It’s a holiday weekend here in the U.S., so let’s keep today’s question simple–What are you reading? Anything special? Any particularly juicy summer reading?

It's not a holiday here in the UK because we tend not to celebrate high treason, but luckily enough we don't hold grudges for too long either.  George Washington will be forgiven sometime around 2276ad. 

At the moment I'm reading a couple of books.  The one that I'm giving most time too is Nicholas and Alexandra by Robert K. Massie.  It's a biography of the last Tsar and Tsarina.  It's a really good book, the subject is handled with tact and care and having a haemophiliac son himself he is good at exploring the effects of Alexei's disease on the family.  It's a very personal portrait, talking a lot about family life and personalities, it makes the tragic murder of the Romanovs seem all the more horrible when you start to know the little personality traits and what not of the children.  I'm still not convinced I wish to read the last chapters mind.

Beyond that I'm still rereading war and peace, just not very quickly, it's kind of simmering in the background and I just read a few chapters at the weekends.

Is playing some brilliant tennis on centre court at the moment.  If she can take this first set I think she'll win the match, Venus is looking frustrated and distracted.  It's so good to see a British girl giving it this against one of the best players in the world.  It can only be good for tennis in this country.  People expected the whole match to be over in under an hour and we're still in the first set so whatever happens, Anne Keothavong has done herself proud.

My rather marvellous accomplice in crime and I have been putting together a little meme on blog nostalgia. I'm tagging everyone, because I'm like that, and I'll be doing it myself too.

The Blogstalgia Meme...

1. Can you remember without looking what your first post was about?

2. Where did you write it?

3. Which was the first blog you read?
 
4. Who did/do you tell about your blog if anyone?

5. Has your blog ever caused a scandal?

6. Tell us something random which happened as a reslt of blogging?

7. Snog, Marry or Avoid - pick another blogger for each.

8. What's your most amusing blog memory?

It's really time the west put up or shut up with regards Zimbabwe.  Tsvangirai is now hiding out in the Dutch Embassy for his own safety, Mugabe's thugs are still beating people up.  All you hear from the west is "There can be no legitimate government without free and fair elections" etc, but they are never willing to do anything about it.  It's insulting to the people of Zimbabwe for our leaders to continue to voice off on the subject yet show no willingness to do anything about it.  Zimbabwe is our problem. Not only is it part of the commonwealth but the mess is basically post-colonial mess, we have a moral responsibility to act. 

After all the horrible events in African history the west collectively inhales and says "We'll never let that happen again" well here we are, people are being beaten to death on the streets, a dictator is clinging to power inspite of losing an election, hundreds of thousands may starve.  If the west have no intention of acting then they should stop insulting Zimbabweans by talking tough and not backing it up.  If they do intend to act they need to do something quick before things get even worse. 

Isn't this kind of thing what the UN was created for? Isn't this exactly why we have the United Nations? What's the point in it if it sits idly by.  If they ignore this then they're going the way of the league of nations in the run up to world war two and look what happened then.

• Think about your favorite authors, your favorite books . . . what is it about them that makes you love them above all the other authors you’ve read? The stories? The characters? The way they appear to relish the taste of words on the tongue? The way they’re unafraid to show the nitty-gritty of life? How they sweep you off to a new, distant place? What is it about those books and authors that makes them resonate with you in ways that other, perfectly good books and authors do not?
  
  -Question from Booking Through Thursday
  

I like lots of things for lots of different reasons but usually to escape to a different place. Wodehouse is a splendid example, you pick up one of his books and within moments you're transported completley into a new world (as huw attests!)  The language is so rich, the similies and metaphors are quite fantastic and the plots are all so amusing.  It creates a blissful sense of a life that could have been, had you been born rich and society not became the heap of crud it is today.  I love everything about those books, and they have probably the most distinctive flavour of anything on my bookshelves.  It combines perfectly good stories and intricate plots with characters that you grow to know so well, it means every book seems to achieve the feat of being both new and at the same time familiar.  The characters are vivid and their characteristics highlighted so well to make you love them or hate them. They're quite possibly the perfect escapist fiction.

There are varying ways to wake up but being woken by someone alerting you to the complete absence of bikes in the shed is not one of the better ones. It would be fair to say I was most put out by this, not least as it came the same day I was leaving for my holiday.

The crime itself is the simple get into the yard, cut through the shed padlock with bolt cutters, escape with bikes.

What galls me is that at around one thirty that morning I had heard noises; opening the window I saw a guy in the shadows in the lane.  It looked like he may have been trying to get into a yard opposite, but he saw me and looked up at me.  We stared at each other for a couple of seconds.  He blew a raspberry, I shouted "Yeah yeah son, aren't you big and clever."  Then I popped on my shoes, went over to my sports bag and grabbed a baseball bat* and headed down.  By the time I reached the lane he was gone, the lane was empty.  My back gate, however, was ajar.

I closed up again and went back upstairs. I stayed up for about an hour or so and then went to bed having heard nothing more.  So, waking up to find all the bikes gone and the gate swinging open was less than thrilling.  I spoke to some neighbours and their gates had been opened too, though nothing taken as their bikes were more secure.  We also found the bolt cutters - lying at the spot where I first disturbed him.  It seems he'd been casing the lane and just came back later for the bikes.

I'm not annoyed at losing the bikes.  I loved my bike but it was a wreck and the insurance will pay for a new one.  I'm annoyed because someone has stolen them and will inevitably get away with it, crime going unpunished. 

 * - The baseball bat thing, what are peoples' honest opinions on this? I'd not use it unless attacked, but with the amount of knife crime I don't feel safe going down to possibly confront thieves without some way of defending myself if needed.  On the other hand it doesn't quite feel civilised to wander around with a baseball bat even on your own property, it feels like sinking to their level.  What would you do if you thought there were thieves in the house?