A for Android (ABC Wednesday)

ABC Wednesday is starting over again this week with the letter A. How appropriate. That gives me an apt excuse (as if I needed one!) to show you my brand new Android phone.

I’ve been thinking about getting one for a while now but since I’m rarely away from home more than a few hours at a time, it has seemed rather unnecessary. However, when my brother demonstrated his new Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc to me when he was here, I got hooked… It was smaller and lighter than any I had seen before. After getting acquainted with it, it didn’t take me long to make up a whole list of excuses to get one myself – a.s.a.p.!

For one thing, it will be good to have it when I have to go out to the House on my own, as we don’t have any computer/internet there now (except when my brother is there). For another, even at home I’m beginning to see the advantages of being able to quick-check emails and Facebook and “whatnot” without turning on the computer. Moreover, it can be used for listening to music and audio books, and for taking pictures and watching films, and…

How do they fit all that into a thing that weighs only 117 g?!

I remember the first so-called mobile phone I ever saw “in real life”. It was 1986 or 87. A gang of us were going out for dinner in the evening, and one married couple brought this thing which was about the size of a car battery*, in case their babysitter needed to reach them. (*A last century car battery, that is. Maybe those have been getting smaller as well - I have to confess I haven’t looked under the bonnet of a car in a very long time!)

It looked something like this:

http://4urfone.blogspot.com/2009/10/old-mobile-phones.html

Tourist Attraction

Friends of mine from 35 years back stopped by for a visit today. After a cup of tea and a chat at my place we also went into town for a short tourist stop at the feet of the giant Pinocchio sculpture before they continued their journey (they were on their way home from a holiday trip). The sculpture by world famous American artist Jim Dine is 9 m high. I’ve shown pictures of him before but with real people at his feet you get a better idea of the size.

Thankful Thursday

It’s Thursday evening, and the rain has been pouring down since early afternoon. Never mind. I’m thankful that it was not raining yesterday. We had good weather for the funeral  - neither wet nor too hot. And everything else went according to plan as well.

I’ve just been emptying the memory card from my camera into the computer. For now I’ll just share two pictures with you. The first one (above) is of the church where the funeral took place. Several ancestors on my father’s side are buried in the cemetery there, and now also both of my parents.

The second photo is of a bouquet of flowers of the same kind that I chose for the coffin and grave decorations. I ordered an extra bouquet for the memorial gathering after the service. Afterwards I took it home with me. I did the same thing at mum’s funeral. Somehow I find it helpful – can’t quite explain why.

Some people find lots of flowers at a funeral to be a bit of a waste. Myself I’m thankful for the flowers making such a bold contrast to sadness and darkness of mind. (For the same reason I’m also thankful that both of my parents’ funerals came to be held in the summer rather than in the winter.)

I’m also thankful for the people who came to pay their last respects by attending the funeral; and for those of my own friends who I know have been “with me” from a distance by sending kind thoughts by cards, emails and blog comments. Three of the cards I received by regular post actually came from far-away friends I’ve made in the blog world and have never met face to face. Isn’t that amazing? You know who you are – a special thanks to each of you. It was very comforting to receive your ‘tangible’ greetings.

Busy

Small Tortoiseshell butterfly

Lots of things fluttering through my mind this week – not just butterflies! Probably won’t be able to concentrate much on blogging next week either. The funeral is on Wednesday. A bit of unexpected stress came up yesterday about other things that need attention as well. My brother arrived at the House today (he’ll be here for about a week). Tomorrow we’ll be going to dad’s service center flat where he lived the last year.

Mock orange shrub/tree (Swedish: schersmin) (left)
+ another shrub I don’t know the name of

Reminder to Self: be thankful that it’s just a small flat/room with few ‘things’ (and no papers) that needs to be emptied a.s.a.p. All the more clutter left to sort out in/at the House… but there we are more free take our time about it.

Decorative weeds

Old red currant bush still bearing a few berries on half-dead branches

All pictures above are from the garden at the House. I should point out that what you see here is only a third or so of the house, and the tidiest corner of the large and overgrown garden. It does make a difference though that we managed to hire someone to mow the front lawn during the last two summers.

Booking Through Thursday–Dog Days(!)

My second Dog Days post this week! - but this time the question (and the title) comes from Deb at Booking Through Thursday (because her dog is turning 10 today):

... what animal-related books have you read?
Which do you love? Do you have a favorite literary dog?
(Snoopy, anyone?)

Oh Snoopy, yes, absolutely! Thanks for the hint, Deb, or I might not have thought of him. I don't always spontaneously think of comic strips as "books" in connection with literary questions… But Snoopy I'd definitely count as "literary" ;) …

I think the most “grown-up” book I’ve read that was all about animals (written from the perspective of the animals) is probably Watership Down by Richard Adams (1972). That’s about rabbits though – not dogs.

No dogs in the other animal-related books that come first to mind for me either (at least not as main characters):

The Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling (1894)
Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (1908)
Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne (1926) (do toy bears count?)
The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis (1950’s)

(Winnie-the-Pooh and Narnia belong to my all-time favourites, as regular followers of this blog will already know! And so does Snoopy.)

Then there are of course lots of books where animals play an important part even if the story is not told from their point of view. Browsing my bookshelf for more recently read books my eyes fell on The Conjuror’s Bird by Martin Davies (2005). Not about a live bird but an extinct one!