Category: Life: Books

Well, I’ve just some of my Christmas Shopping on Amazon.co.uk and it’s come to quite a bit! I’ve brought some of the stuff for myself (hey, I deserve to be treated 🙂 ), but…!

• Book: Eaters of the Dead – Michael Crichton – £4.79
• Book: Sphinx – Robin Cook – £5.59
• Book: Vector – Robin Cook – £5.59
• Book: Punchbag – Robert Llewellyn – £5.59
• Book: Brother Nature – Robert Llewellyn – £5.59
• Book: Tales from the White Hart Arthur C. Clarke – £6.45
• Video: Blott on Landscape – Written by Tom Sharpe – £17.59
• Video: Porterhouse Blue – Written by Tom Sharpe – £5.99
• Video: The Complete Fawlty Towers (1975/79) – Written by John Cleese – £26.39
• CD: Escapology – Robbie Williams – £9.99
• CD: Now 53 – Various – £12.99
• Software: Norton AntiVirus Pro 2003 Upgrade – Symantec – £27.99

12 items at a total cost of £134.54! Wow!

Woo! I’ve just completed my 100th page for Distributed Proofreaders (see previous entry). 100 pages puts me in joint 236th position out of 3420 (I’m guessing quite a few people pick ‘100 pages’ as a good resting point). I’ve just been first-level proof reading “The Happy Adventurers” by Lydia Miller Middleton: ok, it’s a children’s book (about a time-travelling girl guide from the 30 pages of the first 60 I’ve read so far – unfortunately other people were working on the book at the same time so I didn’t get sequential pages). Oh, Sluggy Freelancer (a web comic strip about a freelance web designer, a deranged rabbit, a ferret, alien, ‘freelance bum’ and a few other things) is running a filler strip today. Drat. I was hoping the ‘Kitten II‘ strip would really get moving.

I came across Distributed Proofreaders via an article on Slashdot (although the article has now been replicated on Kuro5hin). Basically, it’s a group of volunteers (a bit like ODP) that “proof-read” books for Project Gutenberg (a site where you can download ‘out-of-copyright’ books). I’ve only been a member now for just over 24 hours, but I’m really enjoying it – and I’ve proof read 50 pages so far (rank 347 out of 3349).