Hello fellow Bookworms!
Guess who’s back? Back again? Shady’s back, tell some friends! Oops, sorry! That was a bit of Eminem, lol, but it’s really Chief Bookworm who is back after a brief break last month. Have to admit I was struggling in March, and hadn’t really got going this year compared to the last few years.
OK, I get it, I got a lot read in 2020 and 2021 because there wasn’t much else to do at certain times in those years due to Coronavirus lockdowns, but things got back to something resembling normal in 2022 and so that year and last year I was back to going on holiday, and to gigs and football matches… and still got a lot of books read. Today I finished my 10th book for 2024. It has taken me to 9th April.
In March, when I published that previous blog, I hadn’t finished any books that month at that stage. After publishing the blog, I decided I would give the Ongoing Concerns a break and just read something light and quick, so I got some poetry read and managed to read three books by focusing on that.
Cuppa and an Eccles Cake from Eccles. Hope I’ve not made you too hungry, lol! However, I do hope I’ve made you hungry for some equally-local verse.
Anyway, poetry… first up was It Never Rains, by Roger McGough, who has been one of my favourite poets since I was a kid. I think I was ten when I found my dad’s copy of Watchwords and “borrowed” it! I say borrowed in the sense of long-term borrowing, ha ha!
Another favourite of mine, and a local lad in fact, is up next… John Cooper Clarke. I bought his anthology What at the same time as the Roger McGough one, and that was my second finish for March. My third finish was a re-read of Let the Light Pour In by Lemn Sissay. Actually, Lemn is also fairly local, an adopted Manc so to speak and has been the Chancellor of the University of Manchester. With Roger McGough being a Liverpudlian, it was a trio of north-west poets.
So, that’s my first quarter spread complete in my book journal.
Obviously, with only one blog last month, which didn’t mention books or other events, I’ve got spare lightbulbs in my blog logs, but who knows? One month I might want to blog a lot. I’m just trying to get back into it tonight, though, as I was feeling down last time I published a blog.
I was frustrated with my reading progress, upset that I don’t get feedback on Jet Pack (although I do on Facebook where I also share this blog) and am thus still no wiser as to why some of my blog entries are popular while others get no likes.
I was also frustrated about waiting for an important item I had renewed and those responsible for authorising it and sending it off for me hadn’t done it when they should have done in February, so I had to chase it up, but that eventually arrived in late March and had been backdated a bit as well, so that was a weight off my mind.
Post box topper to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the RNLI, which was early last month. Two hundred years of saving lives at sea around the coast of Britain and Ireland! An awesome achievement, and a cause that my Nana and Grandad, Dad’s parents, used to support. They lived in Malahide, a coastal town near Dublin, so supporting the lifeboats was a logical choice of cause.
This actually brings me on to the fact that my tenth finish for the year, which I polished off earlier today, was Heroes of the RNLI, by Martyn R. Beardsley, and it mentioned our old friend Henry Blogg – you may recall that I mentioned him in one of my blogs a few years ago.
It was the entry published on 23rd January 2021, Wooden Logs and Henry Blogg… and it was because he was mentioned in a book I was reading at the time, The Wrong Kind of Snow, by Antony Woodward and Robert Penn, and it gave a history of his rescuing heroics. I think the entry was for 9th January. You can find that blog entry in the January 2021 archives.
With this being early April and the cherry blossom (sakura) season in Japan, my book journal theme for April is Big in Japan, with plenty of cherry blossoms, plus sushi, origami and Hello Kitty, lol! The playlist is on a travel theme.
A couple of my Ongoing Concerns, one fact one fiction, are set in Japan, but I need to get on with those. However, I have read a bit more of Rambling Man, by Sir Billy Connolly, today so that is now 29% read and I’m aiming to get it to at least 33% before tonight is out. Let’s get the OCs progressing again!
I do have another couple of setups, my general journal and my choir journal, so if they don’t feature in this blog, I hope to remember to show them in the next one.
That is my choir journal setup for April, inspired by the song “‘Cross the Wide Missouri” and also the week by week charts for May through to August. That song is one of my favourites that we sing in the Mancunian Singers.
We have had a lot of changes since the end of last year, and we are still looking for a new conductor, although Tyran, one of our basses, is conducting us at the moment, but we do have a new pianist, although she is not new to me as I knew her back in the late 1990s when I was in the Salford Community Choir!
That was conducted by Julie Parker, but Helen Whitehead was our pianist, so when it was her first rehearsal a couple of weeks ago, I was thinking “I’m sure I know the piano player from somewhere” and during our break we had a chat and discovered that I did know her from a previous choir I was in!
We could do with some more tenors, by the way, so if you’re a fella with a higher pitch range, you fancy a sing, and you can get to Monton Unitarian Church Hall on Thursdays from 8:15 to 10pm, that would be fab! For those who don’t already know, I’m an alto, so I can reach some pretty low notes for a lass. It’s the high ones I have trouble with, lol!
I have got all my monthly spreads on now as that is April in my general journal… Pen Pals! A stationery theme with some very 80s decor and an 80s music playlist!
Didn’t see the eclipse yesterday – here in my part of the UK it was far too cloudy. It has to be at least a bit sunny in order to see the moon getting in the way of the sun! Online friends in the US and Canada got some pretty impressive photos though. I had to make do with listening to “Total Eclipse of the Heart” by Bonnie Tyler instead, ha ha!
That is probably about it for now, I think I have covered all my news about books, stationery, lifeboats, music and other stuff, so until next time, take care and Happy Reading!
Joanne x x x
Books mentioned in this blog entry…
- It Never Rains – Roger McGough
- Watchwords – Roger McGough
- What – John Cooper Clarke
- Let the Light Pour In – Lemn Sissay
- Heroes of the RNLI – Martyn R. Beardsley
- The Wrong Kind of Snow – Antony Woodward & Robert Penn
- Rambling Man – Sir Billy Connolly
Joanne's Bookshelf 