Senses working overtime #582

1 Highlight of the week: First meeting with Billie and great reunion with Poppy, Adam, Ashleigh, Andrew and Fanfa.

Great to have Billie and Poppy's parents staying over at Maple Grove at the end of this week.

2 Reading: Wisdom Takes Work - Ryan Holiday

3 Listening: Ziltoid the Omniscient - Devin Townsend

4 Reading: Play It As It Lays - Joan Didion

5 Viewing: sport

It's all about football at the FIFA World Cup as the round of 32 played out and the All Blacks who played the French in Christchurch - winning by two points just now. Some scintillating sport!

Overtime: Christian Nestell Bovee

Doubt whom you will, but never doubt yourself.

Senses working overtime #581

1 Messy week

Photo by Pier Monzon on Unsplash

Thanks to a two-day trip to Hamilton, two days at school and a day off with a seasonal cold (like a tap running, it was).

2 Watching: FIFA World Cup 2026

Photo by obayda PH on Unsplash

This week, it cranked up to 6 games a day for the third and final round of pool games.

3 Listening: Mike Nesmith - Pretty Much Your Standard Ranch Stash

I managed to find a copy at a record fair in Waipukurau during the week. The inside of the gatefold cover is a bit damaged, but this has been a really hard album to find, and it was only $15. I call that a bargain.

The album's big moment was Some of Shelly's Blues.

4 Reading: Mojo Magazine #338

5 Constant companion this week: Tissue box

Overtime: Maya Angelou

If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude.

Senses working overtime #580

1 Tough week of medical dramas...

Photo from Unsplash

...with Keegan having his (successful) back operation, Fanfa her root canal, and the Minister of Defense his on-going hospitalisation in New Plymouth, and now Waikato.

2 Watching: FIFA World Cup 2026

 

Four games a day of top football action! Welcome to heaven.

3 Reading: Ringo - A Fab Life by Tom Doyle

I struggled to eek out some quality reading time this week but this excellent biography continued to hold my interest. Luckily, Ringo's alcohol/drugs fueled years were dispensed with reasonably adroitly.

4 Celebrated: Macca's 84th birthday...

...on June 18 with Now and Then (the video is great too but have tissues ready) and my favourite track on The Boys of Dungeon Lane - Home to Us. 

5 Listening: Billy Thorpe - Solo

Overtime: Thornton Wilder

Seek the lofty by reading, hearing and seeing great work at some moment every day.

Basically, the motto of this blog!

Senses working overtime #579

1 FIFA World Cup 2026

And we're off in sparkling fashion, thanks to Shakira's amazing performance.

2 Watched - Long Promised Road 

I know I mentioned this one a few weeks ago, but I was interrupted and finished watching it while Jacky was in New Plymouth.

It's quite an emotional experience watching a frail and often anxious Brian Wilson being driven around some of his old haunts. There's always a price to pay.

3 Reading: Ringo - A Fab Life by Tom Doyle

Really getting into this version of Ringo's story set out in 70 bite size themed chapters - gear!!

4 Watching: Lays' FIFA World Cup 2026 bandwagon advert 

YEEHAR!!!

5 Watching: Rip the script!

Awesome football celebration from Nike. I love football!

Overtime: World cup players motto from Basil King

Be bold - and mighty forces will come to your aid.

Senses working overtime #578

1 Reading: The Little Book of Arsenal

Some great quotes in the book, like Martin Keown's, 'Second in the league might be good enough somewhere else, but not at Arsenal'.

2 Listening: Stan Getz - Captain Marvel

This 1972 album by Stan Getz was an excellent acquisition from The Little Red Bookshop this week.

3 Missing Grace

Sadly, this week we said goodbye to Grace. 

Compared to humans, our pets (cats, dogs and horses), have a much shorter lifespan. Grace has been a much-loved part of our family since Red Phoenix Farm around 13 years ago, so it was an especially hard week. Be assured, as a kindhearted and lovely looking girl, she'll be catnip to all those boy horses in horse heaven.

4 Reading: Ringo: A Fab Life - Tom Doyle  

5 Viewing: Sleeping Dogs

I'm showing this to my Year 10 class as part of a unit on the dystopian genre. The film is very prescient, and it holds up remarkably well for a film made in 1977 (trailer is here). 

Overtime: Don Howe (Arsenal manager in 1971 - the league and FA Cup double year)

Above all we were blessed with a backbone of men with character who demanded excellence from others.

Senses working overtime #577

1 This week: out standing in their field...

...while on cross country duty at school. Go Fraser!!

2 Listening: The Boys of Dungeon Lane - Paul McCartney

Macca's latest, released this weekend, is excellent in all ways. I recommend the vinyl over other formats: the packaging, the songs, the sound - it's gear fab!

Here's a taster: Down South is a simple love song to the past.

3 Reading: Bread of Angels - Patti Smith

After being distracted for a few weeks by reading Mojo/ Guardian Weeklies, I've returned to Patti's memoir. I'll need to return to her first chapters eventually. Currently reading about the making of Horses and it's superb!

4 Watching: The Long Promised Road - Directed by Brent Wilson (no relation)

Thanks to their 20% off sale, I picked this up from JB Hi Fi for less than $10!!

5 Celebrating: King's Birthday weekend in New Zealand

Still enjoying his recent speech to Congress.

Overtime: Mahatma Gandhi

We must become the change we want to see.

Senses working overtime #576

1 This week: Celebrating with my Arsenal family: We love the Arsenal, we do!

What a week! CHAMPIONS!!

2 Also this week - autumn's frosty days

Photo by Caleb Stokes on Unsplash

3 Viewing - Person of Interest season 3

4 Feeling thankful: to Nick Marfell

Thanks to an interweb connection to NZ collector Nick Marfell, I have been able to collect two items that were lost years ago in a house move - Let it Be box set from 1970 and John Lennon's Roots album. Now sleeping sounder thanks to Nick.

5 Listening: Everything But The Girl at Maida Vale

Overtime: Dalai Lama

Happiness is not something ready-made; it comes from your own actions.