Under construction

I am really sorry, but this blog is "under construction"!

Well, I thought it was time to do something about the layout, especially about the colours.
I hope this is alright.
As my "html-talent" is a bit underdeveloped, it might take some time.
But I promise to finish it as soon as possible.
So don't worry, if you see different colours everytime you visit my blog, you don't need to see a doctor, it has nothing to do your eyes!

See you soon!

xxx

Paradise Lost

Right, I might also say something about the quote above:
As some of you know, I am still lingering at university - well, my degree takes 5 years anyway, but if I had not travelled the world all the time, I might have finished earlier - and at the moment I am writing on my final thesis, which is kind of connected to Paradise Lost.



I am working on a teaching degree for Secondary Schools (English/History) and on a degree which is comparable to a Master in English Literature, English Linguistics and Early Modern/Modern History. So I have to write my final thesis in my major - English Literature. I took me some time to find something to write about, but I finally made it and even my professor was kind of excited. And here it is:

The narrative creation of fantasy worlds in the novels of J.K. Rowling, P. Pullman and C.S. Lewis

Fancy, isn't it? Well, I guess I never grow up and I just LOVE children's books and I especially love Harry Potter or at beter, I love the books. I am not very fond of the films, though. There is still quite a lot of work to do, but I do not have to hand in the thesis till the beginning of March. I will write about the concept of Secondary Worlds (this term goes back to Tolkien's "On Fairy Tales" and I have already proved that in Harry Potter there is only ONE secondary world with two parallel societies - Muggle/Wizard World - not two independent worlds! If anyone is interested, I can send you the first part of the thesis (The Secondary Worlds of the Harry Potter Series). But I have oral exams coming up at the end of October (pedagogics/psychology) and I guess I won't be able to do anything for my thesis till then.

But back to Paradise Lost: Did any of you read His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman? Fantastic books, aren't they? Well, the quote above is part of the introduction to Northern Lights and I really like it, even though I was never able to convince myself to read Paradise Lost. I have to admit, that I have not finished the Chronicles of Narnia yet, but I managed 5 out of 7, which is not too bad so far!

Did any of you study Psychology? I had my final exams (for the teaching degree) only three weeks ago in this stupid subject. Okay, it is not really stupid, but it is definitely not my favourite. There are a lot of things that are very interesting and helpful for a teacher, but I am not good at learning things off by heart and I don't know why I had to learn all these stupid results of various scientific studies... I survived, but I have never in my life studied so hard for one single exam - I started in April!!!!

Why am I addicted to snails?

Okay, I should explain to some of you why I have chosen this blog title. Well, I guess some already know why;-)
I cannot really explain when it all started, but I guess years and years ago...

Everyone collects something - stamps, postcards, coins, turtles, things no one needs, bric-a-brac, shoes, handbags,... - so maybe I just wanted something else, something very hard to get and therefore I decided to collect SNAILS.
No, not these slimy red or brown ones without houses - cute cuddly snails like the ones on the pictures. Hi hi, they keep on growing, don't they? Oh my good, I seem to collect them like other women collect shoes!


You won't believe me when I tell you that it is very hard to find snails. When you go to a market, you will find all kinds of animals like owls, turtles, hedgehogs and mice and even spiders, but no snails! But there is one company in Germany which sells these cute softtoys!

They come in various sizes with dots or stripes, uni or muliticoloured and I just love them.


There are also special editions like this X-Mas Snail:


But I also collect snails made out of other materials like wood, glas, ceramics and so forth. So if you are ever looking for a present for me, just remember this post!


I have to admitt that I also tasted some in France and well, they are not as bad as their reputation! On the other hand, I find them way too cute to eat them.

As I am travelling a lot and as I am out and about every so often, I decided that "Snail on the Road" is quite appropriate.

I'm still alive

Well, I am quite proud of me, I finally managed to create my own little blog. I even remembered some of the things I learnt about HTML-writing at university - amazing! As Dana said, every single second a new blog is created and this seems to be my "second of glory"!

People keep telling me that they have not heard from me for ages and that they do not even know in which country I am living at the moment. Right, I am a bit lazy and often forget to answer e-mails (sorry everyone), but I do not do it on purpose, I promise ;-) At least I managed to send some mails during my stay in Ireland, didn't I?
But I thought this might be a good way of keeping in touch with all of you. So hello world - here I am!

I decided to write in English, as some of my friends abroad might find it a bit difficult to look up every single word in their German-English dictionary, if they have one! As I study English literature and linguistics and most of my friends here in Bamberg do so as well, I am very confident that they will manage to understand the posts. And all the others had at least 9 years of English at school, so they should manage as well! Every now and then I will include some "mistakes" for you to find, just to check if you read the posts! Of course you can write your comments in whatever language you like, but please use one of the two I understand properly: English or German!

Don't hesitate to leave some comments, so I can have a laugh as well!

Yours
Nadja