Last was in May this year and the next - probably just camping - will be in September.
I am very fortunate in having a friend with a holiday chalet. A group of us go down to open in up and stay for a week or two most years. The only cost is the fuel to get there.
My SO and I usually aim to get another week away - maybe camping, maybe a holiday cottage - later in the year too.
We are in the UK and always go to other location in the UK for holidays. Neither of us have flown since the '90s and have no intention of doing so again.
Personally, I always used to carry a paperback with me and would read in the odd moments that this writer seems to recall as being so dull and soul destroying. I still do carry e-books on my phone of course and use them in exactly the same way - but also with the option of doomscrolling, of course.
As for TV, I was never one for TV - or radio - as background noise. With fiends, I had a bit of reputation of going round and turning such things off when I entered the room, so that we could talk without distraction. I would ask them first, of course.
My ‘big read’ this year is Finnegans Wake - which I am (or have been) reading week by week along with the TrueLit sub on reddit. It would be a profoundly different experience to read it without the analysis and discussion going on there, so that is something…
Otherwise, I am reading The Twisted Ones by T. Kingfisher, which is engaging and entertaining, as was her The Hollow Places which I read immediately before. I am also dipping into a collection of the Para Handy tales by Neil Munro, which are a cosy - if stereotypical and patronising - glimpse into another time and pace of life.
I have just returned from a couple of weeks away during which I finished an anthology of Clarke Ashton Smith short fantasy tales (all about the atmosphere: story and worldbuilding are very much secondary and character scarcely features); Haldor Laxness’s The Atom Station (a sparse look at the clash of modern - written in 1948 - and traditional Icelandic values); and Blackwood’s The Willows (an extrapolation of the original idea of “panic” - as several of this other tales are).
When's the last time you went on a real vacation?
I’m at 17 years. I’ve traveled to fulfill obligations since, but the last time I planned PTO to go somewhere and relax with no set agenda was 2006.
What Did People Do Before Smartphones? (www.theatlantic.com)
Suggestions on espionage/spy shows
Gonna finish off Ghosts of Beirut tonight. Really liking it, and these type is shows in general. Anybody have any suggestions?...
What are you reading? (June 2023)
Hey Beehaw, whatcha reading right now?