Last post of 2010!

The last weeks I haven't been posting much. Don't worry, I'm still here! I've been busy with some major issues in my life. I won't beat around the bush... In a very sneaky way the eating disorder monster found its way back into my life. I hate to admit it, but it's true. Good news is I'm fighting back with all I've got! It is hard, but I'm more determined than ever to get rid of it once and for all...
Another big decision: I decided to try a life without anti depressants. They've helped me in the past and I'm glad they did. After I forgot them for a week (yes, really forgot!) and didn't even really notice it I decided to give it a go. So you see... major issues...

This morning I walked a labyrinth on a foggy beach and it was magical! The fog in my head is slowly clearing away. It will take some time until the ad remainders left my body completely. I asked some guidance in the labyrinth.The answer was clear enough: have faith! So that's my intention for 2011...

To all of you: blessings and all the best for 2011. May your best day of 2010 be your worst in 2011! :)

For Ron

Our love started off on rocky ground

But together we stood tall

Because the love we found

Can really conquer all!

If it wasn’t for you

I wouldn’t be here

The reverse is also true

We just need each other near

Together we are strong

Two halves of one heart

Friends, lovers, soul mates all along

A bond never to fall apart

All the words in all the books can not describe my love for you

So it will take all of my life and more to prove you that it’s true


~*~*~*~

Today is our wedding anniversary, we got married 15 years ago. We are together for 24 years though. I remember that beautiful day back in 1995. Very cliche perhaps, but it really was the happiest day of my life...

Each day I love you more

I love you more than I did yesterday

But less than I will do tomorrow

Forever!

BBC Booklist

I encountered this list again (on Facebook) and finally decided to see how I did and post about it. :)

So the BBC (anno 2003) believes most people will have read only 6 of the 100 books listed here. Bold the ones you've read, and italicize the ones you've read parts of but didn't finish.

1. Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2. The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien (my all-time favourite book!)
3. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte
4. Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5. To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee
6. The Bible (Roman Catholic school and upbringing)
7. Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8. Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9. His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10. Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11. Little Women - Louisa M Alcott
12. Tess of the D’Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13. Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14. Complete Works of Shakespeare (yep, all of it!)
15. Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16. The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien
17. Birdsong - Sebastian Faulk
18. Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger
19. The Time Traveler’s Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20. Middlemarch - George Eliot
21. Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell
22. The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23. War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
24. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
25. Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
26. Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
27. Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll
28. The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
29. Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
30. David Copperfield - Charles Dickens
31. Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis
32. Emma -Jane Austen
33. Persuasion - Jane Austen
34. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe - CS Lewis
35. The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
36. Captain Corelli’s Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
37. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
38. Winnie the Pooh - A.A. Milne
39. Animal Farm - George Orwell
40. The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
41. One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
42. A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
43. The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
44. Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
45. Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
46. The Handmaid’s Tale - Margaret Atwood
47. Lord of the Flies - William Golding
48. Atonement - Ian McEwan
49. Life of Pi - Yann Martel
50. Dune - Frank Herbert
51. Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
52. Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen
53. A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
54. The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
55. A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens
56. Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
57. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
58. Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
59. Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
60. Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
61. The Secret History - Donna Tartt
62. The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
63. Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
64. On The Road - Jack Kerouac
65. Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
66. Bridget Jones’s Diary - Helen Fielding
67. Midnight’s Children - Salman Rushdie
68. Moby Dick - Herman Melville
69. Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
70. Dracula - Bram Stoker
71. The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
72. Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson
73. Ulysses - James Joyce
74. The Inferno - Dante
75. Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
76. Germinal - Emile Zola
77. Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
78. Possession - AS Byatt
79. A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens (still read it every year)
80. Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
81. The Color Purple - Alice Walker
82. The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
83. Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
84. A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry
85. Charlotte’s Web - E.B. White
86. The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
87. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
88. The Faraway Tree Collection - Enid Blyton
89. Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
90. The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery
91. The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
92. Watership Down - Richard Adams (love it!)
93. A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
94. A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
95. The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
96. Hamlet - William Shakespeare
97. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
98. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo

Not 100 because in the original list there were several Harry Potter books, now it's one. The winner was The Lord Of The Rings and I couldn't agree more!

Wow, I got 70 out of 98! I didn't read all of them in English, but also in Dutch of course. I always try to read a book in the original language if possible (mostly English, some German and French).

How did you do??

Disneyland Paris

Thursday Ron, Joke and I returned from a 4-day/3-night stay in Disneyland Paris. We had a fabulous time! Because of the snow and x-mas decorations it was a true winter wonderland. So beautiful... We stayed in the Santa Fe Hotel in a simple but well-equipped room with double beds, decorated in Cars-style. A shuttlebus service was available to go to the parks.

The first day we left early, because it was a 500 km (310 mi) drive. When we arrived we moved into the room, unpacked and rested for a while. We decided to take the bus to the parks to look around a bit. Joke had been there before with Leo, so she knew where to go. The parks were covered with snow. Around 5pm the Once Upon a Dream Parade started, my absolute favourite thing to do (watch). Main Street looked wonderful. A few times my eyes filled with tears of sheer happiness. Finally there, as I've always wanted ever since the opening in 1992... My inner child enjoyed herself to her heart's content!

After an early night and deep sleep we had an early breakfast, so we could leave for the parks early too. Guests of the Disney hotels are allowed early access before opening hour. The first thing we did was Space Mountain. Holy moly, that was quite a ride! I loved it, although I was a bit unstable when I got out. Some attractions were closed because of the weather and/or refurbishing. We did all we could and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. From thrills to wonderful attractions like "It's a Small World" and "Peter Pan's Flight". It was very tiring but I walked on adrenalin! We never had long waiting times; that's the benefit of going on weekdays outside holidays. For dinner we had booked the Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show. Great entertainment and the food was good (except for the cold potatoes).

Wednesday we 'did' the Walt Disney Studios Park. That one is smaller but also great in a different way.The absolute tophit was The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror! Woohoo! Inside it looked spooky and the ride was awesome. The Moteurs... Action! Stunt Show Spectacular was abridged because of the snow, but still spectacular. It was very cold on the grandstand, so after the show we had some hot chocolate and went into the theatre to get warm again. When we had seen what we wanted, we walked to the other park again to shop and of course watch the Parade again. I bought and got some wonderful Tink-stuff! We had dinner in The Steakhouse about which I can be brief: a big disappointment, not something I'd recommend. But we didn't let that spoil our fun too much! We returned to the hotel, very tired (and Ron with painful knees) but very satisfied after another great day.

Thursday we decided to skip the parks and drive home early because the weather forecast was bad. The homeward journey was long. In France and Belgium it wasn't that bad, but in the Netherlands we fell into an early traffic rush hour. We were home around 6pm. First we picked up the dogs at Ron's sister; they were so happy to see us! I had missed them a lot, and the cats too. We ordered dinner in and talked about our adventures. What an experience, what an amazing time...

A selection of our (800+) photos are in my Facebook album "Eurodisney December 2010".