I don't think I've done one of these for a while. What have you been watching/reading/listening to lately?

I haven't actually watched much lately. We are working our way through Midsomer Murders from the beginning on Saturdays; I'm still watching classic Doctor Who on and off (more off than on) and we're also rewatching This Life (all on Britbox; I've also watched several episodes of Captain Pugwash which is charming), but nothing new. And I watched Dirty Dancing for the first time ever a couple of weeks ago, and liked it much more than I thought I would.

I'm feeling a bit glum today (I often do at this time of year, as there's never quite enough warmth and sunshine to have driven the SAD away completely, and I'm shattered, had an annoying afternoon where I ended up not much further forward with my sewing than I'd started out after catching the powermesh lining of my latest Banskia Bralette with the iron and having to unpick everything and cut a new lining piece, and am feeling sad and cross about not being able to have the long weekend I'd been looking forward to), so tell me something happy?

I did at least have a lovely peaceful solo swim earlier, which helped to wash away some of the stresses of the week. The current is much less strong than it was a month ago and I made it further upstream than I have before. I was tempted to carry on to the railway bridge but thought it was probably better to err on the side of caution.

Let's have one, anyway. What have you been watching/reading/listening to lately?

(I have been working my way through Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries recently, which is hitting the right entertaining-but-undemanding buttons, though the series lacks the overtly feminist slant of the novels.)

Because it's been a while since the last one, and I'm actually looking for recommendations for entertaining, undemanding TV I can watch by myself when T is quizzing. The most recent thing I watched was Bridgerton, which I found myself really enjoying; it was pretty to look at (though this Twitter thread is very illuminating on the subject of bosoms in the show, several of which did look very odd) and entirely unchallenging to watch (though I did keep thinking how much better it would be if it was a big-budget adaptation of the_comfortable_courtesan's memoirs), and I'd really like to find something in the same vein, though not necessarily the same genre. (Given that I also very much enjoyed The Untamed it could be that c-drama or k-drama is the way to go, though I don't really know where to start with that.)

So, what's your current cosy media to relax to?

A few weeks ago, my swimming friends and I watched a documentary about ice swimming and all agreed that we probably drew the line at breaking ice to get into the water.

We should probably all have realised that that was a perfectly good theoretical position, but as soon as there was actually ice to break we'd all be far too curious about what it would be like to stay out.



It turns out ice swimming is amazing (even if it was mostly treading water in a small cleared space). We spent eight minutes bobbing around, breaking off chunks of ice to make a swimming space, laughing delightedly and finding the bemusement of passers-by utterly hilarious.

So, is there anything you've sworn you wouldn't do right up until the opportunity to try it presented itself?

How do you prefer to read books? Have you embraced ebooks or are you sticking to paper books? Or maybe audio books fit into your life better?

I still love paper books: the feel, the smell, the sense of history of second-hand books (I have a copy of Mansfield Park my grandmother gave me when she got a new match set of Austen which she'd got second or even third hand and which was originally given to someone by Sir Rowland Hill, inventor of the postage stamp). In particular, I prefer reading non-fiction in paper format and not ebook, and I like paper books for re-reading because it's much easier to find favourite scenes than it is in an ebook.

I also love my kindle, though. Without it, I would probably have had to move to a bigger house to fit all the books in by now. And there's a lot to be said for being able to carry hundreds of books with you and not having to worry about have spare books with you in case you run out of reading material, and being able to read huge epic novels without worrying about whether you can fit them in your bag. (Not that I go anywhere or carry bags any more, but one day I might do that again.) I also find that not being able to idly flick through pages when I know I should be putting the book down and going to sleep and then finding I've skimmed through the whole thing is a good thing, and recently I've also discovered that when my brain is struggling to focus and I keep losing my place so that reading a whole page of text takes ages being able to increase the font size so I only have a few words per page really helps.

I don't do audio books, though I like the idea; unfortunately I struggle too much to concentrate on audio and while I can listen to discussion podcasts while doing something with my hands that stops my brain wandering off on random tangents until I suddenly realise I haven't heard anything for the last ten minutes, I can't manage enough concentration for a story.

How about you?