Saturday, August 06, 2011

A few of my favourite blogs

I thought this morning that I would limit myself to a stroll around the blogosphere, just mentioning some of the posts and blogs that I have noticed.

Sydney blogger Marcellous has been following the strange court case involving McLaughlin v Manly Dungowan. The posts in order are:

Have a browse and then look especially at excerpts from the judgement given in the final post. I sort of blinked at the whole thing, but really blinked at the wording in the excerpts of the judgement. His Honour was clearly annoyed, but would seem to me to be arguably guilty of the same intemperance that he was criticising the parties for.  But then, I'm not a lawyer!

Marcellous has also continued his music reviews. My favourite recent is Living off the fat of the land, a review of Opera Australia’s production of Of Mice and Men.

There was a fun piece on French-Australian Sophie Masson's A la mode frangourou. Sophie offered a prize of a vintage cookbook for the best recipe. She described the competition in this way: 

take your favourite Victorian novel(whether actually written then or a modern one set in Victorian times) and invent a recipe for a Victorian-style 'entree' that might convey the atmosphere of the book. For instance, in a Trollope novel, you might have something rich and fancy; in a Bronte novel, something more austere; in a Dickens novel, something flamboyant and unusual--and so on! Simply post your entry as a comment on this post--I'll be choosing my personal favourite from them.

In the end, she had to choose two. The winning recipes were presented in And the winner of the Mrs de Salis vintage cookbook is.... I won't steal Sophie's thunder by quoting. Do have I look. The two winners are quite fun.

In On information and speed and mind’s problems and then On “How We Know”, Canadian blogger Randy McDonald discusses issues associated with information. That's very shorthand - the posts are worth browsing and I want to come back to them later. Toronto based, Randy is an interesting blogger. He also writes on demography.matters and A Bit More Detail. I like bloggers who take me in directions that I might not otherwise go.

Australian blogger's Chris Walker-Bush's Aussie on the Road is a new addition to my blogging list. As the name suggests, this is a travel blog. Each Friday he gives recommended reads (latest Friday’s Recommended Reads – August 5th) that take us through to other travel blogs.

Australian blog ART and ARCHITECTURE, mainly  is a wonderful blog. Helen links art, architecture, design and history. You don't have to know anything about her topics because each piece stands alone. I know that this sounds lyrical, but it really is good.

I haven't given links to specific posts because it can be hard to choose. Just spend a while browsing and you will see what I mean. Helen also has a very good links section that actually shows some of the specialist depth of the blogosphere.

RKL-diaspora Indian blog Ramana's Musings is another consistently good blog. In preparing this post, I read back through the last twenty or so posts, trying to select my favourites. I found it quite hard!

I decide to select Indians Abroad not because it is the best, but because it made me laugh. The cartoon is from that post.

Today we are  not allowed to say that some of my best friends are Indian or whatever because of the connotations! Yet it remains true that some of my best friends have been Indian.

I say have been because in recent times the happenstance's of life mean that I have met far fewer Indian people, while many of those that I do know have left Australia!. I have actually commented on this in the context of the statistics on Australian emigration

I find Ramana's blog fun in its own right, but also because it actually links to my own past.

I want to finish this post with a brief mention of two of my favourite photo blogs, both from Northern NSW.

Gordon Smith's lookANDSee and Mark's Clarence Valley Today.

Both blogs are area specific. Gordon has a special focus on the  New England Tablelands, Mark on the Clarence River Valley.

Both move out from those points. Gordon is currently touring outback Queensland, Mark has moved from the Clarence up into Gordon's Tablelands' territory. Both provide brief contextual comments on their photos, making them more accessible to outsiders.

Do have a look if you haven't already. I really think that they are good.   

Postscript:

Ramana was inspired write to an entertaining  companion post. Do read his comment first, then go to An Australian And Chalta Hai!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks, J.

I know you are still reading but it's nice to get a little feedback.

I'll check out some of the other blogs you refer to, some of which I have looked at on your recommendation before.

Jim Belshaw said...

Actually, M, I should give you more feedback than I have. Otherwise, it's very easy to feel that you are writing into the ether!

Chris said...

Many thanks for the mention mate. Didn't realize you had an extra blog of your own. I'll add it to my Reader.

Jim Belshaw said...

Thanks, Chis. This one is my strictly personal blog wandering wherever thoughts take me.

Rummuser said...

Thanks for the plug in Jim. (Bowing)

"Today we are not allowed to say that some of my best friends are Indian or whatever because of the connotations! Yet it remains true that some of my best friends have been Indian."

I understand and forgive you. Nothing stops me from saying that some of my best friends are Australians! Is that politically incorrect? Never mind, it is still true. As I write this, one has come over to Bengal on a construction assignment and he is hilarious to say the least. I shall go now and write a blog post about him.

Jim Belshaw said...

Hi Ramana. I enjoted the post!

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