Forté #18

A few things that have inspired me lately and what I've been working on..

Hi you, how was the first week of January? I’ve been reading (or should I say, getting remarkably confused by) Tolstoy’s War & Peace with the slow read-along right here on Substack and although I find it tricky to keep up with all the names, it is a wonderful read so far. I’ve also found a lot of joy in my new Hobonichi Techo notebook:

This is my current notebook “turducken”, the Hobonichi Techo for daily journalling, the small monthly planner for viewing my month at a glance and the small passport-sized notebook (I usually use this one from Muji) for to-dos and things to get done. Obsessive? A little. But it keeps me happy and writing!

And here's another fortnightly collection of things that caught my attention:

🍃 Youth Lagoon is back with brand new music and this first single Football is just heavenly. The rhythm and melody are infectious. I’m so glad Trevor is back to making music. I still count his track 17 as one of my favourite tracks ever. I love it when the whole band kicks in for the last couple of choruses.

🍃 I recently subscribed to The Idler, a charming magazine that focuses on living a good, slow life. As part of the membership you get access to editor, Tom Hodgkinson’s, book An Idler’s Manual which is brilliant and full of lovely advice about how to live better. I particularly like the chapter on what it takes to make a good sandwich; which is both absurd and brilliant all in one.

It’s a fact of life that no one ever regretted making sandwiches.

— Tom Hodgkinson

🍃 This collection of images from the Voyager Golden Record. I love flicking through and seeing what we deemed as important to show of life on earth. See the rest of the collection here. I found these after reading the news that Voyager 1 has stopped communicating with Earth.

🍃 "There’s Waldo" is a robot that finds Waldo. The video is great but to be honest I loved the commenter on YouTube that said “Do you know how many five year olds are going to be out of a job because of you!?” Also, did you know that Waldo is not called “Waldo” in all countries? Here in the UK we call him Wally, in Denmark he is Holger, in France Charlie and in German Walter! 

🍃 Mary Oliver writing beautifully (as she tends to do) about creativity:

It is a silver morning like any other. I am at my desk. Then the phone rings, or someone raps at the door. I am deep in the machinery of my wits. Reluctantly I rise, I answer the phone or I open the door. And the thought which I had in hand, or almost in hand, is gone. Creative work needs solitude. It needs concentration, without interruptions. It needs the whole sky to fly in, and no eye watching until it comes to that certainty which it aspires to, but does not necessarily have at once. Privacy, then. A place apart — to pace, to chew pencils, to scribble and erase and scribble again.

Thank you for being here, let me know what’s inspiring you recently. Hitting subscribe is always welcome and please do share with someone who might enjoy. If you'd like to support this newsletter please buy one of my albums over on Bandcamp, or consider becoming a paid subscriber here on Substack.

SJF