Just had our first book club meeting after summer hiatus; books discussed were Go Set a Watchman and To Kill a Mockingbird. Of the 9 present, 8 rated GSAW 'meh'. One HATED it. I was that one...IMO it was not a book. It was a very early, very very very badly written mess of an idea that was read by a genius editor who spotted a nugget of gold in the childhood reminiscences and managed to wrestle Harper Lee into pulling together TKAM. By all accounts Lee (very rightly) never wanted Watchman published. Frankly, after reading both books I suspect Harper Lee never wrote another book because Mockingbird was more or less a heaven sent combination of editing and one Big Idea, and I doubt she was capable of creating anything else. Anyway, now she is blind, deaf and has dementia. Her sister Alice, a sharp and protective woman (a lawyer herself). who watched over Harper Lee died last year and suddenly two months later her now-fully-in-control attorney discovers and sells the new book for publication. I call bu**sh*t on the whole thing. It isn't a book, just a cash grab and it should never have seen the light of day. Actually reminded me of when I attempted to read Fifty Shades of Grey. I can handle off-putting themes, I can handle unsympathetic characters. But I can't handle bad writing and in both cases, the writing was so execrable I simply couldn't hear anything else. I mean, 'the musky smell of clean Negroes'...I can't even.

true...but every nicer curtain (say linen, linen/cotton, silk, embroidered, etc etc) will be approximately in Anthropologie range, or even just start there..including this Country Curtains site, and couple more nice sites I've learned about here..I forgot the names now. I pinned them to my boards to remember so technically I can dig them out and give you links..but it won't be cheaper..not at all. Pottery Barn is not exactly cheap either..looked into them too. Some nice designs and prints-and the prices are pretty steep. I'd say the same range. You can get sometimes much better prices on Anthropologie too..it happened to me with these family room panels. Big sale, etc. I was very lucky with these. But the moment we talking designs and patterns and blah blah-yes, the price will be different. I usually sit quietly like a cat waiting for a mouse..very patiently waiting for sale or promotion or something like that. Sometimes the curtains are simpler, cheaper, and I need just a pair, and I'm very sure..usually happens with cotton ones...:) I liked some brocade curtains on Country Curtains site a lot..decided to remember them for the future if needed. Because I don't want to take our curtains down, for showings, we still live here after all..and I have a feeling buyers will like some of the curtains.. Hopefully though they'll despise them:) Back to your home though-another option-checking E Bay. But has its minuses. Returns can become less easy, etc, etc. I still bought there things I loved, but mostly clothes and lighting and sheets...stuff like that. Overall, positive experience. Some hunting is involved though. 6 similar panels are harder to find there of course. Possible, but harder.

I'm in the UK so not familiar with US school terminology, so forgive me using the English equivalent, lol! DS (27 last month) was educated at a private (fee-paying) school from age 4. At 16 whilst in the upper school, he began dating a girl he had been in the same group of friends with since she joined the school at age 12. Soon after entering the school's sixth form they slept together at a party held at our house - they were both 16 and it was the first time for both of them. He told us about it next day. We were initially rather shocked, especially as he hadn't had a 'proper' girlfriend to go on dates with before, but had just hung around in a crowd of boys/girls. They were very responsible - in fact even at that young age they were incredibly mature - and ensured she went in the pill. Rather than discouraging them and thus leading them to take risks having sex in unsavoury places - I had friends at that age who had sex under the pier - we gave permission, as did her mum and step-dad - for them to sleep in his room at our house when she stayed over. They were both very academic - but her even more so - and their quite prestigious school had high expectations of them. One concern was that this relationship may have a detrimental effect on DS's educational prospects, but in fact the opposite was true. His GF encouraged him to work harder - he was initially only going to take 3 A levels, but with her encouragement he studied for a 4th - they were in a class of just three pupils for that subject! Throughout the two years of sixth form they stayed together and ultimately came away with AAAA (her) and AAAB (him). We were incredibly proud. At 18 she was offered a place at Oxford university (reading English) whilst he went to Sussex (reading philosophy), but none of us believed their relationship would last the three years of separation. However, most weekends he would drive up to her or she got the train down to him. They graduated in 2010 and bought a flat in London. Now, almost eleven years on they are still together. They haven't married and have no plans to. They have no kids either - just a cute pooch, lol! They have great careers and now live on the south coast of England in Brighton. We couldn't be more proud of them both and are so pleased we didn't discourage their youthful relationship :)

I just finished Troubled Blood, the newest installment of the Cormoran Strike series by Robert Galbraith/JK Rowling. It was a terrific story, and I liked this one better than all the previous ones. This book covers a full year in the lives of detective Strike and his partner Robin Ellacott while they tackle a 40 year-old cold case in addition to their usual caseload. Their relationship (which is why I got hooked on these books to begin with) experiences some satisfying growth and development, Robin truly begins to come into her own, and Strike's personal life takes a larger space in the story. I thought that Rowling toned down the triggery/horrifying/ick factor a good bit from the earlier books, though since there's a serial killer involved, there are a handful of truly nauseating descriptions of sexual assault and torture -- as I knew there would be, and so skipped over them when I could. This was a doorstop at 927 pages, but I couldn't put it down and didn't want it to end. I'm hoping there will be another one.