2012 — 17 October: Wednesday
Wednesday? Already? Don't be ridiculous! I'm no expert1 but, based on the amount of hydrated oxygen clinging to the outside surfaces, it's been doing quite a lot more raining overnight. I shall be collecting the ingredients for my next set of crockpottery magic later on, and this time I intend to remember the cooking wine.
Did you know...
... we currently have colourful giant many-legged bugs roaming our countryside, stalking innocent ramblers?
You have to use your imagination!
(The world news remains far too depressing to comment on.)
Target practice suggestion
This short piece by one of our ex-ambassadors is entirely worth reading. Source and snippet:
And, as doubtless you will have noticed, nothing changed. No reduction in massive salaries and bonuses, no split of casino from high street banking, no transaction tax to deter multiple
speculative trades. A million more unemployed, but none of them investment bankers — they have however sacked over a hundred thousand mostly female staff from their high street branches,
which were the only sensible and profitable bit of the operation. No bankers in jail, not even for LIBOR fraud. Quantitive Easing, or printed money, is given not for infrastructure projects
to produce growth, but given to banks to improve their liquidity. They do not lend it on to companies but pay it to themselves, as bonuses.
Forget burglars. Shoot a banker.
None of my best friends is a banker. But I expect they would lend you the money for bullets :-)
I've been dipping...
... back into one of my books grabbed, more or less at random, yesterday evening...
... and would defy anyone to read more than a few paragraphs without the beginnings of a form of mental vertigo (assuming vertigo isn't entirely mental in the first place). The distances, velocities, timescales and energies involved are all rather more awesome than any stuff I've encountered in the supposedly all-encompassing religious texts I've bothered with. I think I need a burst of fresh air.
And not a sausage (that is, nothing interesting) when I scoured the bargain shelves of Asda. Meanwhile, Mr Toyota's insurance chaps are now giving me a protected 9-year no-claims discount, leaving me pondering — again — the vagaries of the FUD industry. After all, I've only been driving for 5 years. "Gift horse" and "mouth" come to mind. Not that I have any intention of switching over to equine transport. (Might be easier to park, though.)
Later
Dementia has been called "the long goodbye". Closely observing dear Mama's steady downhill 'progress' over the last two and a half years suggests that's not too far off the mark. During my more recent visits to the care-home she has barely recognised me. She certainly has only a very, very limited comprehension of who she is, where she is, who I am, and how I fit into the vague chaos inside her head. Any and every attempt to explain anything only confuses and upsets her. The fact that she cannot hold a complete sentence in her head long enough to articulate it is sad, but undeniable.
Since there's actually nothing I can do or say to materially change this sorry state of affairs, I've concluded that what's left of her is perhaps better left2 quietly in peace. This is selfish of me, but I still have some of my own life to lead. I shall decrease the frequency of my future visits.
It's pouring with rain, and I've just heard a distant rumble of thunder. Wonderful.
I am shamefully under-informed about Guy Barker, having only heard his "Soundtrack" album. Tonight he's orchestrating Miles Davis. I'm listening...