2009 — 4 December: Friday
A sunny, but very frosty, start to the day. Ideal walking weather in many ways, so (as it's unaccountably already 09:04) I'd better dash through the brekkie and packed lunch part of the proceedings, hadn't I? It's all "go", this pensioner skylark.
Meanwhile (it seems) the backlash against the popular "Twilight" series continues. What a strange phenomenon it is — popular culture. Personally, I loathe the celebrity-obsessed media, the whole of so-called "reality" TV, never go near the pap poured out of that nice man Simon Cowell, and disregard most of what passes for music in the sales charts. So here I am, listening to (and enjoying, as I have for the fifty years since I first heard it) music from Act 1 Scene 1 of "Swan Lake" as I munch my healthy cardboard cereal and contemplate this article. ("Girls just wanna have fangs" indeed. Try beating those sales statistics!1)
The world is a strange place. Jane Austen to the rescue! But what would be her response to terrorism and human rights, I wonder?
nil desperandum. This still applies, I suspect:
Back...
... following a pleasantly sunny six-mile ramble from Shawford out, almost, as far as Hursley mostly along quiet roads and tracks that weren't too muddy. I've now grabbed a bite to eat and will shortly be taking my main co-pilot out for a congenial cuppa somewhere while it's still light, still dry, and the car is still out of its nest. Not quite sure how it can be Friday already, but then how did it become December already for that matter?
I note that chums who are still wage slaves at the IBM Hursley Lab seem to be getting their "retirement offer" letters today. Those who sought (mad fools!) extra time mostly seem to be successful, too (mad fools!). I gently remind them to recall what God makes of people with plans. (She laughs.)
Mind you, today's burst of fresh air and exercise obviously failed to spark my creative juices as I can think of no reason whatsoever why I should pay one of my banks (the one Christa used, as it happens) £12-95 per month to "upgrade" my current account and receive thereby a bunch of benefits (a claimed £395 worth in Year 1) none of which has any appeal. "Text" banking, for example? Do me a favour! Aah, the joys of being an old grumpy.
Cure for grumpy
Back (from Hillier's) I was idly browsing a New Yorker piece and spotted Alison Bechdel's name on a "blog" roll in the margin. She's long been one of my numerous favourite female comix artists; her long-running gay soap opera "Dykes to watch out for" has been brilliantly sustained for nearly 25 years now. Anyway, I hadn't (as it were) clicked on Ms Bechdel in a while. From there (Blog, October 28) it was but another simple click to arrive at some amazing animations she'd found from a Dutch artist new to me.
It's what the Interweb is for. (Don't miss this, either.) Mercy me, it's only 16:38 and it's just about pitch dark out there. It's also cold, and raining. (Un)lovely jubbly.
This is rather mischievous.
IQ, or should that be QI?
While the jokes here aren't very funny, some of the quotations are excellent. Kevin Langdon is the chap whose "hardest IQ test in the world" was featured in Omni magazine 30 years ago in an article by Scot Morris. I found the test hard work :-)