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Frenzied and Feverish at the Lifeline Bookfair.

It can only speak to my love of both a bargain and books and magazines that I managed to get up early yesterday and brave the Lifeline Book fair queue despite being in the midst of a really evil flu. This is a date that has been marked on the calendar for months and eagerly anticipated by Ruby and myself all week - not going was not an option. But boy was it worth it. I can't tell you what we spent (really I can't - it's been pushed to the darkest recess of my brain unaccessable by anyone but the most skilled hypnotist) and anyway I like to think of it as an investment. After all when I am done with the many lifestyle and fashion mags I can sell them on ebay can't I? Or else cut them up into a fetching collage. Even stack them into a clever room divider when relatives come to visit. It's a funny atmosphere at the fair though. Bookish sorts queueing for hours as though tickets for some world class rock band are on the verge...

Warning: Disturbing Vintage Themes.

With my mother in law down scaling her possessions to move into a smaller place I was recently the lucky recipient of some vintage children's books. This one of the Pied Piper (1961 I think) particularly appealed. As a child I would have spent hours poring over these illustrations, the black and white more graphic ones appealling the most. Knowing my youngest had never heard this story before I  grabbed him aside so we could enjoy the book together. I few moments in I remembered the upsetting ending (warning: themes of child abduction and disabled children  being labelled with politically incorrect terms coming up). But we soldiered on and when it came to the Pied Piper luring the town's children away to ensconse them inside a mountain - and then a "lame" boy being left behind - he didn't bat an eyelid. I personally remember finding it  more than just a little unsettling.But which message to leave him with? Always pay the piper (and keep your ...