Another Hot & Dry Week

Before this week is over (it is Friday already!), let me quickly write up last week. It was once again hot with the coolest day at 30C/86F and the hottest at 35C/95F and not a drop of rain. I hardly went walking other than what was necessary to shop for groceries or to get to and from train stations. There were two birthday parties to attend, plus the solar eclipse to watch.

On Monday (10 August), I arrived home from Offenburg with a half hour delay. It didn't really matter, as I had no appointments or calls lined up, but just worked at my own pace with an early afternoon nap in between. My flat wasn't overly hot and stuffy because of course I had pulled all the blinds down and windows shut to keep the heat out while I was away for the weekend, and was home still early enough to let some fresh air in before it got too hot.

Tuesday (11 August) was the coolest day of the week, starting at a lovely 18C/64F and getting to a mere 30C/86F during the day. I managed a sunset walk of about an hour on the fields that evening.

It was not only my Mum's birthday on Wednesday (12 August) - she turned 82 - but also the Solar Eclipse. 

Photos taken earlier that day at my Mum's by my sister, who brought her the flowers.

Mum on her balcony

I worked at the office in Weilimdorf and, once I was back in Ludwigsburg, met up with my sister to walk to the beer garden where my Mum was celebrating her birthday. 

Crossing the inner courtyard of Ludwigsburg Palace was the quickest way to get to the beer garden.

I don't go anywhere without my fan these days!

There were 7 of us (a couple couldn't make it), and my Mum had wisely ordered the special specs you need to observe the eclipse. Many people had left it too late and found that the specs were sold out everywhere, but my Mum is good at organising things, and she brought enough for all of us.

In the end, only my sister and I walked up the road a little (you couldn't see the sun under the large old trees in the beer garden) and watched the entire "show" - of course all in our Mum's honour :-) Two other guests joined us for the last ten minutes, but my Mum and another couple of guests stayed at the table; they simply weren't all that interested in the eclipse. We found it quite impressive, though, and had a really good view from where we stood in the street.

On Thursday (13 August), I worked from home and left the house only briefly to get a few things from Aldi. 

Friday (14 August) was busy: Because it was going to be another hot day, I cleaned my flat in the morning and also swept the staircase in our house (4 levels), so that I would be finished before the thermometer climbed to 35C/95F again. After that, I worked at my desk until lunch time, while also boiling pasta and preparing the other ingredients´for a salad to eat in the evening .

I went briefly to my Mum for an errand, and later in the afternoon to my neighbour so that she could hand me her keys. The family are away now for two weeks, and I am looking after their cat and two rabbits, house plants and mail like I already did at the end of May/start of June.

My husband arrived at around 10:00 pm, and we ate some of the pasta salad before heading into town, where the annual Wine Fest (Weinlaube) was in full swing.

The logo projected onto the back of Townhall; the Weinlaube takes place in the courtyard by the building in the middle of town.

We listened to the live music (which wasn't brilliant but not too bad, either) and had a drink. While we were queuing for another drink, I told O.K. of a former class mate and at one time close friend whom I had not seen in a while but wouldn't be surprised to bump into here at the fest. Guess what - with our drinks in hand, we walked to find a place when I spotted the very same person I had just been talking about! Sandy and I hugged and laughed when I told her that I'd practically conjured her up. She introduced us to the man she was with, and we chatted for quite some time until we really, really were tired and ready to go home; it was about 1:30 pm when we were back at my flat.

On Saturday (15 August), I took advantage of the cooler morning air to walk to the bakery for some fresh rolls and croissants for our breakfast. We went for a walk after that, followed by a rest at home.

The neighbours had left mid-morning, still taking care of their pets themselves, so I only needed to start my carer duties in the evening. 

Neo on the door mat in front of his house, a favourite place of his. He is one year old this month.

After that, we changed into nicer clothes; my sister arrived, and the three of us walked the ten minutes or so it took us to reach the Italian restaurant where a friend of ours was celebrating his 70th birthday. The food there was excellent, the service professional and friendly, and the conversation at the table (there were 11 of us) free-flowing. It was a really nice evening, and the heat just about bearable under the large umbrellas in the restaurant's garden.

Sunday (16 August) morning saw me back at the bakery. After breakfast, O.K. and I went for a walk in what goes for "woods" (it is hardly more than a copse) at the southern end of town.

In the early afternoon, we went to see my Mum; later at home, we had a little snack of diced cheese, nuts and crackers with a non-alcholic Crodino Spritz, followed by a bowl of pasta salad each and some delicious ice cream for dessert (Magnum "Crackables" Pistachio, if you want to know). 

When O.K. left at round 8:00 pm for the long drive home, I went to look after my four-legged charges once more; Neo the cat had been there only in the morning. I didn't see him again that night but he had obviously been in, since his food dish was empty. I made sure that he'd find fresh food when he'd come home, and then called it a day (and a week).

Read in 2026 - 24, 25

Because of my backlog of reviews and other posts I want to write, today I'm publishing two book reviews in one post (also because neither book, in my opinion, really "needs" its own post).

# 24: Voices of the Universe

Elias J. Connor

 

This was one of those books I kept reading in spite of not really enjoying it – I was hoping the story would pick up, and the main character would grow on me.

Neither happened, although the story as such held enough potential.

 

We meet Janie when she’s 12 years old, a shy but not unhappy girl who loves to watch the stars at night.

She thinks a lot about her place as a tiny human being in the vastness of the universe, and writes about her thoughts and dreams in her diary.

 

After the breakdown of her parents’ marriage and her Dad moving away, Janie becomes more and more withdrawn.

She doesn’t get along with her mother, and a first tender romantic interest with a boy at school who seems to understand her ends in tears.

 

University follows, and once again Janie feels like the odd one out.

But it is there, with the help of fellow students and a handful of other people, that she finally asserts herself and even finds love.

 

Life looks really good for Janie now – until she receives very sad news…

 

I am not going to say more about the actual story, only that Janie goes through more ups and downs until the book ends with her peaceful death at old age.

 

The story itself is not bad, but the writing is repetitive, and continuity is not always maintained. For instance, as an adult all of a sudden without explanation Janie and her mother are very close and supportive of each other, when before they hardly spoke, and Janie lived away from home.

Also, editing wasn’t up to scratch – apart from the repetitiveness, there are several instances where Janie’s and her daughter’s name are muddled up, and her daughter suddenly is called her grandchild when she is actually Janie’s mother’s grandchild.

I am quite picky when it comes to such inaccuracies; small mistakes, but they could be so easily avoided.

 

Not a total waste of time but definitely not a must read, and I am glad that it was a free ebook and didn’t cost me more than the time I spent reading it on the train.

 

 

Not my picture, but the same edition

# 25: Rembrandt’s Hat

Bernard Malamud

 

My book-swapping friend A. lent me this paperback, and no doubt she’ll want to know my opinion.

Well… it is hard to really explain my impression of this collection of short (and not so short) stories.

My overall verdict is that I can very well go on living without ever reading anything by Malamud again, while I don’t doubt his skill and talent as a writer at all.

 

It is simply that I could not engage with the stories, on no level.

Some of them are outright absurd or bizarre, but not in a funny way (at least not according to my sense of humour).

Others are simply sad, leaving me as a reader somewhat downcast while at the same time relieved that my life is nothing like what is depicted in the story.

 

I guess Malamud and I got off on the wrong foot when I started to read the first story and was appalled by his nasty description of a girl with Down syndrome.

The collection of stories was originally published in 1973, but some of the stories are older, from the 1950s and 60s.

 

Although Malamud as an author’s name was familiar to me from my years working at the library, I’d never read anything by him before now.

Maybe I am the one being nasty now, but I honestly can’t see what made him win the Pulitzer Prize – at least not based on these stories.

Read in 2026 - 23: Elsewhere

Elsewhere

Gabrielle Zevin

My sister lent me this paperback during our recent holiday in Ripon, and I finished it on our last night there.

It is a Young Adult novel in the genre “Magic Realism” (according to wikipedia), but although my own Young Adult time was decades ago, I enjoyed the book very much.

 

The idea behind the story is that people who die are neither here nor there, but elsewhere.

And “Elsewhere” is indeed the place where 15-year-old Liz lands after she dies in a hit and run accident while cycling to the mall, where she was supposed to meet her best friend to help choose her prom dress.

 

Although Liz makes a friend during the passage on the ship to Elsewhere, and upon arrival meets her grandmother (who died before she was born), and Elsewhere doesn’t seem a bad place at all, she longs for her life back on Earth. 

As a teenager, she still had so much ahead and so much to look forward to, and she can not accept that she’ll never be 16, never will have a driving license, graduate from High School, go to college, move out from home and generally do all the things on does as one is growing up.

 

Will she come to terms with her new “life”?

 

There was a lot in this book to like. Most of the characters are like real people, their thoughts and actions plausible. I guess my favourites were Betty, Liz’s grandmother, and the dog she adopts (yes, pets go Elsewhere, too, when they die).

I wasn’t quite in agreement with the ending, but that’s just my personal taste, I suppose.

It was my first read by this author. My sister has more, and I might borrow them from her, too. Clicking on word "wikipedia" above takes you to the entry about the book, which of course links to an entry about the author, which I knew nothing about until reading up on her.

Read in 2026 - 22: Queen Esther

Queen Esther

John Irving

It’s been a while since I last read an Irving, and I remember that I have not liked each of his books to the same extent. My favourites so far were “Widow for a Year” and “Owen Meany”.

For my birthday this year, my sister gave me “Queen Esther”, and although I have finished it weeks ago, I only now got round to writing my review.

 

In short, it’s a great read. Irving’s handling of language, his descriptions of characters, places and situations as well as dialogue are at their best in this book.

The decisions people take and how they deal with each other may not always be plausible or relateable, but that’s life, isn’t it – we don’t always “get” other people and why they do (or don’t) what they do (or not).

 

The book spans eight decades, following Esther’s life and that of her son from 1905 to 1981.

There are occasional dips further back in time to when Esther’s Au Pair employers (and something like adoptive parents for her) were young.

 

I’d say that the life of Esther’s son takes up more room than hers, but she is always hovering in the background even when she is elusive.

 

Born in Vienna and orphaned at the age of 4 after her father dies on the ship to Portland and her mother is murdered by anti-Semites in Portland, Esther is unwavering in her determination to live as her mother taught her, as a Jew, She is exceptionally clever and loved by everyone at the orphanage. When she is 14, the Winslows, a philanthropic New England family, take her in as their latest Au Pair. They aren’t Jewish themselves but despise anti-Semitism.

Again, she is loved by the entire family and fully returns that love.

 

The youngest daughter, Honor, wants a child but without all the physical things involved from conception through pregnancy, giving birth and breastfeeding. Esther, on the other hand, has an insatiable appetite for knowledge and life and wants to at least try everything she can - including pregnancy and birth.

Together, the two young women work out a solution that satisfies them both – Jimmy is the result, with Esther as his biological mother but Honor the mother he grows up with.

 

In the 1960s, he studies in Vienna and makes friends for life there. His approach to fatherhood is as unusual as that of Esther and Honor to motherhood, but it all works out in the end, making for happy families and lasting friendships.

 

I could go on and on about the various elements of the story; the characters and their quirks, the recurring references to being tall or short, to Jewishness and what it means, to wrestling and working for the Mossad.

But I’d rather have you read the book for yourselves, if you found my brief outline interesting enough. I believe you won’t regret it.

 

There is no need to link to further introduce John Irving, I guess – he is well known and popular enough, and of course he has his own website as well as an article on wikipedia if you want to look him up.