The Month That Was…

Theresa Smith Writes

Sep 30

September

Life:

I've been spending time of late cultivating my indoor water plant garden which lives on top of one of my bookcases. I've been *procuring* cuttings from all sorts of avenues, some taking off with success, others being discarded to make way for a swift replacement. My commitment to this garden extends to consuming wine from bottles that I have taken to assessing at the time of purchase as being suitable for cuttings. It's a hobby within a hobby, so to speak...

My interest in plants only began about three years ago. It's mainly restricted to pot plants, but I have worked on one garden bed with success in the front yard and now am tentatively making plant plans for another within the backyard. It's all self-taught through trial and error as to what grows best here, majority of my decisions being made based on the aesthetics of a plant and if it has flowers or interesting leaves. Still, I'm getting there and feel as though I'm learning more and more about growing things. My pot plants live in a courtyard that is perfect for the shade/sun ratio most pot plants seem to need. This morning M and I headed to the local farmer's market which has a sizeable nursery that was advertising 50% off all plants for the long weekend. There are now eleven new plants in my courtyard garden and I'm quite happy with how full and green it's looking.

In my never-ending quest to get a good photo of myself with Zeus, I accidentally took this one:

It's now my favourite photo ever.

Joke of the month:

Suffice to say, we have, on more than one occasion, had to chase an escaped husky...

What I've been watching:

I've watched some good TV this month as well as slipped in two movies. I had already previously seen The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, but I wanted to M to see it and it's such a good movie you could honestly watch it a dozen times over. The other movie, The Night Watch, is based on the novel by Sarah Waters. It's quiet but moving film set during WWII about a few people whose lives intersect during the war and then again, beyond.

TV land saw me returning to Virgin River for the most recent season and then tuning into Charlotte, a Bridgerton spinoff. I actually liked Charlotte more than Bridgerton, and interestingly, I had never much paid attention to the character of Queen Charlotte when watching Bridgerton, so I hadn't really put two and two together as to who she was in real life, which made the series all the more fascinating for me once I realised her placement within the history of the royal family. It was sad too, the actor playing King George doing a superb job. You wouldn't need to have watched Bridgerton to enjoy this, so I highly recommend it to all.

Bloodlands is top shelf crime drama from the BBC, set in Northern Ireland. The cast is stellar, the story is gripping, the setting authentic. I loved it. The Way Home was a surprising watch. I was looking for something light-hearted after finishing Virgin River. It turned out to be a family drama with a side of time travel. Andie MacDowell heads up the cast and she is as gorgeous and compelling as ever. Last but not least, M and I have gotten into The News Reader, an Australian drama set in the mid 1980s, on ABC iView. It's excellent, we've almost finished the first season and will be straight into watching the second. We both love the way it blends the fictional world of their newsroom with actual breaking news from the era. It's very well done.

What I've been reading:

Seven books for this month, slightly down from last month but still higher than months previous. Three out of seven were five star reads - Darling Girls, Lady Tan's Circle of Women, and The Disappearance of Astrid Bricard; the remaining four books all got four stars. I am having a great run of reading very good books of late. All of these have already been reviewed here on the blog except for Darling Girls which I only finished last night.

Until next month...good reading!