Unravelled Wednesday and WAYRN - The one that is very Melbourne

We have a tunnel near our house that is covered in street art. In the 90s the council did it in purpose to stop taggers. A year ago they overpainted the whole beautiful thing in institutional grey. It's poorly lit, and creepy and that did not help, although it got muralled up pretty quickly.

 Then they were clearly trailing some sort of anti-graffiti cladding - pieces of metal on the walls. A couple of weeks ago they repainted again, in bright primary colours. When we walked through there were security guards wandering around. We commented that, while the colours were pretty they would get covered pretty fast. Turns out the walls were being guarded so they would stay nice for the street artists and now St Kilda Junction is a delightful work of art again. 

Which brings me to the NetGalley  review book I am reading - an unauthorised bio of Banksy called The Man Behind the Wall. While Banky's is a name I'm familiar with, and I know some of his work I had no idea of the history or his backstory. It's an interesting read, both for the particulars and information about the wider graffiti scene.

I'm also reading The Spare Room by Helen Garner. I chose it because I was having trouble settling into a book again and this was the oldest book on my Kindle (use it or loose it!). It a short, sparse, very moving book about a woman who has a three week visit from a friend who is dying of cancer. It asks the question, When do you you call it? When should you give up? What is a friend's obligation? It has very few words, but also asks us to consider the impact of not having children and  what meaning our lives hold. All of this without being self-consciously deep. Also, it is set in Melbourne, and they spend a lot of time in places close to my heart - including the old Butterfly club in South Melbourne.

I'm listening to About a Girl, by Rebekah Robertson. Also set in Melbourne it's about a trans girl and her journey. I wanted to read this because there have been bits and pieces about the family in the media, so i had some awareness of them. Also I have a bit of a fascination with gender identity. I guess being CIS het its a way of reading and learning about other, more challenging situations people are in. 

I'm still knitting away on my cardigan. Tackling the bottom ribbing - 10cm of twisted rib knitted flat is no joke! It's been a really good social project - when at home I've been rather more focused on processing fleece than knitting.

And that's my week in reading and knitting. To read my all my book reviews, and to see everything I knit, you can find me on Ravelry as Sharondoubleknit and on GoodReads as Sharondblk.

I'm joining in with Kat from As Kat Knits for Unravelled Wednesday and Kat from the Bookdate for It's Monday, What Are You Reading.  Thanks Kat and Kat for hosting these linkups.