Clik here to view.
How should one read a book?
First delivered as a speech to schoolgirls in Kent in 1926, this enchanting short essay by the towering Modernist writer Virginia Woolf celebrates the importance of the written word. With a measured...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Land below the wind
When I got this photo of Padma's arrival at HARRIS Tuban for her first night in Bali, she had already boarded next morning's flight to Balikpapan where she was met at the airport by her cousin and...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Happiness on a stick!
Last night I plugged in a USB stick with the audiobook of Bill Bryson's "The Road to Little Dribbling" on it while waiting for my usual nightcap, the ABC's Late Night Live at 10 o'clock. I must've...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Was I supposed to drink that stuff?
Looking out the window and seeing the "Rauhreif" on the grass, I'm not surprised they've dropped the term "global warming" in favour of "climate change". Of course, the real agenda of "climate...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Exodus
Trailer Having grown up in post-war Germany where we were all saddled with the collective guilt of what had been done to the Jews during World War II, Leon Uris's 1960 novel "Exodus" was required...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Thanks for leaving your hairdryer behind, Padma!
Day Four of being monarch of all I survey. Before Padma left, she told me to stay active, so I romped up to the local gym today. Confused by all those bouncy girls on different exercise machines, I...
View ArticleClik here to view.
How to read a book
Reading is a basic tool in the living of a good life, and never more so on a crisp and cold winter's morning at "Riverbend". "How to Read a Book" is the classic and definitive guide to reading...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Do I have to shave my head and don a saffron robe to keep it that way?
Padma sent me this photo of herself and an old schoolmate from their three-day retreat at the Vihara Muladharma Buddhist monastery in Samarinda. She must've swapped her good karma for the camera in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
This one is going to be HUGE!
While Padma is meditating with her eyes shut at the Vihara Muladharma Buddhist retreat, I don't expect much shut-eye over the next three days from Monday through to Wednesday, with the worst on...
View ArticleClik here to view.
"All vely nice and all served with flied lice"
It's been a strange sort of day: first I found a hat full of money, and then I was chased by an angry man with a guitar. The only reason I'd driven into the Bay was to stock up for another week on...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Can you tell the difference?
Back in 2021, Colliers in Wollonging published this real estate advertisement, "This is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity to own this very unique and highly sort after piece of Australia. A...
View ArticleClik here to view.
My first attempt at Artificial Intelligence
I'm all for Artificial Intelligence, but not while there is still an acute shortage of the real thing. Anyway, today I took an old photo taken of myself just before we left Berlin during the...
View ArticleClik here to view.
If
My favourite poem read by "The Man Who Would Be King" I f you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Hard New World
This essay's title is not just a clever play-on-words - think Aldous Huxley - but a penetrating and chilling insight into Australia's place in a post-Trumpian world by Hugh White, Emeritus...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Twenty-five years too late for me!
I've just come back from town where I went very early this morning to put the trusty old FORD Focus through its annual service. While I was waiting for the car, I popped into the Salvos' op-shop...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Schachnovelle
Den ganzen Film kann man, auf 50 Teile zerstückelt, hier auf YouTube finden Die "Schachnovelle" ist eine Novelle von Stefan Zweig, die er 1941 und 1942 im brasilianischen Exil schrieb. Heute gilt...
View ArticleClik here to view.
One photograph; so many memories!
My PEUGEOT 504 in the foreground; the Karaweik Palace in the backgroundI named our first home at Cape Pallarenda in Australia after it: KARAWEIK Would you rather have loved the more, and suffered...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Wer einsam ist, der hat es gut!
You don't have to understand German to understand the message in this video clip: being alone at home. I have just discovered that I like it. My life is very simple. I read a lot of books. I watch...
View ArticleClik here to view.
It's been a couple of dark and stormy nights ...
And we may be in for one more bad night before things begin to quieten down on Thursday. I've been holed up in the bedroom with the electric heater switched to HIGH, reading, writing, and listening...
View ArticleClik here to view.
"Herr Görmann ist aus eigenen Wunsch ausgeschieden, um im Ausland eine...
Als achtzehnjähriger Lohnbuchhalter in 1963 oder 1964 irgendwo zwischen Walsrode and Verden wo wir die Autobahn von Hannover nach Bremen bauten.Im Hintergrund ist mein "Schlafzimmer" und der Ölofen...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Read it while you can still be sure it's only fiction
Sam Neill reads an abridged version of the book. For the unabridged version, click here Putting things on lay-by was very popular when I arrived in Australia in the 1960s. I guess they are not so...
View ArticleClik here to view.
A whiff of Passionfruit & Pepperberry
The label reads, "Passionfruit & Pepperberry". Am I supposed to drink that stuff? These days, my ability to remember song lyrics from the 60's far exceeds my ability to remember why I walked...
View ArticleClik here to view.
I'm back at "Riverbend"
While Padma was waiting at Samarinda airport for her flight to Yogyakarta (she's been gone for more than a week and I have almost forgotten what she looks like, but I think she's the third one...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Das Wunder von Bern
Click on "CC" or "Settings" for English subtitles The 1954 FIFA World Cup Final is often listed as one of the greatest matches in World Cup history, and also one of its most unexpected upsets. In...
View ArticleClik here to view.
It's that time of year again
Death and taxes are two unavoidable certainties in life. I'm glad I learned as much as there is to know about taxes instead of, let's say, parallelograms which only comes in handy during...
View Article