I haven't been to Sofia and don't plan on going at least in the near future but I went to a discounted book shop in Hereford and bought quite a few cheap travel guides which are primarily to blog about so there will be quite a lot of tourist blogs over the next few weeks. Anyway the book I read to research this post was City Spots - Sofia which is a very good book & it was 99p reduced from £6.99. Sofia is the capital of Bulgaria which used to be part of the Soviet Bloc but in a bid to improve itself economically has joined NATO & the EEC. It has continental weather meaning it has cold winters when it is a good ski resort and hot summers. Sofia has only been the capital since 1879 & I think some people might prefer the Black Sea Resorts which are also a tourist area. I like to go sight seeing when on holiday so I think it's my kind of city. The international airport is nearby and it is overlooked by Mt Vitosha which you can see from the city centre. There is a good night life with lots of nice but cheap bars and night clubs and staying open till 2am is the norm. It has a huge synagogue because there used to be a sizeable jewish population although that is no longer the case. There is also a mosque which is the only one in Sofia and a bit of a tourist attraction. Note men in shorts and all women are banned from the mosque also you must have your shoulders covered. A bit further afield is Rila Monastery which is a fully preserved christian monastery complete with battlements as it was an unstable country in those days. For a small fee it is possible to stay in a monks cloister overnight but there is no hot water. Rila Monastery is 75 miles from Sofia so it might make sense to stop one night there. Also 62 miles from Sofia is Blavoevgrad which is a perfectly preserved Medieval City.  Also 47 miles from Sofia is Koprivshtitsa which apparently played a key role in an uprising against Ottoman Rule. Finally somewhere in Sofia that you must see is the military museum where they have mig fighters & T34 tanks. The latter played a key role on world war 2.

The book I read to research this post was Taken On Trust by Terry Waite which is an excellent book which I bought from a carboot sale. Terry was the envoy for the Archbishop of Canterbury and had to negotiate the release of any hostages in Lebanon prior to being kidnapped himself. He negotiated the release of many hostages and because the job was so dangerous no one really took over the job. He was in solitary confinement for more than 4 years and begged his captors to get him some books to read. He was tortured and often he was kept in cramped conditions a particular problem because he was 6ft 7ins in height. He was often blindfolded as well. Eventually they did give him a radio but forbade him to listen to the news which he rebelled against. The news was what he most wanted to hear. Eventually he was put in adjacent cells to various other hostages but he had to tap on the radiator and use a code to communicate which was particularly problematic as he couldn't write anything down. Also if he had been caught he'd have been shipped off somewhere else. When he was negotiating the release of hostages all he could offer was to put pressure on Britain and America for the release of islamic POW's in Kuwait and they'd pay what they called blood money to people who had lost sons and daughters in the conflicts. This was quite legal. He would ask to see the hostages which they would usually refuse but they would take a newspaper which he dated and photograph them holding it to prove they were alive. When he was a captive he would plead with them to let him go and they would agree he was a good man but unfortunately he has been caught up in their war.

You might be interested to know I have done a post on The Romans at http://scratbagdave.com & I have done one on Etruscan Art at http://claireabella29.com

Anyway the book I read to research this post was Rome for Dummies which is a very good book which I bought from kindle. Rome is 3,000 years and in ancient times had a similiar population to today. It is one of the great cities of the ancient world. They recommend that you rent a scooter as Rome is very hilly. There's a lot more than the fabled 7 hills. 16 miles away is Ostia the ancient seaport and also a few miles away is the ancient Etruscan city. We still can't decipher the Etruscan texts properly. Some of the famous attractions include the Vatican and its many museums and the Colisseum. The pope used to control Rome as a city state and his power in that regard is greatly reduced nowadays. Of course St Peters Square & Basillica are extremely famous. If you are taking children what about a picnic in one of the many parks which is also cheaper than going to a restaurant. An authentic italian dish that is popular is pizza. If you have a soft drink with your meal in a restaurant rather than wine it's not the done thing and may well be more expensive. Pasta and seafood are staples of many italian dishes. One final thing if you are tempted to rent a car in London and drive to Rome forget it, it's tiring and will work out more expensive than renting a car in Rome. Also Rome & Milan are the only 2 italian cities you can fly direct to from America.

If you are interested in this I have also done posts on Digital Photography & Digital Photography Lighting on my technology blog at

http://scratbagroberts.com

Anyway the book I read to research this post was All About Bokeh by David Wayne which is a very good book which I downloaded for free from kindle. This book is around 30 pages so it is a bit short but it covers the basics and there are some nice photographs. Wayne has written a companion book on kindle which I assume you have to pay for called Near to Nature & he also does a magazine called Macro Madness which looks at one technique every month. I will probably get the book and review it at a later stage. Anyway the book is about taking photos with either a macro or zoom lens. Bokeh is a out of focus layer and this can be either the background, midground, foreground or a combination. It is a good idea to have some idea what you are trying to achieve before taking the photo but you can learn a lot from experimenting. On a simple what you might be after is a sharply focused object travelling at speed against a blurred background emphasising that speed. An alternative might be a blurred object travelling at speed against a blurred background again emphasizing that speed and there is often more than one way to get a result. Another alternative might be you copy a photo into a photo editing program and apply a gaussian blur which you can play with just to get it just right. Often when you blur something a little bit it gives it a luminous effect again this takes practice. Finally if you are a serious photographer you need a DSLR camera which lets you view the image through the lens and also has interchangeable lenses. 

The book i read to research this post is Ferrets for Dummies 2nd Edition by Kim Schilling which is an excellent book which I bought from my local petshop. I don't have ferrets and only got this book because I thought it would make an interesting blog. In Britain where I live ferrets are a fairly popular pet and they have been for a long time. However and I am a bit shocked by this in some states of America they are classed as wild animals and if you do keep them as pets you risk a fine and the pet being put down. A ferret is a domesticated version of the polecat and by that I mean they have them in beautiful colours and also they are far easier to tame than something like a mink. I think a ferret would struggle in the wild. In Britain in the countryside I have heard of some people who knot the ends of their trousers and transport a ferret by putting it down their trousers which sounds a bit dangerous. Apparently poachers used to do that in the old days. I don't know if it's still legal in Britain but some people used to do ferretting where they put a ferret down a rabbit hole and it would chase the rabbit out so they could either net it or shoot it. They would have a bell on the ferrets collar so they could find it. Also sometimes the ferret would find something interesting and not want to come out so they would send a female ferret down on a piece of string to work out where it was and then have to dig it out. Ferrets can be trained to get on with other animals. Ferrets eat alot of meat and surprisingly some insects in their diet. Often their owners like to give them a bone to chew much like a dog and this should be boilled to sterilize it and also soften the bone so it doesn't splinter. Finally you also need to keep them in a good cage as they are good at escaping and are quite able to burrow or chew their way out.

The book I am reviewing in this post is Rose Madder by Stephen King which is an excellent horror novel which I bought from a carboot sale. The plot is there is a lady who regularly gets physically abused by her husband who is a policeman. There is a dilemma in that no one will help her due to his job. Anyway one day he tries to kill her but she gets the better of him steals his credit card and gets away. She travels far away and finds accommodation. At this point her husband is so warped he is murdering other women and trying to use his police contacts to find his wife. There is an observation I liked when King that when someone is running from the police if they are right handed and they come to a cross roads and have to choose a random direction they will tend to go right and the opposite if they are left handed. Anyway his wife is attracted to a strange painting which is a vivid picture of a lady in a garden with what appears to be a greek temple in the background. She trades her wedding ring for the picture but unbeknown to her the picture is possessed. In the picture is a kind of virtual world which she is drawn into. Also the picture has an effect on other people and kind of puts them into a trance and kills them. Also the eyes appear to follow you. In the meantime her husband finds someone who knows Rose his wife and tries to kill her and another lady but happens to find a key which is to where his wife is living. He then tries to kill his wife but the picture which has Rose Madder on the back has other ideas. I think if this was a straightforward thriller about a corrupt policeman beating his wife it would be a bit too morbid. As it is I think King has struck the right balance and it is quite a topical subject.

The book I am reviewing in this post is the excellent thriller A Wanted Man by Lee Childs which I bought from kindle. All Lees books are part of the Jack Reacher series and out of the books I have read by him this is the best. Reacher is an exmilitary policeman who is now a wanderer in the USA and these books feature him solving crimes. The plot is he is hitch hiking when a car with 2 men who have murdered someone and a woman pick him up. The 2 men have murdered a CIA agent at an artesian well that is now dry and the woman is a hostage. The police are looking for a car driven by 2 men in suits driving a red car. The 2 men King & McQueen have changed their clothes and carjacked this ladies car and picked up Jack to try and fool the police. They tell Jack they are on their way to Chicago and suggest they take turns driving the car. The police get the impression Jack is involved in the crime due to him driving the car. Anyway the lady signals to Jack via the interior mirror by blinking a message in morse code. In the meantime the FBI & SAC are getting involved in the case because they are concerned that the groundwater could be poisoned via the artisian well which actually it hasn't. Jack gets spotted phoning for help from a remote garage and he gets away from the lady is still a hostage. An FBI agent comes out to the garage to arrest Jack but he convinces her to let him help her find the 2 men and their hostage. The lady does eventually get away but it looks like certain don't want the 2 men to be arrested and are prepared to kill them if necessary and frame Jack for their murder. The plot also involves them selling nuclear waste to foreign powers to make what they call a dirty bomb which isn't a proper atom bomb but contains fissionable material. If they made a proper atom bomb they would need to build a part nuclear power station part nuclear processing plant which would require a lot of expertise and money. This book is currently No1 on the UK Hardback Fiction Chart and I think that is well deserved.

The book I read to research this post was Newport Story by C Hartley Willan which is an excellent historical account of Newport which I bought from a carboot sale. There is a much more famous Newport in Gwent, Wales but this Newport is a small town in Shropshire, England. Prior to the doomsday book there is no mention of the settlement which would become known as Newport. The first mention of the name was in 1221. At one time there was a large inland sea in this area and Newport was a fishing settlement. This sea gradually got drained by the various rivers although quite a few lakes were left in its place and there was a lot of marshes. When the Romans invaded they built roads like Watling Street which got its name because it was raised and wattled in its construction. Anyway the Romans drained much of the marshes and lakes and built a road through it. After the Norman invasion the area was given to a norman who would become the Earl of Shrewsbury. Unfortunately later on one of his ancestors would rebel against Henry I and the family would lose its title and the crown would take over the land. In this rebellion Newport stayed loyal to the king and gave him money and fighting men so he granted them a town charter. In the Civil War the taxes imposed on Newport by Charles I were especially harsh and first the people tried to fight it in the courts and when that didn't work they started doing things like tarring and feathering the tax collectors or putting them on the ducking stool. After a while the king stopped collecting taxes from them. Among the many achievements of Thomas Telford was the Shropshire Union Canal which passes through Newport and the Shrewsbury and he also linked both these canals. Newport became a port once more exporting iron and steel from Ironbridge. The new town Telford is named after Thomas Telford and in the recent past Newport would be governed from Telford. In 1973 Newport's town status was reinstated so now it is self governing.

The book I read to research this post was The Addicted Brain by Michael Kuhar which is an excellent book which I downloaded for free from kindle. There is evidence that addictions like sex and gambling affect the same part of the brain as what drug addiction does. Special centres for dealing with drug addiction have been with us for a while but they are just starting to do the same with things like gambling. In time they may develop drugs that prevent the high you get when you for example have risky sex. Already there are drugs like this for certain addictions like heroin but they are developing ones that will have a similiar effect on things like speed and MDMA. Somebody wrote a book about an american midwest town where some of the dealers gave away MDMA to get people hooked. The result was a crimewave as addicts desperately tried to fuel their habits once they were hooked and obviously by then had to pay. Many became dealers and some tried to make their own MDMA which you need a laboratory for. Many got burnt in explosions and some lost fingers. In alot of cases despite their injuries they still continued to take MDMA such was their addiction. There is evidence that young people are more likely to become addicted to drugs than adults because their brains are still developing. You might be interested to know I did a post on Cocaine at http://scratbagroberts.com

In a lot of cases the drugs no longer make the addict high especially with heroin and he must take them just to feel normal. With alot of these people it's a conditioned response where they don't know what else to do. Some drugs like heroin require more and more to achieve the same high while with other drugs like Cocaine less and less is needed to achieve the same result which is called sensitization. Drugs change the structure of the brain and provide chemicals which are used instead of DNA which we don't know the full implications of. Many places have female only and male only drug clinics which is a response to a lot of pressure for that particularly female addicts. In america there are 50 million smokers which gives us a good idea how bad the drug problem could get. I have experimented mostly with speed and cannabis and I am lucky I never got hooked on anything addictive. A lot of the reason I took drugs was peer pressure but luckily nowadays I have a different circle of friends. I also had a nasty experience where I smoked a joint of weed and I went a bit crazy temporarily but it was a wake up call. Prior to that I never had any experiences like that and normally if I smoked weed it didn't do much.

The book I read to research this post was Fashion Drawing for Dummies by Lisa Smith Arnold et al which is a very good book which I downloaded from kobo. I think this book aimed at people who want a career in the fashion industry where being able to do a sketch showing a model wearing certain attire is a must. One thing worth mentioning is these are rough sketches that you aren't meant to spend a long time doing although you can be forgiven when you are learning. In a portrait students are told the head makes 1/8th of the height of the whole portrait. In fashion drawing it is 1/11th and the thighs take up 3/11ths and the calves take up 4/11ths of the drawing. Most models are very tall and in particular have very long legs so these are exagerated. Also models are very slim so these pictures are almost stick people often the noses, feet and hands aren't drawn but you have to develop your own style. In you draw a flannel shirt it's never tucked in. It's a good idea to draw accessories maybe a watch, maybe bracelets etc especially if you draw a lady. You should never throw away your old pictures, you never know if it will inspire you with a money making idea. Equally you should draw or at least doodle as much as possible as that is the way to find your style. You should immerse yourself in as much fashion as possible and should be inspired by it not copy it as it is much more fun to find your own style and do your own thing. Fashion is about breaking the rules and redefining an example in this book is a shirt that opens at the back is difficult to get into making it impractical but that doesn't stop some designers from doing it. There are portfolio websites like http://carboncopy.com which are often free at least for the basic package. It's also a good idea to keep a blog to let people what you are about this should contain links to the portfolio site. Finally if you are applying for a job and have to show your prospective boss your portfolio think carefully about what folder you use something with a fancy pattern that you happen to like may not be as appropriate as maybe something in maybe plain leather.