Polar scares?...

Northern frights?...

Snowy howls?...


This is a Dark Matter…



What-ho, Blogfollowers!



Now, I’m not a chap lightly frightened…Firm of jaw, and resolute of purpose, not easily scared; stiff of sinew, bold in the bone and sanguine in spirit, I`m a 'rufty-tufty' Librarian of the Old School …


In my time, I’ve fearlessly catalogued rare books without regard to AACR2 or Dewey guidelines (and all without safety gloves!)…


I’ve wheeled an un-oiled trolley across a wooden library floor, heedless of the murderous glare of any readers…


Why! I’ve even faced down and read nursery rhymes to a baying horde of toddlers!






But, dear readers, I have just been made afraid.


Very afraid…


Very afraid indeed, and it’s all because of a book that I`ve just read…


I’m not usually a fan of horror stories, but this one was thrust upon me by members of the Erith Library Reading Group (not an organization to trifle with, I assure you…)


And the book in question?


Dark Matter by Michelle Paver…


Here’s the blub: January 1937. 28-year-old Jack is poor, lonely and desperate to change his life. So when he's offered the chance to join an Arctic expedition to Spitsbergen, he jumps at it. After they reach the remote, uninhabited bay where they will camp for the next year, Gruhuken, Jack feels a creeping unease. One by one, his companions are forced to leave..






Gulp.






Now here’s a diversionary thought…


Why is it that horror has cold connotations? Frozen with fear?... Blood running cold?…Shivers down the spine?... Chillers?… Cold terror?... Not to mention Scaring the pants off anyone… (not a good idea, naturally, in the polar regions or the high latitudes) …






But I digress, dear readers. This is a wonderful book. Try it. But be warned…(And stay warm!)






TTFN

BLISTERING BARNACLES!

Tintin, Belgians, and book-fights…



Now, dear readers, help me out here, please:



Clear your throats...


Stand up straight, breathe deeply, and approach the nearest microphone…


Adopt a gravelly, authoritative and vaguely mid-Atlantic accent…


Now proclaim loudly and boldly “HERGÉ’S ADVENTURES OF TINTIN!”


……


Well, I don’t know about you, but that made me go quite weak at the knees! You see, I used to love Tintin on TV when I was a mere Blognipper, and those few words at the commencement of the show always heralded a guaranteed fun time.


Stirring stuff!


I loved the books, too – Snowy, Captain Haddock, The Thompson Twins, Professor Calculus – all fine, upstanding chaps or hounds.


Superb penmanship and design, too. Faultless!


……


Hence, it is with no little trepidation or anxiety that I am canvassing your views upon the latest cinematographically enhanced version of our little, quiff-haired Belgian plus-four wearing pal –(why! I even believe that they have rendered him in a revolutionary `three-dimensional` format…)


Has anyone seen it?...


What did you think?...


Did it give you blistering barnacles?...


Do tell me, using the comments whotsit below.


……






Belgian?


And while we’re on Tintin’s case…the little fellow’s actual nationality has been causing a quite heated argument within the Bexleyheath Ladies Library Staff Philosophical and Debating Society…Half the group ventured that Tintin was French, the other half were adamant that he was of sound Belgian stock – well, what a fight ensued! Blood, bent hair-pins and torn fingernails all over the catalogue drawers! Nasty.






Luckily, my extensive research team have taken the cause to their hearts, and unearthed the following five facts:






• Tintin first sprouted in a Brussels newspaper cartoon in 1929


• His creator, Georges Remi, was a Belgian artist – better known now as Hergé


• ‘Hergé’ is in fact, merely the French language pronunciation of his initials – G.R. – but in reverse. (Cunning devils, these Belgians, eh?)


• Remi’s middle name was ‘Prosper’ – and prosper he did! With over 200 million copies of his books sold, he became one of Belgium’s richest men.


• Not that he led a contented or uncontroversial life…he had a “terribly thin skin” wrote one biographer, and was “an emotionally retarded workaholic who cared nothing for his art, disliked children, and allegedly collaborated with the German occupiers during the war”…He suffered numerous breakdowns, endured recurring tortured nightmares, divorced badly, came to loathe Tintin himself, and turned – eventually – to Zen Buddhism.






So now we know. Belgian, beyond a doubt!


……


Meanwhile, my colleagues in the Library Debating Society are still going at it “hammer and tongs!”:


  “How many more famous Belgians in books can YOU name, then, clever-clogs?”


  “Hercule Poirot, of course!”


  “And wasn’t Maigret a Belgian?...And I seem to recall that his creator, Georges Simenon, developed quite a reputation for his extra-curricular activities?”


  “Quite so…then there was Rene Magritte, obviously – although his work tended to be more canvas-based than paper?”


  “Not forgetting, of course, Gerhard Mercator - the great Sixteenth Century Flemish cartographer, who coined the word ‘atlas’ and who also solved the riddle of converting the three-dimensional globe into a two-dimensional map while retaining true compass bearings…”


(You can now see, I trust, the intellectual fervour lurking behind the furrowed brows of our Library Debating Society?…)






So, to sum up:


• We need your comments on the Tintin film itself – a ‘hit’ or a ‘miss’?...


• We need to know if there are any more famous Belgians in books? …


• We need to know – precisely – just what “Blistering Barnacles” actually means – literally*


*(See Blogcast for 17th October…)






Now, I must dash…“Run, Snowy!”






TTFN

We will remember them….

The Great War in words…

At the eleventh hour, of the eleventh day, of the eleventh month in this – the eleventh year –
We will remember them,

and the words they left behind:

In Flanders Fields:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow

Between the crosses, row on row,

That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly

Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:

To you from failing hands we throw

The torch; be yours to hold it high.

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flanders fields.

John McCrae 1892 – 1918

.................................................

.....................................................

“Remember, remember – the fifth of November…

Gunpowder, Erith, and plot”…

 Five Fawkes and Fireworks Facts…
A Wise Guy’s Guide…



Is it me, dear readers, or has Bonfire Night lost a little of its – ahem – sparkle?...




When I was a young Blognipper, it was one of the highlights of the year; sausages, baked spuds, “penny for the guy”, steaming mugs of cocoa, bangers, rockets and scorched eyebrows – but now?...


Are bonfires banned?...


Are we forgetting Fawkes?...

So, in my never-ending quest to bring you sound, reliable and trustworthy nuggets of public interest information, AND to keep this traditional English festival at the forefront of our thoughts, I unveil for you, dear readers, Five Fawkes and Fireworks Facts:

 1. Mr Fawkes was, historians now believe, a ginger northerner…(and we all know what that leads to…)


2. The Gunpowder Plotters actually met in Erith…honest!


3. Fireworks were first used in ancient China…they originally used their vast reserves of saltpetre (a key element of gunpowder) to preserve food – but, surprisingly perhaps, not to barbecue it.


4. Bexley Libraries have a rather fine collection of books with a Gunpowder Plot…but, obviously, not this one…


5. Want the biggest, best and boldest Bonfire Night around? Well, Bexley has it…BANG!






Have fun!


TTFN.

“It’s Literally”…Driving me bananas...

Just a – literally – “quick one” this week, dear readers…But I want your help with this particular blogcast…I`ve become troubled by something…

Have you noticed how often the word `literally` is cropping up in everyday conversation? – it’s literally everywhere! (And, frankly my dear, it’s “doing my crust in”).


Pin your ears back – (not literally, of course, as that would be painful in the extreme, and quite probably contravene various health and safety guidelines) – and take a listen. You’ll be amazed - literally.


It literally makes my blood boil…


So much so, dear readers, that sitting around the radiogram of an evening in front of my hearth, I have taken to sounding off an antique car horn each time I hear this particular word mentioned (much to the surprise and discomfort of the present Mrs Blogbrarian): believe me, dear readers, you’d be literally astonished at the regular cacophony of enraged honking that emanates from our cosy parlour!






Help required:


So, can you start literally listening out for me, please?...


On the radiogram or television, on our local trolley-buses and trains, on the streets and paths of Bexley…keep your ears literally to the ground* and let me know how often/where/when you hear the accursed word. (Just use the comments link; it’s literally underneath this bit).

Oooh! I nearly forgot…Are there any more words or phrases that really, literally, get your goat? Then now’s the time to share. Tell us…Let rip, literally!

Cheerio!

* Disclaimer – The Blogbrary can in no way be held literally responsible if anyone does – literally – keep their ears to the ground, as this might – literally – cause them to get scraped or grazed.

Nasty!

What’s Hot?...

Cool Rules?

Lush Libraries?






“HOLD THE FRONT PAGE!” – Libraries fail to make the ‘Top 20 Cool Icons of the Year’ award…Again.


Well, dear readers, this latest news has left me quite flummoxed, as you can well imagine.


When members of my research team telegraphed me with this latest snippet, I was perplexed in the extreme: I`m a fairly contemporary/cool sort of chap:…my neatly ironed beige polyester safari suit always draws gasps of admiration whenever I saunter around Sidcup in it, and I consider myself to be well-versed in the cutting-edge white-hot world of twentieth century technology.


Furthermore, many of my research staff have acquired reputations for being groovy hep cats…why! - many of them even wear little black dresses with smart corduroy patches on the elbows. (Hence the grooves!)


So, why oh why oh why are Librarians considered (ghastly word insert here) “Uncool”?...


Why oh why oh why is reading a nice musty hardback tome not on the “groovy” list?


And why on earth aren’t libraries considered “temples of the trendy”?...


It defeats me, it really does. Can you help, dear readers?


Answers on a postcard, please…


Or, as a radically cool innovation, I’m now led to believe that you can communicate with us directly and via the medium of the electronic cable network, simply by clicking on the COMMENTS tab below.


Clever, eh? What will they think of next?... how about places where books, information, entertainment, communication, imagination, lifelong learning, heritage, escapism, research, toddling about and singing nursery rhymes, experience, civilization, training, free-thinking, all sorts of people, serendipity, understanding, joining-in, enchantment, events, wisdom, communities, science, activities, contentment, diversity, knowledge, ideas, the arts, companionship, aspiration, short stories and tall tales, enjoyment, media, dreams, conversation, news and views, enlightenment, stories, creativity, re-skilling, partnerships, innovation, sharing, culture, study, being able to think “cor! – that was good”, literacy, guidance, humanity, individualism, the webby web, plus good old unadulterated fun and – even, dare I say it - ‘Romance’ are all gathered together, open to all, free of charge?


No, no…that would never catch on, of course! ‘Cos that would be cool….



Cheerybye.!

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier….
Library worker?!!!...






What-ho, Blog spy-spotters!




Well now, inspired by the release of the latest cinematic manifestation of John le Carre’s George Smiley in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy I`ve been inspired to do a bit of snooping myself recently…Spying on customers and colleagues, actually, to see if any of ‘em are ‘lefties`….


Have you noticed how many left-handers there are these days?...What on earth’s going on?...






And all these left-handed authors, too?...


Mark Twain


Hans Christian Andersen


Bill Bryson


Thomas Carlyle


Lewis Carroll


Franz Kafka


Douglas Adams


HG Wells


Germaine Greer …Lefties, every man-jack of ‘em!






And another thing…Have you EVER spied how many library staff are lefties? It’s astonishing how many of ‘em are, dear readers…It’s a veritable phenomenon!






…One lefty library colleague - who wishes to remain anonymous - (let’s call him ‘David’, just to protect his identity) says being left-handed makes him “clumsy”, and prone to cause his biro to leak…Or is he just really what we call in the library profession “a M**** P**?”






Intrigued?...Why not do a bit of spying on our library staff yourselves?...


…Sneak up on one, quietly, of course…Ssshhh...Take a peek…


Are they lefties?...


Or are YOU a lefty?...


Let us know – right away.


Tell me, it’ll be our little secret…(Because, of course, there are NO  secret spy scandals here in Bexley, are there?)...






TTFN