November 2017 TBR

I don't normally publish a monthly TBR, and November 2017 isn't going to be a normal month. Mainly because my eyes are always bigger than my stomach. I make massive piles of books and know that I will only get through a handful. It can be somewhat dispiriting.

I'm going to participate in two readerly activities this month, so I thought I would think about what I would try to read. Firstly it's AusReadingMonth at Brona's Books. A month long reading celebration of all things Australian. What's not to love? Actually I could probably just participate by blogging all the books I've read but haven't blogged yet, but where's the fun in that? So I scanned the nearest stacks and found these books.

I'm also looking to participate in Nonfiction November. This is a new one for me. I have quite a bit of  nonfiction lying about in the TBR. I'm not a regular nonfiction reader but enjoy it when I do. I'm hoping to get a few of these read this month.

Happily some of them are crossovers, some Aussie nonfiction. And I'm still working my way through my #springreadingstack. Actually I'm not doing too badly with this one. I've read 5/10 so far. (And sadly it stayed at 5/10... but bring on the #summerreadingstack)

War on Waste

A few months ago I watched the ABCs War on Waste. Twice actually. I've always been careful with recycling, trying to be responsible, but this three part series was eye opening in so many ways.

Seemingly simple objects such as bananas are subject to so many rules. The supermarkets have strict size and shape guidelines to make our bananas uniform. The most common banana, the Cavendish, can't be too straight, while the Lady Fingers can't be too bendy. Neither can be too long, or too short. Of course bananas don't know this and many bananas are rejected, and never sold by the growers resulting in literal banana mountains of waste. 

It was completely shocking to me to see teenage girls who only wear clothing once! Who do they think they are? They are certainly not Kardashians. It is difficult I guess where weekly magazines will often ridicule, or at least point out, when celebrities wear the same piece of clothing more than once. It never occurred to me though that "regular" people would take that on though.

The real game changer for me though was the notion of soft plastic recycling. I'd never really heard of this before. I knew that you could take supermarket plastic bags back to special bins at the supermarket for recycling, and did that when I needed to, but I had no idea that Coles particularly was running a scheme called Redcycle. It's fantastic and a great way to keep soft plastics out of our oceans, rivers and landfill. Soft plastics are most dangerous to marine life, a floating piece of glad wrap or plastic bag looks just like a jelly blubber and lots of animal species will try to eat it.

My Coles supermarket had a nondescript green bin, which now post War on Waste has a new sticker proclaiming the full purpose.

I've taken to soft plastic recycling with such gusto, it's pretty much become a new hobby. Of course it is more important to try and avoid plastic use in the first place, rather than just recycle. The plastic we recycle is sent to China by boat, at tremendous cost, and incredible use of resources. 

War on Waste is still available on iView until 18 Jan 2018. 

Five Give Up The Booze

I was openly coveting Enid Blyton for Grown-Ups since the first time I saw them about a year ago, even though I was worried that the joke might wear a little thin over a whole (short) book. A lovely friend of mine bought me two of the books when I was in Sydney a few months ago. This week I finally had the time to get to one, so I picked up Five Give Up The Booze. And what a hoot it is. 

The four cousins of Blyton's Famous Five- Julian, Dick, Anne and George are now all grown up. They're in their late 20's, they've finished uni, they're living and working in North London. They all share a flat and have developed a bit of a big drinking lifestyle. Dick pops into the pub for pint without thinking about it. Julian slugs away at port over Christmas. 

Five Give Up The Booze starts as many similar resolutions do with a very big night out at a New Years Eve party that gets just a little out of hand. They all preload with champagne cocktails before heading out to what they expect will be a bit of a dull party, one that will end up as an early night. 

'That's settled, then,' said Julian. 'Let's see if we stick to them. And guys, how about we aim to get out of here good and early? Stick around for the glass of champers at midnight, two verses of "Auld Lang Syne" and then back into a cab? I'm fond of Jessica, but her parties are tame, even by our standards.'

Oh haven't we all been there and done that? Anyway, the night turns much bigger than they expect, and the next morning is not pretty, it's not comfortable. So the cousins decide to do a dry January, giving up the drinking and the alcoholic blackouts for the month. 

The reworked original illustrations are just perfect. 
Click on the image to read the caption. 

Five Give Up The Booze is a perfect cautionary tale- both of the hard living lifestyle of so many young people, and how tedious it can be going a whole month without the grog. 

He loved booze. He missed booze. Just a few more hours of sobriety, to prove I don't need it, he thought. 

Timmy the dog is still with us, even though he must be about 75 years old, and much humour comes from his view of things, and his elderly digestive system. 

I'm sure that my childhood devotion to Enid Blyton's Famous Five as a child helps colour my reaction to this book, but I think you could approach it with less knowledge. I read all of the original books in my own childhood, and remembered them very fondly. Then about 10 years ago I read all 21 books aloud for night time reading for Master Wicker. Now that's maternal devotion. Even I was really struggling by #13. 

Like most things there's an interesting back story to the creation of the Enid Blyton for Grown-Ups series. And the famous "lashings of ginger beer" actually comes from an early 80s TV series Five Go Mad in Dorset which I'd somehow never heard of. But Jennifer Saunders, Dawn French and Adrian Edmondson (who all look terrifyingly young) reworking the Famous Five! Wow, I'll be chasing that down very soon. 

I can't wait to get to Five Go Gluten Free.

Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon the Third

Today is the 10 year anniversary of Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon, so I guess that there have been 20 readathons. Even though I knew about it for a long time I wasn't able to get organised, but I finally did last year, and loved it so much that I've been scheduling so I can participate. This is my third time. And possibly my most disorganised...

Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon is an international even,t so time zones make it interesting. Here in Eastern Australia it starts at 10 or 11 pm on Saturday evening. Australian Eastern Summer Time in October is the 11pm start time. I was still at work at 11pm. I was meant to finish at 11.30, but got home at about 2am. Obviously you're a bit tired at that stage and it's not an ideal time to be starting anything. 

I'd also worked Friday evening, had not all that much sleep, had been up early Saturday morning to travel to a book sale, so have been even more tired than normal. I've barely stayed awake til now. But 14 hours in I think I'm finally awake. 

I have made a little progress so far. I picked some easy reads to start off. 

I finished off the last 52 pages The Dress. 

I read Bill's New Frock. (96 pages)

So I'm at 148 pages total. I need to settle down on my next book. I'm not sure what it will be yet. I didn't really refine my TBR prior to starting. I'm still working on my #springreadingstack.

I've read 5/10 so far

I gathered together some other options of course. 

But I may read any of the other unread books I have all over the house, depending on where my mood takes me. 

Ever since I discovered Booktube a few months ago my reading has taken a dive as I watch other people talk about (or sometimes do) their own reading. My goodreads target dropped from on schedule for most of the year to 5 books behind! I need to whittle that down some more today. I've got a few partially read books languishing next to the bed, I want to finish some of those and read some others. There's always so much more reading to do.  

Tally ho!

Update 1700 (6 hours to go)
Well I've slept some more, but have managed to finish the last 44 pages of One For The Books, which I started on June 27. 

Pages  192
Books completed 3
Sleeps 1
Naps 3

Update 1900 (4 hours to go)
No naps since the last update!

I read 118 pages of Amulet #1 The Stonekeeper. 

And I listened to the first three chapters of Moby Dick Big Read whilst out walking the dogs.

And I was surprised! Really surprised. I really liked it, and will keep going. Moby Dick Big Read is free to download. Each chapter has a different narrator- some famous, some not. I wondered how I would like that. So far I haven't minded that, the main difficulty is the large and obvious differences in the technical production and sound quality. 

Pages  310
Books completed 4
Chapters of Moby Dick listened to 3
Sleeps 1
Naps 3

Update 2200 (1 hour to go)
I did some real lifing for a few hours, but have read 74 pages of Amulet #2 The Stonekeeper's Curse.

Pages  384
Books completed 4
Chapters of Moby Dick listened to 3
Sleeps 1
Naps 3

Final Update 2300

I finished Amulet #2 The Stonekeeper's Curse.

Pages  529
Books completed 5
Chapters of Moby Dick listened to 3
Sleeps 1
Naps 3

Not quite the result I was looking for, but 529 pages in a day is way more than I would normally read.  And I'm back on track for my Goodreads 2017 Challenge! YAY!

Now for the hard part- I need to blog my reads. I never got to finish blogging the reads from my first two readathons. Must try harder this time. 

Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon The First
Dewey's 24 Hour Readathon The Second

As always I'm joining Brona in #teamanz

15 YA Books That Live Up to the Hype

This week a lovely list from the team at Epic Reads of 15 YA books that live up to the hype. I've only read one of these and it certainly did live up to the hype. Nice that there are three Australian authors (of two books) on the list. 

The Hate U Give - Angie Thomas

Simon Vs The Homosapiens Agenda - Becky Albertalli

Throne of Glass - Sarah J. Maas

The Darkest Minds - Alexandra Bracken

The Sun is Also a Star - Nicola Yoon

This cover is cooler than I realised

Three Dark Crowns - Kendare Blake

The Girl of Fire and Thorns - Rae Carson

Carry On - Rainbow Rowell

Graceling - Kristin Cashore

Six of Crows - Leigh Bardugo

Red Queen - Victoria Aveyard

(On) Jellicoe Road - Melina Marchetta

Daughter of Smoke and Bone - Laini Taylor

Illuminae - Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff

The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue - Mackenzie Lee

1/15

Most of these books aren't really to my taste, so I don't aspire to read all of them, but I am embarrassed not to have read On Jellicoe Road and Illuminae. 

June 2018 2/15

Eat Melbourne 2017 Edition

It's no secret that I love Melbourne. I've had a wonderful relationship with Melbourne since 1987 when I lived there for a year. These days I try to visit as often as I can. Often I get there for Melbourne Writers Festival, one of my very favourite times of the Melbourne year. And so it was again this year. And once again I ate out for the entire ten days.

It's always a cracking pace in Melbourne and within hours of landing I was at the Sofitel for bubbles. Comme d'habitude. 

After dinner elsewhere we were back for more bubbles and some some fantastic back of house leftovers from a function (the perks of friends in high places).

The next morning, rather predictably, we were once again at Shark Fin House in Little Bourke St for yum cha. There was much deliciousness consumed.

Excuse my bad photo, but these are fab-
a definite favourite
lotus root and seafood

Saturday night was a dinner at Philippe. A return visit for the beautifully tasteful French food. 

Prawn in brik pastry. Amazing. 

Cassoulet. Robust and gorgeous

Ouef a la neige, hazelnut praliné,
vanilla bean sauce anglaise
Transcendental

Many of my Melbourne excursions consist of Another Day, Another Yum Cha, but this time there was sadly only two. Another visit to Tim Ho Wan. There may have been more than two dishes...

I'd been aware of Supernormal for some time, but had never managed to fit in a visit. This time I made certain I did.  I was by myself this evening, and had a fabulous light dinner at the bar. Hip Melbourne eateries don't have great lighting, excuse my poor low light photography skills. I need to go back in a group to sample many more things.

A scallop special
Delicate and extraordinary 

The legendary Lobster Roll
brought back memories of my childhood,
sweet fresh crab sandwiches
 made with crabs caught that day by my grandfather

Pan fried pot sticker dumplings
Supernormal is very accomodating for solo diners
I had 3 dumplings not the usual serve of 5

Naturally I fell in the door of Chin Chin once, or more likely, twice. It's very hip in there, so naturally lighting is difficult whatever the time of day. These two are my absolute favourite dishes (even though I'm far from having eaten my way through the menu), and my meal always consists of these with other things depending on the number of diners. 

Son in Law Eggs with Broccolini,
Herb Salad and Chilli Jam

Pad Seuw of Braised Wagyu Beef
Gai Laan, Rice Noodles and
Crispy Shallots

Chin Chin has just recently opened in Sydney to much excitement. It will be quite some time before I get there, but hope they have the eggs and beef on the menu.  

Most mornings I breakfasted at Bowery to Williamsburg in Oliver Lane. I discovered it last year, and just love it. It's convenient to where I stay, and has fabulous food and great staff. I've worked my way through much of the breakfast menu over multiple visits. 

Corn and sweet potato hash
with bonus thumb

One of my favourite breakfasts, I had this a few days.
Lox and potato latkes

Sour cherries on porridge. Oh my. So very good.
The apple, pecan and cinnamon helped too.

I absolutely fell in love with the
Spiced Hot Apple Tea

One morning I ventured forth to Higher Ground, a super hip cafe at the Spencer St end of Little Bourke St. There is often a queue. The food was worth it, the service a bit hit and miss. 

Avocado, seed cracker,
macadamia feta, mojo verde
poached eggs, toasted and fresh seaweed
So many phytonutrients!
With a side of Berkshire bacon-incredible. 

Other new experiences this year included:

The hunt for Butterbing was more exhaustive than I anticipated, but I finally found some at a cool cafe called Kinfolk, that looked well worth checking out at another time. 

They may have looked better before
 being smooshed in my bag for the day

You can only walk past these so many times without succumbing, both to temptation and curiosity. 

I was lucky and got a still molten glaze... 

I sought the sage advice from Agathé 

and had a magnificent Paris style chausson aux pommes for breakfast before I popped into The House of Dior show at NGV (which is totally incredible. Stop what you're doing right now and GO)

Naturally I experienced the full gamut of Melbourne weather in my 10 days or so in the city. One morning in particular you could feel the wind coming off the Antarctic, and yet after I spent 5.5 hours in The House of Dior (what did I say? It's jaw dropping. GO!) it was so warm that I was compelled to have a gelato whilst wandering about at Southbank. 

Gingerbread and banana

I wandered into Doughboys a little late in the day one day and many of the deliciousness was already sold out. Pandan seemed to be a thing this year. I didn't have it so I can't report back. I was sad that whatever the meringue spiked delight in the middle was was sold out. Still I consoled myself with French Toast. 

I discovered that my friends were holding back on knowledge of Jimmy Grants. 

Mr Popadopolous may not look much here
but that slow cooked lamb is incredible
fall apart incredible

I ventured into the suburbs a few times this trip (some trips I barely leave Flinders Lane), and it was worthwhile, for the company and the food. Ayam Chef is a Malaysian restaurant in South Melbourne. 

Fried Kueh Teow always my favourite
-those rice noodles...

Beef Rendang with Roti- best ever Roti. 

One night I made a long awaited trip to the Valley Cellardoor at Moonee Ponds. 

The rather incredible Mushroom and Brie pizza,
the Bress pinot was also fabulous

During my Melbourne visit I was limbering up for my Steptember adventures, so I walked out to Collingwood one day to visit the Australian outpost of Parisian boulanger Gontran Cherrier. They have somehow evaded my grasp in Paris, but Collingwood was on the list for this visit. I've been meaning to get there since they opened of course. 

Lovely flaky croissants

The sadly for next time
pain au chocolat

I was very intrigued by the squid ink bread,
but it too fell in the next time basket

There may have been some pastries of deliciousness consumed that night in Moonee Ponds, but there's no photos so perhaps it didn't really happen. 

See my previous Eat Melbourne adventures. 

Eat Melbourne 2016 Yum Cha and Dumpling Edition

Eat Melbourne 2015 My Paris Day in Melbourne

Eat Melbourne 2014

Saturday Snapshot is a wonderful weekly memenow hosted by WestMetroMommy

This post is linked to Weekend Cooking
a fabulous weekly meme at BethFishReads