For the last couple of years, I’ve been making my own version of Bircher Muesli. I start the night before by putting a half-handful of rolled oats into a bowl. On top of that, I add an ever-changing mixture of nuts and dried fruit. Most often it’s a sprinkle of flaxseed, generous pinches of coconut, sunflower seeds, and pepitas, with some naked ginger and currants, sultanas, dates, or a chopped dried fig. Usually, I cover the mixture with soya milk or apple juice and leave to soak overnight. In the morning it’s topped with yoghurt, honey, and some fresh fruit. I like it so much I’ve stopped buying readymade cereals and this winter I skipped making porridge with rolled oats. Give it a try!
On reading well
Just as water, over a long period of time, reshapes the land through which it runs, so too we are formed by the habit of reading good books well.
Karen Swallow Prior
Repeats
Stamp collectors are not the only ones who collect things. My grandchildren collect ooshies from Woolworths; my hobby-farmer younger brother buys cattle, some collect fridge magnets, I know a man who collects tractors. I’ve got a stash of DVDs. I began with the rule that I would wait until what I wanted to watch was under $10, but I’d pay more for a series. Anyway, after several years, I find myself with a stash of unwatched movies. It’s astounding how, when I want to watch something, it’s just too hard to choose. The genre’s not right for tonight, or it runs too long when I want an early night. Then, what I end up doing is watching something I’ve seen before – something I’ll be sure to enjoy.
All this has made me realize how good it is to go back and re-watch an oldie; it’s the same with books and music. I think it was the fear-of-missing-out that made me such an avaricious acquirer of movies. I’d read a promising review, and I’d be thinking, “I must buy that!” But, now I know, that I would have been happy enough with just a few precious DVDs that I could view over and over again. Besides that, there are not enough free nights in a week (or a year) to watch everything. I guess the same could apply to meals. How many new recipes do we need when we already have some many favourites to try again?
Another world
If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.
C. S. Lewis
The unanswerable
We need answers to the unanswerable: how did we get here? How did “here” get here in the first place? Is this – this brief life – all there is? How can it be? What would be the point of that? And, we need codes to live by, rules for every damn thing! The soul needs all these explanations – not simply rational explanations, but explanations of the heart.
Salman Rushdie
Faith
Faith is not a gift we bring to God in our hands to win his favour; faith is the empty hand of the beggar reaching out for divine charity.
Joel Beeke
In My Life 
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