May 2021

Now that I'm vaccinated I probably can stop logging all these little errands and such. So here's the activities list for what I hope is the last time:

5/3  Verizon store for new Smartphone

5/4   Mah Jongg

5/11 Mah Jongg; Mazzicato Bakery (Middletown): Library

5/18 Mah Jongg; brief walk downtown.

5/25 Picnic; Library

Weather has been cold and rainy so I haven't been out and about as much as I'd like but I've had plenty of time to read some really good books this month. (Nice to be able to browse in the library again!)

Fiction:

They Were Counted (The Writing on the Wall: The Transylvania Trilogy #1) by Bánffy, Miklós; translated from the Hungarian by Thursfield, Patrick and Bánffy-Jelen, Kathy; foreward by Fermor, Patrick Leigh 

Abigail by Szabó, Magda; translated from the Hingarian by Rix, Len

Silence Is a Sense by AlAmmar, Layla 

Oraefi: The Wasteland by Sigurðsson, Ófeigur; translated from the Icelandic by Smith, Lytton 

Miss Mole by Young, E. H. (Emily Hilda) 

Send for Me by Fox, Lauren

Gonzalez and Daughter Trucking Co.: A Road Novel with Literary License by Escandón, María Amparo 

Aviary by McNamer, Deirdre

The Sicilian Method   (Commissario Montalbano #26) by Camilleri, Andrea; translated from the Italian by Sartarelli, Stephen 

The Children's Blizzard by Benjamin, Melanie 

The Performance by Thomas, Claire 

Amy and Isabelle by Strout, Elizabeth

Improvement by Silber, Joan

 

Verse:

More About Teddy B. and Teddy G. The Roosevelt Bears by Seymour Eaton (Paul Piper)

 Audio recordings of this and other Roosevelt Bear books can be found at LibriVox

  

Nonfiction:  

American Covenant: National Parks, Their Promise, and Our Nation's Future by Soukup, Michael A Book Arts of Isfahan: Diversity and Identity in Seventeenth-Century Persia by Taylor, Alice 

Cult Writers: 50 Nonconformist Novelists You Need to Know by Smith, Ian Haydn

 Short (one page) bios, very basic 

Life of James Mars, a Slave Born and Sold in Connecticut by James Mars; first published in the 1860s.

Online:

A Glance at the Life and Times of Miklos Banffy some background material on the author and setting of   The Transylvanian Trilogy which I started this month

Highway of Darkness: A Mystery Reader’s Road Trip Up California’s Highway 99 by Jane Rosenthal

Twenty Books of Summer 2021

 

It's been ages since I've signed up for any challenges but I'll give this one from 746 Books a try. 

 

Since the number twenty is not a challenge for me (I've already read over 80 books this year), I decided to do something to make it more challenging. Project Gutenberg is one of my favorite places to explore so I decided to read twenty books from there -- all with the word "summer" in the title. So I did a quick word search. Of course the results did not all have the word in the title; some were in the author or subject field. For some it wasn't obvious why they came up.

After eliminating those, I still had way more then twenty results. I sorted them to get a variety. There were a lot of travel journals and children's books so I just took a sampling of those. Even so, I ended up with more than twenty but I know from past experience that the some stuff on Gutenberg can be too tedious to finish. Therein lies the Challenge! (That and taking time to write brief  reviews.)

Fiction (5):

Summer by Edith Wharton  (read 6/18)

Staccato Notes of a Vanished Summer (from Literature and Life) by Howells

Tamawaca Folks: A Summer Comedy by L. Frank Baum

Indian Summer by William Dean Howells 

Indian Summer by Emily Grant Hutchings (read 7/24)

Short Stories (3): 

Summer Guests by James H. Schmitz (read 7/8)

Rocket Summer by Ray Bradbury (read 8/3)

Summer Snow Storm by Stephen Marlowe (read 7/9)

 

Poetry (4):  

Summer of Love by Joyce Kilmer (read 8/12)

A Summer's Poems by Francis J. Lys (read 7/21)

Mortal Summer by Mark Van Doren (read 6/19)

Queen Summer; Or, The Tourney of the Lily and the Rose by Walter Crane (read 8/3)

  This one for the illustrations:

  

Juvenile (2):

 A Tale of the Summer Holidays by Geraldine Mockler (read 6/23)

The Seashore Book: Bob and Betty's Summer with Captain Hawes by E. Boyd Smith (read 8/30)

 

Nature (3):  

Our Summer Migrants by James Edmund Harting (An Account 0f the Migratory Birds Which Pass The Summer In The British Island) (read 7/25)

My Summer in a Garden by Charles Dudley Warner (read 6/27)

  Because it's in Connecticut

My First Summer in the Sierra by John Muir (read 8/8)

 

Travel (4 titles, 5 volumes):

The Crest of the Continent: A Summer's Ramble in the Rocky Mountains and Beyond by Ernest Ingersoll (read 8/23)

After Icebergs with a Painter by Louis Legrand Noble (read 8/11)

Ultima Thule; or, A Summer in Iceland. vol. 1/2 by Sir Richard Francis Burton and 

    Ultima Thule; or, A Summer in Iceland. vol. 2/2 

Summer Days in Shakespeare Land by Charles G. Harper 

 

Other (2):

My Summer with Dr. Singletary by John Greenleaf Whittier 

Handbook of Summer Athletic Sports by Fred Whittaker (read 8/6)

Kinda Campy, I hope   

 

Extras (2): 

 I'm not sure why these two came up on a search for "summer," but they look like fun so I'll read them!

Ham Sandwich by James H. Schmitz  (read 8/8)

Ernesto Garcia Cabral: A Mexican Cartoonist by G. R. G. Conway  (read 8/8)

April 2021

So much coming and going this month. Two (2)- count them -Picnics! Getting back to the usual stuff.

4/5  Post Office; CVS; Stop&Shop (first time in a supermarket in over a year!)

4/6  (am)Mah Jongg; (pm) library; JC Farms: Uncle Bob's Garden Center for roses 

4/7  Picnic! Gillette Castle (food from River Valley Provisions)

4/8  Dentist; Lino's Market

4/13 Mah Jongg

4/16 Em (housemate) 2nd Pfizer dose; Neils donuts

4/20 CVS; Mah Jongg; Neon Deli

4/22 Library (indoor); Lyman Orchards

4/23 Stop & Shop

4/27 Vote (fire district budget); Mah Jongg; Istanbul Gyro & Kabab

4/28 Robert's Food Center; picnic Chatfield Hollow 

4/29 Gassed car; library

  

And, of course, plenty of reading. Most of it good with a couple of disappointments. 

Fiction: 

5 of 5 stars;

The Liar's Dictionary by Williams, Eley

 lots of word fun...

Eleven Sooty Dreams by Draeger, Manuela; translated from the French by Mahany, J.T.

Leapfrog and Other Stories by Rosales, Guillermo; translated from the Spanish by Kushner, Anna
Madrid Tales by Constantine, Helen: translated from the Spanish by Costa, Margaret Jill

A Thousand Ships by Haynes, Natalie
Northernmost (Eide Family, #3) by Geye, Peter

   Liked this better than #1, haven't read #2 yet.
Cobble Hill by Ziegesar, Cecily von

4 of 5 stars:

Bangkok Wakes to Rain by Sudbanthad, Pitchaya
Transcendent Kingdom by Gyasi, Yaa
An Elegant Woman by McPhee, Martha
The Lighthouse Road (Eide Family, #1) by Geye, Peter 

3 of 5 stars:
The Sculptor by McCloud, Scott 

 graphic novel
The Sirena Quest by Kahn, Michael A. 

 somewhat silly adventure by somewhat grown-up former college boys
Half Life by Cantor, Jillian

 Alternative lives of Marie Curie. 

The Killing Tide (Commissaire Dupin #5) by Bannalec, Jean-Luc; translated from the French by Millar, Peter

 Not a bad diversion, may read a couple of more from the series when the mood strikes me.
 

2 of 5 stars:

Sarahland by Cohen, Sam

Afterlife by Alvarez, Julia

Nonfiction:
Sobremesa: A Memoir of Food and Love in Thirteen Courses by Caminos Oria, Josephine 

  A modern romance set to food and place (4 of 5 stars)
Fortune's Many Houses: A Victorian Visionary, a Noble Scottish Family, and a Lost Inheritance by Welfare, Simon

 Interesting house, interesting lives but too much detail of the houses and not enough on the lives. Loved the historical footnotes. (3 of 5 stars)
de Gournay: Art on the Walls: Everlasting Beauty, Hand-Painted Interiors by Gurney, Claud
 Beautiful to look at but I couldn't live in most of these rooms (3 of 5 star)

The Secret Life of Dorothy Soames by Cowan, Justine

  Psychological damage in a childrens home... (3 of 5 stars)

Online:

 

Not your "what I had for Lunch" on Instagram food shots: Family-meal image wins international food photo contest.

 

From Project Gutenberg some lovely Floral Illustrations of the Seasons by M. Roscoe

"Consisting of The Most Beautiful, Hardy and Rare HERBACEOUS PLANTS, Cultivated in the Flower Garden, from Drawings by M^rs. EDWARD ROSCOE"

 

Looking into Lost Persian Architecture through Safavid Manuscripts 

Noor Completes Reconstruction of the Mirror Palace in Iran 

March 2021

Now that I'm fully vaccinated I've resumed some activities but I'm still sticking to essentials. Next month I'll have a dental check-up and resume my mahjong games. Also can do more as my housemate will also be vaccinated. I read plenty this week--lots of library books plus one off my "owned-but-unread" shelves. Once again I think I added more to the latter than I read...

Activities:

3/1   Library to pick up holds and browse! Yes, I went inside but only for about 5 minutes. 

3/4   Library (book drop only); JC Farms: Lyman Orchards 

3/10 Lab Work

3/11 CVS Cromwell

3/12 Eye Dr 

3/15 DR; Library; gas

3/16 Tree removal. I didn't leave home for this (other than moving the cars to neighbor's driveway) but I did have to interact with tree guy who was probably not vaccinated.

3/24  Library pick up & browse; Durham Dari-serv

3/24  Took E to Uconn (Munson) for 1st dose vaccine; Neil's Donuts

Reading:

 

Fiction (roughly in the order I liked them but The Rib King was the only real disappointment among the fiction):

Dear Child by Hausmann, Romy; translated from the German by Bulloch, Jamie
Lost Girls: Short Stories by Morris, Ellen Birkett 

 A fine collection.

Elemental International short stories by various authors and translators (my copy)
The Caretaker by Arbus, Doon
Indelicacy by Cain, Amina

Mona and Other Tales by Arenas, Reinaldo; translated from the Spanish bt Koch, Dolores M.
The Bass Rock by Wyld, Evie
Inheritance from Mother by Mizumura, Minae; translated from the Japanese by Carpenter, Juliet Winters
The Glorious Ones by Prose, Francine 

Archipelago by Roffey, Monique

The Last Garden in England by Kelly, Julia
The Rib King by Hubbard, Ladee

  Started out fine but bogged down...I admit to a bit of skimming...

 

Nonfiction (three good, one meh, and a bomb):

Finding Dora Maar: An Artist, an Address Book, a Life by Benkemoun, Brigitte; translated from the French by Gladding, Jody
The Chiffon Trenches by Talley, André Leon
A Most Beautiful Thing: The True Story of America's First All-Black High School Rowing Team by Cooper, Arshay

The Next Great Migration: The Beauty and Terror of Life on the Move by Shah, Sonia 

  this was kind of disjointed and, not exactly to the point (of the title), wish I hadn't bothered..

Leave Only Footprints: My Acadia-to-Zion Journey Through Every National Park by Knighton, Conor 

  Too much "I" more a memoir than a travelogue, he tried to give a thematic presentation but ended up just wandering. His skipping all over the place made me want to do the same with his book.  Didn't make me want to visit any park I haven't already visited (and some that I have visited were barely recognizable). 

 

Online:

 I somehow stumbled onto to the site Olive Oil Times which has a lot of good stuff of interest to the industry and the consumer, see:  Remains of 2,500-Year-Old Mill Discovered in Italy  and Volunteers in Italy and Spain to Track Spittlebug Activity both by Paolo DeAndreis. In addition to news there are producer profiles, health info, and a bunch of recipes.

 

Paolo DeAndreis

Paolo DeAndreis

The Mystery of New England's Gray Corned Beef  by Anne Ewbank

 I was wondering about this as we ate our boxed take-out St Pat's dinner.

Yaupon: The rebirth of America's forgotten tea by Matt Stirn

 Humm..wonder is this stuff will grow in Connecticut...according to the USDA apparently not...see  Plant Guide: Yaupon and Plants profile: Ilex vomitoria Aiton yaupon and Willis Orchard Company: Yaupon Holly Tree

 

Iceburger No, not some crazy frozen dessert. This is an oddly compelling site that lets you create an iceberg an see how it floats. 

How Cats Walk In case you were wondering...

10 Incredible Women of Route 66 by Candacy Taylor (Moon Travel Guides). Interesting sidelights for a road-trip. A couple of the links are broken but easily found by Googling. The hotel in Winslow, AZ is where I want to stay if I ever go to the area again. (We stayed at a Holiday Inn in Williams on our cross country trip in 2001.)

Evolution of the House Plan in Europe: from the Industrial Revolution to the Interwar Period

 by Hana Abdel & Christele Harrouk

February 2021

More isolation, more (mostly good) reading, and a reaction to second covid shot. Such an exciting life!

 

Activities:

2/4    Gas; Neil's Donuts; Ace Hardware

2/11  Library (curbside pickup); Lyman Orchards (breakfast fruit & other essentials)

2/17  Library (curbside)

2/21  CVS

2/25  Nissan (key battery replacement); West Side Market (Rocky Hill); traffic check E.Berlin Rt 372

2/26  covid vaccine dose 2 (followed by two days of nothing but sleeping, mild aches, and light eating)

 

The reading was, as usual, all over the map both geographically and thematically.  The Passenger, set in Nazi Germany, and Pigeons on the Grass, set in Post War Munich, went nicely with Endpapers a family memoir that covers both periods and more.

 

Fiction: 

The Adventures and Misadventures of the Extraordinary and Admirable Joan Orpí, Conquistador   

 and Founder of New Catalonia by Besora, Max  (a fun romp)

The Passenger by Boschwitz, Ulrich Alexander
Pigeons on the Grass by Koeppen, Wolfgang

The Theory of Flight by Ndlovu, Siphiwe Gloria (Zimbabwe?)
The Cat and The City by Bradley, Nick (the city here is Tokyo)
The Mission House by Davies, Carys (India)
The Last Moon Before Home (Moon Trilogy, #2) by Dzikowski, Barbara J. (USA; nice, but not necessary, to have read the first of the trilogy)

At the Edge of the Haight by Seligman, Katherine (Post hippie Golden Gate Park, these are not flower children)

The Ancestry of Objects by Ryckman, Tatiana (meh)
White Ivy by Yang, Susie (My least favorite of the month)

Nonfiction:
Uprooted: A Gardener Reflects on Beginning Again by Dickey, Page (This was a nice read. In the past the garden (in northwestern Connecticut) has been open occasionally for tours. I hope they can do it again. It would make a good day trip)
Endpapers: A Family Story of Books, War, Escape, and Home by Wolff, Alexander   
The Doctors Blackwell: How Two Pioneering Sisters Brought Medicine to Women and Women to Medicine by Nimura, Janice P.
 

Online:

I won't be trying this at home. I never even got past a simple paper airplane...

These impossibly detailed origami figures are made of a single piece of paper Thousands of folds. By Lilly Smith "Several months. One sheet of paper. Juho Könkkölä’s origami characters have to be seen to be believed."

 

Speaking of Neil's donuts...

Food & Wine magazine names Neil's Donuts as Connecticut's best

 

And still on the calorie laden treats theme...

I am impressed with once having a First Lady who behaves as a human (as opposed to a clueless mannequin) that I have been following Dr. Jill on Twitter. Sooo...when Dr. Jill visited a DC bakery. The Sweet Lobby I couldn't resist checking out their site. I was quite taken with their boozy Cocktail Cupcake Menu. I shared this find with my housemate and she countered with a local source of treats -- Nora Cupcake Company -- which offers several cupcakes featuring boozy additives. So we spent a pleasant few minutes at our laptops in a sort of Cupcake War, reading delicious descriptions to each other.

Best Places to Visit in Europe (according to USNews)

I love lists like this one. They open up memories of places I've been to and dreams of places I'd like to go. It's a good list of 25 places, 16 of which I've visited.