2008 — 17 September: Wednesday

As, from time to time, I contemplate the continuous uphill battle that is Christa's garden I wonder what it was that she obviously knew needed doing to the corkscrew hazelnut (for example). Just keep trimming it, I suppose, much as I do with the bits of hair still clinging to my scalp! Here she is, from 25th June last year. At least I found where she kept the secateurs:

Christa working her magic on the corkscrew hazelnut in June 2007

To my considerable surprise, I have been finding it quite soothing to potter around tidying up bits and pieces out there from time to time. She would, I suspect, be even more surprised. I have so far filled three green waste bags. Of course, I have to pick times of low pollen. If there's anything to reincarnation and I come back as a bee, I foresee a major problem!

Minor triumph... dept.

Those frightfully nice people at Amazon, who shipped over a DVD-ROM of National Lampoon magazines by priority international courier, have just refunded their "import fees deposit" without even being asked to. Mind you, the disc cost £16-84 and the shipping cost an outrageous £18-94 on top! Cheap at half the price, or some such. G'night. It's 00:55 and time for some sleep.

(Jakob) Nielsen (and other) ratings... dept.

I'm smiling as I read this piece, but don't ask me why! Maybe it's because the first cuppa is already on its way down.

A 2003 Nielsen warning asserted that a PDF file strikes users as a "content blob," and they won't read it unless they print1 it out. A "booklike" page on screen, it seems, turns them off2 and sends them away. Another Nielsen test found that teenagers skip through the Web even faster than adults do, but with a lower success rate for completing tasks online (55 percent compared to 66 percent). Nielsen writes: "Teens have a short attention span and want to be stimulated. That's also why they leave sites that are difficult to figure out." For them, the Web isn't a place for reading and study and knowledge. It spells the opposite. "Teenagers don't like to read a lot on the Web. They get enough of that at school."

Mark Bauerlein in The Chronicle


Combine that with the suggestion (from a 12 year old son of a publisher) that "So maybe you have to turn all the books into movies so nobody has to waste their time" and the only response has to be a smile, I guess. (Source.)

We're definitely in Cyril Kornbluth's territory of The Marching Morons. (Published the year I was born, by the way.)

Far be it for me to comment3 on our transatlantic cousins and their upcoming election, but the image (here) of the Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin somehow seems to capture the essence of the lady to perfection. I find I can picture what is meant by "Wal-Mart Moms" too.

When is a trilogy...

... not a trilogy? When Eoin Colfer is commissioned to write the sixth book in the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy, of course. (Thirty years ago? Can you believe it? Radio 4 at 10:30 p.m. in the middle of the week with no publicity — we loved it!)

Retaining my horticultural theme...

... back in April I found, and scanned, a print of Christa tending the rather straggly rose bush in the front garden of our Old Windsor house. I wasn't too impressed by the result. Since then, I've turned up my original slide and (using Mike's Nikon) have (I think) been able to improve on my initial effort:

Christa working her magic on roses 30 years ago

I note that slides, when mounted, apparently clip the edges of the available image. I also had no idea she was still using the same pair of secateurs back then. Good heavens! Well, it's already nearly six p.m. and I'm due in Winchester for a meal and a movie in an hour or so. Better start getting ready. Where does the Time go?

  

Footnotes

1  I was once summoned to the IBM Hursley Lab Director's office by her secretary, who required me to demonstrate how to print out a web page so it could then be read by the great lady. In fairness, this was around 15 years ago.
2  So much for all that time wasted getting web browsers to mimic the display of skilful typography, heh?
3  I can safely leave that to my faithful New York correspondent! She tells me: I can't believe that the American public can fall for such an over-confident, inexperienced, under-educated ninny, but we appear to have done so. It is utterly insulting to women that we are expected to vote for her ticket because she's a woman, when her positions are anathema to so many...