Welcome again to the 5BF, where I share 5 note-worthy highlights from my past week in a small article. Reading, writing, watching, discovering, just about anything that I know would be beneficial for the readers.
Without much ado, here’s this week’s 5 Bites Friday.
1: What I wrote…
In June of this year, I finished reading 100 books. Yay! And
I wanted to write a personal blog where I’d reflect back on the journey of
reading book, writing, and how it aided to my proudly being an introvert. Well,
I couldn’t write it in June, or next month, since our town’s library was closed
due to the lockdown. However, last week, I finally managed to finish this blog
which came out to be thirteen thousand words long. I know it is too lengthy.
But I poured everything I had summed up during the journey into this article.
Here it is: A Love Letter to Myself: on reading, writing, and being an introvert.
2: What I read…
Reading has been great for me this year. And I do owe a
thanks to the pandemic for this. By this day of the year, I’ve read 43 books in
total, beating my challenge set for 35 books. Anyways, here’s a couple of books
I read this past week, and you can read the reviews by clicking on the titles:
Talking to Strangers (Malcolm Gladwell): Interesting,
timely, and serviceable, Gladwell’s ‘Talking to Strangers’ is no less
shocking and fun than his previous books. A genius of non-fiction writing!
Good Manners for Nice People who sometimes say F*ck (AmyAlkon): All in all, Alkon’s book covers almost all the important topics in
which we lack and should know the manners: telephone, apologies, traveling,
neighbors, and more. Backed up with research, her book is really helpful,
which is a rare compliment for ‘self-help’ books. It can also be used as a
return-to guide, for when you forget your manners – which we all do from time
to time.
3: What I watched…
One of the many sources of entertainment that almost
everyone turned to during this pandemic to keep themselves busy and not have a
breakdown, was movies and TV. Games and TikTok too, but those are out of my
league. Here’s what I watched recently, and why I recommend them too:
The Boys (Season 2): If you haven’t watched the season one,
go watch it now. And although the season two is only 4 episodes out, it is
worth watching and waiting. Not only is it fun, but it is timely for its
sarcastic portrayal how our corrupt world is, and presents the audience with
challenging moralistic questions. Definitely worth watching!
The Lives of Others (2006): It is a German movie based around
a detective who’s assigned to spy on a writer and his actress girlfriend. But
after the detective, Wiesler, finds that the official who has assigned him is
corrupt himself and is after the actress, he decides to hide important
information about an article that unveils some dark truth about Germany.
Intense, touching, and beautiful. A must watch!
4: Singularity (after Hawkins) a poem by Marie Howe
They are things that touch you so deeply, whether
emotionally or intellectually, that they become a part of your consciousness.
And it stays with you wherever you go, while timelessly offering you the
eternal joy it carries. Howe’s ‘Singularity’ has become such a poem for me.
Although a recent discovery, it has captured both my thoughts and emotions in a
most beautiful and imaginative way. The recitation of this very poem in a
YouTube video ‘here’ makes it that much more powerful. A must listen, and must
keep-on-listening!
5: This week’s Quote
“The way I see it, a bare minimum of one kind act a day
should be our self-imposed cover change for living in this world. We get the
society we create – or the society we let happen to us.”
– Amy Alkon