OYSTERHOOD is reclusiveness or solitude, or an overwhelming desire to stay at home.

— @HaggardHawks

I went Harry hunting in the morning today. It seems that readers are not too eager to part with their Harry Bosch books – so I had to order number four in the series new, and only got ten and eleven second-hand for now. But apparently, The Narrows is a sequel to The Poet, which I read a few years ago, so I should be fine until number four arrives.

On my Harry mission, I got a few other books (obviously), but two were quite a strange acquisition. One of the readers who came to talk to me during the Alma Café Traders’ Market told me that he saw a Max du Preez book dedicated to André and me at a charity bookshop in Mowbray. It confused me, because we have never given away any of our library books, and definitely not signed ones. Searching for Harry, I decided to check out the bookshop and see for myself.

And I found not only one but these two in the bookshop, and I bought them back. How did they ever leave our library? Either someone took these books from the house and donated them to the bookshop for some reason, or borrowed them from us and decided to donate instead of returning them. Either way, seeing them in the bookshop and having to buy them back was a strange experience – quite disconcerting, because I now walk around the library and think, how many more books are missing without my knowledge …? When you are a custodian of a library of about fifteen thousand books, it is impossible to know whether there are any missing or not. And if there are, I wouldn’t even know where to start looking for them and how to bring them back. How did they get lost in the first place …? I am not sure I want to know the answer.

New arrivals in the library: these two Deep South review copies in my postbox. Looking forward to reading and reviewing them!

While book shopping, I also got some frozen dumplings and treated myself to a lunch that felt like complete overindulgence, but was sooooo goooood. A real treat.

The rest of the day was admin, visit to the bank to clear up an unexpected issue, hundreds of emails (at least it felt like hundreds), and a Skype chat with a young woman who is interested in an internship at Karavan Press. Two quiet moments: a short coffee and ice-cream break with Mozart in the afternoon, and a lovely sunset walk and dinner with my love in the evening.

Now, I am ready for bed. My arm is itching while healing; the scabs are coming off, the bruises turning green and yellow. I still can’t believe how lucky I was …

I am nearly finished with the embroidering of my new mask :)

Be kind. Wear a mask. Support local.

“Physical distancing remains one of the key strategies to curb this pandemic.”

— NICD