A couple odds and ends

I just had a couple little odds and ends that I thought I should post.

First thing when I was away a guy at the hotel didn't believe I was old enough to be Horse Girl's mother. He was all upset about Horse Girl getting breakfast all by herself, even though I was right next to her. When I told him I was her mother he didn't believe me. Then I told him my age. He did a double take and said "Good work." So I guess being sixteen at heart sometimes shows through to the people looking at me. ;-)

The one of the other things is that a few posts ago I said the only thing I could think of that I have been doing longer then Studying Russian History was swimming. I came up with something else. I have been listening to the band The Police for longer time then I have been studying Russian History. I have always been a big fan member of their Fan Club and all that jazz and I will finally be seeing them in concert on July 29th. I had long given up hope when it came to seeing them in concert, but luck prevailed. :-)

The last thing is that Fly Guy got me this book, Putin's Russia: Life in a Failing Democracy, by Anna Politkovskaya and the forward by Anne Applebaum. Anne Applebaum wrote this great book on the Gulags that I have read. It is well written and researched. Anna Politkovskaya also wrote a great book about Chechnya which I have read and really helps a person understand what is going on there. Anna Politkovskaya isn't a historian she was a journalist for Novaya Gazeta....a very good one at that. She was murdered in October 2006. Since 2000, when Putin came to power, there have been 12 Russian journalist murdered while working stories Russian politicians, mafia and oligarchs didn't want worked on, that is including Anna Poltikovskaya.

Any how I really look forward to reading this book on Putin. It is a few years old published in 2004, but Putin hasn't gotten any better, he just has gotten worse so it will be interesting to find out what she wrote.