Our neighbour across the street has a big tarp spread across the garden bed he hopes to begin when spring comes. We’ve had some rainy days recently and the water has pooled on top of the tarp. I am sitting here at my desk, looking out the window and watching the plovers (birds) give themselves a great big bath in the water. Plovers have lived in the lot across the street for decades but they never had a swimming pool. I am being quite entertained watching them.
I’ve had a bit of a break from this blog but am back now. Sometimes you reach a point you just don’t feel like writing.
I’ve had a couple of disappointing reads lately. Our book club read Betty as I mentioned. I didn’t like it at all but many members in the group did like it. The writing was good but there was too much really serious trauma without anything good to balance it out. The child and animal cruelty was just too much. I am happy to have moved on.
I did finish the book Touching the Sky by Deborah LawrieThis is wonderful story of Australia’s first female commercial airline pilot and what it took to reach her goals. Talk about perseverance and tenacity, this woman has it in buckets. The first part of the book is about her training and qualifying and then trying to get hired in a very misogynistic 1970s. Ansett Airlines was an Australian airlineback then and Reg Ansett did everything in his power to sabotage every effort she made. The second half of the book was about her days of flying around the world and her 19 years of flying for an airline in the Netherlands. Her relationships really struggled as she had to put her whole heart and soul into her dream. I was really impressed about the massive amounts of training pilots go through. Very comforting.
A very inspiring book. I heard her interviewed one night on the ABC radio and I just fell in love with her.
Now I’m reading another book for our book group. It is called Trickery by Rosanna Pike. 1500s, Tudor era and more hardship for women.
Born a vagabond, Tibb Ingleby has never had a roof of her own. Her mother has taught her that if you’re not too bound by the Big Man’s rules, there are many ways a woman can find shelter in this world. But now her ma is gone.
As she journeys through the fields and forests of medieval England, Tibb discovers that there are people who will care for her, as well as those who mean her harm. And there are a great many others who are prepared to believe just about anything…
So, when the opportunity presents itself to escape the shackles society has placed on them, Tibb and her new friends conjure an audacious plan- her greatest trickerie yet. But before they know it, their hoax takes on a life of its own, drawing crowds – and vengeful enemies – to their door.
I’m finding it an okay plot but the repetition if the same dialogue throughout is just too much. It really needs much tighter editing, in my humble opinion. it’s kind of a non event for me.
Today I’m off to the eye surgeon to see what they can do to keep the vision in my right eye from descending into craziness from glaucoma. I’ve been on more eye drops and if this hasn’t lowered the pressure then the next step is laser and the third step is surgery. It worries me as my right eye is my “photo” eye and my left eye is all but useless. I’m not driving at night as much as I was and this slow decline is really annoying. I can’t deal with the lights of oncoming eyes on two lane roads. Fortunately going into town to my Fullers book shop events the road is one way going and one way coming home. There are also street lamps but outside of the city limits is now a no go area.
It’s always something.
However I do have some good photos to share with you of some lovely fungi and a small gum leaf hanging by one silver thread from a tree. I took these in the southwest of the state. I hope you enjoy them.
Beautiful Tasmania
I’ll be off now for another week. Hope your weekend has something you are looking forward to.
Follow up- eye appointment shows eye pressure is still too high. So now I have 2 kinds of drops a day for the next 6 weeks and if that doesn’t work we’re looking at laser or surgical treatment.
Until next time….
Travellin' Penguin 
Yes, I’ve had a couple of female pilots too. I believe Deborah was on Hard Quiz once.
Anyhow I’m sorry about your eyes and hope the drops do it. I’ll keep my fingers crossed. I have a friends who is allergic to the drops. They are doing the job I think but she has permanently red eyelids. I feel so sorry for her. She’s changed drops but it’s the same.
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That’s not good news about your eye but it is good that they can do something. Just tell your specialist *wink* that you have a horde of subscribers who love looking at your photos and would he please do the best he can.
I’m sorry to hear that you’re not getting on with Trickerie, I loved that book. But of course not all books suit everybody, let’s hope your next one is better.
I am old enough to remember Deborah Lawrie though we knew her as Deborah Wardley. What people may not realise is that now newspapers could not print the insulting things he said because now we have anti-discrimination laws and so on, and more than that, there has been a huge shift in what people think it’s acceptable to say. But back then men like him had control literally and figuratively of almost everything including the media and he would be interviewed on TV (by a man, of course) and say whatever he liked, it was just appalling. I’ve always hoped that one day I’d be in a plane flown by a woman, but it never happened. Oh well!
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Thanks for the well wishes. I have flown with a female pilot a couple of times. I think it was in America. America employed female pilots before Australia as did Europe.Deborah doesn’t hold back about Reg Ansett in her book. Ironically it was Rupert Murdoch who intervened finally when Reg had to sell his airline. Murdoch was very supportive of her. Reg was really awful . I enjoyed this book so much.
Trickerie grew on me towards the end but I got so tired of Kip saying the same stuff again and again. (Everything was her fault. She wasn’t a good person. What does Ambrose see in me, blah blah blah) So much self denigration. I did enjoy the revenge at the end and the mother of the King’s experience with the angel.
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Yes, a bit of revenge can be very satisfying!
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Oh man…I’m sorry to hear the disappointing news about your eye. I imagine it’s both scary and worrisome. The photos you posted are really good so we must keep your eye camera ready!!! I will keep all my fingers and toes crossed for a GREAT outcome.
I would love to see those plovers frolicking in the water!
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Plovers are quite aggressive birds. If you approach them, especially with chicks they dive bomb you. You’ll need to stand back if you watch them, hahaha.
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