2012 — 19 May: Saturday
Though Nemone has grown on me, I'm curiously pleased to discover Jo Good sitting in for her this morning.1 I can also report that my FOAF — he of the aortic aneurysm — is still among the living, and demanding orange juice and grapes. I expect I shall learn more during this morning's walk, for which the weather is looking just dandy right now (now being 08:08 or so).
Bring me the finest celebratory tea you can manage, Mrs Landingham.
I suspect...
... I shall be buying the book (What matters in Jane Austen?) interestingly noted here by its author :-)
1. Who marries a man younger than herself?
2. Who says: 'I hate money'?
3. Why is Mr Perry getting a carriage?
4. Who marries for sex?
5. Which novel's plot relies on the weather?
1. Charlotte Lucas, 2. Isabella Thorpe (the only one I don't know, as she features in the only novel to have defeated me on every attempt), 3. for (lucrative) house calls, 4. Robert Ferrars, 5. all of them.
Being a lesbian...
... trapped in a man's body (a line that reliably makes my favourite gay cousin giggle) has its compensations. I'm delighted to learn that lovely actress Cate Blanchett is to star in a film version of Patricia Highsmith's 1952 novel "The price of salt", more recently published as "Carol". My 1990 edition features a cover illustration (by Jane Harris) very clearly inspired by Edward Hopper's evocative 1942 painting "Nighthawks at the Diner"...
The novel (unusually for one of its genre) even has a happy ending. I trust they won't tinker too much with that.
I've been pondering...
... how to make better use2 of the (not cheap, at £800) centre loudspeaker that I removed from my living room system. It occurs to me that I could well pop it on to the windowsill of my little reading room upstairs and then use the currently unused Denon tuner/amp set to "mono" to drive it. Doing so would let me bring back down here the tiny little Class D amp and the pair of "Rock Solids" to use as a local PC sound system rather than firing up the main system at the other end of the room.
My more immediate task, however, is to get dressed, assemble a packed lunch, and hit the road.
After 8 miles that...
... were all too reminiscent of the horrible clay and mud trails around Selborne last Sunday, I dragged my aching limbs straight into a shower and subjected myself to a gruelling regimen of hot tea, administered internally. Thus restored, I could focus what I laughingly think of as my attention on Mr Postie's little weekend offering left while I was out gallivanting:
The musical accompaniment this afternoon being Talvin Singh's 1998 album, "OK". More than OK — downright excellent — though I was once married to a fine lady whose opinion of this music was not high :-)
Her opinion of dandelions wasn't much higher, come to think of it. This splendid specimen from my front bit of urban jungle...
... would have been cut off long before reaching this stage. I guess nobody's perfect.
I was recently bemoaning...
... my inability to find my copy of Daniel Clowes' graphic novel Ghost World. Happily, I need bemoan no longer:
Not that I was actually looking for it a few minutes ago, of course. Now, if only I could find (or even remember) what I was actually looking for this time :-)