Advantages: Good facilities. Well appointed. Light and airey. Air conditioned. Disadvantages: Eye-wateringly expensive. Could be anywhere in the world
INTRODUCTION
In the seven or eight years I have been going to Cyprus for my holidays, a lot has changed, and not necessarily for the better. It was only a matter of time before this beautiful island was afflicted with the relentless influx of multinational American brands and corporations that seem to blight Europe these days. The drive down the Finikoudes ? Larnaka?s main, palm-lined seaside promenade ? now takes you past McDonald?s, KFC, TGI Friday, Haagen Dazs, Pizza Hut, and Bennigans. The seemingly unstoppable globalisation of Cyprus seems well and truly underway.
So it was with dread and dismay that I received the news that Cyprus had been ?blessed? with two new malls since my last visit two years ago ? the ?Mall of Cyprus?, built next to an IKEA on the outskirts of Lefkosia (Nicosia), and the newer ?My Mall?, an even ...
Advantages: Heart warming and sometimes harrowing account of life with a chronically ill family member, balanced with lots of humour Disadvantages: Stock up on tissues...
Normally, as a very fast reader, I can sit down with a paperback and whiz through it in a few hours, finish the thing, and then think no more about it.
Until I read a copy of ‘Diana's Story’ by Deric Longden. This book moved me beyond words and for the first time in my life, I felt compelled to put pen to paper and drop a note to the author to congratulate him on a very wonderful and very sad but true story. I wanted to thank him for sharing his heart breaking account of life with M.E. sufferer Diana (his wife) and for portraying an M.E. sufferer as a real life human being with thoughts, strengths, humour, intelligence and wit and not just as an 'invalid'.
Maybe I'm a little biased, as I am recovering from M.E. myself, but Longden's heart-warming and loving account of his life with this brave, funny and wonderful lady ...
Advantages: Every Track Is A Winner! Disadvantages: None!
By the end of the 1970's Diana Ross' recording career was back on shaky ground. Her studio albums, the excellent Baby It's Me (1977) and the hodge podge production of Ross (1978) had sold disappointingly. Not only that but her third silver screen venture The Wiz (1978) performed badly at the Box Office and became something of an embarassing fiasco to all concerned, not least to Ross who was virtually ridiculed by critics.
Diana Ross always had that drive, determination and uncanny ability to bounce back no matter what set back her career endured (and she certainly has had more than her fair share of set-backs, especially in more recent years). At the fall of 1979 she wisely focused her attention on fixing her flagging recording career. As it stood, she hadn't had a major chart hit since 1976 with the exciting, tempo-shifting Disco ...
