Eyes and Ears - 09/01/2009

USSR:

Good Christmas presents:
(1) New Girl gave me the framed picture. When I finally get round to rearranging my lounge room it's going to nestle nicely amongst my English crime collection. Bliss. Not that I'm reading any of that just now. It's a winter pursuit, I feel. On the lounge with a crocheted rug and a cup of tea. Except I don't drink tea. And I don't crochet. But a girl can dream of the ideal life.
(2) Next to that is the four-volume collected letters and diaries of Harold Nicolson. This was from The Antiquer and an exceptionally thoughtful present it was. We'd seen this bundle in a second hand book shop and The Antiquer was nudging me to buy it, but it was more than I could afford at the time (and it meant I'd have to give up getting Rationale of the Dirty Joke by G Legman). Lo and behold it turned up in my Christmas stocking. I've been browsing through it ever since. Great stuff.

Also read (but far from also ran):
100 Australian Poems You Need to Know: Slightly overblown title, I think, but chockers with great poems I've never read before. My two favourites so far are side-by-side. Excerpts:

'The Quality of Sprawl' by Les Murray:

Sprawl leans on things. It is loose-limed in its mind.
Reprimanded and dismissed
it listens with a grin and one boot up on the rail
of possibility. It may have to leave the Earth.

'Bring Me the Sweat of Gabriela Sabatini' by Clive James

Bring me the sweat of Gabriela Sabatini
In a green Lycergus cup with a sprig of mint
But add no sugar -
The bitterness is what I want.

Radio hb:
2-4-6-8 Motorway - Tom Robinson
Driver's Seat - Sniff 'n' the Tears
Open All Night - Bruce Springsteen
Radar Love - Golden Earring
The Ballad of John Bonham's Coke Roadie - TISM