November rain and happiness

Last weekend was still mild and sunny -
but now November arrived for real, with grey skies and rain.

We tried our luck in a rainbreak, and it was good to get some fresh air...



... at least until the next rainclouds arrived.

Knowing that it would be a rainy weekend, I visited the library and picked some of their new books.

The green one is about happiness - it's written by Maike van den Boom, who is half Dutch, half German, and who travelled around the world and visited the 13 happiest countries - and met with common people and with scientists - to find some of clues to happiness, both on a national and a personal level. Pretty interesting. A bit too generalizing maybe - I guess you find happy and less happy people everywhere, and the country/culture is only one of the many factors for happiness.



The other book is one I almost didn't pick, but the publisher is rather good: campus. Turns out, the book is rather good, too: "Manul for the brain" is an introduction into the ways our brain and memory is functioning, with many recent studies included, and with practical advice for current themes like the use of social media, or the trend to multitask.

And I watched a great film which had an odd title, but was fabulous: "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" (oddly. the German title is shortened to: "Me and Earl and the Girl"). The film premiered at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival and won the U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Dramatic and the Audience Award for U.S. Drama at the festival. It's simply amazing.

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more skies from around the world:
Skywatch friday