Welcome to Sunday Bookends where I ramble about what I’ve been reading, doing, watching, writing and listening to.

What I/we’ve been Reading

I finished Call Me A Cab by Donald Westlake this week and really enjoyed it. It was more of a romance than anything else, without the ridiculous tropes that some romances offer.

I did have a mistake last week when I said the book was released in February of 2021. It was actually released this February.

A couple of different versions of the book were found after Westlake died and an editor who had worked with him in the past combined them to create the final draft of the previously unpublished work. A portion of the story had been published in Redbook Magazine in the 70s, but not the entire novel.

This week I will be continuing Miss Julia Rocks the Cradle by Ann B. Ross, which is moving slower than molasses in January at this point. The previous book I read from this series moved much faster and while I like quirky characters, this book features chapters full of blow-by-blow descriptions of fairly mundane events. Hopefully, it will pick up soon, but even if it doesn’t, I’ll probably still read it because I love the characters.

I also need to read at least some of a book I agreed to read for a book tour later in April this week. It is a non-fiction book called Anything But Simple by Lucinda Miller and is about a woman who grew up in the Mennonite community. It is the fifth book in as. I have a series about members of the Mennonite and Amish communities. I started it a couple of weeks ago and I am enjoying it, but got distracted by a couple of other books after starting it. Plus, I knew I had most of March to read it. Oops. March is gone, isn’t it? So yesterday I read more of it and realized Lucinda and I are very similar. I am looking forward to offering a review of this book the week after next.

Here is a small description of the book:

Like her grandmother, Lucinda J. Miller wears long dresses and a prayer covering. But she uses a cellphone and posts status updates on Facebook, too. Anything but Simple is the riveting memoir of a young woman’s rich church tradition, lively family life, and longings for a meaningful future within her Mennonite faith. With a roving curiosity and a sometimes saucy tongue, Miller ushers us into her busy life as a young schoolteacher.

Book 5 in the Plainspoken series. Hear straight from Amish and Mennonite people themselves as they write about their daily lives and deeply rooted faith in the Plainspoken series from Herald Press. Each book includes “A Day in the Life of the Author” and the author’s answers to FAQs about the Amish and Mennonites.

What’s Been Occurring

Not a lot has been occurring recently. It’s been pretty routine around here. Our adventure last week was a trip 45 minutes to a new doctor for my son to ask him about the smell and taste distortions my son and I have been dealing with since we had the dreaded virus in November. Bottom line? The doctor can’t do anything and pretty much no one can. The general consensus seems to be, “Wait it out.” So, we are waiting it out and hope it will get better. Some days the situation is better, and we hope we don’t have the issue as long as some of this doctor’s patients have had it.

After our doctor’s visit, we stopped at the house of a butcher to pick up a quarter of a cow my dad had ordered. That was an interesting situation — at face value anyhow. This was a very simple home with a simple sign of the butcher’s name and business out front at the end of the driveway near some cow head skeletons. I couldn’t see where I was supposed to go to tell the gentleman I was there, but my dad had said there was a door under a meat hook at the end of a ramp. I thought he meant the ramp led to the house, but alas, the ramp led to the basement of the home. This sent some alarms off for The Boy who announced it was starting to feel like the start of a horror movie.

He waited in the car while I made my way to the basement, knocked on the door and heard a voice invite me inside. I had nothing to worry about because the basement had been converted into a very professional, clean, and modern butcher space. Even though I had nothing to worry about, it did make me a little nervous when he asked me to close the door behind me. Again, though, I had nothing to worry about as he is a very kind man who butchered a cow for a friend of us. She sold it to our family for $3 a pound and his butcher fees.

By the end of the day, we had a freezer full of meat, which made up for not having any answers from the doctor.

Later that day our area was nailed with crazy storms, which luckily didn’t bring the flooding they thought it would bring.

I thought the storms might mean a break to the cold weather that has been gripping our area and maybe bring some actual spring weather. Sadly, the temperatures are apparently going to be below 60 again this upcoming week. Yeah. That “yeah” was very unenthusiastic, by the way.

Yesterday the temperatures were only in the 40s but we still enjoyed some time outside with Little Miss and her friends and, of course, the youngest cat who is still slipping out:

What We watched/are Watching

I hate to sound like a broken record but we watched more Brokenwood Mysteries this week.

Then I watched a bunch of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which someone put up on YouTube. I hadn’t watched the show before because I always thought I’d think of Mary as Laura from The Dick VanDyke Show, but I didn’t. She’s definitely a different character on her own show and so far I love it. I’m going to watch as many seasons as I can on YouTube because I really don’t want to add another streaming service to our list.

What I’m Writing

Last week I worked a bit on Mercy’s Shore but shared on Friday why I am struggling with writing fiction at the moment.

• Fiction Friday: Why I’ve been struggling to write fiction lately

Other posts I shared this week included:

• I like movies and books about quirky smalltown characters
• Five uplifting, sing-along worship songs you need to listen to today

What I’m Listening To

I’ve been listening to Matthew West a lot this week. I’ve needed his uplifting music. Some of my medical issues have reared their ugly heads and I’m tired. I’m tired and I don’t know if it is my medical issues or left over from the dreaded virus. Either way, I’m drained from it all.

Now it’s your turn

Now it is your turn. What have you been doing this week? Watching, reading, listening to?