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Showing posts with label gift ideas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gift ideas. Show all posts

Monday, October 5, 2015

5 Non-Fiction Books You Should Be Reading







Do you want to get to know the woman we first came to love on Comedy Central's Upright Citizens Brigade? Do you want to spend some time with the lady who made you howl with laughter on Saturday Night Live, and in movies like Baby Mama, Blades of Glory, and They Came Together? Do you find yourself daydreaming about hanging out with the actor behind the brilliant Leslie Knope on Parks and Recreation? Did you wish you were in the audience at the last two Golden Globes ceremonies, so you could bask in the hilarity of Amy's one-liners?
If your answer to these questions is "Yes Please!" then you are in luck. In her first book, one of our most beloved funny folk delivers a smart, pointed, and ultimately inspirational read. Full of the comedic skill that makes us all love Amy, Yes Please is a rich and varied collection of stories, lists, poetry (Plastic Surgery Haiku, to be specific), photographs, mantras and advice. With chapters like "Treat Your Career Like a Bad Boyfriend," "Plain Girl Versus the Demon" and "The Robots Will Kill Us All" Yes Please will make you think as much as it will make you laugh. Honest, personal, real, and righteous,Yes Please is full of words to live by


There is a story that is usually told about extremely successful people, a story that focuses on intelligence and ambition. Gladwell argues that the true story of success is very different, and that if we want to understand how some people thrive, we should spend more time looking around them-at such things as their family, their birthplace, or even their birth date. And in revealing that hidden logic, Gladwell presents a fascinating and provocative blueprint for making the most of human potential.

In The Tipping Point Gladwell changed the way we understand the world. In Blink he changed the way we think about thinking. In OUTLIERS he transforms the way we understand success.


When the tiny desert state of Qatar won the rights to host the 2022 World Cup, the news was greeted with shock and disbelief. How had a country with almost no soccer infrastructure or tradition, a high terror risk, and searing summer temperatures, beaten more established countries with stronger bids? The story behind the Qatari success soon developed into a global news sensation.

In 2014 The Sunday Times Insight team in the UK spilled the secrets of a bombshell cache of hundreds of millions of secret documents, which were leaked by a whistleblower. In forensic detail, they reported how Mohamed Bin Hammam, Qatar’s top soccer official, used his position to help secure the votes that Qatar needed to win the bid. The investigative team spent three months painstakingly piecing together Bin Hammam’s activities and reporting on cash handouts, lavish junkets, and evidence of payments to soccer officials around the world.

Now in this remarkable book by The Sunday Times journalists at the center of the investigation, Heidi Blake and Jonathan Calvert, comes a comprehensive account of what happened and who was involved. A bestseller in the UK, The Ugly Game is undoubtedly the biggest sporting story of recent times.

In the summer of 1990, Cathy's brother Matty was knocked down by a car on the way home from a night out. It was two weeks before his GCSE results, which turned out to be the best in his school. Sitting by his unconscious body in hospital, holding his hand and watching his heartbeat on the monitors, Cathy and her parents willed him to survive. They did not know then that there are many and various fates worse than death. This is the story of what happened to Cathy and her brother, and the unimaginable decision that she and her parents had to make eight years after the night that changed everything. It's a story for anyone who has ever watched someone suffer or lost someone they loved or lived through a painful time that left them forever changed. Told with boundless warmth and affection, The Last Act of Love by Cathy Rentzenbrink is a heartbreaking yet uplifting testament to a family's survival and the price we pay for love.



The improbable, intimate account of how nine working-class boys from the American West showed the world at the 1936 Olympics in Berlin what true grit really meant.

It was an unlikely quest from the start. With a team composed of the sons of loggers, shipyard workers, and farmers, the University of Washington’s eight-oar crew team was never expected to defeat the elite teams of the East Coast and Great Britain, yet they did, going on to shock the world by defeating the German team rowing for Adolf Hitler. The emotional heart of the tale lies with Joe Rantz, a teenager without family or prospects, who rows not only to regain his shattered self-regard but also to find a real place for himself in the world. Drawing on the boys’ own journals and vivid memories of a once-in-a-lifetime shared dream, Brown has created an unforgettable portrait of an era, a celebration of a remarkable achievement, and a chronicle of one extraordinary young man’s personal quest.

Friday, November 23, 2012

Gift Ideas from the Washington Post


Gift ideas from the local celebs at the Washington Post

1. Gin Fizz Perfume- Wannabe princesses will swoon over this Gin Fizz scent by Parisian perfume maker Lubin. Distinguished by top notes of lemon, mandarin and juniper berry, it was created in 1955 in honor of Grace Kelly and named for a cocktail in fashion that year in Paris’s American bars. $135 at Goodwood, 1428 U St. NW, 
Or just $90 on Amazon

2. Bracelets from J. Crew- Impress your sister, who will find these sparkly bangles irresistibly wrist-worthy. Stun her with your fashion advice to mix them with bunches of other bracelets for additional texture and interest. $58 each at area J. Crew stores and www.jcrew.com.


 3.  For home listeners, the importance of a set of quality headphones can’t be overestimated. “You shouldn’t allow lousy equipment to interfere with the listening experience,” Patrick Kigongo, guitar and bass player for the D.C.-based electronic rock group Ra Ra Rasputin, says. Sony’s MDR-V6 headphones meet the musician’s demanding standards for crisp sound. $109.99 at www.sony.com, or $70 on Amazon.


4. Your funky friend will like docking his iPhone into this silicone amplifier that doubles the sound without speakers, cords or cables. And the opening at the bottom allows charging while listening. Phone-ograph, $9.95 at www.cb2.com.


5. Olympian Gabby Douglas tells the Washington Post that tween and teen girls would all love these mini nail polishes in eight fun glittery and non-glittery colors stored in the familiar Crayola box. And I'll add, not just teens and tweens would love this. Totally cute!  $12 at www.fredflare.com.

 
6.  So that your favorite technophile need not go glove-less in foul weather, the thumb, forefinger and middle finger in Muji’s new unisex Touchscreen Gloves are woven with a conductive material that allows texting and typing on all touchscreen devices whatever the thermometer says. $21.95 at www.muji.us. Or $5.99 on Amazon. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to buy myself a pair of these!

They have 24 more gift ideas, all a little quirkier than the last! Check it out on the WashingtonPost.
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Monday, November 19, 2012

Most Wished for Holiday Gifts 2012

Have some shopping to do but you don't know what someone might want? Here are the most wished for items on the Amazon Wish List.

DVD/Blu-Ray
The Dark Knight Rises, $24.96
(But personally I don't see why you should get that when you can get the Batman trilogy combo pack for $29.96. In fact, I just added it to my own wish list!)




Electronic-
Kindle Fire HD $199


Video Game-
Halo 4 $59.96


Toys and Games-
Cards Against Humanity, $24.96


Books-
The Casual Vacancy (JK Rowling), $20
(Can I put in a plug here for my own book? Get You Heard It Here First on Kindle for $2.99!)


Music-
Babel by Mumford and Sons, $11.37 (not going to even pretend I understand this one!)








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