Book reviews (part 2)

Here are a few more reviews of books I've recently been reading.

The No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith – 4.9 / 5.0

The No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency was a book which had never really appealed to me, but I eventually picked it up as the third book in a multi-book discount deal. I’m extremely glad I did as I thoroughly enjoyed it and will definitely be searching out the follow-up books in the series.

The book tells the story of Precious Ramotswe and her investigative adventures after she uses her inheritance to set up the first and only female detective agency in Botswana. Some of the chapters could almost be read individually as self-contained short stories, but there are also a few ongoing story-lines and themes running throughout the book. Its style will appeal to a wide audience and several moments in the book will bring a smile to your face. Overall, the No.1 Ladies’ Detective Agency is a thoroughly enjoyable and heart-warming book which I would enthusiastically recommend.

Hidden jigsaw puzzle found on British coins

A tricky and complicated jigsaw puzzle found on the back of British coins.

As a quick follow up to last week's Easter egg themed blog post, I thought I would also mention a hidden jigsaw puzzle from the Royal Mint found on the back of British coins. Anyone who uses cash a lot might already be familiar with this, but those who prefer to pay by card may not be aware of it yet.

The pieces of the puzzle can be found on the back of recent editions of British coins from 1p up to 50p, i.e. 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p and 50p, and when put together the coins display the image of a shield. If you’re struggling to complete the jigsaw puzzle then you can also find the solution on the back of recent editions of the British pound coin, i.e. it shows how the shield should look when the correct coins are in place. Although to be fair, you shouldn’t really need the solution to complete the puzzle as it only involves six pieces!

10 more cool internet Easter eggs ... the sequel!

Another list of weird hidden features (or 'Easter eggs' as they’re known) from around the web.

 

Another batch of internet Easter Eggs.

One of my personal favourite posts on this blog was my '10 cool internet Easter eggs' post which lists hidden features and tricks found on the internet such as the YouTube snake, the Nyanit cat and even an update on the end of the world. There are many more hidden Easter eggs found on the internet though, so I thought it was about time I listed another ten cool internet Easter eggs in a post creatively entitled '10 more cool internet Easter eggs ... the sequel!'

1) ASCII Star Wars

Any Star Wars fans should definitely check out this first Easter egg. If you open up DOS (click on the Windows ‘Start’ button, then Run, then type ‘cmd’) then type:

telnet towel.blinkenlights.nl

…you get to watch the entire Star Wars movie illustrated with ASCII text symbols!

10 cool Swedish words and expressions (part 1)

Fart bumps, poison marriage and eating barbed wire.

Caution: Posionous marriage!

I'm a big fan of the Swedish language, so I thought it would be fun to write a post on ten of my favourite Swedish words and expressions, starting with a word seemingly invented by an apparent love cynic.

1) Poisonous marriage

In Swedish, the word for married is 'gift' and this is also the word for poison.  Whoever invented Swedish can’t have had the most optimistic outlook on marriage.

2) Black sickness

‘Svartsjuk’ is the Swedish word for jealous and this literally translates as ‘black sickness’ which is an interesting way to describe jealousy.