2011 — 23 September: Friday
After today's visitor1 has departed I may just still have time to whizz over to the care-home, but the odds are against it. Still, there's always Saturday. I doubt dear Mama is going anywhere in a hurry, a Surrey, or anything else.
It's 09:19 and I could do with raiding a piggy bank to topup the petty cash, but not without some breakfast, methinks.
The things we learn...
... after it's too late to benefit. Source and snippet:
While a myelin coating greatly accelerates an axon's bandwidth, it also inhibits the growth of new branches from the axon. According to Douglas Fields, an NIH neuroscientist who has spent years studying myelin, "This makes the period when a brain area lays down myelin a sort of crucial period of learning — the wiring is getting upgraded, but once that's done, it's harder to change." The window in which experience can best rewire those connections is highly specific to each brain area...
It can seem a bit crazy that we humans don't wise up a bit earlier in life. But if we smartened up sooner, we'd end up dumber.2
Reasons for...
... avoiding social networking go on increasing. Open Graph is the latest. (Link.)
There's a suggestion that BT is worth less as a company than the copper in its 75,000,000 miles of UK cable. Now there's a thought that reminds me of the Norman Jewison film I bought back in May.
Somewhat later...
... after my mild curry supper, I'm now catching up with the BBC Radio 5 Live Kermode and Mayo film review podcast (having given up on the Laurie Taylor piece on suicide when my network failed briefly). It's 20:19 and cool enough for a brief burst of central heating to take the chill off. Had a good catchup / chatter with Ian, who continues to struggle with a freelance web site he is becoming increasingly stressed about.
I've just learned that "Judi Dench" is (football) rhyming slang for "bench"! Thanks to Tom Wilkinson.
Later still
I'm taking a brief break from "Firefly" to report today's delectable delivery, which I had to ask Mr Postie to pop into my ertswhile milk bottle container as I was driving Ian out for a Carlo's icecream at the time:
It's frightening to ponder the (chrono)logical implications of it being 1973 that the Truffaut title won an 'Oscar' for best foreign film, and it will also be fun to re-acquaint myself with real-life father-and-daughter Mervyn and Glynis Johns in the splendid ghost story, which I've been wanting to get on DVD for a long time. As for "Big Bang #4" — what can I say? Sheldon rocks, and I'm a big fan!