Tea Time

I have had lots of fun to this point talking about the books we have been reading and that is great, but this is also a tea (coffee as well) reading room. We can't have a tea reading room if we never talk about tea. I love tea, mainly because it can be drunk a number of ways. There are also these things called tea parties.

Most little girls love tea parties, I know I did. Little china set that held a thimble sized amount of liquid. Granted most of these tea parties occur with stuffed animals and dolls so therefore everything was in pretend mode. But when you had another person, it was fun to have real tea, sugar, and milk. Yummy.

Fast forward into adulthood and tea parties become something else altogether. They do when I throw one. For one, I tend to want some tradition in my parties. Thank god for trusty Google where it knows almost everything. People input this stuff, so it's never going to be 100% accurate. With that being said, there are actually different kinds of tea. The most common at the pretend tea parties are actually High Tea.

Off on the internet super highway and one can find places that serve high tea and lo and behold, menus. Those are awesome. Cause what does one serve at high tea? Why dainty little yummies. Cucumber sandwiches, scones, mini desserts. This means, lots of finger food so lots of selections. After stealing ideas from menus and others that post on the internet, one can create their own high tea menu. 

This is a lovely little menu I made for a tea party I orchestrated (meaning I demanded they play dress-up and come party). As stated in my about page, I have a lot of tea and I love adding to the collection. I made several of the listed menu items, finding simple recipes online. Those mini quiche were yummy.

Having a tea pot with cups and saucers to streamline the feel of this being a lovely day at a tea room with your girlfriends sitting at a lovely table looking out of a giant window at the people passing you by. Back to reality, as I was saying before I transported myself into that seat which in my mind is really comfortable, a tea kettle is really important in heating up the water. Plus, it whistles at you. (No I don't have issues. I'm quite content talking to myself.)

Some cream, sugar, honey, and jam work well sweetening tea. With so many types of tea out on the market, there is something for everyone. I love jasmine green tea along with fruit teas. Everyone has their own taste and having several to choose from is awesome.

Now this is the most important part, have over your besties. I mean yes you could have stuffed animals and dolls around the table, but they can't talk back. You want to converse with these friends and have fun. This might be high tea, but that doesn't mean you can't have some fun.

Personally, my girlfriends and off onto some random ass topics. Hello, if we haven't read the posts regarding tentacle porn, you should to understand the level of fun one can have a these parties. Go on and read them, I'll wait.

This is some yummy tea and the chocolate hazelnut piroulines la di da.

All right, now that you get an idea of the crazy level. Go have a tea party, dress up, and let loose. Alcohol isn't even needed. Just some good old fashioned fun.

For a party of one, do everything listed above, but instead of having friends over, curl up in a comfortable place and grab that book you've been eyeing. Go on, it's fun.

Out of this World

In one of the latest movies I went to see the theaters, there was a trailer for The Martian starring Matt Damon. The trailer was really well done. Matt Damon's character was stuck on the planet Mars after his crew left him because they thought he was dead. He also has to figure out a way to contact Earth to get rescued all while trying not to die. It went onto the list of select movies I'm willing to go see in the theaters.

Fast forward a few weeks and my husband tells me that this movie is based on a book (something I didn't notice from the trailer). That got my attention. While I'm an avid reader, he is very selective and even he wanted to read it. So on the recommendation of my husband's friend, we venture to the local bookstore (which can be a hit or miss experience, but I was hopeful) and there was The Martian  by Andy Weir. It even had Matt Damon on the cover. Jackpot. So clutching the book like the treasure it is, I got it.

As soon as we were seated in the car I read the first few lines, but alas I get car sick when reading and those few lines were awesome and sucked me in. If less than a hundred words can do that, then this book was going down. I look at the page count and for this edition it was 369. That's a good little number, but it's not like I haven't inhaled longer works. Granted the last thing I was expecting was to be challenged. And that was what the question, "You think you can read that book by tomorrow?" I scoffed and looked at my hubby as if I didn't hear him correctly. I mean I eat, um read, yup read, books up. so my response was, "Of course." I really wanted to roll my eyes. okay maybe I did. I don't recall.

Now, I wanted to get home and read right away, but I had some domestic things to do. Cleaning and cooking. So after I made the dishes go from dirty to clean with my magic wand, aka the Dishwasher, I pulled the whole chicken from the fridge, gave it a little bath, buttered it up and dressed it in spices before throwing it into the oven to bake for hours. Hours mind you. That would give me plenty of time to sit down with Matt, errr, Mark Watney. But alas Facebook stole me away for a bit. Then, I was able to settle down onto my comfy couch to be brought to Mars.

This finally came to pass around 9pm-ish. I wasn't watching the clock all that closely. I mean sure I had work the next day, but I was determined.

I happen to really like the planet Mars. It's my favorite out of all the nine, wait someone downgraded Pluto, so I guess we have 8 planets in the solar system, and then they added little ones didn't they? I was taught that there were 9 planets and by god I'm going to continue to believe that. I mean I know the planet isn't flat, But we named Pluto and Pluto shouldn't be thrown into the doghouse. He's a good little planet all the way out there. This is my blog and I say there are nine planets damn it.

Rant over. As I was saying, Mars is my favorite planet and it all started when I was a wee little girl. I spent my time in science museums for fun and there was this traveling exhibit called "Mission to Mars." My parents brought me to it and I was allowed to fly "the spaceship" and land it on Mars so that we could do experiments. Now I seven or eight at the time. It was fantastic and I really thought we went to Mars, so sad to learn we didn't. but come on it was the reason that astronaut became the thing I wanted to be when I grew up.

Mars, wonderful little red planet that will kill you. So back to the book that I finished at 3:50 am that same day. Well, if you want to be technical, it was the following day, but I hadn't gone to sleep, so it was still the same day in my little world. I had the lovely visual of Matt Damon as Mark throughout the entire book, thank you movie marker people. It was funny and entertaining. Andy wrote a wonderful character and he placed you on Mars.

There were so many little jokes and things that happened that I wouldn't be able to list them all and I wouldn't want to spoil this novel or in some cases the movie. How true to the written word will be seen later in the movie theater with popcorn and Coke. Mark's personality was what kept me so entertained. Here's a man stranded on Mars and he's writing a log about how he plans to survive and how he plans on finding a way to contact Earth.

Most of the novel is written like this. It's as if Mark is talking to you. I loved how he redesigned things throughout the novel. He was a nerd alright. One that made mistakes as well. He was flawed. Yay, a flawed character on Mars. Sorry, I like flaws, they make characters realistic. The novel switches POVs (point of view). We get the first person narrative on from Mark, but we also have third person POV, The 3rd POV is done in a couple of different ways. Each POV brings something different to the novel bringing the reader onto an unforgettable journey. I read it quickly, while cooking lunch for the next day.

Here's the book blurb from Amazon.com:

Six days ago, astronaut Mark Watney became one of the first people to walk on Mars.

Now, he's sure he'll be the first person to die there.
After a dust storm nearly kills him and forces his crew to evacuate while thinking him dead, Mark finds himself stranded and completely alone with no way to even signal Earth that he’s alive—and even if he could get word out, his supplies would be gone long before a rescue could arrive.

Chances are, though, he won't have time to starve to death. The damaged machinery, unforgiving environment, or plain-old "human error" are much more likely to kill him first.

But Mark isn't ready to give up yet. Drawing on his ingenuity, his engineering skills—and a relentless, dogged refusal to quit—he steadfastly confronts one seemingly insurmountable obstacle after the next. Will his resourcefulness be enough to overcome the impossible odds against him?

Tentacle What? Tentacle Porn

There is so much to read in the world. Romance. Humor. Mystery. Satire. Well, there is a book out there called The Squirm Files by Cari Silverwood. And you guessed it. Tentacle porn. It's a lovely parody that had me in stitches. (Possible, probable spoilers ahead. Nothing to revealing. I promise.)

The anthology has all three stories about the heroine Virginia Chaste, our reluctant virgin captive. What can I say? The author had me laughing out loud at the dialogue and prose. Each installment had something different to offer.

The first installment of this anthology sets the stage and we meet our lovely Virgin, um *cough,* Virginia. She is just a nice normal young woman looking for the ultimate prize of a 10 incher. A skill she has honed to a scary ass science. She of course is taken captive by a tentacle monster. (Where else would the tentacle porn come into play?) We get to meet Dangerous Bob, who does nothing but cuss but somehow still is understandable. Plenty of word play and the author calling her readers tentacle perverts mid story. Loved it and totally kept reading waiting for more gems like that. There was lovely tentacle erotic sex, by an alpha evil tentacle monster, Karl,  who loves throwing people off roofs and into portals. Virginia Chaste is a sassy mouthy woman on a quest getting more than she bargained for. Plenty of sassy banter between her and her inner voice. Plus RABBITS. (Spoiler: Jokes abound.)

Installment two. A book with a long complicated name that means evil sex book is on the loose about to destroy the world. Oh my. That would be one hell of a fun book to get your hands on. A book about any and sexual acts, toys, you name it. Move over Kama Sutra say hello to the Necrosexi-texmexicon. (Told you it was a long complicated name.) Virginia must save Karl and to do that she needs a demon rock star, Zagan, and his band (not of merry thieves either) to save the world. Mostly, Karl and his biker group of monsters. But the world is very important to them all. Somehow, they end up in the world of books and weirdness. Lots of random humor that ins't so random. Erotic sex with demons and tails and tentacles. Cause there can't be enough tentacles. Dino sex and frying pans. There is so much humor written throughout that it can't be contained. Nor should it. After, a mind blowing three-way with Virginia, tentacles, horns, tails, and suction cups, the world is saved.

Holy shit, installment throws us into the past with the help of a futuristic skateboard. Virginia ends up in the wild west while Karl is ill in the future. She can't believe this is happening to her and this time she has a talking skateboard to help her out. I was dying when she decapitates a poor defenseless cactus just because. Though if I ended up in the wild west after having had dealt with becoming a captive and then helping save the world from ultimate destruction by a sex book, I would become homicidal as well. Okay, back to Peckerwood Springs. Yes, this is real folks. There she meets a new tentacle monster by the name John Beastwood. There are roses, talking dishes, and Virginia is a captive once more. Now, where do I know that story? Doesn't matter, she just needs to get home to her own personal tentacle monster. But wait, before that can happen lets have more tentacle porn. Not just plain old tentacle porn either. Lots of fetish tentacle porn.

As one can see, Tentacles are integral to the story line as is humor. (Duh. Satire. Parody. Whatnot.) There were lots of other little gems that I didn't mention. I laughed throughout this book. Of course, my lovely friend Katie read it with me and we messaged each other back and forth laughing out loud with each new discovery. Read alone or with a group of friends, (I recommend that you read with a friend), but this is a great book to pick up and read.

I am now a fan of the Tentacle porn. So many tentacles, so many possibilities.