Great book group

“Come and join our book group,” was an invitation I received last year from people I knew or had met through the WEA and the WORD festival. My last book group had lost its appeal for various reasons and I went through a period of grief, I guess, for what had been an excellent social and mentally challenging monthly meeting.

This new group is excellent. We sit in a circle in a local library for an hour once a month and each person talks about what they’ve been reading. I find this refreshing and interesting after being in a group where we all discussed the same book.

This week, in a group of about 12 plus a librarian, we heard about a range of books as usual. Mine was Patchwork, the graphic biography of Jane Austen by Kate Evans. One woman had read Marie Benedict’s book about Rosalind Franklin. Benedict writes about women who have been overlooked by history and another book grouper has read all her books. One woman talked about an article in NZ Gardener about climate change affecting trees. Another talked about a book on NZ Wildlife. There was Munich by Robert Harris, which the reader says has disturbing resonance with contemporary politics. Karen by Kelsey Grammer is about the actor/comedian’s sister who was murdered when she was 18. Another book was about growing up in Northern Territory Australia – living with snakes and living off bush tucker. One was a memoir by Stalin’s daughter.

Some books were exchanged – often they were personally owned, some picked up from little book libraries or second-hand shops. Many were library books, some ebooks. I went away feeling the richness of reading in our group, the enthusiasm for learning about other people’s lives and about the world in general. I know that there are book groups in libraries across the city – and across the country – all with a different flavour, it seems, when they report back on the Christchurch City Libraries newsletter.

Sometimes, when the books we have discussed are quite grim, I feel like scuttling back into the comforting arms of cosy crime! But, right now, I’m reading Helen Garner’s diaries from the 1970s to the 1990s and enjoying being inside the mind of a writer.

My ‘book’ bookshelf

The right tools for the job

The arborists have been. The whole place seems light and tidy. The three men had the right ladder, tools and skills. What’s more, they tidied up afterwards. All the clippings went into the mulcher and were taken away.

After their three hours of steady work, they happily wolfed down my hot, buttered hot-cross buns.

During the apple tree’s pruning, lots of apples were dislodged which I popped into a pot. They seemed to instantly turn into puree. No sugar added. I did put some lemon juice in – from lemons dislodged from their tree.

A piwakawaka flitted about, undeterred, as they worked. Catching dislodged insects, I suppose. One of the arborists said that only about 6% of fantails are of that variety: dark and slightly larger than the others. Every day’s a school day!

Autumn harvest

Mum’s favourite recipe. I don’t bother with the crosses, just some glaze

So strange to be celebrating the spring festival of Easter in autumn, when you stop to think about it! Hot cross buns come out of the oven again, and we’re eating windfall apples, raspberries, grapes, zucchini, spinach, beans, tomatoes and rhubarb from the garden.

Tasty red tomatoes for bolognese sauce and soup
Spinach, beans, zucchini and parsley are welcome additions to our dinners
Sturmer apples, autumn-fruiting raspberries and late season runner beans

Breaking News: Expired mouse discovered behind bookcase respectfully laid to rest in compost heap.

A bit of what’s good for you

This is today’s blackboard list. After our oat breakfast, I drop Mum at church (she fairly sprints inside with her walking stick) and pick up my friend for our weekly walk on the beach. The three dots after beach are because the weather is a bit doubtful: grey and drizzly.

It doesn’t rain, the sand is firm for walking and eventually we sit on a log to eat double dark chocolate muffins I have made and chocolate biscuits she has made.

Back home, my brother turns down my offered muffins despite the cheerful accoutrements. (Slightly anxious thoughts: What does he know that we don’t? Perhaps we know it, but we’re not worried. A recent blood test says I am not diabetic and Mum, at 97, can eat whatever she likes.) We’ll have to eat them all ourselves…how sad!! (Haha) They’re delicious heated for a few seconds so the chocolate melts a bit and you have to eat them with a spoon.

We will enjoy one each day, with a few more in the freezer to last the long weekend and into the week, along with home-made hot-cross buns. But right now, the cocktail hour (more often a glass of water), it’s time for cheese and crackers (two each) to keep us going until our home-cooked, balanced evening meal featuring some veg from our own garden, and a little square of home-made dessert made from our home-grown fruit.

I wonder if I’ve convinced myself that it’s okay to have ‘a bit of what’s good for you’ …

PS No sign of the mouse.

Of mouse and me

Mum said she didn’t mind Felix coming into her room at night, so I left the hallway door open, but barricaded my bedroom door with the laundry basket and a wedge (it doesn’t quite latch properly) because I can do without being woken by the unmistakeable sounds of Felix with a mouse (or rat).

At 2.30am I was woken abruptly by a mouse running over my elbow. I thought I saw its shadow disappearing behind the basket where I store my woolly mittens and scarves. To hell with burglars and rapists, I threw open the window and french doors and got back under the duvet. Luckily it was a warm night. I thought a bit sympathetically about how light and velvety the wee mouse was. I watched the radio clock count the quarter hours and half hours until falling into uneasy sleep at about 4.30am.

Has it gone out? Why didn’t it take its chance when all doors and windows were open yesterday? Has it decided to take up residence? Which would you choose: a compost heap or a basket full of woolly mittens?

Felix has just come in with that triumphant trot he has when he’s pleased with himself. He’s licking his lips – has he polished it off?

Autumn hydrangeas

In January I posted a photo of my pink hydrangeas ‘as big as your head’. Now, they are sporting their autumn colours. Around the side, there are some green ones.

Last year I dried some hydrangea flowers which won’t win any flower-arranging prizes, but are still good.

Art in the mist

The anemones are beginning to wake up

What a mist there is this morning as I go out to get the paper! It has crept up against the house – even the doormat is damp. The air, thick with humidity, makes it a little hard to breathe. This is Halloween/autumn weather: ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’.

Spiders have spread their webs from one support to another. I imagine them flying, Tarzan-like, from clothes line to bird feeder to pear tree. And their webs are astounding – but hard to photograph. I learn a few things about my camera as I try to capture the awesomeness, such as how to tweak aperture, exposure, and lighting. I experiment with the ‘stage light’ option which, as you might expect, has a dramatic result, but the spiders’ webs disappear. I go back to the default settings.

This web is going on for a metre across
You may be able to see three webs here

There’s no sign of the spiders. Perhaps they are resting after the long hours of painstaking artistry, waiting in crevices somewhere until something is caught in their nets.

Garden centre

That’s a Salad Bar in the background

It wasn’t on my list to go to the garden centre but, somehow, there I was. I particularly liked this display. I bought some flower and vegetable plants.

Here’s Felix inspecting the plants.

I had to go to the hardware store for an obelisk which is high enough. It was 20% off because the tip is bent, and was a wee challenge to fit into the car.

Dinner was based on home grown garden produce. The ironing might get done tomorrow.