You can tell a lot about a fellow's character by his way of eating jellybeans.

I can’t be certain, but it appears that Jen here is attempting to eat Ezra.

scan With darksome devouring eyes my bruisèd bones

Poo isn't recyclable? Bellerive, January 2011.

There was a time when I didn't like Gerard Manley Hopkins. It was all the passionate (defrocked) priests that ruined it for me. As time brings distance between myself and passionate (defrocked) priests, I think that I've come around.

40 (Carrion Comfort), by Gerard Manley Hopkins

NOT, I’ll not, carrion comfort, Despair, not feast on thee;
Not untwist—slack they may be—these last strands of man
In me ór, most weary, cry I can no more. I can;
Can something, hope, wish day come, not choose not to be.
But ah, but O thou terrible, why wouldst thou rude on me
Thy wring-world right foot rock? lay a lionlimb against me? scan
With darksome devouring eyes my bruisèd bones? and fan,
O in turns of tempest, me heaped there; me frantic to avoid thee and flee?

Why? That my chaff might fly; my grain lie, sheer and clear.
Nay in all that toil, that coil, since (seems) I kissed the rod,
Hand rather, my heart lo! lapped strength, stole joy, would laugh, chéer.
Cheer whom though? the hero whose heaven-handling flung me, fóot tród
Me? or me that fought him? O which one? is it each one? That night, that year
Of now done darkness I wretch lay wrestling with (my God!) my God.

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.

You need hands to hold someone you care for.

You need hands to show that you're sincere.

When you feel nobody wants to know you, you need hands to brush away the tears.

You also need hands to dig in the sand, and you need hands to wash the grit off your hands.

A precedent embalms a principle.

Yes, we've had a bit of rain. St Johns Avenue, New Town. January 2011.

Two books this week, and both good 'uns! The first, So Long A Letter by Senegalese author Mariama Bâ.

So Long a Letter takes the form of a long letter written by a widow, Ramatoulaye, to her friend, over the mandatory forty-day mourning period following the death of a husband. It explores the concept of marriage and role of women in post-colonial Senegal, and reveals much of the same double standards that exist in gender relationships.

The narrative construct – which allows Bâ to explore two very different choices within one artistic framework, and succeeds because of the intelligence and maturity of the narrator, and the significant abilities of the author to ‘make a point’ through the construction of an interesting story.

I have not read many novels by female African writers, but I must say that I enjoyed this tremendously, not least because it offers a fascinating and educative look into the life (lives) of people very different to my own, but closer in sensibility than I might otherwise have recognised.

Even better, the other book that I read this week was just as good!

Offshore by Penelope Fitzgerald was the 1979 Booker Prize winner, beating out (among others, V.S. Naipaul’s A Bend in the River. Fair? I’ll leave that one up to you, but Offshore is a worthwhile read.

The story centres on a disparate community that live on barges in Battersea – on the Thames – in the early 1960s. The novel ponders the existence (subsistence) of those who do not belong to the land, but also not properly to the sea. As such, it is an odd little book.

Just over 130 pages, Fitzgerald packs it full of peculiar characters, not quite depressed, but never truly happy. This provides many opportunities to display some of the wittiest and most melancholy prose you can find.

At the centre of the novel is an abandoned (or perhaps escapee, Nenna – the character – herself seems unsure) mother and her spirited daughters. Tilda, the younger, "cared nothing for the future, and had, as a result, a great capacity for happiness." Martha, the elder of the two at 11, is considerably less carefree. "Small and thin, with dark eyes which already showed an acceptance of the world's shortcomings,"

The tidal push and pull of land and sea for Nenna and the other inhabitants presents the grist of the story. Even the family cat exists in an uncertain state, constantly forced assess and reassess her notions of vermin and authority. Though she is capable of catching and killing very young rats, the older ones pursue her. "The resulting uncertainty as to whether she was coming or going had made her, to some extent, mentally unstable."

The humans in the tale are not so different.

This really is a terrific little book, and the construction of the little world seems effortless. Highly recommended.

Also, I thought I’d mention an intriguing little book that I picked up for the kids. Reminding me a little of The Little Prince, Crockett Johnson’s Magic Beach is a beguiling little number. It has the feel of an artist's sketchbook – Henry thought it was a notebook of mine – featuring sparse, seemingly unfinished pencil sketches on a plain background.

The allure kind of passed Ezra by, but Henry was as absorbed as I. The story was a “story within a story (within a story)”, but not in an Italo Calvino, post-structuralist head-up-one’s-backside way.

The tale of cute little Ben and Anne, as they create – then destroy – their own little world is fantastic. Charming, peculiar, and unceasingly cruel.

We loved it.

Action may not always bring happiness; but there is no happiness without action.

Carcharodon carcharias, Ranina ranina and merely the humble old Nardoa rosea?

Whatever it is, it sure has got their attention!

Nothing is so admirable in politics as a short memory.

It’s parked there all say, every day, yet it never gets a ticket. Out back of the Withdrawal Unit, St Johns Park, New Town. January 2011.

“Fancy girls push me in the bottom”?

Desire? Complaint? Fantasy?

“Fancy girls push me in the bottom”?

A cry for help?

“Fancy girls push me in the bottom”?

Which girls? Where?

“Fancy girls push me in the bottom”?

Who? Why?

“Fancy girls push me in the bottom”?

It’s like that a five-tone musical phrase that’s repeated in Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

“Fancy girls push me in the bottom”?

Over and over and over again.

I’m expecting a visit any day soon…

As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information.

Is it possible to be any more fresh-faced, upright, and decent as Henry looks here? I am thinking that he could be just the man to revive the stagnating Superman franchise…

The more we have the less we own.

Thar be a cruel wind blowin’, Bellerive boardwalk, January 2011.

Ten Things that I have never done:

• Jumped from a plane.
  
  
• Been on a sailboard.
  
  
• Swam with a shark (that I’ve been aware of).
  
  
• Been to Africa.
  
  
• Posted anonymously online.
  
  
• Shot at (that I’ve been aware of).
  
  
• Been skiing.
  
  
• Made a formal complaint about something.
  
  
• Visit Disneyland/world/Paris, or wanted to visit Disneyland/world/Paris.
  
  
• "Met anyone for coffee".
  

I expect that rules me out of the next Sex in the City movie. Hey there’s another things I’ve never done!



A jetty, with Sandy Bay and Taroona in the background. Bellerive Boardwalk, January 2011.

As a rule, men worry more about what they can't see than about what they can.

A pre-haircut Ezra does his best Burt Lancaster impression down in Bellerive. Post haircut, he riffs on a more George Clooney ER Season Two vibe…

In the end, everything is a gag.

Larus dominicanus is nibbling on something. Opossum Bay, December 2010.

Larus dominicanus – A.K.A. the Kelp Gull – is a large black-backed gull with a white tail and a large yellow bill with a red spot on the lower tip. Alas, It is only the second largest (or should that be the first smallest?) gull in Australia. The wing has a wide trailing edge and a small white 'window' in the wingtip. This is how I tell ‘em apart from the bigger and friskier Pacific Gull.

In terms of tucker, the Kelp Gull takes what it can get on both land and water, but rarely in the air. It feeds mainly on fish and crustaceans, but will scavenge when it gets a chance. I understand that they have a predilection for pommes frites, Schwartenmagen and 1945-vintage Chateau Mouton-Rothschild Jeroboam.

If it cannot get that dish, it gets anxious. Indeed, Kelp Gulls have been observed feeding on living Southern Right Whales. In desperation, it will plunge its mighty beak to peck down inches into the skin and blubber, often leaving the whales with large open sores, up to half a meter in diameter! Ouch.

The BBC has more…

Characters do not change. Opinions alter, but characters are only developed.

Henry on a seesaw.

Henry on a teeter-totter.

Henry on a tilt.

Henry on a tilting board.

Henry on a teedle board.

Henry on a dandle board.

Henry on a Ridey-Horse.

Henry on a Hickey-horse.

Henry on a seesaw.

Death is a very dull, dreary affair, and my advice to you is to have nothing whatsoever to do with it.

Don’t stand so close to me! Bellerive, January 2011.

2,428.

That’s right: two thousand, four hundred and twenty eight.

Two thousand, four hundred and twenty eight what?

That is for you to guess!

The winner gets…

[um]

… an enhanced sense of self?

Every day confirms my opinion on the superiority of a vicious life – and if Virtue is not its own reward I don't know any other stipend annexed to it.

Continuing our pirate training, it’s important that both lads are given ample opportunity to come to grips with deadly razor-sharp grass!

Such grass is not only useful in times where camouflage is a necessity, but it can also be utilised as a lethal weapon if your flintlock has gone blunt or cutlass is out of ammunition.

It is also healthy, nutritious and sets off a bowl of gruel and hard tack beautifully…

Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction.

We have elevator shafts, but no building. Problem? Developments on Argyle Street, Hobart. January 2011.

Sunday, you say?

Sunday means Sunday Top Five!

How about a Top Five Excuses For Not Getting A Blog Post Up As Per The Accustomed Time?

5. A saltwater crocodile named ‘Bitey’ (inspired by his annoying habit of nibbling on other people’s belongings) ate my notes.
   
   
4. Henry [and/or] Ezra.
   
   
3. I’m having an epistemological break.
   
   
2. The Internet was broken.
   
   
1. What? Late? I’m not sure I understand you…