Season's Greetings

...and A Very Merry Christmas to Everyone x

Yes it's my photo of a Yorkshire Robin, I just added a bit more snow

The Tartan Rangers by Jonathan Gash. Book review

The Tartan Ringers
by

Jonathan Gash

Sue Gilbert's Goodreads review

Dec 01, 2019  ·  edit

liked it

bookshelves: funny, mystery, novels, whodunnit

An entertaining read, written and set in the early 1980's so dated in a lot of ways. The story of antiques dealing rogue Lovejoy who's viewpoint it's told from. Shortly after this was written the Lovejoy character became a popular TV series. The shows were slightly toned down from the books, and Tinker became posh! He isn't posh here.

My main problem with the book was that we, the readers, were not there for the climactic auction, because Lovejoy had scarpered, again. He does a lot of scarpering. Plenty happens to keep you engaged; there are murders, thefts, boozing, cons, car chases, lusting, drunken sex, a circus and the fortune (or lack of it) of an unexpected highland laird. Maybe too many character in the plot and the circus convoy for total comprehensibility but who really cares? It's a good ride!

And this book is not PC in any way, get over it!

The Fairweather Gardener - November

I hardly went out into the garden in October, except to note that the bird-feeders are constantly empty within 48 hours of being filled, it's the starlings wot does it! I have a bird table and hang the feeders under our large pergola, because otherwise the gulls would eat everything they could get at, including the small birds who I'm trying to encourage. Not seen a huge variety of species in the garden so far, wood pigeon, sparrow, wren, starling, dunnock, robin, blue tit, great tit, coal tit, crow, goldfinch and a poor garden warbler that the cat brought in. I miss the garden we had before, it backed onto woodland and I counted over 40 species there, not counting the peacock because he was strolling up the road, I didn't seen him from or in the garden!

I did go-a-gardening today, sunshine was nice after all that rain and all the weeds were wet so pulled up easily. I put most of them in the compost bin, which is heaving with red brandling worms as well as woodlice, snails and big leopard slugs. However the couch grass has gone into the big bag of leaves for the tip.

Said leaves are mostly from the neighbour's tall sycamore, one branch of this is trying to take the roof off my garage, must finds a man with a ladder and a big saw. I've collected several bags of leaves to make leaf-mould but am worried that I've collected all the seeds up with them, will I just have bag's full of saplings? Then I'd feel guilty that I wasn't growing them on as trees, the planet needs trees but my small garden can't accommodate a thousand sycamores.

Another recent job was to sweep the patio and clear the path of leaves and growing things. I won't call them weeds, they include campanula, moss, dandelion, foxglove, geranium and oxalis. All are welcome in the right place, but I do need to keep the path clear for my mum who arrives in a wheelchair these days. I allowed one foxglove to stay overhanging , I love them and it's taken up residence right by the low wall where the path widens out so shouldn't be a problem.

What's flowering? Geraniums, chrysanthemum, hydrangea, kalanchoe, winter jasmine, cyclamen, not as much as at this time last year, that long hot summer kept things going well into winter. I've moved some to the geraniums indoors and must remember to do the same with the kalanchoes tomorrow. On the plus side, in my small conservatory my Christmas cactus has just begun to flower and one of my jade plants has produced tiny, aromatic, white flowers.

St Leonards' Writers

We meet weekly in a side chapel and each time I

attend, I sit facing this stained glass window.

I'm delighted to be a member of St. Leonard's Writers' group, which I definitely had to join early in 2017 as, not only are they a great bunch of talented people, but also I discovered that the group meets weekly in St. Ethelburga's Church, which is about 30 metres from my front door. It would've been positively rude to ignore them! I could have joined the group a year earlier but didn't know they were here, their website was then a bit neglected and uncommunicative. It's now been renewed and updated.

St Ethelburga's was built in the twentieth century, 1929, though in a traditional style, with a beautiful roof in a tithe barn form. They lend space for a number of local group activities.

I've been in other writer's groups, when I lived in West Yorkshire and always found them hugely encouraging and supportive. St Leonards Writers is no exception. Friendly, supportive people, lots of laughs, plenty of great writing and useful, constructive criticism. Also coffee and biscuits. Can writers cope without coffee..?

I've become a committee member - most people seem to be on the committee automatically unless they opt out.  I'm also the group's librarian so have taken charge of donated books which group members can borrow, as well as previous unsold anthologies and archive materials.

We're in the process of collating a new anthology, the group's fifth but the first that I've been involved with. It will have short stories and poems by group members.

We are also preparing a new, more accessible and lively website. The site is now live, though still under construction. The link probably won't work yet, so copy and paste to find it -
 http://stleonardswriters.com/

Swell - A Waterbiography - my review on goodreads

Sue Gilbert's Reviews Swell: A Waterbiography

Swell: A Waterbiography
by

Jenny Landreth

liked it

bookshelves: biog-memoir, funny, non-fiction

Interesting take on the activity of swimming from a feminist rather than a sporting point of view. What has feminism got to do with swimming you may ask? Well up until around 100 years ago almost no women in the UK could actually swim.
Swimming was deemed a purely masculine activity, unsuitable, unseemly and unhealthy for females. Sure, the wealthier classes could hire a bathing machine at the beach and enter the water decourously in voluminous bathing costumes, but they didn't swim, just dipped themselves, while the lower orders would paddle or even, daringly, wade in the shallows. Swimming was for the blokes and the chaps. Over the past 100 or so years this has changed, but it took a lot of determinesd women to make it happen.
Jenny Landreth intersperses a detailed, sometimes humorous take on the history and the heroines of the women's swimming movement - yes it was a movement, you can't swim without movement! - with her own swimming experiences and her love of her local Tooting Bec Lido.
Has got me thinking, I must swim more often, were is my cozzy?

Poem for National Poetry Day

I just won a prize for this poem, which is a first.

Happy National Poetry Day!


Still Life, With Waders



Remember. He was a twitcher

before there was twitching.



But not just a list of sightings

like train numbers. Love seeps

from his lists of Lapwing,

Linnet, Greylag, Goosander and

the great, Great Bustard.



After life, remains life.

There are still sunset waders

beside the shore

up to their Redshanks

in  a skin of light.

Rhinoceros - Word of the Day

Today is World Rhino Day. Which has been observed annually on September 22nd since 2010.  
  

The word Rhinoceros comes from Greek, Rhino meaning nose and Keros meaning horn.

We all know what a rhino looks like.  This is an Eastern Black Rhino, living in safety at Port Lympne where they have a breeding program which is contributing to the survival of this endangered species. But all 5 existing species of rhino are endangered, most of them critically. 


All the Rhinoceros on earth are the survivors of populations of many millions, in dozens of species, which once lived all over Europe, Asia, Africa and Northern America. Now there are less than 30,000 rhinos on earth. 
figures from-
www.savetherhino.org/rhino-info/population-figures/

The rhino's problem lies in that nose horn, and the madness of the situation lies in the word Keros - from which we get Keratin. This is the root of the rhino's problem. Keratin from their horns is believed by many people to have almost magical curative properties, particularly for high fever.  

Keratin has no scientifically proven curative properties of any sort, whether from rhino horn, cows' hoof or human fingernails. So once all the Rhinoceros have been exterminated people who hold this belief will at least be able to chew their own fingernails. It will cost them a lot less than rhino horn and will have exactly the same effect.

Female Artists in History

Female Artists in History FB group has a wonderful database of artists including many who have been ignored and forgotten as well as the great and the good. Link below

FAH is now posting links to this blog where I have articles about some of the 31 women artists I’ve researched. Many thanks Christa for all the great work.

"For centuries, the Art Canon was dominated by art made by men, preferably white and dead for at least 50 years. That was the paradigm about art. No matter how talented and skilled a woman was...  What you see is that many women (even in the more free thinking societies) stopped or diminished their artistic activities after their marriage, or they continued in a different form – on a smaller scale, with subject closer to home, in a more perishable form – for the sake of the house and family. Sometimes they continued working, but under the name of their husband, brother, or father. Only some managed to continue their work professionally. Many never married." Christa Zaat. Links - @female-artists-in-history
female artists in history        

Last Supper - Just a Bowl of Cherries

I read an interesting and evocative column by food critic Jay Rayner, about Last Suppers. Not only his idea of what he would really want for his own last supper, but the concept of last suppers. He was most concerned to be in good company, during his final meal. 

And he's right, it should be about who you are with as much as the food. 

I'd be with the family, all of them, from parents and husbands to adopted sisters and step-second-cousins-once-removed, all gathered together at the same time, in the same place, for once. Adults nattering and drinking and catching up because some of them haven't seen each other for years. Teenagers sharing selfies and apps, children racing around the tables with cousins they hardly ever see, babe's being nursed, or bottle fed or whatever comes naturally. 

Everyone could have whatever they wanted to eat and drink, from a gigantic buffet satisfying everyone from carnivores, vegetarians, pescetarians, fruitarians and vegans to insectivores, if there are any! There can be wine, beer, spirits, juices, tea, coffee and even those vile branded colas whose name I refuse to mention, for the kids.

I'd eat a perfectly cooked baked potato, made with a large desiree spud, with crispy, very slightly charred skin and soft but not mushy interior, split open and filled with a mound of butter, a large wedge of ripe brie and sprinkled with salt, black pepper and fresh grated nutmeg. There'd be a side salad of fresh watercress.  I'd follow it with the world's best, most chocolatey chocolate mouse and a huge bowl of ripe, dark cherries. Everything washed down with a bottle or two of Farnese Montipulciano D'Abruzzo.

Hmm. Think I'll start now, by sending the invitations. If I don't die, we can all do it again next year!

https://www.theguardian.com/food/2019/aug/25/one-foot-in-the-gravy-jay-rayners-last-supper

No! I Don't Want to Join a Bookclub by Virginia Ironside - Book review

 

Sue Gilbert's review on Goodreads 

Sep 03, 2019 

liked it

I picked this up because I've always quite admired Virginia Ironside as a right-on journalist and agony aunt. The story is okay for what it is, but I was hoping for something a bit stronger or at least a little funnier, from this writer.

Plenty of it is good. Marie Sharp is defiant of the stereotypes and expectations of a woman of a certain age, i.e. sixty. She lists them with contempt and vows to definitely grow old disgracefully. She will remain single but will not become a little old lady. She will wear purple, demand attention and express her opinion at every juncture.

She will also dote on her grandson and give up sex.

Her description of the illness and death of a close friend is unflinching and moving, I felt for all of them. This was for me the most powerful part of the story, her friendship slowly bleeding away.

Where the story fell down was the always implied idea that she will not actually remain single and she will not give up sex. So at the end we come back to the ordinary story of a woman who can't be complete without a man, yet again. I was so hoping for a more interesting ending, but it became just another romance. I was afraid it would.

King Crow by Michael Stewart - book review

I started reading this in 2012, I had a signed copy because I've met the author, but I never wrote a review because I never finished reading it. Annoyingly, I left it on a train...

Eventually I bought another copy. This time I read most of it on another train.... the journey went very fast, as did 16 year-old Paul Cooper's journey in the story. It mostly takes place over a few short days and is gripping.

Paul is naively obsessed with birds, his favourite bird changes but is currently the raven, he's a bit of a twitcher and has his lists, but he's much more imaginative than most.  He has just started at a new school, because his mum has decided they need to move house, again.  There are always problems starting at a new school, exacerbated when you are sixteen.  But soon there's a school trip, to the Tower of London, where there are ravens. I won't tell more of the story than this, no spoilers, read the book.

The narrative is in Paul's point of view and very much inside his head. It's an interesting kind of coming of age story, with action, birds, murder, birds, car chases, birds, drugs and girls, well a girl and more birds. 

Ok, I will say a bit more about the birds.  I like birds.  I'm a bit of a birder myself, but I just think that in this particular story there are too many throw-away birds.  Concentrating on fewer species maybe would have been more engrossing for me, each new species mentioned was a distraction.  And fewer species of bird would certainly be less confusing for any reader who doesn't know her jackdaw from her jackass. 

But confusion is part of the plot, so hey-ho!

King Crow is a damn good read, read it!

Professor Branestawm.

Am I stingy towards other writers?
On Goodreads.com I've listed a total of 255 books which I've read, yet I've only given a five star score to 32 of them. The first two of those went to Rudyard Kipling, who died in 1936.

And the third was to the book that made me laugh more than anything I've ever read since. Norman Hunter's "The Incredible Adventures of Professor Branestawm."
With brilliant illustrations by Heath Robinson.

All the Dark Air by Livi Michael - book review

Can't understand why this book has no reviews on Goodreads. It's a very good story, moving if troubling. I picked it up to read on a long train journey, 5 hours and three changes later I arrived somewhat dazed by the emotion of the story.

All characters are strongly drawn and feel very real especially the lonely and uncared for Julie, whose story it is. She loves Michael, or maybe when she began to love him, at school, she was in love with the idea of loving Michael and never managed to shake it off. Whether Michael loves her is another question. She lives with him and his uncle Si and Michael's best mate Darren.

Most of the story takes place during Julie's prolonged pregnancy, which isn't truly prolonged but feels that way to Julie and to the reader. Occasionally the POV seems to slip, but mostly it is Julie's. Her journey ends with a party to celebrate a death that hasn't happened yet, then with her in the hospital for a birth that hasn't happened yet. I understand why the ending comes there, though it seems abrupt.

The author is compassionate to all her characters, even the absurd ones, even the violent ones, whilst being unsentimental describing their flaws. She's non judgemental, just shows the traumas of lives and how people have to manage to get on with things in their own way, alone. It's a sad story, left me wondering how the characters fared afterwards. That's how real it feels.

Garage Sale

7 garages in Fulham, London were sold for £700,000.

In view of that fact, my garage is also for sale.
It can be yours for a mere £100,000.

This period property has brick walls, 
an almost leak free tiled roof, azure
painted double doors and an enormous clematis,
which climbs over the roof and enters under the tiles, 
fills the loft space and encourages 
huge spiders and other sustainable wildlife.
Pith helmet and machete not supplied.

Sale does include:- 
a 37 year old road bike (tyres shot), 
17 loudspeakers of varying vintages, 
11 bits of carpet - random colours, 
3 lino off-cuts - fake tile effect, 
1 rusty wheelbarrow, 
2 tea-chests full of old paperbacks 
which never quite got unpacked when we moved in, 
113 random bits of timber that might be useful, 
2 broken bookcases - hence the books in tea-chests,
370 black plastic flowerpots, various sizes, snails included, 
1 box full of cables and other useful bits of vintage wire - needs unravelling, 
13 cans of nearly finished paint, in 1980's hues,
1 boot-mounted bike rack that fits neither the boot nor the bicycle 
and 
2,174 other equally fascinating and potentially invaluable objects. 

Not to mention a squirrel's nest - the squirrel would prefer to remain anonymous -
so I haven't mentioned him. Shhh!
 
I must add,  you can't drive into the garage 
because a wall has been built at the wrong angle 
blocking one door and a neighbour parks his Mini
far too close to the other door. 
… Also, the garage is not in Fulham.

Psephologist - Word of the Day.

The Greek word psephos means pebble. So maybe I'm a psephologist, I spend time every week on pebbly beaches. But no. The relavent pebbles were used by the world's first democracy as ballots.

So, a Psephologist, in case you don't know (I certainly didn't :D) is someone who specialises in using history and scientific analysis to examine election results. Good luck with making sense of Yesterday's local election!results. Whatever people felt like stuffing into the ballot boxes, it wasn't just pebbles.

Enough pebbles for a landslide...

A thought on brexit - which is an abomination of word and deed.

To the so called prime minister.
I will not listen to your pathetic press conference.
I will not endorse your perversion of democracy.
I will not condone your party’s defaming of my country.
I don’t suppose you want to know what I think,
I will tell you anyhow.

Please hold out your hands and imagine
I am giving you a rounded object
No not a bomb – I am a civilised person.
This is a rough, stone lump the size of a coconut.
Dull and heavy isn’t it?
This inert thing is a dinosaur coprolite.
It was shat out
Sixty-six million years ago by a beast
so vast and so ugly and so stupid,
it needed a second brain in its arse
just to be able to void primitive bowels
all over the doomed Cretaceous plains.
 
You, on the other hand, are not that impressive
if smelly beast, neither are you its once putrid dung.
You are the botfly maggot which slithered and slurped
in the slimy crevices and creases
of the crinkled, stinking, reptilian anus
which produced this huge, fossilised turd.