2011 — 30 October: Sunday

I have to say, the new orchestral variants of Peter Gabriel's music1 sound magnificent. Rather more successful, it seems to me, than an earlier experiment when Andrew Powell produced an orchestral album based on the music of the Alan Parsons Project. (Peter always preferred that version, though.) Anyway, I'd love to hear the Gabriel stuff on that Steinway speaker system. At the moment, my only playback option is using the pretty decent Creative X-Fi sound card in BlackBeast, feeding optical digital audio directly into the Audiolab pre-amp.

But time is ticking on — it's 00:42 even if it will be an hour earlier in another 90 minutes or so. I desperately need another dose of sleep. G'night.

Given how few...

... economists seemed able to predict the global financial woes now assailing us, I find news of an open letter from "100 leading economists" in today's "Observer" (calling for a change from Plan A to Plan B) underwhelming. The concept of "peak oil" has long been established. Why shouldn't there equally be a concept of "peak economy". After all, the only resource actually in unlimited supply on the planet is (according to Einstein) stupidity. (Link.)

Lists like this...

... are usually more entertaining when people pile straight in lobbying for their favourite omissions. In this case, I own and have read (and greatly enjoyed) just five of the ten suggested titles so I have no idea how the other five stack up against some of my own favourite omissions. (Link.)

I suppose I'd better get some breakfast, and then2 I really must clear Junior's room to the point where I can finally fit tomorrow's Ikea delivery of a new flatpack bed into it. Otherwise I know perfectly well I'll be stumbling over it downstairs somewhere3 and cursing. My powers of procrastination are wondrous to behold.

Unconsciously assisting me with my ongoing campaign of delaying tactics, Big Bro emailed me a bunch of pixels he captured around one of his garden lakes? pools? puddles? recently. Click the pic for a bigger image:

NZ frog

Is it tea-time yet, Mrs Landingham?
"Ribbet. Ribbet."

Dammit. I need a break! It's noon. (Actually, it isn't; guess who forgot to adjust his wrist watch?) [Pause] The hateful task is nearly done, though so am I. It's 12:53 and my tum has been insisting it's later than I think for quite a while. One chicken salad coming up and, I think, another delicious dollop of "Castle". An addict? Who, me? Get outa here. [Pause] Right, the single bed is now broken down into its three main components. All that remains is to figure out where I can stash it, out of the way, to be sure of being able to persuade Mr Ikea to lug the replacement up the stairs for me when he shows up.

Moving right along

It's now 14:16 and I also have about half a cubic metre of unwanted books cluttering up the front of the living room floor. They need to be unleashed upon the charity shop world (though I've retrieved some of my choices from the several boxes Peter and Peter's g/f had packed). Remind me never, ever, to move house. This is considerably better exercise than all those gentle rambles around the Hampshire footpaths, but not as much fun.

Well, if the new bed doesn't fit in the space I've just finished clearing for it, the wardrobe will simply have to go. I'm fed up of this lark. Time for tea. And I can't help noticing it seems to be getting quite dark already, too. Must be that upcoming winter time of year thingy. Yuk. Still, at least I now have a working heating system.

Oops! The Ikea email reminds me the delivery is on Tuesday, not tomorrow. Just as well I didn't find that out earlier, probably :-)

  

Footnotes

1  Those 24-bit FLAC files in that hefty free 1.5GB download.
2  Having reset the two kitchen clocks (microwave and cooker) that are too stupid to do this for themselves.
3  Though exactly "Where?" is an excellent question.