Sunday, October 01, 2006
Shoeshine
October 1st.
The date reminds me that it is more or less half way to the end of the year since the start of the blog. Total weight loss so far is about three kilogrammes which in my opinion is quite satisfatory.It does of course amount to a total weight loss rate of nearly two stones per year--something I have no intention of achieving. Tomorrow I shall be on the Carvalho diet with a lot of footwork and possibly swimming and some really intensive sight-seeing. More intensive than in Malaga.
In preparation for my trip I have shined my own shoes which is an immensely satisfying and soothing activity, even though I am , as I recall, heading for one of the shoeshine capitals of the world. If I were going on a long trip- anything over two weeks - I would take my own polish and a brush. I feel sorry for those people who don't know this pleasure and for those who are no longer able to clean their own shoes due to infirmity, old age, loss of shoes or feet or hands. Do the 'Royals' ever get the simple pleasures of caring for themselves?
Cuzco must be the shoeshine centre of the world as far as I have observed for myself. You can hardly walk ten yards there without getting an offer to shine your shoes even if they are already gleaming.I even received an offer there for a shine while my shoes were being shone by someone else!
The problem today is to decide what books to take. I have run out of Padura,Camilleri, Montalban, Leon and Simenon. Dibdin's Aurelio Zen is another of my favourites but it isn't gulp fiction. I had thought that I would restart Anna Karenin but its too thick to fit in the trouser pocket but I suppose I could take it to read in bed. I might re-read a Maigret. There is nothing worse than running out of decent reading material on holiday, so I'd rather take too much than too little so maybe I'll even take Ulysses: I've never had the stamina to finish it. I have an unread Mankell but Kurt Wallander has become too depressed and the plots have become too gruesome as the years have passed.Perhaps I should try and read some Spanish but I think Padura and Montalban would be far too difficult and maybe the latter might have been written in Catalan.
Blogs will probably not appear in the next few days.
The date reminds me that it is more or less half way to the end of the year since the start of the blog. Total weight loss so far is about three kilogrammes which in my opinion is quite satisfatory.It does of course amount to a total weight loss rate of nearly two stones per year--something I have no intention of achieving. Tomorrow I shall be on the Carvalho diet with a lot of footwork and possibly swimming and some really intensive sight-seeing. More intensive than in Malaga.
In preparation for my trip I have shined my own shoes which is an immensely satisfying and soothing activity, even though I am , as I recall, heading for one of the shoeshine capitals of the world. If I were going on a long trip- anything over two weeks - I would take my own polish and a brush. I feel sorry for those people who don't know this pleasure and for those who are no longer able to clean their own shoes due to infirmity, old age, loss of shoes or feet or hands. Do the 'Royals' ever get the simple pleasures of caring for themselves?
Cuzco must be the shoeshine centre of the world as far as I have observed for myself. You can hardly walk ten yards there without getting an offer to shine your shoes even if they are already gleaming.I even received an offer there for a shine while my shoes were being shone by someone else!
The problem today is to decide what books to take. I have run out of Padura,Camilleri, Montalban, Leon and Simenon. Dibdin's Aurelio Zen is another of my favourites but it isn't gulp fiction. I had thought that I would restart Anna Karenin but its too thick to fit in the trouser pocket but I suppose I could take it to read in bed. I might re-read a Maigret. There is nothing worse than running out of decent reading material on holiday, so I'd rather take too much than too little so maybe I'll even take Ulysses: I've never had the stamina to finish it. I have an unread Mankell but Kurt Wallander has become too depressed and the plots have become too gruesome as the years have passed.Perhaps I should try and read some Spanish but I think Padura and Montalban would be far too difficult and maybe the latter might have been written in Catalan.
Blogs will probably not appear in the next few days.
# posted by Bob @ 11:48 am 
