Tag: Elif Shafak

March 2021

Another Month –  I’m no longer counting.

First of all, welcome to my time zone. A challenge achieved. When I didn’t put the clocks back last Autumn I thought it would be something I’d manage to do for a couple of days. The confusion of it seemed obvious at the outset. Although I don’t have many appointments these days, I do have some. And there are a few things I like to watch on TV in real time. How could I be so out of synch? Probably the most important thing was that Pavel agreed to do this with me. I’m absolutely sure it would have been impossible with two of us on different times in the same house! Well, we did it and you all joined us in our light evenings a week or so ago. I would do it again. I settled into doing such things as having lunch while everyone else was having coffee and I ignored the raised eyebrows (you know who you are) when discussing anything to do with time with friends. I don’t have an image to celebrate this bit of nonsense so here’s a photo of a sundial I made.

If you remember, this all started off as a project related to reaching 70. Another school friend just did that too. Annie Wilcox lives in Canada now and is vegan. For her 70th she sent 70 vegan recipes to her friends. She says the recipes produce delicious offerings and are not complicated. Therefore here I am with another challenge. I will, from now on, cook two vegan recipes from Annie’s list for as long as I agree that what I’m producing is delicious! Thank you Annie for the inspiration. In the meantime I cooked:

A rather nice and unusual sweet potato macaroni cheese
And these meringues which were a total failure. Fiona keeps the photo of them to look
at whenever she wants to laugh….

I’ve made a bit of progress along the canal as the map shows. An aside – I discovered the canal is 35 miles long and so doing it in ‘there and back’ chunks means 70 miles. So I’ll go back and repeat the parts that have only been walked once. This month the walk was from Bridge (No 84?) to Goytre Wharf; Goytre Wharf to Pontymoile Basin; and Pontymoile Basin to Five Locks. There we ‘officially’ met up with brother Malcolm & Linda who brought us (thebest) fish and chips from Page’s in Cwmbran – this is a recommendation – and we wandered back to our starting point. I’m quite disappointed that I’ve not seen a kingfisher on the canal walks. Other people seem to quite often.

Talking of birds, I sent for some proper colouring pencils but they didn’t arrive in time to colour a bird this month. So I chose a wood pigeon which really only needed pencils…… And I’ve started the bird tapestry but not done enough to warrant a photo.

I’m not sure that this warrants a photo either!

I made two donations this month.  One to Coffi Cymru/Living With Dementia which is a group organising get togethers for local people with dementia.  The other to The Parkinson’s Society.  I donated to a local Parkinson’s group earlier in the year, but this month my friend Jane’s mother died with Parkinson’s and her daughter-in-law decided to ask for sponsors for her challenge to climb Skirrid – a local mountain – every day in March.  I love other people’s challenges and this one was much more demanding than any of mine and so I wanted to support her.  And anyway, it was for Jane too.

I forgot to report on Matt’s CD last month. He’s not sending me new CDs this year, but his favourite ones instead. He knows I won’t have them already. So, February and March – I think I’ve got this right are Neutral Milk Hotel and Deer Park. Matt must be getting old too because he gave me Neutral Milk Hotel a few years ago when he came to stay in luxury instead of a Green Man Festival tent. I like both, and I do so like getting some music each month that I wouldn’t otherwise know about.

Neutral Milk Hotel on the left obviously

Books. Two again. One for bookclub – Elif Shafak’s 10 Minutes and 38 Seconds in This Strange World. I wasn’t sure what to expect as I’d not read about it. But I had read Elif’s little gem – How To Stay Sane In An Age of Division, so I was optimistic. She didn’t disappoint. A book about Leila’s memories that come to her as she is dying. Which may sound depressing, but it’s not. It’s about friends, their friendships, and extraordinary lives. I very much liked it.

I read Belinda Bauer’s Exit, which was a swapped birthday present. Susie originally bought me Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club, but I’d read that over Christmas and since the wonderful Book-ish was Susie’s shop of choice I was able to do an easy exchange. I decided on Exit because it’s partly about elderly people getting tied up in a murder. It’s fun and I enjoyed it, but it’s not quite a good a read as Thursday Murder Club.

The favourite monthly CLOUD, POEM and PIECE OF MUSIC from the breakfast time routine:

I mean… where did it come from?
My choices are often short. Not next month though… it’s only 4th April and I know which one it will be.

It was a difficult choice of music this month but I loved that when I listened to Libertango by Astor Piazzolla I could see the dancers. Then I found this on YouTube.

That’s all for now! I gave up chocolate for Lent under the influence of Joanna who I know has been doing it at least every year since we met in 1984. I thought it would be something to do in lockdown (and a challenge!). Emma helpfully pointed out that it was the complete opposite of something to do…… Anyway, I did it. Happy Easter.

And thank you Tony Chocoloney!

November Month 10

This has been the most difficult month so far and the writing of the blog follows suit. I feel I don’t know what to write about, but here goes.

There are no birds to spot – even the pigeons are in short supply – and so I decided to draw a few so that when the days are more conducive to ornithology, I may stand a better chance of recognising my feathered friends. It goes without saying that I can’t draw but I’ve made use of Matt Sewell’s Our Garden Birds and I’m copying his drawings. That doesn’t feel like much of an achievement, but better than nothing. I don’t think I’ll be sued for copyright any time soon!

I have another job. This is a voluntary one until Christmas. I’m calling myself Ms Am@z0n because I’m off to Book-ish every morning to pack the web orders from the day before. Every little bit helps I hope, at least Emma says it does. It’s good for my brain because I’ve had to learn how web orders work, how to check stock and how to order books. However, the real reason I’m writing about it here is that, yes, I am counting it as a job, albeit temporary, which was a challenge from a couple of months ago. It works really well with me being (still, yes still) on British Summer Time. I wanted to be able to work before the shop opens to reduce contact with people, and going at 9am my time is only 8am Book-ish time. I have plenty of time to not be able to find books before anyone comes anywhere near the shop!

Walking the canal is progressing with a bit of manoeuvring. This month was supposed to be Llangattock to Abergavenny, the plan being to catch a bus to Abergavenny and walk back. On the assigned day the bus was FULL and so the plan was quickly changed to drive to Abergavenny, walk half way to Llangattock and back again, and the next day to walk from Llangattock to the previous day’s destination and walk back again. A brilliant plan even though it meant walking this stretch of the canal twice. It was made even more brilliant by the fact that the ‘mid way’ destination turned out to be The Towpath Inn in Gilwern. We crept in to have a look, having not been in a pub for 10 months or so, and it was EMPTY. On both days. A drink was had and it made those two walks very special. Did you note how I managed to capitalise both full and empty in this paragraph?

Enjoying the pub. There’s brandy in one of those!
Canal sights 1
Canal sights 2
Canal sights 3

This month’s donation to Fine Cell Work. A charity which works with prisoners who make absolutely beautiful things. Have a look.

Matt sent me a ‘sweary’ cd this month. Kesha – High Road. He told me it was sweary to warn me and he was right. I didn’t mind too much. I actually liked most of it on first hearing. I haven’t played it a lot because I also ordered the new Bruce Springsteen. Not sweary. Very much liked my me.

Hard to see….. here’s Bruce:

Memory stuff. A real challenge this First of all the poem. I now know the second verse. I wonder if I’ll get it done before February? A friend Lorraine sent me a piece about the poem which I loved reading and made me think. Always a good thing!

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/89511/robert-frost-the-road-not-taken

Then the Chopin Waltz from memory. Even harder, but I can pretty much do this if I have the music in front of me, not to follow, but for a quick look if I stumble. Since I’m short of content this month, I planned to post a recording of me stumbling. I’ve spent half a day trying to work out how to do that, and I’ve failed. You’ll have to take me at my word that I’m hardly looking at the music at all. If you’ve received a link to the blog via an email from me I’ve added the recording to that.

Cooking – here are the best from the month. A roasted mushroom on butterbean mash, recommended this as it full of tasty spices, and chocolate chip muffins. The chocolate chip muffin recipe is from Candace who seems to have made me these muffins at important moments in my life. A pandemic feels important!

Another of those ‘tasted better than in looked’ dishes
Had to be done

This month I read Ali Smith’s Winter and Elif Shafak’s How to Stay Sane in an Age of Division. See how it is? Wintery. Divided. Neither were Bookclub books so another challenge by the wayside. It’s ok though. Elif says so!

On a brighter note, it is my birthday in a couple of months, and no, I won’t have completed my 70 things, but if the governments let us, we will be celebrating in style. I’ve booked something for the day itself and if it happens, it will be perfect. It does, of course, involve eating. Details to follow.