Friday Finds

Friday Finds is a meme hosted by Mizb at Should be Reading.

So here are my book finds for this Friday 18 June:

i)Understanding Jewellery-David Bennet

 

A I own an on-line jewellery boutique www.luxuria-jewellery.com

I am always interested in jewellery books. I came across this one this week, and really quite fancy it.

ii) One Amazing Thing-Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni:

 

What would you do if you were suddenly trapped with nine other people?
In "One Amazing Thing" nine people who were waiting for Visas in the Indian Embassy are caught together in an earthquake. How they react, what they think, and what they feel makes the theate for this drama.

iii) Every Last Cuckoo-Kate Maloy

 

I love stories about friendships and the coming together of lost souls, and this book seems to really fit the bill.

It’s about an elderley woman who loses her beloved husband in an accident. As  way of coping with her grief she opens who home to various lost souls; together it seems they all help each other. This sounds like a wonderfully positive and uplifting book; just the kind of book I love.  

I would love to hear your thoughts on my finds this week.

W W W Wednesdays!!

WWW Wednesdays is is a meme hosted by Mizb at Should be Reading.

To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…

·        What are you currently reading?
* What did you recently finish reading?
* What do you think you’ll read next?

 
OK, here are my answers for this week:
i)Currently reading:
Tell Me No Secrets-Julie Corbin

 


A tense psychological thriller set against an instantly familiar domestic backdrop, that leaves you with the chilling feeling that this could happen to you. You won’t be able to put this down!!
I say no more!

ii) Recently finished:
One Day-David Nicholls

 
  15^th July 1988 Emma and Dexter meet on the night of their graduation. Tomorrow they must go their separate ways. So where will they be on this one day next year? And the year after that? And every year that follows?
I loved this book and kept thinking about Emma and Dexter long after the last page. You are left with the hallucinatory feeling that they’ve become as well know to you as your closest friends. Quite an intoxicating read.

iii) What will I read next?
I’m really looking forward to reading “What Should I do With My Life now?” (I’m just waiting for it to arrive in the post)




I love stories of people re-inventing themselves, following their passion (usually against the odds) , and moreso in the second phase of their life.
Altho’ I am from the UK, I live in Spain where the mentality is that your life is over once you hit 40! Employers don’t give you a second glance if you are over 40, and the Spanish government has said that if you are 40 and unemployed, you might as well consider yourself retired from hereonin!!! How ridiculous is that?  I find it infuriating and plan to give this book to all my Spanish friends (who read English!). Can’t wait to read this book.   

Would love to hear your comments.

 

Words we can all live by!

I saw this article some time ago and have been meaning to post here.
What an incredible man!
I think we all can learn something from him.

At the age of 97 years and 4 months, Shigeaki Hinohara is one of the world's longest-serving physicians and educators. Hinohara's magic touch is legendary: Since 1941 he has been healing patients at St. Luke's International Hospital in Tokyo and teaching at St. Luke's College of Nursing. After World War II, he envisioned a world-class hospital and college springing from the ruins of Tokyo; thanks to his pioneering spirit and business savvy, the doctor turned these institutions into the nation's top medical facility and nursing school. Today he serves as chairman of the board of trustees at both organizations. Always willing to try new things, he has published around 150 books since his 75th birthday, including one "Living Long, Living Good" that has sold more than 1.2 million copies. As the founder of the New Elderly Movement, Hinohara encourages others to live a long and happy life, a quest in which no role model is better than the doctor himself.

Energy comes from feeling good, not from eating well or sleeping a lot. We all remember how as children, when we were having fun, we often forgot to eat or sleep. I believe that we can keep that attitude as adults, too. It's best not to tire the body with too many rules such as lunchtime and bedtime.

All people who live long — regardless of nationality, race or gender — share one thing in common: None are overweight. For breakfast I drink coffee, a glass of milk and some orange juice with a tablespoon of olive oil in it. Olive oil is great for the arteries and keeps my skin healthy. Lunch is milk and a few cookies, or nothing when I am too busy to eat. I never get hungry because I focus on my work. Dinner is veggies, a bit of fish and rice, and, twice a week, 100 grams of lean meat.

Always plan ahead. My schedule book is already full until 2014, with lectures and my usual hospital work. In 2016 I'll have some fun, though: I plan to attend the Tokyo Olympics!

There is no need to ever retire, but if one must, it should be a lot later than 65. The current retirement age was set at 65 half a century ago, when the average life-expectancy in Japan was 68 years and only 125 Japanese were over 100 years old. Today, Japanese women live to be around 86 and men 80, and we have 36,000 centenarians in our country. In 20 years we will have about 50,000 people over the age of 100.

Share what you know. I give 150 lectures a year, some for 100 elementary-school children, others for 4,500 business people. I usually speak for 60 to 90 minutes, standing, to stay strong.

When a doctor recommends you take a test or have some surgery, ask whether the doctor would suggest that his or her spouse or children go through such a procedure. Contrary to popular belief, doctors can't cure everyone. So why cause unnecessary pain with surgery? I think music and animal therapy can help more than most doctors imagine.

To stay healthy, always take the stairs and carry your own stuff. I take two stairs at a time, to get my muscles moving.

My inspiration is Robert Browning's poem "Abt Vogler." My father used to read it to me. It encourages us to make big art, not small scribbles. It says to try to draw a circle so huge that there is no way we can finish it while we are alive. All we see is an arch; the rest is beyond our vision but it is there in the distance.

Pain is mysterious, and having fun is the best way to forget it. If a child has a toothache, and you start playing a game together, he or she immediately forgets the pain. Hospitals must cater to the basic need of patients: We all want to have fun. At St. Luke's we have music and animal therapies, and art classes.

Don't be crazy about amassing material things. Remember: You don't know when your number is up, and you can't take it with you to the next place.

Hospitals must be designed and prepared for major disasters, and they must accept every patient who appears at their doors. We designed St. Luke's so we can operate anywhere: in the basement, in the corridors, in the chapel. Most people thought I was crazy to prepare for a catastrophe, but on March 20, 1995, I was unfortunately proven right when members of the Aum Shinrikyu religious cult launched a terrorist attack in the Tokyo subway. We accepted 740 victims and in two hours figured out that it was sarin gas that had hit them. Sadly we lost one person, but we saved 739 lives.

Science alone can't cure or help people. Science lumps us all together, but illness is individual. Each person is unique, and diseases are connected to their hearts. To know the illness and help people, we need liberal and visual arts, not just medical ones.

Life is filled with incidents. On March 31, 1970, when I was 59 years old, I boarded the Yodogo, a flight from Tokyo to Fukuoka. It was a beautiful sunny morning, and as Mount Fuji came into sight, the plane was hijacked by the Japanese Communist League-Red Army Faction. I spent the next four days handcuffed to my seat in 40-degree heat. As a doctor, I looked at it all as an experiment and was amazed at how the body slowed down in a crisis.

Find a role model and aim to achieve even more than they could ever do. My father went to the United States in 1900 to study at Duke University in North Carolina. He was a pioneer and one of my heroes. Later I found a few more life guides, and when I am stuck, I ask myself how they would deal with the problem.

It's wonderful to live long. Until one is 60 years old, it is easy to work for one's family and to achieve one's goals. But in our later years, we should strive to contribute to society. Since the age of 65, I have worked as a volunteer. I still put in 18 hours seven days a week and love every minute of it.

Judit Kawaguchi

Friday Finds

Friday Finds is a meme hosted by Mizb at Should be Reading.

So here are my book finds for this Friday 11 June:

  

i)The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks:

 

A fascinating and moving story of medicine and family, of how life is sustained in laboratories and in memory. Henrietta Lacks was a mother of five in Baltimore, a poor African American migrant from the tobacco farms of Virginia, who died from a cruelly aggressive cancer at the age of 30 in 1951. A sample of her cancerous tissue, taken without her knowledge or consent, as was the custom then, turned out to provide one of the holy grails of mid-century biology: human cells that could survive--even thrive--in the lab. Known as HeLa cells, their stunning potency gave scientists a building block for countless breakthroughs, beginning with the cure for polio. Meanwhile, Henrietta's family continued to live in poverty and frequently poor health, and their discovery decades later of her unknowing contribution--and her cells' strange survival.

 (Extract from Amazon Editorial Review)

ii) Red Hood Road-Ayelet Walman

A dense story of irreparable loss that tracks two families when the bride and groom are killed in a freak car accident hours after their wedding.

 

iii) A Note From an Old Aquaintance:

A thought provoking read. What would you od if an old love from the past re-enters your life? As well as being a love story there is also mystery, action and intrigue thrown in also.

 

 Hope you enjoy my finds and perhaps add them to your Wishlist!

What book changed your life?

I am currently reading a fascinating book above (compiled by one of my favourite authors Jack Canfield) where 55 "well-known" people tell the story of the book that changed their life.
I then started thinking about the books that changed my life. I'm not sure if these books changed my life, but they certainly made an impact.

They were:

These are the books that really got me hooked on reading when I was a young girl. I remember my mum shouting for me every morning as I was late for school because I was engrossed in my Famous Five adventure!

Later, I think the non-fiction books that had a huge impact on me were:
i)



ii)
 
Both of these non-fiction books really changed my thinking.


And in the fiction category:

i) a book about the holocaust and it's impact on later generations of the same family




and



ii) a side to illegal immigration we never think about.A book that left me thinking about it days after I finished it.

I am sure there are many more books that really had an impact on me, but these are the ones that spring to mind .

What books had a lasting impact  on you? I would love to hear.

11 Answers I know for sure.

Here's a little meme I read in a magazine and have "borrowed". Do comment and leave your list.



1.What's the quickest legal route to joy?
 Eating Ben and Jerry's (without guilt) 

2. What makes you stop still?  
Being in the presence of  kindness and intelligence

3. What words do you live by?
If you have to choose between being right or being kind............choose being kind.

4. What's the hardest truth to tell?
My weight

5. What makes a person fearless?
Faith

6. What's left on your "To Do" list today?

Nothing; I micro-mange my life to within an inch of my life! I really need to ease up on this one

7. What do you ask yourself most often?
"Does my bum look big in this?" (Well what do you expect after question 1 ?!)

8. Favorite Quote?
 "If you want to make God laugh, make a plan"-Kathy Cordova

9. What's the most daring thing you've done?
Upping sticks and moving to another country

10. ...and the most daring thing you wish you'd done? 

Learnt to ride a horse

11. What are you an expert at? 

Making lists.

Friday Finds

Friday Finds is a meme hosted by Mizb at Should be Reading.

So here are my book finds for this Friday (4 June):

i)Sylvan Street-Debra Schupack:

What happens when 5 sets of suburban New York neighbours find a suitcase of cold cash? How do the tensions between benevolence and greed, duty and desire inform our every action and interaction? Read and find out.

ii) What Should I Do with the Rest of my Life ?- Bruce Frankl

True stories of finding success, passion and new meaning in the second phase of your life. Some really inspiring and uplifting stories.

iii) The Wildwater Walking Club-Claire Cook 

How do you turn a ‘golden handshake’ into a series of wonderful, touching and life altering adventures? Read this book and find out .

I would love to hear your comments, especially if you have read any of these books.

Monday Morning Inspiration!

If you think you are beaten, you are;

If you think you dare not, you don’t;

If you want to win but think you can’t;

It’s almost a cinch you won’t.

If you think you’ll lose you’re lost;

For out of the world we find.

Success begins with a fellow’s will;

It’s all in a state of mind.

For many a race is lost;

Ere even a step run.

And many a coward fails;

Ere even their work is begun.

Think  BIG and your dreams will grow;

Think small and you’ll fall behind;

Think that you can and you will;

It’s all in the state of the mind.

If you think you are outclassed you are;

You’ve got to think high to rise;

You’ve got be sure of yourself before;

You can even win a prize.

Life’s battles don’t always go;

To the stronger and faster man

But sooner or later the man who wins;

Is the person who think they can!

Author unknown