More Q&A - #s 5 and 6

Jill asked: Peanut M&Ms or plain?

"Now there's a question to ponder", thought Jazz, scratching her head and munching on her M&Ms.

Because you see, there's a lot riding on this question. It is a question of coming down squarely on one side or the other. One can't just make it up as one goes along. There are so many pros and cons.

Plain M&Ms:

• They can be quickly chewed and then you can suck all the chocolate out of them before eating the yummy candy coating.


• Or, you can just let them melt down to nothing, creamy goodness for long lovely minutes.


• On the other hand, though they say chocolate is good for you, I'm pretty sure they're not talking M&M grade chocolate. Plain M&Ms are junk, pure and simple.


• Junk however is good for the soul now and then, not to mention life saving when I'm PMSing and it calms me right down, thus saving everyone around me from the wrath of Jazz. It goes without saying that PMS wrath is deserved by all those upon whom it is visited. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Peanut M&Ms

• Not so great to let melt in your mouth. The whole peanut thing, dontcha know. How long would it take a peanut to melt? I'd rather not think about it, the very concept somehow disturbs me to a great extent.


• On the other hand, such a satisfying crunch to the eating of a peanut M&M


• And then there's the blend of chocolate/candy/peanut to consider. Though I loathe peanut butter and chocolate - it has got to be the most repulsive mix known to mankind - a nice crunchy peanut in chocolate is simply sublime.


• And of course, there's the nutrition factor. Peanuts aren't junk food, they're chock full of good things, ergo peanut M&Ms are healthy... they're health food even.

Thus, for all the above reasons, I must come down squarely on the side of the Peanut M&Ms. Nutrition and junk all rollled up in one perfect colourful package.

Ticknart asked: How much of The Silmarillion did you actually read?


With his question, Tick seems to doubt that I actually did read the whole thing. Hmmph.

However, I did. I read it. Yes I did.

Lo these many many years ago (eons ago if we must be honest about it - yes, I am that old), after my first reading of the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, someone told me about the Simarillion. About how it explains any questions I might have about the other books. About how everything would be explained!

I figured I must read it.

And read it I did. From one end to the other. For some reason I thought it would actually get more interesting after the first 30 pages.

Newsflash: It doesn't.

It was a long long slog through norse myth. A slog through unpronouncable names of people I really didn't give a damn about. And yet I kept with it. I was slogging through quicksand, it was dragging me down and yet I did eventually make it to the end. At some point it stopped being just a book and became a nemesis, it wanted my sanity. It almost got it. But Jazz prevailed.

Perhaps had I had questions to anwer, it would have been more interesting. Thing is, there weren't any questions. That book did teach me though, that if I wasn't into a book after 50-100 pages, it simply wasn't gonna happen and that I should maybe just cut my losses already.

I still can't quite comprehend how the author of my favourite book of all time, LOTR (which I've read at least 10-11 times), can have written that particular piece of boredom.

But I do have a cool bit of trivia for you. Marillion (that favourite, oh so wonderful band - shameless plug) was named Simarillion at the beginning of time, twenty odd years ago. Then the Tolkien family said: Cease and desist using that oh so sacred name. And they became Marillion. Voilà.