Travellin' Penguin

I am back and hope to be back again sooner this time. I had a great many things to catch up on in life and I gave films and books a complete miss for almost a month. I just put my head down and moved forward with a myriad of chores, new structures, health jobs and all that’s worth doing around here.

Now I look ahead to the rest of spring and summer with more spare time and a new reading area in our back “lockup”. Our lockup is a lanai type area behind our house and we enclosed it with lattice panels and laser light ceiling. It has a large passion fruit vine just cut back a bit as it was taking over. It is a lovely area for our cats to be outdoors as we don’t believe in letting cats roam outdoors, especially in Australia where so many native animals are small and cars are often driven by hoons.

So this post is pretty book free….but not entirely. I bought a small electric folding bike and I need to learn to ride it. Approaching age 73 next month, my balance is not great and although I work on it in the gym and at home, I think riding a bike will help. Waiting for a mirror to arrive as I hate being on roads around here without a mirror. I never understood why bicyclists don’t use mirrors like motorbikers.

I have done a bit of photography and magazine reading but no books. I have attended several book launches.

Today I received a lovely, short book by Sarah Bernhardt called In The Clouds from my Renard press subscription. I think I will ease back into reading with this 95 page novella published in 1878 to the utter dismay of Gustave Flaubert, when it replaced his.

I hope everyone has stayed well and has been enjoying hearing about the Booker Price announced today. The Sri Lankan book looks very interesting as were the other books it was up against. They were certainly different from each other. I would hate to be a judge.

Well that is me for the moment so I am happy to be online again.

This past week was really busy with all kinds of “catch up” appointments such as eyes, teeth, gym, events. I did manage to get a bit of reading tidied up.

What I finished reading this week:

I finished Sei Shōnagon’s The Pillow Book . It was written 1000 yrs ago from the perspective of a lady at the imperial court of Japan. It is described as a “crazy quilt of vignettes, opinions and anecdotes” of the times.

Our book group will discuss it on Wed night. It was a real eye opener to see many of the issues in that book were the same as the ones we deal with now.

There is also a lot of humour in the book. I laughed out loud at this quote:

Old fashioned people put on their gathered toursers in a very time consuming and awkward way. They pull the front panel up against the stomach and proceed first of all to tuck all the layers of robe in under it, leaving the back strings dangling till they’ve got the front completely straight and tidy, then they bend forward to reach for the back panel, gropping behind them with both hands. They look like monkeys with their arms tied behind their backs, standing there fumbling about with the strings like that. You can’t imagine how they could ever get dressed and out the door in time for any urgent appointment.

And

Infuriating things: A guest who arrives when you have something urgent to do, and stays talking for ages.

Or a very ordinary person, who beams inanely as she prattles on and on.

Or a dog that discovers a clandestine lover as he comes creeping in and barks or a baby who cries when you’re trying to hear something.

The entire books is made up of many observations of life.

Audible book finished this week.

How to End a Story: Diaries 1995 to 1998 by Helen Garner.

I enjoyed her narration of the book but she is in so much pain as she ends her third marriage and she doesn’t leave much out of this book of how she feels.  It continues how people can write about the extreme angst they might have in their life for the world to see.  It seems she’d want to keep it private but then who am I to know how others handle their grief. We’re all different. 

Bookish Event of the Week: 

My friend and I attended a book launch at Fullers this week. The book is:

Nine Lives For Our Planet:  Personal stories of nine inspiring women who cherish Earth by John Watts. It is described as “Here are nine personal stories of brave hearted women defying the greed and corruption smashing Australia’s environment, including its farmlands. 

John Watts introduced s to women who light up the darkness of the climate and extinction emergencies with their flair and stoic commonsense. Each has acted to take on the gas frackers, coal miners, native forest loggers, wildlife killers, water profiteers and their political agents.

(quote by Bob Brown, acclaimed author, photographer and life long activist).

The author was interviewed by Bob Brown and the discussion was very interesting. The women are not well known celebrities of any kind but those who work to make positive changes in their own quieter ways.

One of the women was Simone Marsh and she was also part of the three person panel.

There was a lot of head shaking and discomfort hearing what the big corporations and politicians have done to no advantage of the environment or people living on the land.

Penguin’s Choice:  Last week I announced the random draw of the week was the short story, Christmas in Stalingrad by Anthony Beevor. I began it but I just couldn’t face another story about war.  I have read and heard much about the atrocities of war in the past two years and I am over it.

I decided to pass it back to the box, maybe for another time and I spun the wheel again and a Roald Dahl book was chosen. It is A Taste of the Unexpected. I have no idea what it is about but it should be a bit cheerier than the war books.

Life as it happens

The coming week is not going to be as hectic as this past week was. A couple of weight classes at the gym, maybe a long walk, if the weather changes from cold rain to something more pleasant. I have the shared reading book Monday of the Kafka stories and Wednesday will be the book group discussing the Pillow Book.  I think there will be a big variety of opinions about this book. Thursday night there is a book launch that I’ll be attending. That should be enough to keep me socialising and exercising this week.

From the Photo Archive:

Here are two more photos of beach scenes from the south coast of NSW.  It was a lovely day to be out with a camera. Such a shame it seems like it was such a long time ago.

Stay well, until next time….keep moving, catch up with people and stretch your brains.

I have returned from a lovely trip to see friends in NSW. Almost 10 days down the south coast from Sydney in New South Wales and the northern beaches of Sydney. Then followed by meeting up with another friend for 5 more days in the city. It was great to finally get off the island we live on and see more of Australia.

By the way, the quote above is what was printed on my license plate frame on my scooter.  While I am no longer a motorbike rider I still hope to enjoy the intent of this quotation.

What I’m Reading: 

I am working my way through Sei Shōnagon’s The Pillow Book . It was written 1000 yrs ago from the perspective of a lady at the imperial court of Japan. It is described as a “crazy quilt of vignettes, opinions and anecdotes” of the times.

Our book group will discuss it in the first week of September. She discusses the many issues she encounters in her life and it is interesting so many of them are relevant today. Relationships with men and friends, communication with others in the palace, much of it through written poetry that everyone wrote back and forth and following the young Empress who over sees daily life in the palace. 

It is not a book I’d pick up and read in large chunks but I try to read 15 – 20 pages a day and that is enough. The author lived in the Heian period that translates as ‘peace and tranquility’.

The periods stretched from 794 to 1186. 

My copy is a black Penguin classic and the introduction and addendums take up as much space almost as the story itself. It is certainly different from what I usually read and I am enjoying it more than I thought I might.

Audible Book on the Go at the Moment:

How to End a Story: Diaries 1995 to 1998 by Helen Gar

ner narrated by. Helen Garner. I listened to her first two diaries and this is the final one in the trilogy. It is described as:

“The third instalment of diaries from the inimitable Helen Garner covers four eventful years in the life of one of Australia’s most treasured writers.
Helen Garner’s third volume of diaries is an account of a woman fighting to hold on to a marriage that is disintegrating around her.

Living with a great writer who is consumed by his work, and trying to find a place for her own spirit to thrive, she rails against the confines while desperate to find the truth in their relationship-and the truth of her own self.”

I can’t say it is pleasant to listen to but at times is interesting. I don’t know why so many people want to publish a ‘warts and all’ diary for anyone out there to see, but it seems to happen with regularity.

I wonder what her ex-husband thought of this publication as it certainly doesn’t shine a good light onto him. It also isn’t hard to discover who the unnamed husband in the book is either. But it is a rather short book and as I found her first two diaries interesting I wanted to see how it all ends up. 

Bookish Event of the Week:  

I attended a lovely Fullers book shop event last Sunday with a friend. Carmel Bird launched her wonderful book  Telltale with a fun interview with author Danielle Wood. There was accompaniment by a Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra member, Michael Fortescue, who played the beautiful double bass as she read aloud passages from her book. 

We really enjoyed it and I look forward to reading her book. Carmel Bird really identifies with the peacock and not only does her book have a beautiful cover featuring a peacock, she was dressed in the gorgeous colours of a peacock herself. The room was full of appreciative readers and we all went away feeling most uplifted. 

Penguin’s Choice:

The Penguin 70s bookish project begins.  Our facilitator of our book group is going off on maternity leave in October and that month will see our final discussion. We won’t meet again until March of 2023 and not only is she going to give us recommended reading for the summer, I will be attacking the books on my shelves that lie unread. I will also be getting into the 70’s anniversary Penguins from the boxed set.

Kicking off the random draw is: No. 16- Christmas at Stalingrad by Antony Beevor. More on this little book next time.

Life as it happens…..  the coming week has me getting out of travel mode and back into the regular routines. Medically, especially with the old eye, things are looking up. A bit of vision has returned, and I have been instructed by the ophthalmologist to go to the optometrist and get fit for some new lens in my glasses. Although the vision will never be great in that eye, the improvements do make it easier to read and drive. The glasses will hopefully increase the vision a bit and now we just hold steady to see what progresses in the future.  So now, the eye discussion is at a close!!! Such a boring topic. 

Back to the gym this week too and that should be a laugh as I stumble my way back to fitness with a good sense of humour. I expect to be quite sore for a few days but feeling good.  Old age is hard to face but it helps to keep oneself in as good of physical (and mental) shape as possible. So on we tread……sometimes clumsily.

From the Photo Archive:

So far I have not downloaded and edited all of my photos from NSW. I do have some interesting filters to add to Photoshop and Lightroom which I am playing with. Although a steep learning curve, I am getting a bit of success. I will share the two photos I have entered in to our club challenge. One is a open theme of which I submitted the Sydney Harbour bridge with a vintage touch. The second theme is about taking something we all know as familiar and changing the way it looks but still keeping it recognizable.  I decided to fantasize what the Sydney Opera House would look like if global warming increased to such an extent it would melt.  It was an interesting exercise. 

What the Penguin did this week:

Penguin and I were thinking about aging. He has travelled on six continents with me and he still looks as good as ever. I think I am feeling the older years more than him.

But I heard some very good advice and I try to live by it now.   1. Exercise.   2. Socialise with others. 3. Learn something new.  That should keep us going in the right direction for a while.