Quiet time before Easter

Good Friday, 
This should be a quiet time...

Early afternoon - BAAANG!!!

Something banged near our house. I head towards the door, and see someone already ringing the bell.

I open it - a friendly guy from our Parish.

"Excuse me, but I pulled my car into your driveway to turn around and... I hit the garage door."

I walk out to the front of the house - he really did...

I go to check the back door - impressive!!!

 

How come?
What happened?

Simple - his car hit the front door, the door hit the car inside, the car jumped forward...

Excuse me -  our visitor interrupts - we're rushing to church now. After the service, I'll come and explain the situation. We'll cover all costs.

He is right – give God what is divine, what's human may wait a while.

I called the insurance company – to my surprise, they were working (Good Friday is a public holiday).

They recorded an accident report – I added that the matter was critical because my wife has difficulty climbing stairs, so the garage was her only way out of the house.

20 minutes later, a repairman called and said he'd be at our place shortly.

He was – very nice – Czech by birth.

He took a sledgehammer to the front garage door and straightened it enough for me to pull the car out onto the street.

Saturday 7:20 a.m. – two repairmen arrived.

They removed the old door and installed a temporary one. They'll finish this up next week when the shops reopen.

The temporary door, from inside the garage, looks like this...

By the way... that wood smells so good.

Time to go shopping.

Our car was parked outside all night, I walked up, and what did I see?
The windshield was covered completely in shit.

Oh yeah, the news mentioned that the toilet on the spaceship had a problem and... they fixed it.

I wasn't sure whether to wash the window or notify the space agency to secure the ShNA samples.
However, I decided that in the current political climate, it was better to keep a low profile - I washed it, did some shopping, blessed my Easter basket, and I hope to see Easter Sunday.

I wish all the visitors of this blog a joyful and peaceful Easter.

Kind of

Kind of, Sort of, Maybe, But Probably Not by Imbi Neeme
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Generally I feel that reading this book was a waste of time.
All the characters were remote to me and I was either bored or disgusted with their way of entertaining themselves.
I felt some sympathy to the main characters - Phoebe, Suzy , but for me descriptions of their feelings and actions was very, very simplistic and naive.

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The Friends

My Friends by Fredrik Backman
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Full respect to the author, he managed to make me vulnerable, to shed a tear, to feel spasm in my heart.
It lasted for half of a book, then cracks appeared.
I looked closer on the other face of a lovely FOUR - stealing, making mess, throwing shopping trolley in an abyss. And an overwhelming contempt for security guards.
Could F. Backman write a book about friendship among security guards?

The last third of the book was annoying, I just wanted to finish it and the author employed every possible trick to make it longer.

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The Deal

The Deal by Alex Miller
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

It looks to me like a very self-centred story of a not fullfilled artist.
Well written but very alien to me.


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Gulliver's Wife

Gulliver's Wife by Lauren Chater
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I am rather disappointed with this book.
I could not find a STORY in it.
L. Gulliver returns home after his visit to LilliputLand and does not connect with his family - end of story.
Actually I looked to the source - Gulliver Travels by J Swift...
"During my short stay in England, I gained much by showing my cattle to various distinguished people and commoners. Before I undertook my second trip, I sold them for six hundred pounds. I stayed only two months with my wife and children.... I left my wife 1,500 pounds and settled her in a comfortable home in Redriff. My son, John, attended elementary school, and my daughter, Elizabeth (who is now married and has children), learned sewing."

I highly appreciate author's skill and effort in presenting conditions in which London midwifes in XVIII century lived and operated.
I appreciate author's skill in presenting environment in which London midwifes in XVIII century lived and operated but in first place I got a feeling that she connected her story to a very popular book just to gain readership and haven't tried to pass to the reader the atmosphere of the original.

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The Great Man

The Great Man by Al Morgan
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I read a Polish translation of the book, while reading I got memories from many years ago when I heard it as a radio play.
My memories were good and resulted in a positive rating - based on cold reasoning my rating would be lower..
The story - a very popular radio presenter dies, radio bosses are planning to deliver a new one. The book shows how cold and ruthless process it is.
Story is told from the position of a candidate to replace the star who died.
He investigates the career of his predecessor and learns many bad things about him and it looks that if he follows this career path, he will be the same.
On one hand I was bored a bit with the details of dependencies in radio business, on the other hand I liked author's writing style.

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Best Wishes

Best Wishes by Richard Glover
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Definitely not my type of a book, I read it only because it was to be discussed in my book club.
Why not my type of a book?
Because in a book I am looking for a STORY, sometimes I try to connect to the story.
Best Wishes is something opposite - list of things author dislikes, 365 of them.
Generally I found this approach annoying, the only positive was a good sense of humour of the author.

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