2009 — 17 February: Tuesday
My next picture of Christa. It shows her in the Old Windsor bathroom over 30 years ago doing something complicated and hair-related at bedtime. Gawd knows what, but, since she was still smiling at me, who cares?!
Christa doing bedtime "hair" things in Old Windsor
We have a very similar bathroom cabinet to this day. And — last time I looked — it still has more of her stuff in it than mine. I don't really have the heart to chuck things out at the moment, though I'm getting there.
G'night.
The nostrils have it... dept.
I can remember when science was a serious, mysterious business...
We don't have to go to other planets to find weird life. It could be right in front of our noses — or even in our noses, it is entirely reasonable to expect we will find a shadow biosphere here on Earth. But nobody has actually taken the trouble to look. The question is why? The cost is not expensive — it would be a fraction of the money we spend searching for extraterrestrial life.
I wonder if this is the same Davies who wrote The accidental universe and How to build a time machine (not to be confused with the Alfred Jarry variant, of course).
Before I tidy up (I'm joking, of course) here's just a part of the tangle no longer to be found cluttering my telephone cable network hereabouts in the wake of yesterday's efforts:
Have just learned (here) that Steve Van Zandt's well-regarded "Underground garage" radio show has (finally) been picked up by a UK channel, in fact by the outfit that used to be called Virgin radio (I believe). I've just been scouring their web site (here) for Mr V Z without success. Still, at least they broadcast on Freeview (727). Mind you, I was intrigued to learn they "operate 'hot potato' routing, and do not necessarily honour MEDs" — have I been asleep at the wheel or something? I was interested to note that their FAQs admit to the amount of broadcast delays across various transmission platforms — something I've yet to see from the BBC.
105.8FM: as live 1215AM: half a second delayed SkyDigital: half a second DAB Digital Radio: 1 second Internet: typically 13 secs, depending on your connection.
Right. Time for a spot of localised economic activity. It's 11:02 and still dry. And now it's 13:39 after the successful hunter-gathering of two well-fired loaves, two pots of the chunky orange marmalade Christa always managed to find in Lidl but I've only just discovered, my third paperback by Natalie Angier, and the new issue of The Word with an obituary article on John Martyn. Perhaps that's what delayed it this month? Furthermore, I'm already on my "pudding" after stuffing myself with chicken breast in tarragon sauce, chips, peas and Algerian sun-dried remnants of what may, once, have been tomatoes. Could the August(e) Escoffier beat that, I wonder!
A pox on your bonuses, bankers!
Are the execs at my former bank (RBS) really worth £175,000,000 in bonuses this year, even if this is less than the £2,500,000,000 they awarded themselves last year? After an infusion of £20,000,000,000 from me and my fellow tax-payers four months ago to stop the bank itself going bankrupt... I'd far rather see an aggrieved (or greedy) banking executive in court, arguing why her absurd and outrageous "contract" had to be honoured lest she be tempted to flee overseas to a better paid position. Sorry, but after the bank has been propped up to this extent, all bets are off, in my opinion.