Another Week Another Catch Up

This week has been busy with acquiring books but as for reading I am still travelling through Moby Dick.  Progress on Moby Dick is up to Chapter 60.  It continues to amaze and amuse me.  I am seeing all the Christian symbolism in this book. You cannot help it as it hits you in the face but I am choosing to ignore all of that because I simply like the story.  As I am not reading this book for any course I am able to do that.  There is also a major theme of living together with other people. The sailors onboard the Pequod come from every country, they are poor, they are middle class, they are people of all colours.  There are obsessive goals on board as well. Considering this book was written in 1851 America the point of it is not lost on me.

We are now well and truly out to sea and the white Whale Moby Dick is being discussed at length. Captain Ahab is truly a mad character as he walks about on deck with his ivory leg and I look forward to seeing what happens to him.

It was also not lost on me that a white whale was seen the other day off the coast of Sydney.  It's picture was in the newspaper.  I thought that was a bit of synchronicity.

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On another note I received our daily Hobart newspaper the other day.  It is a Murdoch publication and the editing in it is abysmal. So when I read it I take great delight in going through it with a red pen and circling the errors.  There are often words spelled incorrectly. As in those words that are pronounced the same but spelled differently with different meanings.  I am sure if we ever had a bear in the street it would be spelled bare.  In fact they would probably print something like "The black bare walked down the rode."   Luckily Tasmania doesn't have bears so this will not happen.

I call them "clunkers" and the "clunker" this week was:  "Graphic designer Jess N. is passing on lessons learned through her own allergies to schoolchildren."    Now is Jess allergic to school children? I doubt it.  Is "schoolchildren" one word? Are there any English teachers out there reading this. What would you write?

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New books this week.  One from the bookshop in town.  This book, The Moor by William Atkins is a new one out of England and though I have read a review recently that did not glow I am looking forward to reading it.  It is supposedly about the Lives, Landscape and Literature of the moors in England.

Other books came from the library after a significant wait. Orange is the New Black was one I really wanted to read ages ago but I have since watched the entirety of series one and now series two is about to start on TV.  I really loved series one and the people in it are quite interesting.  This is often the case, by the time the book arrives in the library I am onto something else.  But it is a shortish book so I will probably have a go at it.

Another one was ordered when I was determined to cut out all sugar (read chocolate) in my life.  I was trying to lose weight and get fit.  Now I have gone through that phase this books comes in for check out.  Maybe it will motivate me to try again.

The last of the library books is this wonderful Australian children's book about Jeremy the Kookaburra.  The kookaburras are one of my favourite birds and I often see them sitting on wires or low branches in trees as I scoot down country roads. I hear them in the morning laughing at life
around them. They are so much fun to listen to.  Besides I have young nephews and nieces and I like to keep up on children's books as well as young adult writing.  It is so much different than it was when I was growing up.

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Last but not least it continues to be the depths of winter here though mild days are most enjoyable. I am sure it is related to global warming but I am enjoying the 50 to 60 F (15 C) degree days with sunshine. Also the winter solstice is upon us with longer days ready to begin.   I know the worst of winter is still ahead of us.    My animals do not want to get up in the morning and they certainly seem quite smoochy these days.  I can hardly separate these two.

Odie and Cousin Eddie