2012 — 15 May: Tuesday
Well, there are some patches of blue visible1 up in the sky thing, which means the necessary next supplies run may not be too unendurable. But not without a cuppa inside me. Besides they don't open for another five minutes.
One might think...
... that a chap who has obtained almost all his foodstuff from Waitrose for the last four years and more would be slightly more alive to the possible benefits of a 'loyalty' card. Still, I've now got an application form. I also filled up with petrol for free (paying for it, that is, with half of the refund transferred into my account by the gas / elec folk just yesterday). And the sun is shining, though it's surprisingly chilly in the breeze out there.
I'm delighted to hear that BBC 6Music won the "Station of the year" award last night. If that isn't a well-deserved smack in the eye for the witless execs in the BBC who wished to close it down, I don't know what is! Tee-hee. Or perhaps "Tick, v.g." (to quote my friend Iris).
While I'm...
... rapidly getting used to the doubled screen real estate, I've noticed one minor drawback (which I could avoid, I assume, if I was using two identical models of display screen). The amount of "ClearType" tuning needed for each screen is subtly different, and (of course — I've just experimented) the two screens are treated as a single entity by that particular tweaking tool. I expect I'll survive.
Meanwhile2 I think I shall start the process of ripping my way through my remaining CDs — Junior has been nagging me to convert all the classical stuff for the last two years or so, but one doesn't want to cave too quickly, does one? Deferred gratification is always good for him :-)
"Perverting the course of justice", "concealing documents and computers from officers"... hardly sounds like fit and proper behaviour for the boss of a "newspaper" within the Dirty Digger's media empire, surely? Tee-hee. Or perhaps "Tick, not v.g." (Link.)
Beer versus Aeschylus?
The ever-interesting AC Grayling is on good form in this review of Michael Sandel's book What money can't buy: the moral limits of markets:
Critics will also pounce upon Sandel's view that there is a clearly discernible hierarchy of goods that allow us to see what is and is not marketable. "When market reasoning it applied to sex, procreation, child rearing, education, health, criminal punishment, immigration policy and environmental protection, it's less plausible to assume that everyone's preferences are equally worthwhile," Sandel writes. "In morally charged arenas such as these, some ways of valuing goods may be higher, more appropriate than others." These last dozen words will be the critics' goad: they express the same idea that got John Stuart Mill into trouble when he asserted that some things (e.g., reading Aeschylus) are intrinsically more valuable than other things (e.g., drinking a beer). Who, they will ask, has the right to say such a thing?
But isn't the existence of beer proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy?
Music (still) has charms
What on earth is it about Respighi's "Pines of Rome — On the Appian Way" that raises the hair on my arms? Weird. [Pause] And how can it possibly be 29 years since I bought Mahler's Symphony #1 with the Chicago Symphony and Claudio Abbado from HMV for £9-99? I know I bought that largely for Christa as my appreciation of ol' Gustav was initially never as high as hers. Plus she was recovering from her first cancer surgery at the time, which adds a further layer of emotional complexity to my current response to this (I now belatedly admit) magnificent piece.
Soon be time to nip over to the care-home to sneak another peek at dear Mama. The clouds look fairly water-logged. [Pause] Make that hail-logged.
A second little...
... dash of wheelspin on the way back from the care-home — another short but utterly dispiriting visit — has prompted me to give in and fix an appointment for two new front tyres at some ungodly hour on Thursday morning. I was gently warned by Mr Toyota at last year's "MOT" and "big service" that I would be lucky to get another six months of legal driving from them, and since that was about nine months ago I've just had to bite the bullet. Ho-hum. There's a first time for everything, I guess. The back two tyres are still the originals from October 2007, but it's front wheel drive with steering and engine weight doubtless contributing.
To cheer myself up, I've just ordered a splendid double bill: "Stage Door" and "Splendour in the Grass" — the latter was Warren Beatty's screen début opposite the enchanting Natalie Wood, the former pairs Katherine Hepburn and Ginger Rogers (among many others). What's not to like?
How about some tea, Mrs Landingham?