Bits and Pieces this week

 This has been an interesting week.  I took some books back to the library and as nothing I had reserved had come in I decided to have a look around.  On the cart of books returned and yet to be shelved I found a biography of Eudora Welty. Eudora Welty was born in 1909 and lived into her 90's in the USA. She grew up in Jackson Mississippi and was known mainly for her short stories and a memoir but she wrote so many great things she won almost every award going including the Pulitzer Prize.

Such an amazing woman of her time.

I have always been fascinated by her character but didn't really know much about her and had forgotten I was interested in her.  The book lying there on the shelf jogged my memory and I checked it out.

I have begun it and am really enjoying it.  Such a hard time trying to establish herself as both a photographer and writer during the great depression of the 1930's.  Her family always encouraged her quirky ways and she spent a great deal of time between Jackson, Mississippi and New York City which she loved.

I have always found the stories of writers living in New York City in the 1930's - 1950's wonderful as they all seemed to soak up the atmosphere of so many cultural experiences there. I love the jazz age of the Cotton Club in Harlem, the writers circles, the black and white photography.

I am really enjoying this book.

So that is the main book focus of my last few days.

Huge storage compartment under the seat. Could easily
hold more than 30 or 40 Penguin books at a time.

I am still awaiting the arrival of my Aprilia SR Max 300 Scooter. Hopefully it will be here maybe in another 2 weeks.  It is obviously on a very slow boat on a container somewhere out of Italy.  Can't wait to get it and will pack it with a couple of books, my new camera and a sleeping bag and tent.  Travelling with a mate we'll spend a couple of days up the east coast of Tasmania.  That is hopefully happening in early April.  I had hoped to do a good bike trip Penguin Hunting in Tassie in March but there is just too much going on and I have run out of time. But plenty of shorter days
trips on the horizon.


One of the happy things about to unfold is Elaine of Random Jottings is visiting Tasmania with her daughter next week.  Elaine has a wonderful following on her book and life blog and I know many are following her trip to Melbourne to visit her daughter and see what she gets up to reading, eating and touring on this trip.

She'll be here next Thursday and I have volunteered myself and my car and will happily play tour guide to them. Her daughter is joining us a couple of days later so I'll have Elaine to myself for a couple of days.

We'll all be blogging about fun things hopefully. Will be sure to put up photos.

Speaking of photos. I have decided to renew a very old hobby of mine of photography. I used to do a bit of photography in the 70's and 80's and always enjoyed it. I always have a small digital camera nearby but thought I'd like to revamp the Travellin Penguin a bit and include photography along with my bike travels, Penguin book hunting and books.

I realise I am not much of an academic book reviewer but I do know what I love and what I don't and happily read away, though not at the speed of sound as some bloggers out there are able to do.

I went into the city today and bought myself a Canon OES 650 DSLR and I am looking forward to learning how to use it.  Cameras have certainly changed a great deal since the 70's and 80's but I still know what  shutter speed, aperture and ISO stand for.

Travellin Penguin will have his own small camera and he too will be journeying with me through my days of reading, book collecting, picture snapping and motorbiking. Hopefully I will be able to combine all four activities as much as I can.

I have always believed it is good for one's mental health to always have something to look forward to but now I am feeling overload. No chance of boredom any time soon.