Troubleshooting

Yesterday, suddenly I could not access my blog at all through Internet Explorer. I kept getting an error message saying the address could not be found, and the search process was aborted. Every now and then, though, I could still see the page behind the error message, so it was obviously not gone... And my other blog was still accessible. Switching to Firefox, I could also enter this blog that IE stubbornly maintained did not exist. Big mystery...

I was kind of hoping the problem would mend itself during the night, but it did not. Reading some help messages at Blogger Help Group this morning revealed that other people "out there" were having similar problems, and some blamed the changes recently made to the Followers function.

So I removed the Followers gadget in my margin and now I seem to be rid of the problem. I will wait a while before I try to reinstall it. If many users are having the same trouble, I'm guessing it's a bug that Blogger/Google will have to find a way to fix.

The computer is a wonderful invention, but not always a time saver. I wonder how many times I have said "I'll just take a quick glance at..." - and ended up spending hours trying (more or less successfully) to fix some kind of error...!

Royal Engagement

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The day our annual book sale started this year, 24th February (see previous post), was also the day that Sweden's Crown Princess Victoria, after years of rumours, finally got officially engaged to her Man of the People, Daniel Westling - a personal trainer and gym owner. The royal wedding will take place next summer. As Victoria's husband, Daniel's title will be Prince Daniel, Duke of Västergötland.

Since it reminds of a fairy tale, I thought the piece of news fitting for this blog...

Annual Book Sale

The last week in February means start of the annual nation-wide Book Sale in Sweden, as far back as I can remember. It is not quite what it used to be - the last chance to get cheap left-over copies of books that were going out of print. These days, cheap editions of some books are even printed especially for the sale. But it's still an Event for all booklovers. And a Temptation...

However, I'm not all that fond of crowds and queueing (I wonder if there's any chance I got the spelling of that word right...), and that sometimes keeps me from venturing into the bookshop on the first day of the sale. Besides, my bookcases are all full...

Nevertheless, I found myself joining the crowd (and queueing) again this year, even though I wasn't really looking for any particular book. And now I have to make room in my bookcases for three more books on mythology, and one about dreams. As if I didn't have any of those before...

But who can resist titles like these? (Not I, obviously...!)
(All books in Swedish, the titles translated into English by me.)

• World Religions (seems to contain readable summaries of the Big Ones... and pictures)
• Gods and Goddesses in Classical Mythology (very neat, with charts and pictures...)
• Classical Symbols, an Encyclopedia (lots of useful trivia, and again, pictures...)
• Dragons and Demons of our Dreams (fascinating/scary cover picture, and the book was really, really cheap...)

Quotation of the Week 9/09

I'm still reading Wuthering Heights. Here is another quotation from it that caught my eye (with the recent dream discussion in mind).

I've dreamt in my life dreams that have stayed with me ever after, and changed my ideas; they've gone through and through me, like wine through water, and altered the colour of my mind.

Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights, Ch. 9
(the first Catherine speaking)

Nature's Magic Mirror

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I brought my camera with me on a walk the other day.

I love the way the trees are reflected in the water.

In the photo below it is almost hard to tell

which branches belong to which world...

Libraries and secret passages

Borrowing another writing prompt from the One-Minute-Writer:

Write about a childhood memory related to reading.
I used to borrow lots of books from the library. Enid Blyton was among my favourites (for a period). I still love libraries, and almost any story that has a secret passage in it... (the Blyton kids always seemed to find one of those).

Cathedral of the Sea

I have finally finished Cathedral of the Sea by Ildefonso Falcones, which I have been reading "by ear" - a box of 19 CD's (in Swedish), borrowed from the library. It took me six weeks to get through them. I found the book historically informative: it is an epic novel set in 14th century Barcelona and includes topics like the building of a cathedral, slavery, serfdom, anti-Semitism, the Spanish Inquisition, prostitution, the growth of sea trade and insurance companies, and more. But somehow I found it hard to really connect to the characters. It is a "heavy" story, not the most easily digested kind. The main character is Arnau Estanyol, son of a fugitive serf, seeking freedom in Barcelona. How to define freedom is a recurrent theme.