The mere brute pleasure of reading the sort of pleasure a cow must have in grazing.

Pretty little flower blossom. Natone Street, Lindisfarne. September 2013.

Let's Explore Diabetes with Owls, David Sedaris: A new book! That's a rare thing these days. Like the one I reviewed last week, this is a hit and miss collection of essays and anecdotes with enough of a light touch to keep things ticking along. Worth a look. B-.

Two Views, Uwe Johnson: A book very much of its time, this novel is essentially about the divisiveness of East and West Germany. The tale of two lovers (acquaintances would perhaps be closer to the mark), what the reader faces is an immense accumulation of detail to build the two "views" while two people endeavour to reach each other. The politics remains in the background, but remains a ubiquitous presence. I can't say that I particularly enjoyed reading this, but can recognise the skill. C+.

The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood: This is not the first time I've read this, but I'm not sure that I find myself believing any more than I did last time. I can see where she's going with the conceit, but it still didn't grab me. C+.

Blue Skies, Helen Hodgman: I'm sure that this is the first novel that I've ever read that is set in Hobart. Thus, it's a real shame that it didn't like it at all. A vacuous and annoying narrator and ludicrous conclusion has a tendency to do that I guess... D-.

The Odd Angry Shot, William Nagle: This one I did like, very much. Raw and honest, it's an interesting insight into the Australian experience of fighting in the Vietnam War. Equal parts brutal and moving. Highly recommended! A-.

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Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral...

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke...

In dreams begin responsibilities.

A life at sea, that's for me, only I just don't have the BREAD. That's right, Theme Thursday yet again and I post a photo of a yacht dicking about in Bass Strait just off Wynyard. The problem is, I am yet again stuck at work, slogging away, because I knead need the dough . My understanding is that it is the dough that makes the BREAD. And it is the BREAD that buys the yacht. On my salary though, I will be lucky to have enough dough or BREAD for a half dozen dinner rolls. Happy Theme Thursday people, sorry for the rush.

This will hurt me...

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