Month: September 2025

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📘 Crossing them off the list….

It looks like I spent an awful lot of time with my nose in a book this past month – well you’d be sort of right…..but the truth is most of these (apart from one) were fairly short, easy to read or ‘gallop through the pages’ page turners

Starting with a Seasonal Read, followed by Travel – Crime – Passion.
All of them published a while ago

Spring in September – Ursula Bloom 1983
Timeless Classics Collection
* When Janet meets a fascinating older man, she thinks he is the answer to all her problems. But they are only just beginning

What you might call a ‘sweet read’ following along as young Janet – just finished her final term at boarding school with her life opening up in front of her – finds out that all is not as it appears when our ‘grown up’ ideas don’t pan out the way they should have…..a coming of age story with a happy ending

The Accidental Tourist – Anne Tyler 1985
* How does a man addicted to routine – a man who flosses his teeth before love-making – cope with the chaos of everyday life

A twisty turny humourous tale – my first Anne Tyler read – which I thoroughly enjoyed

Death of an Airman. – Christopher St. John Sprigg 1934/2015
* In full view of a half dozen witnesses, the flying instructor of the Baston Aero Club goes into a tail spin, crashes, and is killed.

I usually enjoy these old ‘golden age’ crime novels but this one was a slog. The first few chapters flowed along nicely but then it seemed like too much was going on and the reader ( me) became quite confused – once an international drug smuggling operation entered the plot it got even more confusing so that in the end I never really cared how George Furnace came to die ( because it wasn’t the way it seemed in the beginning)

Harnessing Peacocks – Mary Wesley 1985
* Living happily alone in a seaside town in Cornwall, lovely Hebe supports her son at an expensive boarding school by cooking and discreetly making love for profit, until the unexpected happens

Witty and unconventional is how I’d describe Mary Wesley’s writing – never fails to please me. The 1993 ‘made for TV film’ (John Mills) is based on the novel…..similar but not the same.


https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harnessing_Peacocks

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Then onto ‘the next instalment’ which reignited my completist leanings……I’m determined to finish those series I’ve begun – recent ones as well as those begun a few years ago and left floundering in the TBR spreadsheet (of which there are quite a few!)

I had a serving of tartan noir last month (Stuart MacBride) – this month I’ve been bingeing on outback noir…….continuing with more from Garry Disher’s ‘Hirsch’ series featuring Constable Paul Hirschhausen’s life in a one-man station in a small, dusty South Australian town where amongst the ordinary day to day some very extraordinary can appear. If you can find them – pick up and enjoy.

📘Peace
Hirsch #2
📘Consolation
Hirsch #3
📘Days End
Hirsch #4

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My next was one of those elusive books, the ones you look for but can never find – the first of a series I began quite a few years ago now. A surprise find at the library when I popped in to pick up a reservation. What’s the betting all the others turn up now – I read somewhere recently they are all now available online so that might be my next move

And to be able to finish another Australian series, I’ve just begun the last of Jane Harper’s books featuring Aaron Falk. Unlike many in my ‘reading group’ I didn’t exactly rave about the first two so I’m hoping to find this one holds my interest.

  • Exiles – Jane Harper
    Aaron Falk #3

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And this 👇has been my thoughts over the past few weeks

Do you ever feel that way?

Sharing with Share Your Shelf

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🧶 But for the want of…..

Not a nail but those two little balls of brown wool!

If I’d remembered them – If I had put them with the rest of the garment then Mia’s present would be finished. Looking on the bright side there’s only a little more work needed (apart from making up and the neckline) and then it’s finished. And there’s plenty of time between now and Christmas to do that.

Lookee here my friends- what did get finished while we were away is this – sized for a 4yr old (24”) rather than the larger one I’d planned. Not intentional- just a case of realising (after working several rows) I’d cast on the wrong amount of stitches – so decided it was easier to carry on rather than faff about adding more😊

And here’s the next one – in the same design ….because I forgot to put the other patterns in (sigh) …..finished apart from making up and doing the neckline that is

🧶📘🧶📘🧶📘

Now all you crafty ones – what about this for a new hobby!
This came home from the library so I could find out what it was all about. There were lots of instructions – easier to read if enlarged

A little bit of fun but I’ll give it a miss – somehow it just doesn’t look as calming as conventional needle knitting…also, what do you do if you need to go to the loo in a hurry????

🧶🧶📘🧶📘🧶

Pop over and see who’s been visiting Kat — Unraveled Wednesday

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I have….

been going through one of my ‘want to be alone’ times since we came home. It might be Spring and although some days have been quite pleasant there’s been an awful lot that haven’t so basically Warm Weather Withdrawal Symptoms are what I’ve been suffering from. ‘The Back’ playing up hasn’t helped matters so it’s been easier just to retire (with a book) to my own little world for a short time

A session in the warm water therapy pool always helps….just have to remind myself to check the pool availability chart. I didn’t realise the Fathers and Babes class was weekly so twice I’ve turned up and half the area has been blocked off. Not so bad when there’s only a few others in the water but things got a little tense as more arrived and ‘room to move’ became limited

Then there was the nuisance factor in coming home to this…..courtesy of a very windy (like gale force we were told) storm – one demolished blind. Admittedly it did already have a small tear and was to changed anyway but what a way to go. One quick trip to ‘the big green shed’ aka Bunnings and we were back to the way we were

Nice new one in place now

Being ‘topped and tailed’ has helped – Cutting of the hair and toe nails happened 😊.
The hairdresser and podiatrist appointments were already in the diary but not until a week after we got home…..which was good really because it gave me a chance to work some of my misery out of my system before getting the boost I needed.

Then there was a bit of a laugh when I finally got the urge to go grocery shopping. Prices seemed to have soared again but this one stopped me in my tracks…..until it dawned on me the price was for the 30 eggs above and not the dozen below 🤭

By Friday emotions seemed to have come good and I ended up not canceling a planned lunch – one where I’d be surrounded by oodles of women – because the lunch was with other View Club members and that is an organisation solely for women. I knew when I sat down, each person in the room was comfortable with the other ‘ladies’ at their table and via The Smith Family there was a common interest and solution to helping some disadvantaged Australian children cope with problems of education.  Voice, Interest Education of Women.

http://view.org.au

After lunch speaker had us amused and interested in her recollections of a trip to Antartica – she spoke about Shackleton’s expedition and how they (well some of them) finally ended up South Georgia and how she herself ended up visiting there – on a cruise ship…..chosen because it was on the itinerary.

I’m now back in the business of life again, trying to think positively…..yes it’s not summer yet but it’s not far off – the Spring equinox has arrived, the clocks change soon, the temperature will rise (we will then complain it’s too hot😊) and …..’The Back’ doesn’t feel quite so uncomfortable at the moment.

How about you- how do you cope with the changing seasons ?

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