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Reading November
Nov. 20th, 2021 03:57 pmI have not updated here much recently as events took over - my city went back into lockdown on the 17th August, after one Delta strain COVID-19 community case, a fact which involved a lot of international & local commentary about over-reacting. Numbers obviously then increased, and eventually & slowly, decreased. We eventually hit single figures for daily cases - and then COVID-19 got into the homeless population, people with low levels of vaccination and little reason to trust any governmental organisations, and we lost control. Inevitable, but still hard.
On the date we went into lockdown less than 20% of the population were fully vaccinated, and about 1/3rd had had one dose. We’re now coming out of lockdown and moving towards a living with COVID-19 model, averaging about 160 cases per day. COVID-19 is moving downwards and throughout the country, popping up now in places that have never had cases, but now 82% of the eligible population is fully vaccinated (no vaccines yet for under 12s here) and 91% have had at least one dose. This is good but rates are much lower in certain areas and in certain typically disadvantages populations, especially Māori (running at about 62% double vax’d, and with younger average populations that mean more people aren’t yet eligible). Vaccine mandates are now in effect for a number of jobs, and as the numbers unvaccinated get smaller, the protests and dialogue get more bitter and more violent.
(on the bathos rather than pathos front, my local FB group had a massive schism as one of the admins is an essential oils marketer who deleted any and all mentions of COVID-19 and/or vaccination that weren’t about how terrible the vaccine was)
Anyway. I’ve been working and home-schooling, and reading - and even writing - but I haven’t been posting. Here is November (so far):
Just finished:
( King, Merriman, Durst, Francis, Harper, Mejia )
Still reading:
The Heart Principle, Helen Hoang. Her latest, this has Anna, a performance violinist stuck in a musical block, a loveless relationship with a guy who only wants her because she makes his life so much easier, and the expectations of her family, who never see her for herself. When the terrible boyfriend decides he wants an open relationship for a bit she rebels by joining a dating site for a one night stand, and meets Quan, best friend of Michael from The Kiss Quotient. He’s struggling to trust his body after cancer surgery, and also not looking for anything long-term - however, that’s what they both get. It’s a sincere, heart-felt book, about female autistics who mask until they’ve lost sight of their own selves, about the pressure on family caregivers and the pressure from family; Quan is a little too perfect and easy-going, but Anna’s fantastic.
Planetside, Michael Mammay. I can’t remember where or why I picked this up but I am on chapter 2 and it’s deeply irritating old-school military sf with a really annoying lead character. I might give it another couple of chapters but will probably dump it.
Up next:
At school each term there’s a book club from Scholastic, and I normally let the kids pick out books up to $20. The last one we got, my son stared wistfully at a boxed set of 8 volumes of the Amulet graphic novel series, which was definitely more than $20, and I said that given that I was a totally terrible example at resisting book temptation he could have it if he didn’t have anything else for the year. Naturally then we went into lockdown and he finally got it last week, several months later, and is now wallowing in it, and I want to read them too.
On the date we went into lockdown less than 20% of the population were fully vaccinated, and about 1/3rd had had one dose. We’re now coming out of lockdown and moving towards a living with COVID-19 model, averaging about 160 cases per day. COVID-19 is moving downwards and throughout the country, popping up now in places that have never had cases, but now 82% of the eligible population is fully vaccinated (no vaccines yet for under 12s here) and 91% have had at least one dose. This is good but rates are much lower in certain areas and in certain typically disadvantages populations, especially Māori (running at about 62% double vax’d, and with younger average populations that mean more people aren’t yet eligible). Vaccine mandates are now in effect for a number of jobs, and as the numbers unvaccinated get smaller, the protests and dialogue get more bitter and more violent.
(on the bathos rather than pathos front, my local FB group had a massive schism as one of the admins is an essential oils marketer who deleted any and all mentions of COVID-19 and/or vaccination that weren’t about how terrible the vaccine was)
Anyway. I’ve been working and home-schooling, and reading - and even writing - but I haven’t been posting. Here is November (so far):
Just finished:
( King, Merriman, Durst, Francis, Harper, Mejia )
Still reading:
The Heart Principle, Helen Hoang. Her latest, this has Anna, a performance violinist stuck in a musical block, a loveless relationship with a guy who only wants her because she makes his life so much easier, and the expectations of her family, who never see her for herself. When the terrible boyfriend decides he wants an open relationship for a bit she rebels by joining a dating site for a one night stand, and meets Quan, best friend of Michael from The Kiss Quotient. He’s struggling to trust his body after cancer surgery, and also not looking for anything long-term - however, that’s what they both get. It’s a sincere, heart-felt book, about female autistics who mask until they’ve lost sight of their own selves, about the pressure on family caregivers and the pressure from family; Quan is a little too perfect and easy-going, but Anna’s fantastic.
Planetside, Michael Mammay. I can’t remember where or why I picked this up but I am on chapter 2 and it’s deeply irritating old-school military sf with a really annoying lead character. I might give it another couple of chapters but will probably dump it.
Up next:
At school each term there’s a book club from Scholastic, and I normally let the kids pick out books up to $20. The last one we got, my son stared wistfully at a boxed set of 8 volumes of the Amulet graphic novel series, which was definitely more than $20, and I said that given that I was a totally terrible example at resisting book temptation he could have it if he didn’t have anything else for the year. Naturally then we went into lockdown and he finally got it last week, several months later, and is now wallowing in it, and I want to read them too.
