Ortiz Cofer
177.) Mencken’s Chrestomathy by H. R. Mencken
178.) The Merry Wives of Windsro by William Shakespeare
179.) The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
180.) Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
181.) The Miracle Worker by William Gibson
182.) Moby Dick by Herman Melville
183.) The Mojo Collection: The Ultimate Music Companion by Jim Irvin
184.) Moliere: A Biography by Hobart Chatfield Taylor
185.) A Monetary History of the United States by Milton Friedman
186.) Monsieur Proust by Celeste Albaret
187.) A Month Of Sundays: Searching For The Spirit And My Sister by Julie Mars
188.) A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
189.) Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
190.) Mutiny on the Bounty by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall
191.) My Lai 4: A Report on the Massacre and It’s Aftermath by Seymour M. Hersh
192.) My Life as Author and Editor by H. R. Mencken
193.) My Life in Orange: Growing Up with the Guru by Tim Guest
194.) Myra Waldo’s Travel and Motoring Guide to Europe, 1978 by Myra Waldo
195.) My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult
196.) The Naked and the Dead by Norman Mailer
197.) The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco
198.) The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
199.) The Nanny Diaries by Emma McLaughlin
200.) Nervous System: Or, Losing My Mind in Literature by Jan Lars Jensen
201.) New Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson
202.) The New Way Things Work by David Macaulay
203.) Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
204.) Night by Elie Wiesel
205.) Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
206.) The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism by William E. Cain, Laurie A. Finke, Barbara E. Johnson, John P. McGowan
207.) Novels 1930-1942: Dance Night/Come Back to Sorrento, Turn, Magic Wheel/Angels on Toast/A Time to be Born by Dawn Powell
208.) Notes of a Dirty Old Man by Charles Bukowski
209.) Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
210.) Old School by Tobias Wolff
211.) On the Road by Jack Kerouac
212.) One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
213.) One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
214.) The Opposite of Fate: Memories of a Writing Life by Amy Tan
215.) Oracle Night by Paul Auster
216.) Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
217.) Othello by Shakespeare
218.) Our Mutual Friend by Charles Dickens
219.) The Outbreak of the Peloponnesian War by Donald Kagan
220.) Out of Africa by Isac Dineson
221.) The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
222.) A Passage to India by E.M. Forster
223.) The Peace of Nicias and the Sicilian Expedition by Donald Kagan
224.) The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
225.) Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
226.) The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
227.) Pigs at the Trough by Arianna Huffington
228.) Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi
229.) Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk Legs McNeil and Gillian McCain
230.) The Polysyllabic Spree by Nick Hornby
231.) The Portable Dorothy Parker by Dorothy Parker
232.) The Portable Nietzche by Fredrich Nietzche
233.) The Price of Loyalty: George W. Bush, the White House, and the Education of Paul O’Neill by Ron Suskind
234.) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
235.) Property by Valerie Martin
236.) Pushkin: A Biography by T. J. Binyon
237.) Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
238.) Quattrocento by James Mckean
239.) A Quiet Storm by Rachel Howzell Hall
240.) Rapunzel by Grimm Brothers
241.) The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe
242.) The Razor’s Edge by W. Somerset Maugham
243.) Reading Lolita in Tehran: A Memoir in Books by Azar Nafisi
244.) Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
245.) Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggin
246.) The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
247.) Rescuing Patty Hearst: Memories From a Decade Gone Mad by Virginia Holman
248.) The Return of the King by J. R. R. Tolkien
249.) R Is for Ricochet by Sue Grafton
250.) Rita Hayworth by Stephen King
251.) Robert’s Rules of Order by Henry Robert
252.) Roman Holiday by Edith Wharton
253.) Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare
254.) A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
255.) A Room with a View by E. M. Forster
256.) Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin
257.) The Rough Guide to Europe, 2003 Edition
258.) Sacred Time by Ursula Hegi
259.) Sanctuary by William Faulkner
260.) Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay by Nancy Milford
261.) Say Goodbye to Daisy Miller by Henry James
262.) The Scarecrow of Oz by Frank L. Baum
263.) The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
264.) Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand
265.) The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir
266.) The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
267.) Secrets of the Flesh: A Life of Colette by Judith Thurman
268.) Selected Hotels of Europe
269.) Selected Letters of Dawn Powell: 1913-1965 by Dawn Powell
270.) Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen
271.) A Separate Peace by John Knowles
272.) Several Biographies of Winston Churchill
273.) Sexus by Henry Miller
274.) The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
275.) Shane by Jack Shaefer
276.) The Shining by Stephen King
277.) Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
278.) S Is for Silence by Sue Grafton
279.) Slaughter-house Five by Kurt Vonnegut
280.) Small Island by Andrea Levy
281.) Snows of Kilimanjaro by Ernest Hemingway
282.) Snow White and Rose Red by Grimm Brothers
283.) Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy: Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World by Barrington Moore
284.) The Song of Names by Norman Lebrecht
285.) Song of the Simple Truth: The Complete Poems of Julia de Burgos by Julia de Burgos
286.) The Song Reader by Lisa Tucker
287.) Songbook by Nick Hornby
288.) The Sonnets by William Shakespeare
289.) Sonnets from the Portuegese by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
290.) Sophie’s Choice by William Styron
291.) The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
292.) Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
293.) Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers by Mary Roach
294.) The Story of My Life by Helen Keller
295.) A Streetcar Named Desiree by Tennessee Williams
296.) Stuart Little by E. B. White
297.) Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway
298.) Swann’s Way by Marcel Proust
299.) Swimming with Giants: My Encounters with Whales, Dolphins and Seals by Anne Collett
300.) Sybil by Flora Rheta Schreiber
301.) A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
302.) Tender Is The Night by F. Scott Fitzgerald
303.) Term of Endearment by Larry McMurtry
304.) Time and Again by Jack Finney
305.) The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
306.) To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway
307.) To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
308.) The Tragedy of Richard III by William Shakespeare
309.) A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
310.) The Trial by Franz Kafka
311.) The True and Outstanding Adventures of the Hunt Sisters by Elisabeth Robinson
312.) Truth & Beauty: A Friendship by Ann Patchett
313.) Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom
314.) Ulysses by James Joyce
315.) The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath 1950-1962 by Sylvia Plath
316.) Uncle Tom’s Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
317.) Unless by Carol Shields
318.) Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann
319.) The Vanishing Newspaper by Philip Meyers
320.) Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray
321.) Velvet Underground’s The Velvet Underground and Nico (Thirty Three and a Third series) by Joe Harvard
322.) The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
323.) Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett
324.) Walden by Henry David Thoreau
325.) Walt Disney’s Bambi by Felix Salten
326.) War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
327.) We Owe You Nothing – Punk Planet: The Collected Interviews edited by Daniel Sinker
328.) What Colour is Your Parachute? 2005 by Richard Nelson Bolles
329.) What Happened to Baby Jane by Henry Farrell
330.) When the Emperor Was Divine by Julie Otsuka
331.) Who Moved My Cheese? Spencer Johnson
332.) Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee
333.) Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire
334.) The Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum
335.) Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
336.) The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
337.) The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

Proust Questionnaire

What is your idea of happiness?

Reading by the sea

What is your favourite virtue?

Quietness

What do you most value in your friends?

Art of listening for the male. Confidence and humor for the women.

What is your biggest weakness?

Constant criticism

What is your most marked characteristic?

Beard and disorganised hair style

What is your idea of misery?

Losing my daughter

What is your favourite bird?

Red robin

Who are your favourite writers?

China Mieville, Philip K. Dick, Jules Vernes, J. Prevert, Henri Michaux.

Who are your favourite musicians?

Bach, Beck, Jethro Tull, Radiohead.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in fiction?

Hatteras, Mary Poppins.

Who are your favourite heroes and heroines in history?

Louise Michelle, Socrates, Isaac Newton, Grace Hooper.

What is your favourite food and drink?

Andouillettes. Diabolo menthe.

What event in history do you most admire?

The fall of the Berlin wall.

What social movement do you most admire?

May 1968 ... even if it failed. La commune de Paris.

What is your present state of mind?
Curious, optimistic, anxious.

Which fault in others do you most easily tolerate?

Rudeness.

Which fault in yourself do you most easily tolerate?

Extreme Introversion

Irish bucket list (outside Dublin )

Continuing from Dublin bucket list and that old post from 2008, on the 10 best things to do in Ireland, here's my Irish bucket list (omitting Dublin ):

• See Fungi the dolphin in Dingle, and have a swim with Dustin in Doolin.   ✔ ✔
• Visit Newgrange   ✔
• Visit the Titanic exposition in Belfast   ✔✔
• lock-in a pub ( not necessarily drunk).  ✔
• See the Giant Causeway  ✔
• Games Of Thrones film location road trip:
• Tollymore Forest Park.
• Castle Ward.
• The Dark Edges.
• Downhill Strand.
• Ballintoy.
• Shillanavoghy Valley.
• Walk to the top of Croagh Patrick
• A road trip along the Atlantic Film Trail:
• Leenane (Movie: The Field)
• Cong (Movies: The Quiet Man, The Purple Taxi) ✔
• Roundstone (Movie: Into the west)
• Dingle Peninsula (Movies: Far and Away, Ryan's daughter) ✔
• Derrynane (Movie: Excalibur)
• Union Hall (Movie: The War of the button) ✔
• Kilmichael - Co Cork (Movie: The wind that shakes the barley)
• Youghal (Movie: Moby Dick)
• See the Cliffs of Moher ✔ - bonus: On a boat from the sea. ✔
• Walk the Wicklow way / St Kevin's Way
• Climb Mount Brandon (Kerry)
• Mountain bike in Ballyhoura. ✔
• Cycle the Great Western Greenway (Mayo)
• Cycle the Dublin-Galway Greenway (once completed)
• Visit the Japanese Garden in Tramore
• Cycle the Great Southern Trail
• Pub in session in the Salty dog in Kilkee. ✔
• Surf on the Clare coast. ✔
• Scuba-diving the following sites:
• Down the Skelligs. ✔
• Kilkee. ✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔✔
• Inishboffin. ✔
• Hook Head. ✔
• U boat in Cork.
• Spend a week on an island off the west coast of Ireland. ✔
• Father Ted Festival
• Electric Picnic. ✔ ✔
• Body & Soul. ✔
• Sea Session. ✔
• Climb Carrauntoohill. ✔
• Attend a Munster Hurling Final in Semple Stadium.
• Listen to ghost stories in Kinsale. ✔
• Watch the sunset over Rock of Cashel. ✔
• Circumnavigate Ireland in a sea kayak.
• Sea Kayak expedition in the following:
• Kerry
• Tramore ✔
• Cork
• Dublin Bay
• Clare Coast.
• A night out in a Doolin or Brandon pub. ✔
• Spend a night on one of the Aran Island, after a day of cycling, you'll enjoy the best Guinness in the world. ✔
• Drink a pint in the South Pole Inn, on your way to Dingle. ✔
• Have an unexpected encounter with sharks on the west coast of Ireland (basking or blue). ✔
• Climb all the way up to the Skelligs.
• Participate to a Currach race down in Kerry or a Galway Hooker race up to the Arans.

Reading and watching Science Fiction

I have rekindled recently with reading Science Fiction books, in great part because I discovered ( probably a bit late compare to everyone else ), this "weird" author that is China Miéville.
So far I devoured "Embassytown" and "Perdido Street Station". The universe he described are something I rarely seen before, mixing steam-punk, with insects and other weird world descriptions, pulp, horror.

List SF authors and books  which had the most influence on me:

• Jules Vernes: 20000 miles under the sea but more importantly Robur the Conqueror.

• Philip Kindred Dick: The Man in the high castle, Dr Bloodmoney, Time out of JOint

• H.G.Wells: the invisible man, The Island of Doctor Moreau. The Time Machine

• Frederic Brown: Martians Go Home, What Mad Universe

• H.P.Lovecraft

• Richard Matheson: I am a legend

• John Brunner: Stand on Zanzibar

• Robert A. Heinlein: Starship Troopers

• Arthur C.Clarke

• A.E. Van Vogt

-----

Christophe's sf book montage

Christophe's favorite books »

Failures, successes and lessons learned from 2014

"There are years that ask questions, and years that answer." Zora Neale Hurston

As much 2013 (and the year before ) was an exciting year, full of change, and challenge.. the past year 2014, did not turn out to be as promised, mainly of my own fault.

2014 mark a failure on my part on few areas. First and foremost I failed in finalizing the Msc I started in 2013, only managing to scrape a Higher Diploma in the process.
I somehow neglected my friendships and myself.
I  did not go scuba diving as much as I had initially envisaged, stop going to Aikido, my lack of exercising. All this also resulted in some extra gain weight, basically regaining all I had lost in the past two years.

But at the same time, I had a couple of interesting opportunities and encounters.
I went for the first time to Body & Soul, and it was a refreshing experience.
I started to go to meetups, mainly related to R, Data Analytics, hackers and Python related subjects, and discovered a vibrant community.
As a result of one of this encounter, I was part of a team who entered the Kaggle Epilepsy challenge ; we ended up in the first tier, not that bad for a first participation.
I engage myself in more projects, and used online resources (Coursera, Checkio ) to practice and learn more about python, programming and data analysis.


So what did I learn from all that...

• Always ask questions, question everything. Ask for help and advice to mentor and veterans. This is something I was doing all the time when I started my engineering career, but somehow during my thesis, I forgot about it.
• Be relentless, and focus. Only chase one rabbit at a time. Focus on the task at hand, then move on.
• I need my own alone time, to reflect on my own project. Somehow I forgot that about myself.
• Exercise, make it a habit. Either be going dancing (salsa/swing) every week, snorkelling, hiking or diving. 
• Have project and objectives, those might change depending on opportunities arising.
• Not only seize opportunities, but also thrive to create them.
• Embrace friendship and be present when needed.

I intend for 2015, to learn from those errors and not reproduce the same mistakes again.

2011 - A summary, top events...

Top things which happen in 2011:

• A lost

Me in green ... helping somehow my grand father :)

• Diving trip to Inishboffin

Inishboffin

Post dive relaxing guinness....

• Seeing Jethro Tull in concert (Dublin, March 2011)

• The Waterford Tall Ship festival

Masts .....

• A dolans concert: The Answer

The singer of The Answer.

• Discovering Hook Head on a dive trip

xhh

• Going back surfing

Ready to go in the water in Spanish Point

• Working trip to Arizona, and making the 12 pubs of christmas over there.

No Pic available, thank god.

• Seeing my firt octopus in Irish water ( down in Kerry ).

Octopus (photo: B.Donnelly)

• A trip to Dublin to see the Guinness museum and the French rugby team in Landsdowne Road.

Inside the Guinness Storehouse

And all the friends talks and activities...

Top  Movies seen in 2011. Poor year for cinema attendance at least for me.

• Black Swan (D.Arronofsky)
• Tangled (Disney)
• True Grit (Cohen)
• Exit through the gift shop (Bansky)
• Super 8 (JJ Abrahams)
• Crazy Heart  (Scott Cooper) 

Three things about me ....

In 2010, I've definitely bad at blogging ( 8 post so far compared to the 87 i did four years, ago ) let's try to improve on this. This one came through FB, where you get tagged and have to write 3 things about you, so here it is:

Three names I go by:
1. Christophe
2. Tof ( only in France )
3. Christopher ( by most Irish who suppose there is final R in my name)

Three Jobs I have had in my life: ( by decreasing time length sentence )
1. Chip Design Engineer
2. Student
3. warehouse man / shop assistant

Three Places I have lived:
1. Grenoble France
2. Monza Italy
3. Clermont-Ferrand France

Three Favorite drinks:
1. Sparkling Mineral Water ( St Yorre / Chateldon )
2. Spiced Rhum ( Actually just finished filtering a 2 liters batch ready for consumption)
3. Tariquet Premieres Grives

Three TV Shows that I watch:
1. Try to reduce my TV consumption so...
2. Any documentary by the BBC ( Ian Hisllop Do gooders, Empire of the sea, The story of Kellogs cereals.... )
3. How I met your mother

Three places I have been:
1. Red Sea
2. Corsica
3. Belfast

Three favorite foods:
1. Andouillette
2. Potato Omelette (French style)
3. Pasta alla carbonara

Three friends that I think will respond:
1.NA
2.NA
3.NA

Three Things that I am looking forward to:
1. Christmas in Auvergne ( family and mountain biking in the snow )
2. Arcade Fire Concert in Dublin in 5 days
3. Getting back in the water ( scuba-diving, snorkeling ... )

Three Things that are always by my side:
1. Camera
2. Nokia cell phone
3. pen and paper

2009 - A summary, top ten things....

A summary of the 2009 year in picture.



And to get in line with the annual top ten from Time, here's my personal top ten for 2009.

• Movie: Pixar Up
  The 10 first minutes are absolutely fantastic in term of story telling. And I got my quote of the year: "I hid under your porch, because I love you"....


• Galway Volvo Ocean Race
  In June, the Volvo Ocean Race visited Galway, fantastic atmosphere in town.
  
  


• Halloween in Mickey Martin
  
  One of the best party of the year.
  


• Irish seals
  2009, will be the year where I saw most seals, the first one were down in Cork in Union Hall basking in early march/april
  Then we saw one or 2 venturing regularly near Kilkee.
  
  


• 90 years ago, my granddad was born, just had to celebrate his birthday.
  
  


• Concert: Mick Flannery in Dolans
  
  


• Snorkel with Dolphin in Milton Malbay
  On of the most amazing encounter in the sea, as i was training for duck diving in Miltown Malbay, a curious dolphin came to see what i was doing...
  


• PS3 Game: Assassins Creed 2
  Finished it but still addicted to that game by now... have to wait for the third installment, now.
  


• Obama election / French politics
  Big hope from the USA with Obama election, and at the same time in France... the left wing are left arguing between themselves in front of a media omnipresent president.
  


• ASM 10th final... lost again....
  No comment. Congratulations to Perpignan.
  
  
  Demie_Finale_ASM_ST
  Uploaded by asm. - Basketball, baseball, pro wrestling and more sports videos.
  
  

Top ten Movies seen in 2009
1. Inglorious Bastard - Q.Tarantino
2. Up - Pete Docter / Pixar
3. Moon - Duncan Jones
4. (500) days of summer - Marc Webb
5. District 9 - Neill Blomkamp
6. The Wrestler - D.Arronofsky
7. Vicky Cristina Barcelona - Woody Allen
8. Fantastic Mr Fox - Wes Anderson
9. Where the wild things are - Spike Jonze
10. The Ugly Truth - Robert Luketic

Additinal interesting movies:
Bolt - B.Howard/C.Williams/Disney
The Men who Stare at goats - ??
A Serious Man - Cohen
Waltz with Bashir - Ari Folman
The imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus - Terry Gilliam

Week End Summary - 20090906

Movie of the WE
(500) days of Summer


Good comedy about an hopeless romantic :o, and as so rightly said this is not a love story, but it has brilliant ideas.

Things I learned this weekend
5. I've got concentration issues.... should I blame internet ????
4. Edinburgh seems to be a nice city to live in, and there is a bar called the Tass ( like the french word cup )
3. The last and only other time a team won four Senior All Ireland in a row was in the fourties (Cork at the time)
2. There is stuff I know but which keeps surprising me, like Winter can start early in Ireland... here we go for the real dark rainy months...
1. Loads about myself, other interesting people, and how wrong i can sometimes be.

Songs of the week end
- Mick Flannery "I wish you well"
- Hall & Oakes "You make my dreams come true"
- Simon & Garfunkel "Bookends"
- The Smiths "There is a light that never goes out"
Take me out tonight....
- The Eagles "Take it easy"

And an interesting blog about expat experience: Lyonnaise in Vancouver

Top 5 things I learned this Weekend

Top 5 Things I Learned This Weekend

5. A movie with Matthew McConaughey must contains a scene where is shirt is off, bad (Sahara) or good (How to loose a guy in ten days)
4. I should not trust my horoscope, even the Chinese one, and it's funny to see that my French horoscope is completely different from my English and at the same time both are completely wrong.
3. Irish radio show are brilliant, a full hour of Radiohead on Sunday night (great)
2. I am curiously incredibly productive on Saturday and Sunday early morning, when left alone.
1. I am proportionally more inclined to procrastination on Sunday evening.....

Songs of the Month [Mar'09]

Fight Like Apes : Something Global

Violent Femmes : Blister in the sun

R.Plant & Alison Krauss : Please read the letter

Frank Black : Bullet

Vampire Weekend : Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa

Luck of the Irish dive sites

IMG_0140.JPG, originally uploaded by TOF2006.

I just stumble upon to this top ten dive site in Europe by Scuba Travel

1. Diving the Booroo The Zenobia, Cyprus
2. Blue Hole, Gozo
3. Cirkewwa, Malta
4. Booroo, Isle of Man
5. Blockship Tabarka, Scapa Flow, Scotland
6. Diamond Rocks, Kilkee, Ireland
7. Eddystone Reef, England
8. Secca della Columbara, Italy
9. Fanore, Ireland
10. Chios island, Greece

And guess two of them (Fanore and Kilkee) are actually at a driving distance from Limerick... to be more precise, number 6 is a regular dive site for our diving club... I'd also loved to go to Scapa Flow...
So let's go diving

Materialistic 5 things

...which makes me happy:
- my white MacBook, for my digital living.
- my camera (Canon EOS).
- my notebooks, all kinds:
from my work one A4, black cover
to the Moleskine Weekly Notebook (discovered it this year, I've finally found the perfect organizer )
not forgetting the small pocket one ( a clairefontaine ... like in School ) I carry all the time.
- a Bic Cristal pen, indispensable accessory to the previous items. I like its simplicity and robustness, probably the best pen Bis ever design even if it was almost 60 years ago (1950).
- a medal I've got since my early childhood.

And you, what day to day objects makes you happy ?

I've stolen that 5 things idea from Fabienne.

10 movies I think frequently

Ten movies I think of, frequently, those images fill my mind.

Chung King Express (Wong Kar Wai - 1994)
No point of telling the stories of that movie, you just have to let the images drawn you. I prefer the second story with Faye, how can a man not fall in love with her ? Even if she's a little bit crazy.

Bringing up baby (Howard Hawks - 1938 )
Another strong woman (this time its Katharine Hepburn ) storming into the life of a nice old chap, with some devastating effects ( and love not being the least).

Moonfleet (Fritz Lang - 1955)
Another classic movie from Hollywood ( I should probably thanks Eddy Mitchell and his TV show "La dernière séance" to have me discovered those movies ), the photography is absolutely fantastic, in a very gothic atmosphere, all the scene with the young Mohune deeply impressed me (and still today).

La Jetee (Chris Marker - 1962)
A short movie, all created with still images and a voice over. The story is trong and is at the origin of a remake by Terry Gilliam: Twelve Monkeys.
I miss seeing short movies ( if you go in Clermont-Ferrand in february, you should drop by the international short festival, to see thousands of them).

Silent Running (Douglas Trumbull - 1972)
An ecological tale in space, by the man responsible of special effects in "2001", and "Blade Runner". I like the image, of giant domes containing forest, deriving through space.

Monster Inc (Peter Docter - 2001)
Pixar... oh pixar, I love their movies. It's not about the techniques, the fabulous things they can achieve with computers, it's more the fact that all those prowess are based and for the story. Pixar movies have a real strength in very good story-telling, and everything in the making come in support of that.

Joe's appartment (J.Payson - 1996)
A MTV movie, actually its a musical, about singing cockroaches.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show (J.SHarman - 1975)
One day I might come disguise as Franck N'Furter...
Don't dream it, be it

Santa Sangre (A.Jodorowsky - 1989)
What a shock when i saw this movie, the first time. From the elephant death, till the puppet son, this movie is full of (somewhat disturbing) invention.

My Neighbor Totoro (Hayao Miyazaki - 1988 )
Another shock, but of marvelous amazement, every time i walk in a forest i wonder which wonderful creatures are there in hidding.

Ten TV series which influences my childhood

Here the ten TV series who influenced my childhood, for bad or good.

• Litllest Hobo (French Title "Le Vagabond")
  
  There was some sadness, about the story of this dog, which kept leaving at the end of each episode... I wonder if he ever found his family, if he ever settle down.
  And a great lesson for life: every stop i make, i'll make a new friend.
• Punky Brewster
  Another seemingly sad story (a child abandoned by her mother in a mall), but it ends happily. I whish my parent would have let me paint my bedroom like she did, or even let me have the doghouse in my bedroom...
• Magnum PI
  Aaaah ... magnum... when i was 7, this is the way i imagined my life when i would be older, hawaian shirt, moustache, and sea kayak (not much facination for the car though, i'd prefer the 2 dogs zeus and appollo). Today I am almost there... Not.
• Mac Gyver
  One of the rare TV series, I watched with my father, the game was to see if MacGyver tricks were plausible, most of them are theorically right, but not really practicable... if you have Discovery Channel, I encourage you to look at the Mythbuster episode dedicated to Angus McGyver.
  
• Code Quantum
  One of the 2 TV series, I've seen all the episodes (with McGyver), a total nonsense scientifically speaking (unless soul exist). I love the episodes about Kennedy Assassination or about Al first wife. The final episode was also quite mystical, with a great Bruce McGill (yep the mythical Jack Dalton in MacGyver) as a god-like bartender.
• Silver Spoon
  Totally the opposite of punky brewster, though his mother does not take much care of him... on the other hand Erin Gray is a dream step-mother
• Buck Rogers
  It was not so much, the space action (i've seen some episode again recently, and was a bit disapointed by the action in space, BattleStar Galactica was much better for the battles in space, and the look of the spaceship and uniform), but the robot twiki is gas ... bidibidi ...bidi bidi.
  Off course there is Erin Gray (she appeared in 3 series in this list), absolutely beutiful, but in one episode Arnold (Gary Coleman from Diff'rent Strokes - Arnold & Willy) confront twiki.
  
• Whiz kids (in French "Les Petits Génies" )
  May be the origin of my fascination for computer, it looks ridiculous to see what they were doing at the time (stopping a plane ..etc), but at the same time it kinda predicted what we are seeing today with the web


• The A-team
  Guilty pleasure, but how could you resist to that when you were 10 years old... You have a problem, let's weld some metal shield on a car and make it a tank, take your weapon and fire ... amazingly nobody ever gets hurt in the series, nobody die. It was also a yerribly mysogynic show
  10 years later we discovered this parody by Benny Hill:
  


• The Fall guy
  Colt ... how many TV series did Lee Majors stars in my youth ? Part-time bounty hunter, part-time stuntman seemed an intersting career perspective at the time

To finish a special mention to Fraggle Rocks, for some reason, i did not watch much of it during my childhood, but even today it's a pleasure to discover a replay on the tv screen:

Entrez dans la danse, les ennuis n'ont pas de chance

---

On a completely different subject:
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights turn 60, today 10th of december.
Blog Bonne Nouvelle 60 years

2008 Top 10 Things

The Time is publishing it's top 10 of evrything for 2008: Time Special Top 10 2008, so here's my personal top 10 for 2008

• ASM 9th french rugby union championship final. Against Toulouse, even if it was not the result expected, Auvergne is still lookking to win the Brennus. Actually if Clermont win against Munster next saturday, this might replace that entry.

• Radiohead "In Rainbows" in Dublin
  An excellent new album, distributed freely through the web (i know it's actually 2007).
  
  And on the top of that, i've seen them in a fabulous concert in Dublin, dreamy from the start with a double rainbow welcoming the group in Marlay Park.
  

• Wall-ee
  The last pixar marvel, absolutely enchanting, in particular the silent 1st part of the movie.
  

• US presidential campaign
  From Hilary raise, to Obama victory... it has been a quite exciting and over-publicized campaign. Change could not come at a best time ( or at a worst ? ).
  

• Bertie Ahern stepping down.
  Fascinating, a great political figure, which shape today's ireland, a finance minister who does not have a bank account (how did he get paid ? in cash ), a man who lead the peace process. He had an incredibly long career in Irish Politics, which is contrasting, when you compare to the american system: Obama political career only started 4-5 years ago, while Bertie started in his 20's... France is unfortunately no different.
  With all the afairs, he also did a lot for the raise of Irish stand up comedian.
  

• Large Hardron Collider almost start up
  The Large Hardron Collider, building is finished, and experiment will be able to start. A particular feeling about that news, as lots of my teachers in Clermont University worked ( and are still working ) on that project.
  

• Munster-All Blacks in Thomond Park
  What a game, makes you proud of living in Limerick.
  Everything, from the Munster haka to finsh was exceptional that night.
  

• Lisa Hannigan "Sea Saw"
  Some interesting things happen this year in music, from Portishead latest addition "Third" to MGMT "Kids", but i have a tender preference for Lisa Hannigan first album, and not only for her live show in UL.
  

• Basking Sharks in Kerry
  The first time, I saw so huge animals in the sea... I know it's not a big news, and they are quite frequent on the Irish Coast, but it's in my top ten...
  
  Next year I'll try to get closer, bigger picture of them.
  

• Crunch....
  This growth rate seems unreal, and crazy for most part of the year, and now it's gone, in less time than it takes to write it. How artificial has been our occidental capitalistic lifes ? We'll see if 2009 brings better alternatives