2010 — 28 January: Thursday
It's 00:39 or so and I'm recently back on a deliciously empty motorway from a lovely meal over at Mike's and an excellent new Ang Lee film: Taking Woodstock.1 There's just time for a burst of "Late Junction" and a late supper cuppa. And to say that yesterday's photo was, according to Big Bro, (after cleaning up his spelling and grammar) of a BMW 755i and that the photo would have been "around 89/90 more likely 90 when I was leasing a couple of [Boeing] 767s from the car's owner, Big Bill and certainly not a friend of Mr B. 'Twas a very nice car and went exceedingly well on the M1 I recall."
I don't doubt it. But was it really twenty years ago? Amazing. So there you have it.
G'night...
Did he do well?
This chap (shown here 41 years ago on the occasion of his entrance into "Fleet Street") is currently achieving an average revenue of £492 per user in the UK from his little satellite TV empire while his people continue to opine that the BBC's licence fee is poor value.
Give me quality over quantity any time in just about any sphere of Life I can think of. I'm reminded of the dialogue in a delightful cartoon in Private Eye some years ago between a TV salesman and the punter.
Good heavens, it's already 11:04. No wonder I'm feeling peckish. The sun is out and dodging about through clouds. I feel a minor-league expotition may be on the cards.
Boris the film critic?
A Torygraph reader named Nigel begs to differ...
Other comments attached to the mayor's review of "Avatar" are Quite Interesting, too.
Do I really need...
... yet another proprietary database in my Life? My son is getting this (Mac-only, of course) but I am trying to wean myself off some of my longer-lived dependencies. Back from phase 1 of today's little fresh air jaunts I think it's time (13:41) for a tiny spot of lunch. I'm widening my repertoire to include (for the first time since several months before Christa died) some pâté2 that should go nicely on a slice of toast with a sprinkle of lemon juice and (according to Mike) black pepper (which, in my case, I 'ave not got).
Nor am I quite as enthusiastic as this celebrated Apple fanboy about their new tablet device:
Right. Time for my next adventure. It's 14:30 already. [Pause] Having lightened my bookshelf burden by one (Boller and George's "They never said it") and regaled my hosts with my reading of Gary Hogg's Secret Life of Walter's Mittens (available here in an infinitely superior performance) while being fed a Danish pastry and a cuppa, I'm back in the darkening twilight (it's now 17:35) for a quiet evening at home. There was a tinge of "red sky at night" out there, but it's jolly cold. Indeed, I'm noticing the loss of heat now that Junior's radiator is leaning against my wall downstairs rather than busily transferring therms into his room. Still, I have a plentiful supply of warm jumpers and, if all else fails, that spare ski-suit I test-walked in my earliest days as a pensioner.
Later
I didn't set out to watch it, but I found I enjoyed the whole of The Culture Show, and I'm now half-listening to Time (I got fed up with the silly visuals, so I've just tuned into the audio). I missed the first transmission of this series in August 2007 because that was during Christa's illness. TV was very low on my priority list back then, unless she chose to watch a particular programme. Another mention of Ragnarok!
Later still
The day after Christa died, I found myself wondering, quite seriously, how I was going to feel watching (on my own) films that we'd previously enjoyed together. We were both keen cinema-goers when we met, and saw hundreds of films over the years, starting all the way back in 1974 with Lindsay Anderson's marvellous O Lucky Man! Well, to my relief it's turned out to be basically OK. Some titles now induce (shall I say?) a more lachrymose response than in happier times but, in general, my enjoyment is largely unimpaired.
Tonight's choice, for example, was "Three to tango" — and I absolutely loved it. Matthew Perry has a great gift for physical comedy (also displayed in "The whole nine yards"). Neve Campbell is very dishy. Oliver Platt is a hoot. Bob Balaban is always interesting. So: thoroughly recommended to warm the cockles on a cold winter evening.
Time now (of course) for a cuppa. It's 23:13 — maybe there's still room for a bite of late supper, too. Why not? A quiet life, perhaps, but there's still much to be enjoyed...