City of Crows
25/05/2018 10:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
izmeinaLast Friday was a gorgeous crisp and crunchy day but today it was raining cats, dogs and elephants. So grey and miserable and the water tank at the Lair is well and truly overflowing. It is either a feast or a famine
Could not help but be reminded of last Friday lurking around the spooky Stirling Square, listening to the radio, reading “Catching Fire” - book 2 in The Hunger Games and finally giving in to the irresistible urge to acquire a big juicy bag of dirt for the Serpent’s garden.
Not the stuff you put on the weeds. It’s more to feed the serpent’s skull with juicy swamp gossip.
It had been an unwritten rule that since being a member of five libraries and especially now that I work part time in the books section of 2 charity shops, that buying new books - especially from overseas for any reason other than as presents for other people was simply inexcusable.
The inner goblin contrasted and compared between Amazon and Book Depository. Amazon’s shipping fees seem to have gotten ridiculously high or maybe that’s because the Oz zloty parity with the USD is now ancient history
Amazon came out slightly ahead for a change mainly due to a credit note that I had completely forgotten about. But there’s new bells and whistles. Tracking is available for all orders now and they claimed that the order would arrive around 8th June just in time for the juicy Singapore Summit
So got back to the dramas in District 12 and thought no more of Amazon owls. So was the Izzie ever so surprised to see a big fat beautiful brown box by the back door on Tuesday
No owl could ever be that quick. Obviously that tax dodging FAILING Amazon were resorting to scavengers to deliver dirt by the crazy David Cay Johnston who doesn’t even KNOW the Donald along with that dreadful LOSER Luke Harding who hangs around with filthy spies who write FAKE dossiers.
Been very very good and did not even peek in the box until this morning while sitting in the garden after planting 3 banksias to keep the birds happy.
On the several occasions that I have dropped by Privet Drive since Petunia has departed, I noticed not just the crows are squawking but NO other birds are lurking around other than the hens who don’t quite count since they are residents rather than visitors.
It was quite creepy and uncanny since the place used to be a veritable aviary
Keeping the forked tongue crossed that this omen carries the usual traditional meaning.
Then yesterday after spending 4 hours tending to my territory of the book shelves in the Salvo’s store, got the notion of being a treacherous serpent and went snooping in enemy territory. The Vinnies store (Saint Vincent De Paul) has a very sad selection of books which are all just randomly stacked and stuffed on the shelves with apparently no rhyme or reason. Just the sort of crawling chaos that a book worm hates. But when the inner serpent whispers, it’s best to listen
And there on the bottom shelf sandwiched between two cook books was Chris Womersley’s “City of Crows” which had been on the wish list since at least last year when he was on numerous Radio National book shows as well as this year’s local writer’s festival. For the princely sum of 2 silver sickles and it was in good as new condition.
It only came out last August so figured it would be a long time before it ever appeared in charity shops.
What got the Izzie ears all abuzz was the story about his source of inspiration. He had been reading Owen Davies’
“Grimoires - A History of Magic Books” and wanted to make use of all the interesting spooky stuff he found within
Of course that leads me to think that there really is no longer any excuse since that very tome has been sitting on the serpent book shelves for a good few years now just gathering dust. It did make it up to the bedside table but there are just so many other temptations and distractions out there
But recent events have got me thinking - at the sad and pathetic rate of 1 book per month or maybe 2 with a bit of effort, that gives me about 250 books to read before departing this mortal coil and that is being really rather optimistic since Izzie is a not too fit, fat and frumpy serpent.
Even if I were to never ever darken the door of another library or bring home another book baby from a charity shop, the bookish loot in the Lair itself could keep me reading for another 9 lives.
So before all those crows come to pick my bones, it is time to get a proper list because life is too short to miss out on good books.
Could not help but be reminded of last Friday lurking around the spooky Stirling Square, listening to the radio, reading “Catching Fire” - book 2 in The Hunger Games and finally giving in to the irresistible urge to acquire a big juicy bag of dirt for the Serpent’s garden.
Not the stuff you put on the weeds. It’s more to feed the serpent’s skull with juicy swamp gossip.
It had been an unwritten rule that since being a member of five libraries and especially now that I work part time in the books section of 2 charity shops, that buying new books - especially from overseas for any reason other than as presents for other people was simply inexcusable.
The inner goblin contrasted and compared between Amazon and Book Depository. Amazon’s shipping fees seem to have gotten ridiculously high or maybe that’s because the Oz zloty parity with the USD is now ancient history
Amazon came out slightly ahead for a change mainly due to a credit note that I had completely forgotten about. But there’s new bells and whistles. Tracking is available for all orders now and they claimed that the order would arrive around 8th June just in time for the juicy Singapore Summit
So got back to the dramas in District 12 and thought no more of Amazon owls. So was the Izzie ever so surprised to see a big fat beautiful brown box by the back door on Tuesday
No owl could ever be that quick. Obviously that tax dodging FAILING Amazon were resorting to scavengers to deliver dirt by the crazy David Cay Johnston who doesn’t even KNOW the Donald along with that dreadful LOSER Luke Harding who hangs around with filthy spies who write FAKE dossiers.
Been very very good and did not even peek in the box until this morning while sitting in the garden after planting 3 banksias to keep the birds happy.
On the several occasions that I have dropped by Privet Drive since Petunia has departed, I noticed not just the crows are squawking but NO other birds are lurking around other than the hens who don’t quite count since they are residents rather than visitors.
It was quite creepy and uncanny since the place used to be a veritable aviary
Keeping the forked tongue crossed that this omen carries the usual traditional meaning.
Then yesterday after spending 4 hours tending to my territory of the book shelves in the Salvo’s store, got the notion of being a treacherous serpent and went snooping in enemy territory. The Vinnies store (Saint Vincent De Paul) has a very sad selection of books which are all just randomly stacked and stuffed on the shelves with apparently no rhyme or reason. Just the sort of crawling chaos that a book worm hates. But when the inner serpent whispers, it’s best to listen
And there on the bottom shelf sandwiched between two cook books was Chris Womersley’s “City of Crows” which had been on the wish list since at least last year when he was on numerous Radio National book shows as well as this year’s local writer’s festival. For the princely sum of 2 silver sickles and it was in good as new condition.
It only came out last August so figured it would be a long time before it ever appeared in charity shops.
What got the Izzie ears all abuzz was the story about his source of inspiration. He had been reading Owen Davies’
“Grimoires - A History of Magic Books” and wanted to make use of all the interesting spooky stuff he found within
Of course that leads me to think that there really is no longer any excuse since that very tome has been sitting on the serpent book shelves for a good few years now just gathering dust. It did make it up to the bedside table but there are just so many other temptations and distractions out there
But recent events have got me thinking - at the sad and pathetic rate of 1 book per month or maybe 2 with a bit of effort, that gives me about 250 books to read before departing this mortal coil and that is being really rather optimistic since Izzie is a not too fit, fat and frumpy serpent.
Even if I were to never ever darken the door of another library or bring home another book baby from a charity shop, the bookish loot in the Lair itself could keep me reading for another 9 lives.
So before all those crows come to pick my bones, it is time to get a proper list because life is too short to miss out on good books.
