Currently (August 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

It’s been forever since I last took part in Currently. That’s partly because the day coincides with the Insecure Writer’s Support Group posting day and partly because I cannot always think of much to say to the prompts. Today though, I’m feeling like writing and the prompts appealed to me.

Choosing

To take an Ativan to avert yet another crisis. Well, not quite avert, as it was already happening. I’m safe and relatively calm now that the Ativan has had about an hour to kick in.

Consuming

Banana chips and grated coconut. I bought a bag of both at a wellness store yesterday. Consumed all the banana chips in one sitting and put some of the coconut in my smoothie. Today, I actually ate some of the coconut as is.

Enjoying

Reading, of course. I spend a lot of the time with my face in a book, figuratively speaking, as I use my Braille display to read books on.

Add to my reading experience some calming music, for example a Robbins Island Music Group album, and some essential oil. I bought two essential oil blends at the wellness store yesterday and particularly love the one called Joy. The other one was called something like Sleep Well, so I may be able to use that tonight.

Ordering

Not anything right now, but the shoes I ordered last Monday, did arrive today. They’re brown with pink walking boots and I love them. I tried to explain to my husband what I’d ordered and he kept coming up with walking boots that cost like €200. Makes me feel I got quite a bargain, as mine cost €80. Of course, that’s still a lot of money.

Remembering

That no-one promised me a rose garden. I need to remind myself of this, because I seem to be dealing with a lot of fear of joy lately, as well as having a big case of “the grass is always greener on the other side” with respect to living situations. Maybe I just need to accept that the care facility I live in now isn’t perfect, but it’s as good as it’s going to get. This issue may be one reason I spiraled into crisis today.

How have you been?

Children’s Books With Colors in Their Titles

Posted on by Astrid

Today’s Top Ten Tuesday (#TTT) is all about books with colors in their title. Wow, this challenge is hard! I could off the top of my head think of four books, then thought of another, but then I was stuck. So to give me some inspiration, I decided to search Bookshare. When I typed the first color, “green”, into the search box, already several hundreds of titles popped up even when I kept the search to children’s literature. In this list, you’ll find some kidlit books (from picture books to YA) with colors in their titles that I think may be worth a read.

1. The Green Children of Woolpit by J. Anderson Coats. This is a fantasy children’s book based on a classic British legend. I don’t usually read fantasy, but this one sounds particularly interesting.

2. Blue Daisy by Helen Frost. This is a children’s book about two children who find a dog in their neighborhood and grow to love it, but will the dog love them back?

3. Blue Skies by Anne Bustard. This sounds like such a fascinating middle grade novel. I don’t normally read books not set in the current time, but this one sounds great.

4. My Heart and Other Black Holes by Jasmine Warga. This was one of the books I already had in mind. I really want to read this YA novel. Too bad I am already reading several books now.

5. Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery. This one is also already on my TBR. In fact, I started listening to it as an audiobook on Scribd some months ago, but then stopped because I didn’t like the narrator’s voice.

6. Yellow Flag by Robert Lipsyte. I am absolutely clueless about racing, but this book sounds interesting.

7. The Doll With the Yellow Star by Yona Zeldis Mcdonough and Kimberly Bulcken Root. Another story centered around World War II, but it definitely sounds intriguing to me.

8. Red, Yellow, Blue (and a Dash of White, Too!) by Charles George Esperanza. This sounds like such a funny yet educational book for young children. It’s all about mixing colors and what this can achieve. I’m sad that I won’t be able to see the illustrations.

9. Silver Spurs by Miralee Ferrell. As a former horseback rider, I still love stories about horse girls. This one sounds truly endearing.

10. Silverlicious by Victoria Kann. This sounds like such an endearing read for young children. When Pinkalicious loses her sweet tooth, she writes to the tooth fairy to get it back. I sense that she’ll learn a valuable lesson.

Now I realize that most of these, I may not actually read. Still, I hope some of my readers will find these interesting for their children or students.

What books with colors in their titles do you like?

Reading Wrap-Up (August 3, 2020) #IMWAYR

Posted on by Astrid

It’s been forever since I last did a reading wrap-up. I always felt I didn’t have enough to share, since I don’t finish many books fast enough for my liking. Today though, I’m loving a good book and am wanting to share with you what I’m reading. I’m linking up with #IMWAYR.

What I’m Currently Reading

I love reading many books at the same time. This does mean I hardly get to finish anything. For example, I’m still reading Five Feet Apart by Rachael Lippincott. Now that I’m over 30% done with it, it does start to feel like a book I’ll like.

I also yesterday decided to pick up Heroine by Mindy McGinnis again after having let it lay there for months.

Lastly, I seem to have totally gotten into foster care memoirs again, so I finally decided to start reading Too Scared to Tell by Cathy Glass. I was somehow convinced it’d be her last ever foster care memoir, but then I learned that some new ones are coming out, so I didn’t feel as bad about reading this one. Now I must admit I haven’t read many of her older memoirs either, so even if this one were her last, I’d still have a lot to read.

What I Recently Finished Reading

Last week, I picked up a picture book called ABC of Feelings for my inner children. It was sad that we couldn’t see the pictures, as I’m blind, but the words were also good.

Then yesterday I finished Who Will Love Me Now?, a Maggie Hartley foster care memoir, after only having started on it earlier that week. See my review.

What I Think I’ll Read Next

The thing with me is that I always have an eye on too many books that I won’t be able to read even if I devoted the entire day to reading. I have a ton of middle grade and YA novels on my TBR still, but I also want to read some adult novels. I’m not sure what I’ll be reading next.

Reading Goals

Since it’s the beginning of the month, why not set some reading goals? I’ve always wanted to participate in a readathon, but I always see them when they’re already happening. I think I may want to participate in one this month though. Feel free to drop your recommendations in the comments.

Other than that, I just hope this month will be a pleasant reading one. I beat Apple’s default reading goal by having read my fourth book off Apple Books this year. I read most of my books in other apps, so it isn’t as lame an achievement as it sounds.

What are you reading?

Book Review: Who Will Love Me Now? by Maggie Hartley

Posted on by Astrid

A few days ago, some people on an E-mail list were discussing a new collection of short stories by UK foster carer Maggie Hartley. I couldn’t find the collection on Apple Books, but I did stumble upon one of her full-size books, called Who Will Love Me Now?. Most people on the list had already read it, but I hadn’t, so I bought it and started to read it.

Summary

At just ten years old, Kirsty has already suffered a lifetime of heartache and suffering. Neglected by her teenage mother and taken into care, Kirsty thought she had found her forever family when she is fostered by Pat and Mike, who she comes to see as her real mum and dad.

But when Pat has a heart attack and collapses in front of her, Kirsty’s foster family say it’s all her fault. They blame her temper tantrums for putting Pat under stress and they don’t want Kirsty in their lives anymore.

Kirsty is still reeling from this rejection when she comes to live with foster carer Maggie Hartley. She acts out, smashing up Maggie’s home and even threatens to hurt the baby boy Maggie has fostered since birth. Social Services must take Kirsty’s threat seriously and Maggie is forced to choose between eight-month-old Ryan, who she’s grown to love, or angry Kirsty, who will most likely end up in a children’s home if Maggie can no longer care for her. Maggie is in an impossible position, one that calls in to question her decision to become a foster carer in the first place…

My Review

This book totally spoke to me! I could on some deep level relate to Kirsty. After all, I too displayed many behaviors similar to her at around this age. Age ten was also when my parents first considered (albeit not seriously) institutionalizing me at the school for the blind.

I could and to some extent still can relate to Kirsty’s volatile behavior. I have never had to live with anyone other than my biological parents until I was nineteen, but I did often feel rejected by them and showed this in quite dramatic ways.

I immediately, for this reason, rooted for Kirsty and resented Pat and Mike. It was for this reason that I loved to see how the story unfolded.

I read one earlier story by Maggie Hartley, but that was an eShort. I for this reason already knew I liked Maggie’s writing style. I loved it in this book too.

Overall, this was a great read and I finished it within less than a week.

Book Details

Title: Who Will Love Me Now?: Neglected, Unloved and Rejected. A Little Girl Desperate for a Home to Call Her Own
Author: Maggie Hartley
Publisher: Trapeze
Publication Date: July 20, 2017

Read With Me

Book Review: Diagnosis by Lisa Sanders

Posted on by Astrid

While scrolling over the new and noteworthy books on Apple Books about a month ago, I came across a Dutch book called Diagnose by Lisa Sanders. Sanders is a Dutch name too, so I initially assumed the book was originally Dutch. I don’t generally read many Dutch books and I certainly don’t buy them. Imagine my delight when I found out that the original title is Diagnosis and the book is originally written in English. Imagine my further delight when I found that Diagnosis is available on Bookshare, so I got it practically for free.

Summary

As a Yale School of Medicine physician, the New York Times bestselling author of Every Patient Tells a Story, and an inspiration and adviser for the hit Fox TV drama House, M.D., Lisa Sanders has seen it all. And yet she is often confounded by the cases she describes in her column: unexpected collections of symptoms that she and other physicians struggle to diagnose.

A twenty-eight-year-old man, vacationing in the Bahamas for his birthday, tries some barracuda for dinner. Hours later, he collapses on the dance floor with crippling stomach pains. A middle-aged woman returns to her doctor, after visiting two days earlier with a mild rash on the back of her hands. Now the rash has turned purple and has spread across her entire body in whiplike streaks. A young elephant trainer in a traveling circus, once head-butted by a rogue zebra, is suddenly beset with splitting headaches, as if someone were “slamming a door inside his head.”

In each of these cases, the path to diagnosis–and treatment–is winding, sometimes frustratingly unclear. Dr. Sanders shows how making the right diagnosis requires expertise, painstaking procedure, and sometimes a little luck. Intricate, gripping, and full of twists and turns, Diagnosis puts readers in the doctor’s place. It lets them see what doctors see, feel the uncertainty they feel–and experience the thrill when the puzzle is finally solved.

Review

I love medical storytelling. Still, I have quite a few books written by doctors about their patients that I just can’t finish. Diagnosis definitely wasn’t one of them! I didn’t finish it as quickly as I do some books, but that’s probably because this is a collection of stories. For this reason, at the end of a story, I can shove the book aside without wondeirng how the story will end.

The book is organized into eight parts, each describing a main symptom. As said in the introduction, there are only so many ways in which the body can show that it is unwell and yet there are over 90,000 known diseases. Isn’t that fascinating?

With some stories, I guessed correctly what was going on before it was mentioned. The man collapsing after eating barracuda was one of them (no, I won’t spoil it!). I found this pretty cool. With others, I had no idea until the end. This was fascinating too.

I loved the author’s writing style. Sanders uses clear but not too simple language. She also usually starts her stories in the heat of the moment, gripping my interest immediately. Overall, this was a great book. I gave it a five-star rating on Goodreads.

Book Details

Title: Diagnosis: Solving the Most Baffling Medical Mysteries
Author: Lisa Sanders
Publisher: Broadway Books
Publication Date: August 13, 2019

Read With Me

Lovin’ Lately (June 19, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi everyone and welcome to another edition of Lovin’ Lately, in which I share all the things I’ve been loving recently. I’m joining in with Friday Favorites.

Today was a pretty busy day. It was the Friday we have day activities (every other Friday is a day off). As such, I’ve been pretty active. This is why I didn’t sit down to write until now that it’s past 10PM. With no further ado, let me start.

1. Netflix. Last Saturday, in an impulse, I decided to get a Netflix subscription again. I always get the basic one, as I, being blind, don’t need HD video or multiple screens to watch on. I wanted to see the Netflix original documentary series Diagnosis. This is really fascinating!

2. My yoga mat. My husband brought it to me last week and I finally unfolded it this evening to get some working out done. I tried several yoga apps, but haven’t found one that I like yet. Then again, I love doing yoga just the way I like it. I mean, I’m pretty inflexible and don’t have much strength in my muscles at all, but if I don’t practise, it will remain this way. I tried a beginner’s yoga class with the app Down Dog, but couldn’t follow it without being able to see the video. Still, I loved the feel of working out.

3. Journaling prompt collections. I’ve probably mentioned half a dozen times already that I love to collect books of writing prompts, particularly those geared towards journaling. This week, I got a few good ones. The Goddess Journaling Workbook by Beatrix Minerva Linden is great. I already worked on some of the prompts over the past few days, as you can see. I however also love The Year of You by Hannah Braime.

4. A stuffed pillow. I got to borrow one from another client here at the care facility earlier this week and was totally in love with it. I kept stroking its soft side as I dozed off to sleep.

5. My Fitbit. This is by no means a new product, but I just want to mention it as a way to celebrate the huge step achievement I reached this week. So far this week, I got over 56K steps. This includes a short elliptical workout this evening. My Fitbit doesn’t count the yoga workout.

What products have you been lovin’ lately?

Reading Wrap-Up (June 10, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

Good evening everyone! I’m in quite a good mood for reading lately, so I thought I’d share a reading wrap-up with you all today. I’m joining in with WWW Wednesday.

What I’m Currently Reading

Last week, I downloaded a couple of autism-related books off Bookshare. I started with Our Autistic Lives edited by Alex Radcliffe. This is a collection of personal accounts of life with autism, organized by author age.

Then I stumbled on Diagnosis by Lisa Sanders. This is a collection of colums by the author about strange medical cases. I’m 20% done with it now.

Lastly, today I picked up Five Feet Apart by Rachael Lippincott again after a few weeks of not reading it. I’m not sure I’ll finish it, but we’ll see. I don’t think I like this book as much as I’d originally thought.

What I Recently Finished Reading

I spent all of last week-end reading Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett and finished it on Sunday. See my review, which I wrote on Monday.

What I Think I’ll Be Reading Next

I put a few other autism-related books on my virtual shelves this past week, including Spectrum Women by Barb Cook. I also downloaded a few more books in honor of #BlackLivesMatter, namely On the Come Up and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas.

However, I’m a true mood reader and I’ve had Clean by Juno Dawson on my radar for a while, so I may buy that one soon and read it first.

What have you been reading lately?

Book Review: Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett

Posted on by Astrid

Last week, I was drawn to Anne of In Residence’s Black Lives Matter booklist. I am white and admittedly completely clueless about racism, certainly as it applies to Black people. I however immediately decided to download a few books off this list onto my phone. The first book I got to read, obviously, was one with a medical aspect to it, because that’s what I’m most interested in: Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett.

Summary

In a community that isn’t always understanding, an HIV-positive teen must navigate fear, disclosure, and radical self-acceptance when she falls in love–and lust–for the first time. Powerful and uplifting, Full Disclosure will speak to fans of Angie Thomas and Nicola Yoon.

Simone Garcia-Hampton is starting over at a new school, and this time things will be different. She’s making real friends, making a name for herself as student director of Rent, and making a play for Miles, the guy who makes her melt every time he walks into a room. The last thing she wants is for word to get out that she’s HIV-positive, because last time . . . well, last time things got ugly.

Keeping her viral load under control is easy, but keeping her diagnosis under wraps is not so simple. As Simone and Miles start going out for real–shy kisses escalating into much more–she feels an uneasiness that goes beyond butterflies. She knows she has to tell him that she’s positive, especially if sex is a possibility, but she’s terrified of how he’ll react! And then she finds an anonymous note in her locker: I know you have HIV. You have until Thanksgiving to stop hanging out with Miles. Or everyone else will know too.

Simone’s first instinct is to protect her secret at all costs, but as she gains a deeper understanding of the prejudice and fear in her community, she begins to wonder if the only way to rise above is to face the haters head-on…

My Review

When I bought this book off Apple Books, I had next to no idea what this book was about other than the main character being Black and HIV-positive. Having an excuse to read a medical novel under the guise of supporting Black lives felt good though (yes, I know that makes me pretty oppressive). I had no idea this book was so good though.

Not only does it talk about HIV in much more depth than I ever was aware of. I mean, I almost immediately felt the shame come back to me from when we were presented with a problem case in college in which a fictional workplace was disrupted by stigma surrounding one worker’s HIV-positive status and I pretty quickly jumped to conclusions by saying the coworkers might want to be tested. My instructor immediately called me out that you don’t get HIV from drinking out of the same cups as someone who’s positive. I mean, I knew this much, but still objected that fear might guide the coworkers to get tested anyway and I’d understand that. How horrible!

It was totally liberating learning about not just HIV, but sex and sexuality in a broad perspective too. Several characters are openly queer. I loved learning about diversity like this.

Then there’s the race aspect. I didn’t learn too much about that from this book, as it assumes you already know a bit about Black culture, but I bet Black people can relate to some of the things being discussed.

The book is more plot-driven than character-driven, but I happen to love that. The characters are still really well-portrayed.

Overall, I totally loved this book and as such gave it five stars on Goodreads.

Book Details

Title: Full Disclosure
Author: Camryn Garrett
Publisher: Penguin
Publication Date: October 29, 2019

MamaMummyMum

#WeekendCoffeeShare (June 7, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

It’s Sunday and I am feeling pretty lazy. I have quite a few ideas for blog posts, but I’m just going with the #WeekendCoffeeShare. I haven’t participated in that one in a while. Grab a cup of coffee, green tea or I think there’s some soda or juice in the fridge still too and let’s catch up.

If we were having coffee, of course I’d talk about my new iPhone. I already shared about it on Friday, but well, I’m totally in love with it! I got the iPhone SE 2020, which the info section in Settings just calls the SE. That’s pretty confusing, since I also have the old SE still. I haven’t prepared that one for reselling or donating to charity yet. Not even sure what I’m going to do with it. Probably donate it to charity for recycling, but I’m not confident enough to remove all data yet.

My husband asked me what type of case I want for my new iPhone. He’s going to buy me one for my birthday. I currently have a jelly case, but I want a bookcase.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I got over 50K steps this past week. Last week, I got nearly 65K, so this isn’t a big accomplishment, but it still feels good.

If we were having coffee, I’d tell you that the weather is weird. Sometimes it rains, while other times it’s just slightly cloudy or even a bit sunny. Because of the rain, I haven’t been walking as much this week as I’d want to. Then again, I guess nature and agriculture need the rain.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that on Thursday, the staff intern and I made apple pastries. I didn’t do more than cut the apples into cubes, but it was okay. They were delicious!

If we were having coffee, I would also tell you that on Thursday I went to my GP. I have a large itchy spot on my upper leg that won’t go away. The GP thinks it’s an insect bite made worse by my scratching it. I got some hydrocortisone cream for it. It’s slightly better now.

If we were having coffee, I’d share with you how happy I am that WordPress isn’t planning on retiring the classic editor anytime soon. I don’t hate the block editor as much as some other bloggers do, but I find it somewhat annoying at the same time. I never liked the WordPress.com editor, so am actually pretty happy it’s gone.

If we were having coffee, lastly I would tell you that I’ve done a lot of reading lately. I’m truly in the mood again. I bought the YA novel Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett on Thursday and actually finished it in only three days. That’s pretty awesome for me.

How have you been lately?

Lovin’ Lately (June 5, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

It’s Friday, yay! Today I’m sharing another Lovin’ Lately list with you all. Want to know what I’ve loved lately?

1. My new iPhone. This one just has to be at the top, of course. I ordered it last Saturday and it arrived on Monday. On Tuesday, a staff member helped me set it up. Except for the pattern you need to scan with your old phone to make the old one send data to your new one, the whole set-up process was pretty easy. I did need a lot of help getting the screen protector and jelly case on the phone.

I got the new iPhone SE 2020. I can’t really compare how well this iPhone performs compared to my old one when I first had it. I mean, I use my new one much more than I did the old one back then, so it’s obvious the battery doesn’t last as long. However, I’m generally pretty impressed with how long I can use the new phone with the battery not getting below 50%. In addition, my new phone is a lot speedier than the old one. Not that I found my old one slow, but now that I have this one, I’m so happy.

Unfortunately, all bugs that I experienced with the old one, are still there. This means they’re software bugs. Just need to wait for iOS 14 to come out, I guess.

2. Twitter. I’ve been enjoying being on Twitter more over the past few days. I downloaded an app called Twitterrific that makes it pretty easy to use. Somehow, the app store highlights only one-star reviews and people claim it’s a scam. It does ask for money, but so far, the purchase seems entirely optional.

3. YouTube. As someone who’s never made any videos and doesn’t intend on it either, I tended to avoid YouTube because I can’t participate on it like I do with my blog. However, today I decided to check some book-related YouTubers (or BookTubers for short). I loved it!

4. Reading. I’ve not been reading much lately, but a few days ago, decided to read some autism-related non-fiction again. I’ve been loving some books detailing the autistic experience.

Then yesterday I was reading someone else’s #BlackLivesMatter TBR and impulsively bought a novel off it. I’m already at 57%. It’s Full Disclosure by Camryn Garrett. As someone who’s white, I don’t find that I read many books about black people and other racial minorities. Racial disparities just don’t speak to me. Then again, if I ever want racism to end, I’ll have to educate myself. This book also talks about queer stuff and the main character is HIV positive.

What have you been lovin’ lately?