2012 — 8 May: Tuesday
When the first two headlines are a "bomb in underwear" and calls for a "shake-up of the social care system in the UK" is it any wonder long faces are the norm? And my Dad would have been 95 today, apart from the minor detail that he died in 1975. Crikey.
No long faces hereabouts, no time. I'm a man on a mission, me. We're going to risk a local walk as (despite it obviously being in the middle of our monsoon season) the rain has forgotten to fall this morning for a while. And I've just shooed away a plumber1 who'd actually parked, not across my drive, but actually on it, dammit!
XKCD
Randall Monroe manages to steer an unlikely course, veering between merely excellent and occasionally brilliant, with a side order of genius. This example combines Gilbert & Sullivan and academia and ...
... is just the opening salvo of a wonderful riff on college course selection. I've long harboured doubts about chemistry.
How about some breakfast, Mrs Landingham? Time's ticking on.
Can one ever...
... go wrong, with a good book?
Safely back, unwetted
A quick bite of lunch, and just time to realise that if "Engels Gesproken Nederlands Ondertiteld" doesn't mean "English audio, Dutch subtitles" then I could have a problem with Mr Postie's offering while I was out:
Even though it features the divine Stana Katic. (Ooh, I'm such a fan boy.) Right. Time to nip over to the care-home. TTFN.
It's taken me a while...
... but I think I've finally worked out how to deal with dear Mama's intellectual implosion while managing to retain some sort of equanimity.2 The trick is to keep my visits short and sweet and simple. And she, too, seems to be more at peace. She's now looking remarkably like her much-missed older sister (my favourite mad aunt from the Midlands).
R.I.P. Maurice Sendak
It saddens me to hear of Maurice Sendak's death. He's been a virtual friend of this family (not that there's much left of it!) for well over 30 years. I first encountered his work in the form of the 50 line drawings he did in Ogden Nash's 1957 collection "You can't get there from here". This splendid chap...
... accompanies "The praying mantis":
From whence arrived the praying mantis? From outer space, or lost Atlantis? I glimpse the grim, green metal mug That masks this pseudo-saintly bug, Orthopterous, also carnivorous, And faintly whisper, Lord deliver us.
I confess, my ignorance of "Orthopterous" remains intact to this day.
As I prepare my evening meal, I can reflect on two minor-league successes: I managed to upgrade the firmware on my Oppo Blu-ray player without ever leaving the disc tray empty at any point (recall, it will only reliably eject the tray if the tray is non-empty — don't ask) and I have confirmed that the newest Blu-ray does indeed carry an English audio track (with Dutch subtitles that can be suppressed).
Oh, and it turns out that Stana Katic can sing, too. On with the show.
It must be...
... my lucky day. Uncle ERNIE tells me he's on the hook to send me three (minimum level) prizes this month, and my gas'n'elec outfit has finally fixed its website, accepted my meter readings, and promptly promised a £96 refund within the next ten days. Cool!