Bookish and Not-So-Bookish Thoughts

Posted 1 April, 2020 by Lianne in Miscellaneous / 0 Comments

Bookish and Not-So-Bookish Thoughts is a weekly blogging event hosted by Bookishly Boisterous. It allows book bloggers (and non-book bloggers) to write about pretty much anything, bookish or otherwise (i.e. share exciting plans for the weekend, rants on things they’ve encountered during the week, etc.).

  1. I’m back! Sort of? I’ve started scheduling a few posts here in an effort to catch up on what I’ve been reading, inject a bit of life here and express what I’ve been thinking and reading. Of course it won’t be the same as before, but I will try very hard to reply to comments and whatnot. See if I can blog hop a bit, time-permitting.

  2. With everything that’s going on, I ended up breaking my social media blackout for Lent. It’s hard being off it at a time like this when digital communication is the only way to stay connected with other people, see information and what’s going on outside of what’s on the news right now. Just need some streak of positivity.

  3. On a not terribly positive note, Twitter still looks like terrible, populating my feed with posts that other people liked. WTF, if it I didn’t need Twitter for this blog I should just delete my account. FML.

  4. Since my update post, nothing much has been happening (har har, guess that’s what happens when you #stayhome and maintain social distancing). Work continues to ramp up with new protocols and policies in anticipation of COVID-19 hitting our system, but I really hope it doesn’t come to it. It’s already pretty hard, hard to do our routine, provide care, and on top of it now there’s all these other things to consider, not to mention your own safety.

  5. I’m hitting the last weeks of the semester, which is pretty quiet after the onslaught of midterms and assignments the last few weeks. My university moved to online delivery pretty fast so lol. I’m just prepping for exams…and I’m supposed to be working on a final assignment for another class 🙁

  6. On the other hand because of this mini-break before exams, I’m starting to take care of other things like this blog, updating some other journals, finally going through my travel photos (just might be able to post them here in the next month or so). So yeah, slowly getting a lot of things done amidst all of this. It just sucks I won’t be able to celebrate my friend’s birthday next week and stuff like that.

  7. Books I’m currently reading: Italo Calvino’s The Complete Cosmicomics, at long last. Read a few of its stories in the past but now I can read the whole thing 🙂 I also started reading Carl Jung’s Answer to Job which was recommended to me. Should be interesting.

  8. I don’t know when this is going to happen but I’m thinking of re-reading the first two books in Hilary Mantel’s Thomas Cromwell trilogy before delving into The Mirror and the Light. Colour me excited 😀

  9. I was working on an upcoming poetry collection before midterms slammed me in the gut. Unfortunately that went into a standstill because I realised I didn’t have enough content for that collection and will now have to figure out a way to re-organise what material I have. Again. It’s pretty dizzying when you have to go through how many notebooks with how many years worth of poetry. It will be done, one way or the other, but I’m holding off until after my exams to properly look through them.

  10. With all the extreme weather we’ve been experiencing and the stress of the last few weeks, my Lenten plant died this year. So I bought some succulents to spruce up my space:)

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And that’s it from me! How are you all holding up? Stay safe, everyone 🙂

An Update

Posted 20 March, 2020 by Lianne in Miscellaneous / 2 Comments

Hej! Long time no post!

Yeah, my hiatus ended up much longer than I had planned; life has been very busy these days for me juggling so many different facets. And on top of it right now we’re in the midst of a pandemic with COVID-19. If you’re following me on social media you’ll know that I took a hiatus there at the start of Lent back in February and I plan on maintaining that until Easter. My blog however is not part of that hiatus; if anything, this is like a drop in!

So yes, I’m okay, my family’s okay. My city’s in a partial lockdown in that schools, daycares, community events, public places are closed. My university–like all the others–switched to online delivery, which doesn’t really impact me so much until finals as this was enacted just as I finished my midterms (FML; survived those). Most people are working from home, but I work in healthcare so I’m going to work when I can. It’s eerie taking public transit to work sometimes, seeing the almost empty streets and subway cars during rush hour. Felt like a Sunday, except it was a Wednesday. Because of the nature of the virus, it is scary not knowing if you already have it, how symptoms may present in one person and the next would be asymptomatic, how badly it has hit other places in the world. A lot of my plans have been affected as a result of what has happened but I hope we’re doing what we can to stem the tide.

In the meantime, I hope to start scheduling some blog posts here again: school and work has really affected my reading these days but I’ve read a ton of stuff since the last time I posted here.

Until next time, stay safe! Hope you and your loved ones are well under the circumstances and are taking care.

Review: Fleabag

Posted 23 December, 2019 by Lianne in Books / 0 Comments

Fleabag
By: Phoebe Waller-Bridge
Format/Source: eBook; my purchase

Celebrate the incredible journey of Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s outrageously funny, blazingly forthright Fleabag, from fringe theatre hit to international cultural phenomenon, in this special edition – featuring the original playscript, never-before-seen colour photos, and exclusive bonus content by Phoebe, director Vicky Jones and key members of the creative team.

In 2013, Fleabag made its debut as a one-woman show in sixty-seater venue the Big Belly, at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe’s Underbelly. It was an immediate hit, going on to enjoy two runs at London’s Soho Theatre, national and international tours, whilst picking up prizes including Critics’ Circle, The Stage, Fringe First and two Off West End Theatre Awards, plus an Olivier Award nomination.

The 2016 TV adaptation propelled Fleabag and Phoebe to worldwide fame, earning critical acclaim and further accolades including Writers’ Guild, Royal Television Society and BAFTA Television Awards. A second series, nominated for eleven Emmys, followed in 2019, along with a sold-out run of the original play in New York.

This special edition was released alongside Fleabag’s first West End run at Wyndham’s Theatre, London. It is introduced by Deborah Frances-White, stand-up comedian, writer and host of The Guilty Feminist podcast.

Yup, picked up this book after watching the show a few months ago (which is brilliant btw, why didn’t I watch it sooner? Oh that’s right, I take forever getting around to watching stuff). I wanted to read what the original was like.

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eclectic tales is going on hiatus!

Posted 1 November, 2019 by Lianne in Website / 0 Comments

Hello everyone! Just a heads up–although I don’t know if it’s much of a heads up since I’ve only been blogging every other day/casually for almost a year now–that the blog will be going on hiatus from now until Friday, December 13th. School has been pretty crazy since it started but I had managed to keep up preparing content here until now as some stuff had been pre-scheduled. However things have been snowballing and picking up since and my reading has dropped considerably since school started so just in an effort to stay focused on my studies while balancing work and other offline stuff, the blog will be on hiatus. Hopefully my leisure reading between now and the time I come back won’t be so abysmal that I have something to post into the new year, lol. We’ll see.

Until then, have a wonderful November and start to December! 🙂

October Updates

Posted 31 October, 2019 by Lianne in Website / 1 Comment

So I’m posting this later than usual because honestly this month has been insane. Work and school and personal life has been very busy. While it looks like I’ll have a bit of a break, next month will still be just as hectic, to be honest. Anyway, things that has been happening on the blog for the month of October:

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  1. Books reviewed this month include Sally Rooney’s Normal People (review), John Scalzi’s The Consuming Fire (review), and Sarah Perry’s Melmoth (review). You can check out all the books I’ve reviewed recently in the book review tag.

  2. I reviewed two movies for this month, John Wick 3 (review) and Spider-Man: Far from Home (review). You can check out all of the past movies I’ve watched and reviewed in this tag.

  3. In celebration of my birthday, most of my poetry books have been 30% over at Lulu.com. More information can be found over at the following post (sorry, am just linking it directly because the code is not working on the preview for some reason: http://eclectictales.insanitysandwich.com/blog/2019/10/07/writing-poetry-books-on-sale-this-month/ Sale ends at midnight!

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And that’s about it about the blog for this month. Please stay tuned as I have a wee bit of an announcement tomorrow (you probably figured it out by now). Have a wonderful November! 🙂