2012 — 6 August: Monday
Hello, pension pittance!1
Today, I have a lunch with Iris for natter and, depending on the weather, a stroll. By contrast, tomorrow I shall be sitting in the latest Dr Fang's chair of dubious delights as he makes some minor repairs.
An unconsidered life
... part 2. Just for the hell of it, three years since I last attempted the exercise, I've been glancing back at my diary entries for this day...
- 2007: liquid morphine to tackle Christa's "breakthrough" pain — Grrr!
- 2008: Christa's Tax Return (!), a replacement bottle of wine, clear evidence from a phone call of dear Mama's failing short-term memory2 and a Pixar shorts DVD
- 2009: a crockpot and some software maintenance, it seems. Plus a tea outing and Luc Besson's (excellent) "Angel-A"
- 2010: nearing the end of the central heating and consequent flooring refurbishments, but with 178 cartons of books still offsite and waiting to be lugged back
- 2011: toying with the Android Tablet PC
Watch this space in 2015 :-)
Time for breakfast.
Rinse and repeat
When I was a naive youngster, I read Asimov's original "Foundation" trilogy and thought to myself "Psychohistory sounds really cool". Later, as an engineering student, I met the concept of the Kondratiev cycle3 (though apparently this is now passé). The latest idea is "cliodynamics". And, by the way, is there a more chilling phrase than "computer social scientist"? (Link.)
Doesn't Time fly...
... when you're enjoying yourself? And why is that, in any case? Lunch was lunched at the Brambridge Garden Centre, and then we adjourned to Compton, waited out about five minutes of rain, and set off on the same six-mile loop we did last February. It was quite sticky but mostly dry. Turns out Iris has only belatedly discovered Maurice Sendak. I guess not being a parent may have a bearing on that. It's quite sobering to realise (as I told her) that I bought a fat book of his delicious artwork (visible here) on my last visit to the ICL HQ in Putney for my 'termination' interview — in March 1981.
I wonder if the Liberal Democrats truly believed Tory backbench MPs in their coalition would ever countenance reform of the unelected and undemocratic House of Lords. If so, I suspect they are dimmer than I thought. Which is itself a depressing notion. The things people will do to obtain, and retain, power...
Obsessive completeist? Who, me??
I've not seen the 1991 Wim Wenders film "Bis ans Ende der Welt", and — judging by the prices I've seen being demanded — I've now left it too late to buy the DVD. But I've enjoyed hearing the CD of music from its soundtrack many times. All 17 tracks. Hang on! There are 19 tracks listed under the album in its MP3 download format. Well, that won't do, will it? [Pause] So I'm now listening to the Talking Heads track "Sax and Violins" and have queued up the U2 track "Until the End of the World".