http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/ 2012-04-14T17:21:43+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/04/post_156.html I have discovered what ereaders are good for: reading erotica in public. Actually, they're good for a myriad of reasons. I am a reluctant gadget adopter as I tend to only buy them when I have no way out... Books claudia 2012-04-14T17:21:43+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/04/easter_in_edinb.html At Edinburgh Books. ****** Edinburgh has brilliant cemeteries. The 18th century graves at St. Dunstan's are the best ones. Memento Mori galore. ***** The National Galleries of Art exceeded expectations. The only downside was that the shop had run... Travel claudia 2012-04-13T11:57:06+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/03/useless_but_add.html What do you do when you find the French state has massive portions of their public records online? You go find birth records of writers and artists, of course. Marcel Proust. Or Valentin Louis Georges Eugène Marcel Proust. His father... Books claudia 2012-03-30T11:41:54+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/03/argh.html Claudia's Law of Unwise Reading Choices: sitting next to me on a flight from Lisbon was this very nice and interesting Portuguese lady who turned out to be a scholar, prize winning poet and profusely translated at that. We chatted... Personal claudia 2012-03-21T16:19:39+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/03/misericords.html Misericords. I noticed them in Ludlow one of these last weekends for the first time and I only haven't found them earlier because I've been sitting on them. Misericords are narrow ledges on the underside of tip-up seats, offering... Art claudia 2012-03-08T12:12:50+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/03/on_having_a_bib.html I'm never without a book to read and, despite the periodical frustrations with fiction, I almost always have sucess at finding new authors. Especially through other authors - I just ordered a John Cowper Powys on the strength of a... Books claudia 2012-03-07T18:38:43+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/03/post_155.html Why am I not going to heaven? Certainly for very good moral reasons, but for much more practical reasons too: I've already been there. What is heaven? It is the Galleria in Milan. I'm sitting with a real cappuccino, in... Books claudia 2012-03-07T16:48:31+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/03/post_154.html Dorothy L Sayers in her essay "The Gulf Stream and the Channel", from the book "Unpopular opinions": "It has, I believe, been said that Britain possesses no climate, only weather. The weather of this country has been much abused (...)... Personal claudia 2012-03-04T11:59:50+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/02/at_the_movies.html The Muppets. Unexpectedly, the level of silliness was below par. It was probably the mixture of nostalgia pangs and "misfit identity crisis" plot which, while never reaching a stage that could be mistaken - not even remotely - for serious... Cinema claudia 2012-02-28T11:34:13+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/02/snowdonia.html We spent the weekend climbing to see hidden lakes on top of mountains. Llyn Cau. It's in a protected area and there was no one in sight. Other than sheep. If it weren't so cold out I would have skinny... Travel claudia 2012-02-24T13:57:14+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/02/bath_spa_suburb.html Despite living in the much famed Cotswolds, we have as a favorite day trip a jaunt to the city of Bath Spa in Somerset. You don't realize "awarded World Heritage Site status for its outstandingly preserved Georgian architecture" means until... Travel claudia 2012-02-12T11:58:52+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/02/lateral_evidenc.html (quote that proves my theory that the Dowager Countess of Grantham in Downton Abbey is, in fact, a bitchy gay man) William Beckford in a letter: "I take airings everyday like an old Dowager".... Personal claudia 2012-02-10T18:53:58+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/02/keeping_tabs_1.html Double happiness: it snowed and my favorite spot - I always have one wherever I am, like a cat - will be spared the ignominy of fake beautification (also known as "development" or "progress"). The spot being the ruins... Cinema claudia 2012-02-08T18:51:44+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/02/special_turkish.html Hugh MacDiarmid’s ‘Glasgow 1960’ Returning to Glasgow after long exile Nothing seemed to me to have changed its style. Buses and trams all labelled "To Ibrox" Swung past packed tight as they'd hold with folks. Football match, I concluded, but... Poetry claudia 2012-02-03T10:05:31+00:00 http://claudia.weblog.com.pt/arquivo/2012/01/post_153.html There must be a person somewhere at Gloucestershire's library headquarters who knows my name by heart at this point. That same person which regularly must say "Which odd, never borrowed before book do I have to go search the reserve... Literature claudia 2012-01-26T09:28:44+00:00