AI gave me a random “My Day Out”. I wrote about this in my previous post. It stated I should visit a book store. How appropriate is that? So that’s what I did.
I invited my 91 year old good friend to go with me and we drove north for 45 minutes to visit the small, but elegant, Black Swan book shop. It is owned by Alexander Okenyo and he and his staff are lovely and don’t even mind a quick chat even when extremely busy making many coffees. They have the most interesting shop, they are independent and their coffee is some of the best in the state. Cappuccinos are covered in chocolate and it is hot. Did I mention that my friend and I also shared a fudge brownie between us?
I took the Penguin with me on this trip. I also took his American friend with him (who by the way is now an Australian citizen), Bald Eagle. He left America too. Literally! The two of them seemed to enjoy what was going on in the shop. We had a small photo shoot, after all Penguin really wants to be his own influencer. (Roll eyes…) I have decided that Penguin needs to get out of the house more often too and I don’t mind if he takes a friend as he has several.
I bought a beautiful journal. I also bought a very interesting non- fiction book called How to Live an Artful Life by Katy Hessel. I haven’t come across this book before and I felt it pull me across the shop once I saw it. You know how that is.
It is a book about a collection of ideas and observations drawn from the lives and work of women artists through out history. Rather than being a conventional art-history book, it offers short reflections- one for each day of the year- about creativity, noticing the world around you, finding inspiration in daily life, and having the confidence to make or appreciate art. It’s designed to be dipped into daily, almost like a creative journal or companion, rather than read it straight through.
I am looking forward to a big “peruse”.
I also picked up this lovely little journal as I liked the cover so much.
When we left the book shop we stopped and looked at all the plants. We are into spring now and there are plants everywhere. There is a market here every Saturday morning and my friend enjoyed looking at unusual things for sale as we strolled down the street. She is an Op (thrift) Shop queen. She loves a bargain.
I bought two ranunculus plants for my back patio area. The patio area is actually all enclosed as it doubles for a large cat enclosure. I need to be careful of what plants I put out there. Not that the two of them bother plants but you just never know. They are more interested in the spiders and lizards and other little bugs.
The last shop we went into was FLYWHEEL. Flywheel is an absolutely beautiful stationery shop. I have to take tissues in there with me as I drool over the journals, the colourful inks and the fountain pens. Did I get another journal? Yes I did. These particular journals have paper that the fountain pen glides over and I really like them. I’ve never seen them in other places. Penguin and Bald Eagle agreed they were gorgeous.
The woman who runs the shop is lovely and she helped me pick out a beautiful forest green ink for my pen. It is a little bottle of ink made in Japan but I also own a couple of small bottles of ink I bought there previously that are made in Tasmania.
I must say the first random, Day Out day was a winner. I look forward to where Chat GPT sends me next week. I told it I am limited to anywhere in southern Tasmania. Anything to do with photography, books, art, touristy reserves, parks, etc. It sends me plan every Sunday morning.
Did any of you have a Day Out this past week? If so, tell me about it. I’ll put your adventures in my journal. I love little stories from friends. All the best for the next week.
Travellin' Penguin 
Your day out sounds great:) My week consisted of a ‘jaunt’ to South Yarra to have an X-ray and ultrasound of my shoulder. Frozen shoulder, again (!) to add to my troubles, and whereas last time they fixed it almost immediately with a cortisone injection, this time they have sent a ‘treatment plan’ to my GP. I don’t need that, I already know all the exercises to do from last time; I don’t even need to go to a physio. I feel mildly resentful about this but there is nothing I can do about it.
But I also had an enjoyable Book Chat at the Sandy library. Nobody had read anything that tempted me, but it was still nice to talk books with other booklovers.
I used to love writing in my reading journal with a fountain pen, but then I discovered that it faded so much, it’s hard to read. I keep meaning to recover what I can and type it up, but I haven’t got round to it yet!
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You might need a higher quality of ink. Who knows? Sorry about your shoulder. Our dog woke up this morning, went out, came in with hind leg in the air. Looking like he may have thrown a cruciate. Off to the vet tomorrow—again!
The book chat sounds fun. I love talking books with people.
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I hope he’s ok. I’ve had a bit of experience with cruciate ligaments… small dogs just love to jump up on things, don’t they?
You might be lucky, with three silky terriers and two of them eventually needing both CLs done, it happened that the first couple of times it resolved itself after an injection and as much rest as I could persuade them to take. Amber (now 12) has had a couple of ‘limpy’ days, one of which was on a Friday night and had resolved itself by the end of the weekend, and the other time, just needed an injection. So although I feel it is inevitable since they have such a long lifespan (Topaz and Sapphire both lived to be 18) we’ve avoided it so far and there’s no sign of arthritis. I am not looking forward to it because our brilliant vet has retired and I don’t have the same confidence in his replacements.
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We;ve had several dogs with cruciate issues. Both surgical and not. Our containment thing is set up for Ollie in the meantime. It’s a big net pen. He has his big bed in it.
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Yes, that’s a good idea. I have a soft sided crate now, which I didn’t have for the other two, and a ‘play pen’ so I have the infrastructure. It’s the complaints that are hard to manage!
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