Author: TravellinPenguin

Hi everyone. It has been very busy lately with a lot of activities. So not to dawdle I’ll just bring us up to the current week.

MONDAY: Back to weight class but our regular instructor is on holiday so we had a very hyperactive instructor from Brazil. I haven’t seen such mania and chaos in a person in a long time. I actually left a few minutes early as I had finished my main exercises and had to find some calm.

That night I finished a book by David Sedaris. Theft by Finding. It is his diary from his attendance at university to just beginning to get serious about his writing. He had some really tough experiences with road trips and he had some very hard edged friends. Lots of alcohol, drugs, family issues especially with his parents. He is a feminine looking man and more so as a young man. His parents were both difficult and did not cope with his coming out at all. Homosexuality caused him to receive a great deal of beatings and discrimination back in he 1970s and 80s of America. It is really surprising he has survived his life.

This book is not for the faint hearted who don’t like awful references about women from some of his acquaintances and the language is foul throughout. I actually skipped a few pages when it got too bad. Overall I enjoyed reading about his life as he travelled a great deal throughout the USA, experienced extreme poverty for many years, lived in Europe off and on, mainly in Paris. Throughout he seemed to keep his gentler nature and I wondered how he did so having lived in squalid conditions, sometimes being homeless but always writing, writing, writing. He is also extremely funny and the subjects he pondered were hilarious at times. He has a very unusual (to me) take on the world. The book wore me out but I’m glad to have found it and would certainly read another of his. He is currently touring Australia and I will see him at our beautiful Theatre Royal on 1 Feb. I had tickets to see him before. I did see him here several years ago but the last time Covid cancelled it.

TUESDAY: This day started a new venture. I have a new Minelab, Equinox 800 metal detector. I know, I know. I’ve heard the jokes. I took this up quite a few years ago but didn’t have good equipment but did fine a few old horseshoes from the brewery and a couple old Aussie pennies. Now I’ve upgraded, joined a couple of metal detecting fb groups, one being Tasmania and I plan on getting out with it along with my camera. On my day out I can do photography and when that is done I can do a few sweeps and maybe find some jewellery, coins or even a hidden stash from a gaoled bush ranger who never retrieved. I like the history behind the targets people find. So far as I’m learningabout frequencies and settings and various metal types I’ve only been sweeping my backyard. I found an old chain and lock we lost from our back gate over 30 yrs ago and a broken toaster was dug up out of the yard. Our property used to be owned by Cascade brewery and I’ve found horseshoes and pieces of chain over the years p,anting things. They used this area as a rubbish dump and there is a lot of old fill so who knows what lies buried here in this neighbourhood.

I’ve picked up Patricia Highsmith’s Diary I started sometime back. I’ve been dipping in and out of it for months as it is a very large diary. As a young women, once again, lots of booze and love affairs but now her writing is starting to take off and I’m finding it more interesting. I’ll persevere between other things.

Well I noticed this is very long so going to stop midweek. I can add Thurs through to Sunday soon as there are a couple 0f things happening. So until then. Stay well.

Well Christmas is all over and I for one am looking forward to the new year. I have American brownies just out of the oven, so the house smells good. I haven’t had anything sweet in the house for ages as my personal trainer at gym suggested I lose a couple of kilos which I have now done. So the brownies will be a treat and then out it all goes again.

I got a light hearted book to read this week. It’s Australian but I’m not familiar with the author. It’s called Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson. It is a mystery filled with dark humour. I have only started it but have had a few laughs. It begins with him having to dispose of a criminal body his brother accidentally ran over with the car. The brother didn’t want to save the man because the man was wearing a balaclava and had a bag with $280,000 of cash in it. Once our protagonist got out of that situation he is obliged to attend a big family reunion in the mountains run by an aunt who organises everything in spreadsheets. The company, the meal, the accommodation and the relatives get memos related to the spreadsheet that drive all of them nuts. Of course there are those spouses that marry into the family who are seen to speak,out of turn. Two of the attendees are participating in a private bingo game unknown to those who are the butt of the game.

A paragraph: ‘Glad you’re finally here. I was waiting for you to rescue me- I knew you’d distract everyone. Here.’ She handed me a small, square piece of cardboard, which had a grid printed on it. Inside each box was a short phrase, relating to different family members: Marcello shouts at a Waiter; Lucy tries to SELL you anything. I spotted my name- Ernest ruins something- in the middle of the left column.

I can see my family having participated in a game such as this in the past. I only wish I had thought of it. Mr Penguin and I had a family very similar to Clark Griswald’s in the film Christmas vacation with Chevy Chase. It has long been our favourite silly Christmas movie along with sharing jokes with my brother.

All of this happens in the first two chapters.

Now we have wrapped up the holiday season quickly I look forward to our reading groups beginning next year as well as my photography groups getting active again. I have joined a second one also and look forward to seeing what they get up to. Stay tuned.

I look forward to hearing about new books out there exchanging hands and a clean slate of a new year beginning. I’ll have a toast that all of us have a good year.

We’ll kick off here with Thursday today. It has been a very busy week but interesting. I started off Thursday with my trip to the weight training group. Some days I really drag but today I was right up there, feelin’ good.

I had dropped Ollie off at the vet for his sedation and X-ray following his six weeks of recovery from his surgery. I had to get back and pick him up. He is healing well and his orthopaedic surgeon sent us a six week plan of physio. It was addressed to Ollie but I think we’ll have to encourage him on his progression beginning with 15 minute walks through to a short beach walk and then longer bush walks. Six more weeks living life on his lead.

Then Thursday late afternoon had me coming home, scrubbing up and getting myself down to the Theatre Royal for the Tasmanian Literary awards.

I bought a dress for the event but had to exchange it when I discovered it was slightly too small. All I could think of was comedienne Kitty Flanagan saying “If you look like a rolled roast, go up a size”. So I did!

It was a pretty good evening but sadly most of the more well known authors, Amanda Lowry , Robbie Arnott, Aunty Patsy Cameron were not in attendance.

The evening started with a recognition of country by an indigenous poet, sorry I forget her name. The following awards were in the categories of fiction, non fiction, children, poetry (for the first time), Margaret Scott award, and on it went. Australians who are interested in the winner’s list can go here. https://www.arts.tas.gov.au/tasliteraryawards/home .

As this was the first time the awards were held since Covid many were happy to see their return. The honourable MP for the Arts, Elise Archer, liberal, handed out the major awards. The highlight for me was when Andrew Darby won the non fiction category for Flight Lines.

The book…..

“Andrew Darby follows the extraordinary migratory shorebirds from Australia’s southern ocean to the Arctic and back. On these travels he explores the power of science to reveal the mysteries of these birds, and to heal both their endangered world – and unexpectedly – himself.’

The journey of these rare, grey plovers, is incredibly long and perilous. Andrew gave a passionate speech about the risk to these endangered birds by the liberal government’s plan to put up a mass of wind turbines on one of the islands in Bass Strait, directly in the flight path of many of our migratory birds. Of course the presenter of his award is from the liberal party. There was much applause and hooting and hollering.

I think members of our liberal government lie awake at night just thinking of ways they can bulldoze our state and eradicate all wildlife.

It was good to see Arts Council Tasmania bringing back the literary awards. Of course Ms Archer announced a measly increased amount of money in the state budget for the arts. But nothing like the $750 million dollars they are planning to spend on our THIRD football stadium in our little state of 500 million people, half of whom don’t care for football. The AFL won’t give Tasmania a team unless we build a new covered stadium as the existing two are without covers. Forget the ambulance ramping, little to no low cost housing and the increasing number of homeless here. Every state in Australia has one stadium and we are going to have three!

However I won’t start. Instead I will wish everyone a happy holiday season. We are not doing Christmas this year as we have taken our Christmas funds and donated them to animal welfare groups and the Bob Brown organisation for the wonderful environmental work it does. All the best for however you choose to celebrate the season or not.