Books, e-readers and the iPad

I like books. They have a nice feel, a nice smell, a pleasant weight. I don't like e-readers. They are tacky and plasticy they feel all wrong. I can't lend a story on one to a friend. I can't throw it in a bag and not worry about it. I can't take it on the beach and just leave it with the towels. In short I was sure I preferred the real thing, the e-reader was an impressive piece of engineering but I was a Luddite, an old fogey clinging on to the past, I loved books.

Then the iPad came along and I liked it. It helped that there was some design flair involved, that it was an item you would want to be seen with. This is something that may change my mind. You may notice that it doesn't have any of the attributes that I like about books. I can however see that it is something that I would use for reading more that just books. I could use it for the news and blogs, for videos and e-mails, for Facebook and Twitter. It is a screen that is light enough to take with you. It is for consuming content rather than creating it. E-readers on the other hand cannot be used for the news or video or even basic web surfing.  They have nothing I like about books in them and nothing I like about computers in them.

Despite all this I cannot picture myself curling up by the fire with a cup of tea and an iPad but for trains and buses I would happily use one, when you are on the go the new technology has many advantages. It will never replace books for me, but I can see myself enjoying both. Maybe it is time to embrace the future and go and buy one, maybe...

Football

To set the scene I should add that I know nothing about football. This post will be mostly me displaying my lack of knowledge and being sarcastic. I understand the rules and the way it all works I just don't understand the attraction of watching a group of men kick a ball up a field while a different group, (signified by a different colour t-shirt) endeavour to kick the ball in the other direction.

For those hermits among you there is the World Cup football tournament on at the moment. This is apparently very interesting and worthy of a vast amount of conversation where every last touch of the ball is analysed by experts/ blokes in the pub after a few beers. One of the key points about the world cup is that everyone should have an opinion, even if you know nothing. This results in red faced lardy middle aged men in a pub swilling cheap chemical laced larger yelling at a TV. Whoever called it the beautiful game clearly knew nothing about it. 

I am about to make huge generalisations and use stereotypes so if this sort of thing irritates you stop reading now. The players have more hair gel than brains, there wives are self absorbed bints painted in Dulux orange sunset and the fans are violent thugs. I know this statement will have some people fuming but that is half the fun of making a statement like that.

I apologise for the rag tag rant of a post but it was fun to write even if it isn't to read.