Last saturday, snubnose and I had an exclusive 1-1 session. We used to do this on a regular basis, but of late, she’s been too busy (yes, she has!), and so have I.
The Strand Book Festival was a great excuse for us to plan a fun saturday out, and just that we don’t feel too guilty for leaving out the boys, we offered to do all the weekend errands as well (grocery shopping, picking up stuff after repairs, and even sneak in a visit to a sick relative).
The plan was as follows and we executed and timed it perfectly 🙂
- Art class for the snubnose. Kept her nicely busy while I finished all the errands.
- Lunch – nothing too fancy, but yummy dessert was a must
- Attack the Strand Book sale
It doesn’t sound like much of a plan, but we ended up spending the day outdoors returning home exhausted but happy.
We debated over restaurants for some time before settling on the Coffee Day Lounge in CMH Road, Indra Nagar. This is a great place for some quick and yummy eats without having to spend too much time. The prices are also reasonable for the quality of the food and the ambience.
We gorged ourselves on the Italian toasties (different types of breads – garlic bread, chili cheese toast, and bruschetta) with a side of nachos and salsa. To add to the junkiness of the food, snubnose ordered a plate of honey chili crispy french fries which were also super-delicious.
I withheld the dessert order thinking we would be just too full, but snubnose begged and pleaded and I finally yielded and ordered some Belgian chocolate dessert whose name I no longer remember. It was also predictably delicious and we promptly wolfed down that too.
At this point, I would have been quite happy to ditch the book sale and just go home and sleep, but snubnose would have none of that. There’s no room for lethargy in snubnose’s little world.
She had made grand plans for the book sale. The previous night I had asked her to make a list of books she wanted. She showed me the list and I saw just one book there – Matilda by Roald Dahl. I once mentioned to her that it was one of my childhood favorites, and since then she’s been super eager to read it too.
Unfortunately, that book was already sold out, and snubnose was all pouts afterwards. I diverted her to Charlotte’s Web by E.B.White and assured her that was a good book to read as well.
Actually, both books are a little advanced for snubnose, and I will definitely need to read them aloud to her until she feels ready for them, but I can’t help feeling a wee bit touched that she wants to read the books that I read and loved when I was a kid. She’s probably going to care for my likes and dislikes only for the next couple of years (if I am lucky) so I might as well enjoy this moment while it lasts.
The book selection this time around was a little disappointing, but we did find some steep bargains, and while snubnose couldn’t find too much to interest her, I indulged in shopping for the Piglet who already loves some of the books I picked for him.
Here’s a photo of our entire haul…
Did you check out the Reliance Time Out sale ? They’re apparently closing down and are giving fantastic discounts. I went slightly berserk since I was getting books at 70% ! 🙂
@Anjana: Oh really, I didn’t know. Must check it out. What did you get? Tell, tell 🙂
Nish, I’m so sorry for the inordinate delay in replying. Actually your question absolutely stymied me. I bought around 20 to 25 books. I know !! Quite crazy, right?
At first I thought I would take a picture of them but then I didn’t know how to attach it to this reply, then I thought about mentioning only a few which wouldn’t have been fair to the rest 😉
Now, I’m thinking of writing a post with the pic 🙂
@Anjana: Of course you have to write a post with pics :).
Both the books are superb! But i was much more excited to read Matilda 😀
Charlotte’s web is a very nice book. I personally loved it.
@Ava: I love it too. It’s such a sweet book about friendship 🙂