Day 45: Time to...get on my bike

Day 45 (19 Jan) The time has come. Each January, about now in that lull post Christmas-New Year and just weeks before classes begin again, I get that sudden realisation that there are many things I must do and this is about the only time to do them. They're not what I'd call new year's resolutions but I always set out in my own mind, things I'd like to achieve in the next few weeks. 

Mind you, the list usually begins with the things I didn't quite finish last year...so really, it's a never-ending story. 

Reading is a big part of my job. I read daily newspapers, I read fiction and I read much non-fiction. I don't stick to a narrow focus with my reading either, since I like to draw on a wide range of materials when I teach. That simply increases the reading load, and then, when you add in equal amounts of reading Japanese materials, then that's quite a bit of reading to do. 

Finish that novel, at 6.12am

So at 6.12am, I was awake but aiming to finish off a book, a novel, I'd started before I went away. I will finish it by the end of the week...I'm sure. I've also resolved during the day that I will put some reviews of the Japanese books I bought on the other blog. I didn't have the blog last time I went to Japan so I'd bring back books and just read them...now I've decided to give them a broader audience. I'll start that tonight...

The back deck, at 6.12pm,
a Queensland tradition

It was another hot summery day in Brisbane and I headed to the Gold Coast to have lunch with my mum and take her computer to get fixed...

While driving back I thought about the things I wanted to write and there is much. My main project at the moment of course is the 1890s Japanese politicians and their political philosophies. I still have the 'great Australian novel' floating around in the back of my mind and lots of other research-related materials. Yes, I'd like to write. 

On returning home, it seemed appropriate to sit on the back deck and read the paper which I hadn't had time to do this morning. It's a Queensland tradition, the back deck. So at 6.12pm, it was reading and the back deck, hoping the clouds above would convert to some cooling rain...not to be this time. Never mind. 

But there are other things one must do besides read...the bike is just out of the picture here. It also occurred to me that this blog, by its very nature, could actually make me be 'on my bike' at 6.12am everyday...now's there's a thought, and a time, to act. But can the blog sustain daily pictures of an exercise bike...

Halfway through the Australian Open tonight, Tomic has just been defeated by Federer; the Brisbane part of the twitterverse is hoping for rain and I think that professional cyclist is still making the news today. 612ABC newsreader Shelley Lloyd and I have just discovered we both went to school on the Gold Coast...there you go!  It's been a most interesting day.