2008 — 27 April: Rogation Sunday
Now why does the news that "Ineos chemicals billionaire Jim Ratcliffe, 55, owner of the strike-torn Grangemouth refinery" whose estimated fortune of £3.3bn last year (but down to a mere £2.3bn now, it seems) is on the "rich list" somehow not come as a surprise? Perhaps one or two of the workers at that refinery, facing the end of their final salary pensions scheme, feel a little aggrieved at the gulf between their apparent "lot" and the owner's very real "lot" — who knows? Still, at a loss-rate of £50,000,000 per day1 during the strike the gulf will only take 46 days to disappear. More here.
No matter. I've just watched a couple of ducks fly past over the garden while supping a cup of tea I've made myself while listening to a piece by Lassus. I suspect nobody on the rich list can match that. It's 08:30 and I've again discovered that the earlier I call it a night, the earlier the next day rises up to sock me in the eye.
(Intellectual) Property is theft... dept.
I had no idea the world was quite so stupid. It seems that the "Atomium" in Belgium — a landmark building we often drove past on the way to or from Christa's parents when we used to take the Ostend ferry in the 1970s and early 1980s — is copyright. I'm tempted to host one of my old pictures of it just to be awkward. More here including the weird assertion that "The same applies to any Belgian building whose 'author' died less than 70 years ago."
Another, older, "Cectic" comic (by Rudis Muiznieks at cectic.com) cut to the heart of things:
The artist is cool about people re-using these, but my attempts at email have so far failed.
More seriously
Back in September I posted a picture of #2 niece and her growing family. They've just had a narrow squeak. A light plane crashed at their air base yesterday. The Thorp S-18 hit the ground at the RNZAF base at Whenuapai 2 metres from liquid oxygen stored under pressure in tanks. And about 25 metres from their house. My four "rellies" were with my sister-in-law at the time and have now returned home to an undamaged house, but with (as Lis puts it) "not a pretty sight over their fence".
Life is very fragile, and very easy to take for granted.
Oh well. Now that the local thunderstorm seems to have moved on and there's the odd glimmer of sunshine out there, I've cheered myself down by having a brief chat with dear Mama. The way I read the latest BT phone bill (and their newly-renamed "Unlimited Weekend Plan"), my calls to her at the weekend are actually free, unlikely though that sounds. We shall see. Her own news and outlook on Life remains invariant. She once again expressed the opinion that "young people today" (alas, I fear I'm still in that set in her mind) could benefit from the experience of war. (As you can imagine, that opinion really used to sit well with Christa and me as we sat and listened to it, and much else, on our regular visits over three decades!)
I'm also glumly contemplating Mother Hubbard's cupboard and wondering when best to hit which set of shops to remedy that. Not while a smashing piece of Dave Brubeck (Unsquare dance) is playing, that's for sure. Time for another picture of Christa. From last August with the cousins;2 and a characteristic smile for me despite the breakthrough pain that was hovering on that hot and sunny day:
Baste? What does that mean?
It's 13:18, the cupboard is bulging, and I have a date with an oven to do the aforementioned basting. Junior has been rung; he's fine but seems to have had a night of some considerable lateness, tsk tsk. Niece #2 (as she's just signed herself!) has been rescuing her PC from the sort of havoc that (I suspect) can only really be wreaked by our friend Norton going on the rampage, and has sent me a photo — taken from her kitchen and looking over her garden fence — of a horribly compact neat pile of wreckage. She's given me a new example of "laconic", writing as she did: Yeah, a somewhat lucky escape for us... not so for the occupants. Still unsure why they went in, but must have been fairly catastrophic as they ended up quite a way from the runway... A good day to visit the folks really.
A new low-energy bulb is up in the hallway ready to do its luminal thing (and a spare is now parked where I'm keeping them, which is self-evidently not where Christa used to keep them). I'm still looking, mind you.
I was tickled...
... to realise that my Vista system's version of Windows Defender anti-spyware software has yet to make up its mind about the potential threat status of Windows Internet Explorer browsing software. And, as I couldn't find the right bit to click to get the thing to download updated security definitions, I decided to shame it here:
Good heavens! The Freak Zone on BBC 6Music has just played a track from the film "Getting Straight" (based on Ken Kolb's dopily amusing novel). I haven't heard this strange music since seeing the film in the cinema back in 1970. Wow!
It's still on my shelves, by the way. (But whatever happened to "Sphere" paperbacks?) I bought my copy the same day I got Frank Herbert's "Dune Messiah" (5th December 1970, if you must know) from Dark They Were and Golden-Eyed up in London. I was back home with my parents in Harpenden at the time.