Solving a 30 year old cold case is actually very hard — Murder in the Parish (DI Hillary Greene Book 20) by Faith Martin 📚:
Thirty years ago, two days before Christmas, the much-loved Reverend Keith Coltrane was hit over the head and left to die inside his own church. The killer was never caught.
Another enjoyable read in the series — Malice in Tarnished Spaces: (The Pegasus Quincy Mystery Series Book 6) by Lakota Grace 📚 :
When Pegasus Quincy, sheriff’s deputy, steps into the leaky rowboat to investigate a murder at a mysterious artists’ colony, her troubles have just begun.
Yesterday we drove to Palmerston North and watched the excellent movie The Great Escaper starring Glenda Jackson and Michael Caine. 🎥
It was very nuanced, layered and moving.
Based on the true story of 89-year-old British World War II Royal Navy veteran Bernard Jordan who "broke out" of his nursing home to attend the 70th anniversary D-Day commemorations in France in June 2014.
This morning there were 5 Black-fronted dotterels in the estuary.
Black-fronted dotterels are … recognisable by the striking Y-shaped black plumage on the chest contrasting with white plumage above and below, and a conspicuous black stripe through the eye that extends back to the hind neck.
Just before dawn today, with clear skies, a bit of a frost and mist over the ground.
A whole show dedicated to the latest science around our canine companions
I'm looking forward to listening.
Someone on Micro.Blog mentioned the iCab web browser recently. I used to use that years ago. Just paid for a licence. 😁
Bonus: Apple Pay actually worked on my Mac!
Counting on my fingers against the Topic
For the last week my mind has been preoccupied by a Topic. I don't want it to be.
When I walk I like my mind to be free-spirited, bopping around loosely from one idea to another. That's healthy.
Yesterday and today while I was walking Topic kept intruding. Entirely unwanted.
But I've found a tactic that really helps me. As I walked I touched my thumbs to each finger on the same hand in turn, index finger first, and counted: 1, 2, 3, 4. Easy.
Then I started with the little finger. Still easy.
Then I counted up then down on the one hand: 1, 2, 3, 4, 4, 3, 2, 1. That was actually a little harder.
Next I tried counting up, then down without doubling the end fingers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 3, 2, 1, 2, 3, ….
Hmm, suddenly I was unsure if 4 was followed by 3 or not. Finally I reversed the direction of travel.
These tricks totally occupied my brain and Topic couldn't get a purchase. Hooray!
This all reminded me of when I started learning line dancing and my first discovery was that I could count to 1!
Perhaps this trick can help you sometime if you're out for a walk and a Topic keeps bugging you.
And here's a bonus photo of a slightly overexposed Pied Stilt from today's beach walk.
It was a beautiful morning when I went for a walk in the bush at Papaitonga.
We had over 18mm rain last night, and there was probably much more in the hills. Which will be why there are clumps of river weed near the river mouth this morning.
And my other beach find — a little 5-armed starfish.
At the west end of Homer Tunnel, from a carpark below, we can see the avalanche and rockfall protection roofing, and the amazing view down the Cleddau Valley.
On the east side they're rebuilding the avalanche roof which was flattened by a rockfall.
This is wild country.
On our bus tour to Milford Sound we had to wait for 10 minutes to drive through the Homer Tunnel, a 1.2km-long tunnel through solid rock. This was on the east side at an elevation of approximately 800 metres.
Before the tunnel opened in 1954 after 19 years of construction, there was no road access to Milford Sound.
Last week a friend generalised something I said then used it in a way that undermined me within a group we both belong to. There was more to it than that, of course.
I was angrier than I've been in a long time and it's severely damaged our friendship.
It's as though a space rock hurtles down out of nowhere and hits your foot. First you'd be hopping mad, then after a while maybe just hopping. It might take quite some time before you're walking normally again. And venturing outside may even be connected with a bit of anxiety for fear of future space rocks.
The friendship will probably recover … eventually.
Meanwhile, in the rest of the world people have much bigger problems, but this has preoccupied me (decreasingly so) for the last week.
This morning I joined a couple of other members of the Horowhenua branch of Forest and Bird to do a bird count at Waikawa Beach estuary. We don't have so many birds around at the moment, but along with the usuals we spotted a flock of maybe 60 white-fronted terns, and also 5 banded dotterels. 🙌🏼 🐦
What an excellent idea from Kāpiti Coast District Council: Encouraging chatter that matters:
Chatterbox seats aim to normalise a culture of chat. They help connect communities and strengthen people’s mental health and wellbeing. People are encouraged to sit on the Chatterbox seat if they want to chat to someone, and anyone walking past is encouraged to join them for a chat.
One feature of the book Tempting Fête was that every character was introduced with a reference to their race. 📚
That did effectively raise my awareness of my own assumption of default whiteness. So that's something I can work on …
I bought Tempting Fête (Men Who Stitch Mysteries Book 1) by Kate Silvers partly because its designation as A Diverse Cozy Mystery
intrigued me. 📚
It was OK, but the diversity message was truly hammered home. In fact I suspect the diversity aspect was more important than any other elements.
After a recent excellent holiday I fell into a slight slump and finally realised the last 7 years have been intense with local community activity. I need to step back a bit.
I declared the @ custom Micro.Blog finished. That's one.
I also stepped back from the newly forming Waikawa Environment Group.
I didn't manage to find Comet 12P/Pons-Brooks on this very clear night, even though I went to the beach to have a clear view of the western horizon.
I did manage a photo of Orion above the remains of the sunset though. ✨
There were numerous satellites too, everywhere I looked.