With You and Without You

Written by Ann M Martin (as if you didn't know that), published in 1986. From the back cover:
"Liza O'Hara's father is dying. The doctors say he has just a few months to live. Liza doesn't believe it...until her dad tells her he wants to make this Christmas the best ever. It's his last one.
Life without Dad is even harder than Liza thought it would be. The O'Haras have to move our of their old house, and Liza's little sister doesn't understand that Daddy isn't coming back.
Liza wants to be strong, and bring her family back together again. But maybe being strong isn't all it takes. Maybe it means learning how to love - and laugh - again."

Some memories:
I remembered the youngest sister being kind of annoying and spoiled a la Karen Brewer
I remembered crying when the cat, Charlie died but not the dad

I couldn't pass this book up when I saw it on an online auction. I don't know if I can snark on this book as it is so deeply ingrained in my childhood.
Written previously to her mega successful Babysitters Club series, Martin does a good job here dealing with a sensitive issue for young readers.
The father dies about halfway through the book, so the story deals just as much with his death as well as what the aftermath is both emotionally and financially.
I still got teary while reading the part about Charlie dying (it seemed to happen a lot earlier than I remembered) but this time I did also feel sadness during the death scene of the father.

The father asks that each child contribute in at least a small way to his funeral. That includes a 4 year old (Hope), a 10 year old (Carrie), Liza (12) and the eldest brother. Technically Hope didn't have to make a speech but she chose to. That seems pretty harsh to deal with at your dad's funeral, sure they've had time to deal with it (in a way) but I would find it hard to talk at my own father's funeral at 26 let alone when I was in primary school.
I did think Hopes (the 4 year old) speech was quite sweet though:
"I miss my daddy." Hope began and immediately started to cry. Brent handed her a tissue and she wiped her eyes. Then she seemed to be ok.... "He's a very nice man," Hope went on. "He's funny and he sings me funny songs. He calls me Emmy. No one else does." At that point Mom buried her face in her hands and wept silently. "He likes animals, even Mouse and he can always fix my swing. He's ...he was a nice man," she said again "He was tall. I love my daddy. That's all."

Re reading it, of course it seems shorter than I remembered. It deals with death in a sensitive way, Liza just doesn't get over the death right away and has feelings of anger, frustration, sadness and she especially struggles with guilt and how she shouldn't feel happy or celebrate Christmas.
She thinks some members of her family move on too quickly and she is urged by her friend Denise to let herself cry instead of bottling it up. As usual I was a big sook while reading about Charlie's death (do not watch Turner and Hooch, Marley and Me or Watership Down with me. Actually nor Milo and Otis, damn there was some animal cruelty in that movie. This could be a post on its own) probably as it just reminded me of when our beloved Thomas died in 2003.

One thing that slightly annoyed me is that she does seem to move on and 'get over' her fear of celebrating Christmas pretty quickly once she realises she was ruining it for Hope as well. In saying that though, she still does not want to help decorate the tree and takes a long time to go to visit the grave. Others have criticised the relationship with Marc, a boy she has a crush on and he asks her out several months after her dad dies. I don't think the first relationship with a boy is the catalyst to deal with the death but I think it does help. I think it is written quite naturally and Liza does show a lot of angst about going out and having fun and has a moment at a party where she tears up.

I think this book still holds up, although I'll admit to being biased and attaching a great deal of nostalgia to it. The title always makes me think of the U2 song which I always thought I would like played at my funeral. And then my dad said he wanted it played at his funeral, and it hit me that it was such a morbid conversation to be having with my dad who is still in his 40's, but now I've changed my song to Sia's cover of I Go To Sleep so it's all good.

I have to send a big thank you to Kim from What Claudia Wore as I am the random winner of the Shop Bop voucher with my comment on my favourite Babysitters Club super special. I think I was 1 of about 3 out of 187 who picked Babysitters at Shadow Lake! You can bet I already bagged a purchase of juicy couture flats with the Australian dollar doing so well against the American for a change.

For fear of ruining, I have not worn them out of the house yet

Favourites and fosters

No this isn't a post about my favourite fosters. That would just be mean. Although I do have favourite fosters just like every parent has a favourite child I'm sure, but I'm not going to commit to it in the blogosphere.

The favourites refers to favourite books. I am on a personal mission to read more good books and want to know what other people out there (pop culture and nostalgic junkies like myself) consider their favourite book. Being a true commitment phobe I cannot commit to one book myself, so even a few recommendations would be great.  For me, The Lovely Bones is a great story, no matter how sappy that makes me. I have written on the book and film adaptation so don't feel the need to review it again.
High Fidelity (by Nick Hornby) is another favourite, along with the movie which I may review in the future. And even though reading Stephen King is akin to being caught masturbating according to some, I still enjoy a lot of his stories.
So please share in the comments section, I've had great recommendations from Sadako and Nikki previously and need more!

In regards to the fosters portion of title, this is Jasper.

Jasper is a purebred 4 year old border collie from a country town around 2 hours from my city. He was abused by 2 smallish boys who lived next door to him, who would throw stuff at him, open the gate etc. One day Jasper had enough and bit one of the boys. Well as you can imagine Momma was indignant and called the ranger who took Jasper away. Eventually a court case was held and Jasper was found innocent as the boys were antagonising him. What this all means in the end is that Jasper's owner could no longer keep him as she still lived next door to this family who would presumably be more annoying than ever now.
Jasper is a great dog, very affectionate but has a none too healthy habit of thinking he needs to herd up cars. Which means we don't walk him near busy roads. Aside from that, he's lovely and I'm surprised I still have him after 2 weeks. As you can imagine, purebred dogs are like gold in the animal rescue world and I thought he would have been snapped up by now. He is a bit wary of new people as is understandable but is still okay around kids which is surprising.

Rambo update! He has been adopted by my grandparents who are a respectable 65-70ish age. They have an older dog who has just taken on such a motherly role with little Rambie and they have a lot of fun. I was so excited that it all worked out, and I can still see him grow up. Awww.

Love those ears!

Young Einstein

Presenting the second in line of Australian 'classic' films.
This movie begins with the sound of a didgeridoo playing. Could we get anymore Australian?

Albert Einstein (played by Yahoo Serious, also writer/director) is a young scientist in early 1900's Tasmania, Australia.

He lives with his parents who own an apple farm but Albert just doesn't fit in.

He experiments with scientific theories, and then his dad gives him a challenge in his grandfather's beer brewing shed - how to put bubbles into beer.

Albert then splits the beer atom (yes that's what I said) and on the advice of his dad, travels to Sydney to patent the idea.

On the train he meets Marie Curie who believes in his ideas and helps him along the way. Preston Preston, a snob lusting after Marie (and works at the patent office) is also on the same train who later steals his idea.


When he gets to Sydney though, he needs an invention to patent not just his formula (E=MC squared) and also invents an electric guitar. This same electric guitar will save the world when Preston (using Einstein's formula) creates a large bubble beer brewing machine (essentially a nuclear reactor) and Einstein has to absorb it's energy through the guitar at a scientific academy awards ceremony in Paris where Charles Darwin is also in attendance.



I had forgotten how crazy ridiculous this movie is. I mean this in the nicest possible way. This movie was a regular staple through my childhood, released in 1988, I was at the right age to love watching it's silliness but not really understand what was going on. Even re watching it yesterday I still remembered all of Serious's mannerisms in playing the character. Two friends I asked had not even seen it yet so maybe I'm in the minority of people my age who have seen it?



During the course of the film, Einstein turns himself black, red, grey and white. He also invents surfing and rock and roll music, woos Marie Curie, flys a hot air balloon, rides a horse, and break dances. Need I say more.



Slight exaggeration of the Tasmanian devil



There is a reference to Tasmania being the apple isle of Australia, Einstein is constantly eating apples (sometimes even taking only one bite) and throwing it away.

There are Australian fauna everywhere. Kangaroos at the university, his house, a koala while he's making his surfboard, a galah sitting on his shoulder while he's patching the roof. No wonder Americans think we ride kangaroos to school.



The scene that stuck with me the most, being an animal lover from a young age was the infamous 'kitten pie' scene. Halfway through the movie Einstein gets locked up in an insane asylum (the mad scientists wing no less) and the macabre chef places live kittens into a pie case and then plops pastry over the top of them, with no care for their little mews. Luckily there is a happy ending for these kittens otherwise I think little Amiee may have been traumatised.

Side note: there are kangaroos in suburbia but the ones we see more often have been hit by cars. Koalas are endangered (I think) and I've only ever seen them in the zoo. My brother has a hand reared pink and grey galah named Gus and while he will sit on your shoulder, he is also a little terror and will bite your toes.



The humour is mostly slapstick and while I didn't laugh out loud a lot like I imagined I did as a kid, the film is still enjoyable in the way a silly but innocent movie is.

There are just so many random little moments during the movie. For example, the mad scientists are having their shower/bath time in the asylum and there is a character in the background who spends a good 2 minutes scrubbing his backside.



 How we bathe down under..nah just Tasmanians



Serious plays a likable character, and there's no doubt he has a creative brain for being able to come up with some truly random stuff. He is also played as a bit of a dimwit: not realising he's lodging in a brothel, regularly blowing himself up. His hair in itself is unexplainable (and gives not so complimentary comparisons to Carrot Top).

I'll admit to probably liking this film more than I would if it wasn't Australian and purely also for nostalgic reasons. What's interesting is that I could not imagine this movie getting made today. It's definitely original.

Grossing over 100 million worldwide, it was a big success for a little Australian movie. Serious went on to make Reckless Kelly and Mr Accident, neither of which did as well. He's now reportedly working on a more sombre film about the Kokoda Track.

From yahooserious.com: "I had no intention of making an historical dramatised "documentary" of Albert Einstein but rather to explore the spirit of this rebellious, lateral thinker with the clowning sense of humour. It gave me license to create a strange, epic cartoon with heightened characters bathed in a world of science, music and "fantastic realism".