Church, Sunday Times, Arctic Chill

Today is a lovely early autumn day, perfect for that walk to Church from the gates. The service today was taken by the Associate Minister as the Minister was visiting the Sunday School.

After I finish the Sunday Times I shall continue with Arctic Chill by Arnaldur Indridason. This is a roman policier set in Iceland by a native of Iceland and translated into English (among many translations.)

I really enjoy all these different romans policiers from many countries. You get so much more that the detective story; you get the different heroes, the different relationships among the police teams, but most of all the feel for the countries. Iceland is almost a world on its own, but had American Air Force personnel based there during the Second World War, had the "Cod Wars" some time ago and is now having to come to terms with immigrants.

The hero is Erlendur (first names are nearly always used as surnames tend to indicate only son of xxx). As is not unusual in these types of novels he has his problems in his personal life, starting with losing his brother in a snowstorm when a child and continuing with a marriage which went sour and difficult relationships with his two children as a result.

Blogs and Blogging

I had really not heard of blogs until I read Tom Reynolds’ Blood Sweat and Tea. I found his blog address from the book, read the blog, found it fascinating, and then discovered links to other blogs and from there on to others…..and so on.

After quite some time I started to feel that it was a bit like prying if I read all these blogs, but was not prepared to blog myself.

But where to start. I did what you would do, and did a Google search asking “How do you blog?” I was directed to Blogger Dashboard, and suddenly it was all easy.

I reckoned I would have very little to say, and that the only people who would have any interest would be my closest family and in fact it has served that purpose with elder son, who telephones if I miss a day or so to make sure all is well.

However, like Topsy, it has growed,

I keep finding other things to share and I keep finding new readers. This is fantastic; it is so good for me to get all this stimulus from reading other peoples’ blogs and from seeing other peoples’ comments on mine.

I know that I read some blogs and comment only rarely – usually only if I have something pertinent to say – so I should not be surprised to find that some people comment on my blog only rarely and that therefore I may well have more readers than I have reckoned..

So, writing this blog has opened up new horizons for me. I love finding readers from all over the country, from the USA, from Canada, from Israel, and have been stimulated by them to read more.

With many thanks to a. I have even read a detective novel (roman policier) in French.

Mind you, this has really started something and my friend s. has given me a copy of Madame Bovary in French. Umm.

All these things must help ward off the dreaded Alzheimer’s.