Sunday 28th January - Bell, Book and Kindle

There are no bells in this post. But the title was too good to resist.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/hereford-cathedral-chained-library

I am reading a number of books at the moment;

On Paper -

• Secret Life of Cows (Rosamund Young)
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• The Graveyard Book (Neil Gaiman) - just finished a day or so ago
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• Country Bunch (An Anthology collected by "Miss Read")

On Kindle -

• A Far Cry From Kensington (Muriel Spark)
• 
  
• Letters To A Young Poet (Rainer Maria Rilke)
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• Selected Poems (U A Fanthorpe)
• 
  
• Three Men In A Boat (Jerome K Jerome)
• 
  
• Flame and Shadow (Poems by Sarah Teasdale)
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• The Diet Myth - The Real Science Behind What We Eat (Tim Spector)
• 
  
• The Artist's Way (Julia Cameron)
• 
  
• Fierce Imaginings - The Great War (Rachel Mann)

Reading books, the printed-on-paper sort, is relatively straightforward. You pick up the book, find the page, and start reading. Except for the occasion where you are in one part of the house, and the book is somewhere else, so you have to go upstairs or downstairs to fetch it. Or, even worse, you are out and about somewhere, and you have left the book at home.

Reading Kindle books has advantages. If you have your device with you, then you have all your books as well, and it remembers where you have got to. I've downloaded most of the books in the Kindle list above onto most of my Kindle-reading devices. Great. O, wait, not ALL of my current books are downloaded on ALL of these devices, which are a paper-white Kindle (in the bedroom), my phone (in my handbag), and my android Lenovo Yogabook (downstairs or wherever I am working). Hey, not really a problem, provided I have wi-fi and battery-life and patience.

I also came a bit unstuck last night, when I clicked on the paperwhite Kindle and started to read. It took me a few minutes to work out which book I was reading! The page displayed had a couple of descriptive paragraphs; was this an anecdote from "The Artist's Way"? or scene-setting for "A Far Cry From Kensington"? or the beginning of yet another comic moment from "Three Men In A Boat?" At least I had no trouble discounting poetry, diet myths or "Letters To A Young Poet" from the possibilities. Finally, near the bottom of the page, the name of one of the characters, Wanda, appeared, and I knew where I was again (in Kensington). 

The phone and yogabook are a leetle bit smarter than the Kindle; so when I open the Kindle app, it shows me the cover of the book I last read, like this;

(screenshot from my phone)  

It sort of irritated me to begin with, when this new opening screen appeared after one of the updates. Now I am learning to be very grateful. 

The photograph at the top is of the Chained Library in Hereford Cathedral. We saw it several years ago when spent a week in that neck of the woods. Makes me even more grateful for my Kindle.

Sunday 21st January 2018 - Poetry and Prose

Long time no write.

I've been plagued by general "under-the-weather-ness" since before Christmas. I've now discovered that I have probably been brewing a low grade infection since maybe October. I have regular blood tests to make sure that the various pills and potions I take aren't causing any problems... one of the things they check is my white blood cell count which has been slowly creeping up implying an infection. So I have been taking the antibiotics for a week now, and  I cancelled everything that could easily be cancelled on Thursday and Friday.

That means I have been spending quite a lot of time sitting around in bed, reading, or browsing on the internet, or dozing. The next couple of days are lighter than usual, so, hopefully, by the time I've finished the second box of antibiotics, whatever bugs had taken up residence will have been dealt with.

Meanwhile, I have discovered the poetry of U A Fanthorpe and Rainer Marie Rilke's 'Letters to a Young Poet'. And I'm trying to read 'A Far Cry From Kensington' by Muriel Spark but I can't continue past the first page until I have absorbed all its wonders.

I knew about U A Fanthorpe, in the sense that I had tripped across several of her popular poems and been very amused. Try the one about the damsel being rescued from the dragon which is about the picture at the top of this post. the picture.

But this poem, one, about the list of psychiatric patients for the next day's clinic is very poignant;

The List

Flawlessly typed, and spaced
At the proper intervals,
Serene and lordly, they pace
Along tomorrow’s list
Like giftbearers on a frieze.

In tranquil order, arrayed
With the basic human equipment -
A name, a time, a number -
They advance on the future.

Not more harmonious who pace
Holding a hawk, a fish, a jar
(The customary offerings),
Along the valley of the kings.

Tomorrow these names will turn nasty,
Senile, pregnant, late,
Handicapped, handcuffed, unhandy,
Muddled, moribund, mute,

Be stained by living. But here,
Orderly, equal, right,
On the edge of tomorrow, they pause
Like giftbearers on a frieze

With the proper offering,
A time, a number, a name.
I am the artist, the typist;
I did my best for them.

(from Side Effects, 1978)

And why can't I get past the first page of 'A Far Cry From Kensington'?

' ... I formed the habit of insomnia. Insomnia is not bad in itself. You can lie awake at night and think; the quality of insomnia depends entirely on what you decide to think of.  Can you decide to think?-Yes, you can. You can put your mind to anything most of the time....'

that needs some pondering before moving on. I still don't know anything about this person, except that she is talking about the past, and about now in the book.

Later on...  (I have managed to read a couple more pages!)

'.... if there's nothing wrong with you except fat, it is easy to get thin.Youbeat and drink the same as always , only half. If you are handed a plate of food, leave half; if you have to help yourself, take half...'

if only it were that easy. Oh, wait; she has advice on will power as well! Please excuse me from writing as I Need to Read!

Friday 5th January 2018 - 12th Night

We'll be finishing off clearing the Christmas Decorations this weekend.
Once the house is back back to normal it will feel like the real start to the year.

No, wait, the year 'began' yesterday, on the 4th, when term started.

No, hang on, isn't 1st January the date? Or was it the 1st Sunday in Advent, at the beginning of December? That's when the church year begins.

Or the start of the school year, last September?

Or way back in April, at the start of a new tax year? Tax Year!!!!! Aaargh!!!!

I have been wrestling with Phase 1 of doing my tax return; the Gathering Together of All The Paperwork. The deadline of 31st January is ominously close.

psychologytoday.com

The stuff I earn through PAYE is easy to deal with - round up the P60s and there you are. It's the self-employed teaching that drives me loopy.

I would have got on a lot better if it wasn't for the fact that I organise the figures in school years, eg for the last school year I divide them into Autumn Term 2016, Spring Term 2017, and Summer Term 2017. But the tax year cuts across everything, so for my 2016-17 tax return I have to select the figures for Summer 2016, Autumn 2016 and Spring 2017. I knew I had all the numbers, but in two notebooks (one for each school year) and in various folders on the computer. It was just all a bit brain-bending.

Anyway, three hours later and my papers are in neat piles and the necessary figures are all noted in the current notebook, ready for Phase 2; Do The Tax Return, once I have regained my strength.

Meanwhile... I'll take a break... cup of tea, biscuit, unexpected piano pupil (must remember to add that to this term's records....