The Versatile Blogger Award

Thanks so much to http://www.theolivareader.blogspot.com/ who nominated me yesterday for The Versatile Blogger award - now, in accordance with the rules, all I have to do is nominate another blog/s and list seven things about myself. I'm not sure which is easiest!

After much thought, and at the risk of being accused of playing safe at the expense of all those (less famous) blogs which are out there and which I dip into from time to time, I'm going to nominate the eclectic, controversial, inclusive, funny, serious, whimsical and wise blog of the great Paulo Coelho:

http://www.paulocoelhoblog.com/.

I have read and enjoyed several of Coelho's books but I got into his blog after Lynn read to me from the preface of his 2006 collection of thoughts and reflections, Like The Flowing River. Having decided at age fifteen that he wanted to be a writer, Coelho was challenged by his rather sceptical mother to justify his ambition by finding out what 'being a writer' actually meant. He did some research, the result of which was an eight-point list of writer's attributes, starting with this:-

"(a) A writer always wears glasses and never combs his hair. Half the time he feels angry about everything and the other half depressed. He spends most of his life in bars, arguing with other dishevelled, bespectacled writers. He says very 'deep' things. He always has amazing ideas for the plot of his next novel, and hates the one he has just published.

(b) A writer has a duty and an obligation never to be understood by his own generation..."

And so it goes on.

As to seven things about me:

1. My phobia is gatherings, especially gatherings which focus in some way on me, in which respect I agree with Scout Finch, who said, 'I can stand anything but a bunch of people looking at me.' In an effort to beat this phobia, I attend as many gatherings as possible
2. My magical power is to come alongside the jetty in the pitch dark, without touching it
3. I once sold my pet Jack Russell terrier to my sister for half an easter egg
4. My motto is, 'Suffer fools gladly'. Being intelligent enough to know that I'm not especially intelligent, I see this as a matter of solidarity
5. I aspire to my father's sense of optimism - he was once called by a journalist, 'Look-on-the-bright-side Brian'
6. I would be happy to write as well as my mother
7. My greatest stroke of luck was to find a beauty/talent combo, and marry it