The week started with a hospital stay to have a minor operation, and here I am almost six days later finally feeling the confines of my flat, so must be feeling better. The bed-rest is good in that I've been doing lots of reading, and watched some DVD's, but has been bad in the amount of tv I have watched, though I've drawn the line at American soaps and Eastenders. It's also bad in that I have ideas for some drawings and paintings, but they will have to stay in my head a while longer until I can sit for longer than 5 minute intervals. Plus I don't have internet access, enough said? I'm currently reading a book by Russian author Olga Grushin The Dream Life of Sukhanov. The book's good, beautifully written, but I keep having to turn back pages as I confuse the characters; the names seem very similar. Yesterday I read the beach book Undercurrents by Tamara McKinley set in Queensland, Australia and it made me want to revisit there. I was shocked to work out that I was there EIGHTEEN years ago; made me feel very old. The book I took to hospital was the heavyweight Travelling with Djinns by Jamal Mahjoub, which is an account of man's journey with his son through Europe. I'm not sure what others have thought of this book, but I felt the author was trying to show off with his constant references to various works of literature, Persian poets, history etc., which distracted me from the tale. So you can tell, in my reading I'm bouncing around the world even if I can't physically leave my flat yet.
