The Booketry

Me and ferries again…

2022-09-16T19:32:32Z

The other day, my family and I went on a little outing. Because of the weather, we went by bus. We actually got to do a little sightseeing (from the bus). Mostly it was very nice. Except for a few things about - ferries. First of all, we ended up getting far too close to a few ferry stops. Again. And that wasn’t even the worst part. At the last one we were driven by a driver with less than optimal driving skills…

We stayed so long at one stop, waiting for a small car ferry, I was getting unnerved. I got a bad feeling about it and sure enough we weren’t just waiting for any potential foot passengers to get off the small car ferry. Did I mention it was small? Anyway, it wasn’t even the kind of ferry that took foot passengers.

We were getting on that small thing, in our extremely heavy bus. 3.5 tons or thereabouts, I think. And with us, also four cars. I felt sure we would sink. I was so terrified I almost began to cry. And pray. And I’m not even that religious.

Right in the middle of the passage we began to feel the current rock us. At the end we felt an unnerving shaking as the ferry connected with the quay (?). Then we were on the smaller island off the one we live on. We went to the other end where there was another scary ferry stop. :/ The way back was a lot less scary.

At least we got to see some interesting ruins of a fort. And a castle we’d visited once before, this time from a distance. A very pretty view.

So all in all we had a good time, but if we’d known about the ferry crossing we never would have gone.

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Clothes and fashion

2022-08-02T19:24:32Z

This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. Fashion. Clothes. Body image.

In the past five years or so I’ve put on several extra kilos. Also, since the C-section, my body looks different. My abdomen sort of lost whatever shape it had before my pregnancy.

After that a chronic condition hit me and I put on so much weight in only three weeks or less (I have photos to prove it) that I couldn’t wear jeans. And I had only just managed to get them on after I had the twins. I can wear jeans now, fortunately.

Then on top of that the pandemic. No more long walks, but instead chocolate, ice cream, cheesecakes, mousses…

So extra weight on a flawed body.

That got me thinking about fashion. Clothes. Most fashionable clothes are ugly rags, meant for young, fit, perfect bodies. And when I say young I don’t mean late twenties or early thirties. Teens, early twenties. They must buy these clothes to make statements. ”Look, I’m young, fit, perfect. I can afford to buy this fashion.”

It occurred to me that I want reasonably priced clothes that are cleverly tailored garments meant to flatter even less perfect bodies. In my colors.

Lately I’ve looked through my wardrobe and found that much in it doesn’t suit me. At least some do.

And I’ve studied people around me. What do they wear? What might I wear to look a little better?

I learned to be brave. Let some of my defects show. Many women or young girls look like me. In my worst moments I refer to myself as a walking sofa cushion. Well, if I look like that, many others do too.

So what do I have that helps me look better?

Some examples:

A pair of slightly too small indigo blue yoga leggings. They’re actually better than expensive shapewear.

A really pretty blue dress, with a flower pattern and a detail that cleverly hides my defects to some extent.

A denim blouse that covers my arms in short-sleeved or sleeve-less tops.

An emerald, A-line, workout top that has an asymmetrical hem (?). It’s so pretty it can be worn as an ordinary t-shirt. It’s also cool during a heatwave.

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Scary Ferry Stops

2022-08-01T09:19:07Z

Since we moved to this island we’ve been close to the sea. Most people love it and I have to admit that sometimes I find it pretty too, but mainly it makes me nervous, even scared. Especially when we are on the bus to or from the town.

There are several ferry terminals and also even more ferry holds (?). I don’t know the term in English. It’s like a ferry terminal without the buildings. The trouble is the bus ends up so terribly close to the edge. Close to deep water.

I’m scared there will be an accident and we’ll end up in the sea. I tense up and don’t relax until we’re away from there.

If only they would build a terminal building, a wall, fence or at least have the bus stop ten-twenty meters from the edge. It wouldn’t be too far to walk to

Here is a link to my photo blog on Tumblr.

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More creepy vines

2021-07-01T20:42:37Z

My sister went out there this morning and took some more photos of the creepy vines and the trees. She thinks it’s ivy and willow trees. I’ve read that willow roots are tricky so it might be the tree’s own roots that have invaded the dead tree trunk. It looks like something out of a horror movie.

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Creepy

2021-06-22T16:12:50Z

I did some research online and now I think I know what happened to this tree. It’s a dead or dying willow tree with ivy growing on it. So the snake like growth are vines, really thick vines. Ugh. It really looks creepy.

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Murder by Misrule by Anna Castle

2021-06-18T07:56:29Z

Since I still don’t have access to a computer, this will be brief. I loved this book. It’s well written, historic and a really good mystery. As if that wasn’t enough, I liked most characters. Some are real 16th century English people. There was also a completely unexpected twist towards the end.

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Reviews

2021-01-13T18:34:26Z

Since I don’t have a computer right now, I would have trouble cross posting, so for now I’ll just post reviews on wordpress (crimsoncorundum.wordpress.com).

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Broken computer

2020-10-13T13:14:32Z

My son has broken my computer. If I ever get a new one I’ll start posting again.

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Funny translations

2020-09-19T14:11:39Z

I follow the clinic that helped me get my little darlings and the text in their posts is never in any language I can understand, only the local language, which is quite tricky for me who is only familiar with some of the most common European languages.

When I use the translator, I always get something funny because the difference between that language and Swedish is considerable.

“(Untranslated word) children born with artificial fertilizer are born to be born.” (Yes!)

“Children who show up with play aren’t any different from hard children.”

Finally, their slogan, it seems: “We take care of your health and your fruit!”

I’m wondering if maybe my son is a banana (or a dragonfruit?) and my daughter an apple? (or maybe a Pepper?) LOL.

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It's bigger on the inside!

2020-09-14T11:32:09Z

A little update about our caravan, which, I have learned, is also called a travel trailer and a camper. We've been able to make almost everything work, except the water in the tap at the sink. The heating works - a bit. Sometimes it's too cold, sometimes too hot and occasionally, just right. All in all, everything works great. We still love our little home. I know some people actually live in their caravans/campers but most of those people probably don't have kids. For us, it's enough that we can stay in it while we're settling a few things here and on similar outings.

To make it more comfortable we'll probably buy a few things like a tent. I'm not sure what it's called in English. It's a special type of tent that you attach to the side of the caravan. Some of them can almost double the space you have access to, and some are actually made for use all year round. I'd love to have one. So we'll see how that goes. Since we're not staying for very long, and it rains almost every day we might not unpack the tent until we get where we're going to be staying for a longer time.

If we are. If we can get a 'real' house we can put the caravan/camper away in a garage or barn or something for the winter. If that's the best thing to do. Apparently, we have to worry about damp. So it might be better to use it or at least sit in it regularly during the winter and open a window. There's so much to learn, but almost eveyrthing we've done so far, has turned out to be quite easy.

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Moved again

2020-09-09T12:38:23Z

We finally managed to move out of our apartment and at the moment, we're back in Sweden, to move out of our house (and the cabin). To have somewhere of our own to stay (we're really tired of hotel rooms and other rented places) we bought a caravan. It's completely new for us. We've never had one before or gone camping. We really love our caravan. It's so cute and actually bigger on the inside (LOL) than we expected. Here it is:

There are only two beds for grownups so guess where the shortest of us three grownups ended up having to sleep? That's right. In one of the bunk beds for kids. It's really cramped and at first I was a bit uncomfortable with that. Since then I've grown used to it, and I'm more comfortable lying there, but it's still really difficult to get out and onto my feet, since the bed is actually on the floor.

We've had a few problems (like how do you get the water flowing from the taps? and how can we get the toilet working as it should?), but the worst part is probably how cold it is. When we 'moved into' the caravan, the salesman had turned the heat up and that got far too hot for us so we turned it off. Big mistake. Now it's quite cold in here (not during the day, but at night). It was really hard going to sleep in that cold. Autumn has really come now and the last of the leaves are falling off the trees.

Despite all that, we're really happy with our purchase. From now on, no more hotel rooms for us. :) Most importantly, no more dragging lots of luggage around Scandinavia. It can all go in the caravan. This may sounds silly, but we named it Cassiopeia. I think the mostly white trailer looks a bit like a spaceship and since Cassiopeia is a star, it seems appropriate somehow.

We seem to have picked a good camping. The service building is really close by, there's a McDonalds almost as nearby and right across the street there are a couple of shops. Less positive is the fact that there are no really nice paths to go for a walk and we're quite far away from the town center so we can't get our phones fixed easily (not without a bus ride).

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Lazy?

2020-09-06T21:41:05Z

All my life I’ve been told I’m ’lazy’. My closest relatives/family members have said ’it’s like it hurts her to...” (do whatever chore I had to do). And: ”All you do is sit and talk (or read)”. Frankly, I’m really tired of hearing those words. It’s as if people who are more active feel they have a right to criticize those who are different from them. I realize that society favors those who are quick and active over us who tend to sit and think. The former are probably more useful. Be that as it may. I have begun to resent being described that way. I’m low energy. I tend to be pensive and think before I act. Is that necessarily bad? So from now on, I’d like to ban the word ’lazy’. Call me a low energy person. I can live with that. My dad was one too, and my aunt (his sister). In return I won’t call the high energy people hyper.

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Changing bag for bigger kids

2020-09-04T08:29:39Z

This may be a boring post for those of you who don't have kids or if your kids are all grown, but I'll make it short, ok? You can scroll right past it. :)

Now that my kids are getting big (will be five in January - it feels completely unreal that I have such big kids!), and my sister has two little ones who are also getting big (almost two and a half), it's been hard to fit everything they need into one or even two changing bags. I have a really cute changing backpack/bag that looks a lot like my first changing bag that I really love (dark blue with silver dots), but it's not enough for all the things we need. So in the end, I decided to do something radical about it. I bought a shopping trolley. Those things are not really cool or anything, but they can sometimes take quite a bit of stuff. My mom didn't see the point, but then again, she's not the one who has to carry all the children's stuff. For a shopping trolley, I think it's quite nice.

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Calamity Under the Chandelier by Camilla Blythe

2020-09-03T13:32:52Z

I just read this book. Normally, I get my freebies from Amazon (or Smashwords or Gutenberg or from the author newsletters I subscribe to. This time it wasn’t available from any of those sites. It was Google Play. I have never used that before so I had no idea what to expect. Since I don’t own an e-book reader like Kobo, that reads epub, and my phone isn’t working, I ended up having to read it on my computer. It was - different. Not nearly as good as reading on something handheld, but since I wasn’t in a position to complain, it was great to be able to read at all.

I must mention a few words about the actual book. At first I didn’t know what to expect, but after a while I got into it and it was quite good. I liked the main character, Cora. There were a number of other interesting characters. Unfortunately, one of the ones I liked, didn’t make it to the end. All in all, it was a good read.

This is what Google Play had to say about the plot:

Hollywood starlets are supposed to be happily on set in sunny California, and not trapped in drafty manor houses during ferocious snowstorms.

But after Cora Clarke's best friend and fellow actress elopes with an English earl, Cora visits England to help her friend brave the aristocratic disapproval of her new husband's family.

Unfortunately, the holiday turns nightmarish when a chandelier crashes down and kills somebody. When suspicion falls on her friend, Cora vows to figure out the identity of the murderer. After all, blizzards have a habit of preventing the police from arriving, and body counts have a dreadful habit of growing.

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Autumn

2020-08-27T14:07:17Z

I guess autumn has come. It’s much colder now and today it’s rained quite a lot. Normally, I’d be a bit sad, but these days with global warming and forest fires, I’m rather pleased. Except it’s quite cold at night. At least that’s quite easy to do something about. As long as it doesn’t rain too much it will be ok. I’ll just need my warmer clothes and my boots. I’d love a couple of new books too, but we’ll have to see about that. The kids always need so much and naturally, they have to come first. If I bought all the cute clothes and boots and so on that I find for my kids, I’d probably go bankrupt.

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Disappointment

2020-08-12T11:46:33Z

I was looking forward to getting my phone back. Now it turns out that the local repair shop won’t fix mine because it’s too old. The same goes for almost every unit we have. They’re old, but still good, except of course that the children have broken the screens. I’m so disappointed. I could get a new phone, but not here, since I don’t have the necessary bank documents. They’re only valid in Sweden and right now I’m not allowed to go back if I want return here. Well, under certain circumstances I could, but that would be very difficult so I hope I won’t have to. At least this situation can’t go on forever. Sooner or later things will have to go back to normal.

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A fool's game...

2020-08-03T16:14:43Z

This really good Swedish/Kurdish singer has come out of the closet for Pride week. I’m assuming that’s why he did it. Good for him. Brave too, not just hot and talented. It’s just that - I’ve had a huge crush on this guy ever since he first became famous for his talent. Now I feel like such an idiot. I know I would never have met him and even if we had and even if he hadn’t been gay, he would never have wanted me, but still - Stupid, silly me. :(

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So hot...

2020-08-02T10:30:04Z

It’s so hot right now. I thought it would be getting cooler. It felt as if autumn was coming. Clearly I was wrong. We try to spend time outside every day (except the weekends, when we try to get things done in the apartment.) I really hope it’s going to get cooler soon.

Maybe I haven’t mentioned it, but my phone is broken (the glass). The repair guy has been on vacation in July and now I’m looking forward to getting my phone fixed. I might even share some photos then, but I can’t make any promises. My phone is so old and doesn’t take any really good photos.

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A cold

2020-08-01T06:34:19Z

Just a few days ago we all started feeling sick. It was an ordinary cold, really, not too bad at all, but we immediately began to feel scared it would be Covid-19. For two to three days we felt really awful (but had no obvious Covid-19 symptoms), but right after that, we began to feel a lot better and now most of us are almost completely well again.

There are so many tourists here and it worries me that sometimes it’s hard to keep the distance. So we were really happy to discover a ’new’ (to us) huge protected area, that is a park. There are paths, benches, trashcans - and of course trees and open spaces kept up open by young people working for the town. It’s a really good place, even though the locals walk their dogs there and some, even tourists, it seems, take their kids there. We have no trouble keeping the distance and it’s calm and quiet. Very nice. Now it really feels as if the center of the city is too crowded for us. At certain times of the day, hordes of tourists pass through the park (the one in the center, not the big one we just discovered). Most people are polite though, but there’s just too many of them, even if I understand that they feel the need to get away from their lockdowns.

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Silly but fun meme

2020-07-19T18:27:32Z

I found this on Facebook and I thought I'd do it, since it's very simple and short. Apparently, my gangster name is the color of my shirt (loosely interpreted) and the last thing I drank. So my gangster name would be Red Water(s)! Which actually sounds like a real name, gangster or not. LOL.

What's yours?

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The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum

2020-07-05T06:26:36Z

I got this book quite early, but it was a book I chose myself, so maybe somewhere between 7-10 years old? Anyway, I enjoyed it even though it was old. It was a Swedish translation. Then we went to England on vacation a couple of times and my sister found four hardcover books with illustrations that belonged in the same series as that first book (that was hardcover too). It wasn’t that expensive back then, or maybe I didn’t notice because my parents paid for it. :)

Most people have read the book at some point so I won’t say much about the plot - a girl from Kansas is ripped from her family, inside the family home, by a hurricane/twister and comes to a magical fairytale country, called Oz. Because she misses her family she tries to get home. That’s basically the story.

I understand. I’d never survive without my family, even though Dorothy was lucky to get her house with her with, presumably, what little stuff she had.

Whenever people ask what fantasy world you’d like to live in most people mention Tolkien’s Middle Earth, Narnia and Harry Potter’s world, but I usually answer Dinotopia. I’m obsessed with that island with cute dinosaurs.

However, since I managed to download a free copy of the e-book, I now also think that the land of Oz might be an attractive option. :) Especially now. (Doctor Who isn’t primarily a book but to live inside the TARDIS would also be cool). For instance, in Oz you have trees that grow breakfast- and lunch boxes and bushes with macaroons. :)

At the moment, my sister and I are also watching the first season of animated tv series called Lost in Oz and seems to be a modern retelling of the original story. It’s actually quite good, even though it’s aimed at children. Older kids, I think, because mine don’t find it that interesting. It’s fun, cute and quite thrilling too.

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The Watchmaker's Daughter by C J Archer

2020-07-04T12:04:41Z

From Amazon’s book page:

India Steele is desperate. Her father is dead, her fiancé took her inheritance, and no one will employ her, despite years working for her watchmaker father. Indeed, the other London watchmakers seem frightened of her. Alone, poor, and at the end of her tether, India takes employment with the only person who'll accept her - an enigmatic and mysterious man from America. A man who possesses a strange watch that rejuvenates him when he's ill. Matthew Glass must find a particular watchmaker, but he won't tell India why any old one won't do. Nor will he tell her what he does back home, and how he can afford to stay in a house in one of London's best streets. So when she reads about an American outlaw known as the Dark Rider arriving in England, she suspects Mr. Glass is the fugitive. When danger comes to their door, she's certain of it. But if she notifies the authorities, she'll find herself unemployed and homeless again - and she will have betrayed the man who saved her life.

This really summarizes the story well. I don’t think I could have said it better. Anyway, this was a good read. I’d read about this book a long time ago and decided I wanted to read it ’some time’. When I had the opportunity to download it for free, I was pleased. I’m even more pleased now. This book was everything I had hoped it would be. It’s very well written. It seems to be a bit ’steampunk’, but to begin with, it comes across mostly as a historic story. India struggles with the role society demands she plays. She knows she has a talent for watches, but doesn’t have a clue how far that talent goes. In fact, there is so much she doesn’t know, but as she works with the mysterious mr Glass, she is beginning to suspect there’s far more to watchmaking than she’s been led to believe. And why do most of her father’s old colleagues seem to fear her?

In my opinion this is a very good fantasy story, at least if you like a sort of alternate history.

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Die Noon by Elise Sax

2020-07-03T15:30:03Z

This book’s cover didn’t impress me much. It wasn’t until I started reading that I realized that it so funny. A good mystery too. Hilarious but serious story. A woman with a troubled past inherits a building and a newspaper in New Mexico. And dogs. Did I mention dogs? She also becomes an instant journalist when the editor recruits her to write a three hundred word story. This is very much like Janet Evanovich’s Stephanie Plum mysteries. So funny. Quite a bit of talk about sex, but hardly any actual sex. A relatively simple murder mystery and a more serious one that doesn’t get resolved in the book. Also, the editor shares his name with my son. A grumpy old man, but still, he has the same name.

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Tarnished Silver by Susan Reiss

2020-07-02T17:01:34Z

When her aunt dies, unemployed software developer Abby Strickland receives an unexpected inheritance of eight cartons of sterling silver. But first, she must deal with the police when her serving piece for a special cake becomes a murder weapon. With blood on the family silver and officers threatening to arrest her based on circumstantial evidence, she has to protect herself. Simon, the black Lab puppy, keeps Abby on her toes. Lured to the crime scene in Saint Michaels, a sailing destination on the Chesapeake Bay, Abby finds a different way of life filled with quirky characters, boat races and a handsome guy, all only ninety minutes from the Nation’s Capital. It’s fun until she is tangled in a web of wealth, greed and family secrets.

This was a well written and well researched mystery. I really liked the characters and I suppose that’s one reason I liked this book so much. It’s a mystery, and it’s about antique silver. I didn’t imagine that I would like that so much, but I did. Abby is nice. Simon is adorable, even though he isn’t Abby’s - she’s just babysitting him for a friend. In Saint Michaels, she meets new friends and ends up really feeling at home there.

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Death on the Diversion by Patricia McLinn

2020-07-01T03:57:36Z

From the Amazon page:

Sheila Mackey has a secret. To the world, she’s author of a blockbuster book. Her wily great-aunt, the actual author, orchestrated this mutually beneficial masquerade. Now the aunt’s retiring and Sheila must draft Act Two of her own life. This cruise is supposed to be the perfect time to do that.Crossing the Atlantic on the Diversion, Sheila finds a dead body on deck. She realizes she knows a whole lot more about the interactions of the victim and suspects than the ship’s officials do.

I enjoyed reading this book. It felt a little odd that Sheila could have lived for years with the deception of being a famous author, but I suppose it would be possible. I can feel that Sheila longs to get her real life back. The fact that she’s on a cruise makes the whole sleuthing go a little easier, I imagine, because no one can get away. All suspects have to remain in place. Traveling with Sheila is a boring relative, who shares a name with my daughter. No one could be more different from my fun, sweet, active daughter. Here’s a tiny spoiler: despite being such a wet blanket, the book’s Petronella ends up being somewhat changed for the better. As most of the books I’ve downloaded, read and enjoyed over the past few months, this was a fun, quick read. It was also well written. I think I’d like to follow Sheila’s future adventures.

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