2012 — 31 October: Wednesday
As I was hefting1 a splash of cow juice from my current 2.272 litre plastic bottle of the stuff into my waiting cuppa I decided to "do the math" just to see what petrol is costing me in these straitened times. "Back in the day" I had a penny savings bank in the shape of a 1950s petrol pump, and I had noted from the clock-like dial on these things that Dad could buy six gallons for a pound. Today, six pounds won't buy you a gallon.
Yesterday now looks to have been a good choice for our walk given the forecast of heavy rain heading this way. This exercise in pattern...
... caught my eye, somewhere along a leafy lane. As did this lovely Mencken quote:
A sound American is simply one who has put out of his mind all doubts and questionings, and who accepts instantly, and as incontrovertible gospel, the whole body of official doctrine of his day, whatever it may be and no matter how often it may change. The instant he challenges it, no matter how timorously and academically, he ceases by that much to be a loyal and creditable citizen of the republic.
Blimey! I see now exactly what they meant by "heavy showers".
My continuing ignorance...
... continues to stun me. How come I had neither heard, nor heard of, William Bolcom? His "Graceful Ghost Rag" is now nestled somewhere on one of my hard drives.
And, next thing I know, it's time to fling on some glad rags and whizz out to lunch somewhere. It's not actually raining at this instant... [Pause] And back, some three-plus hours later, to find — almost inevitably — one of those annoying "while you were out..." cards from Mr Postie. So that will be another jolly jaunt out into the gathering wind and gloom in another hour or so. Time2 for a cuppa first, of course.
It's my eyes, doctor...
I'm (somewhat) amused to note that the new "Age UK" tariff I've switched to for my gas and electricity from my previous supplier not only saves me about £15 per year (at no fee for the changeover) but brings with it a confirmatory snailmail in extra large print (apart, naturally, from the small print explaining in a full A4 page my eligibility to join, my right to cancel, and so on — printed in the usual six point). Here are two text samples, "life size":
So, what had...
... Mr Postie salted away for me? A Frances McDormand film I don't know, an imported Blu-ray of "You've got mail" (much crisper than my original NTSC DVD) and a bonus DVD of the 1940 Lubitsch film of the original play from which Nora Ephron pinched the basic plot:
I remember watching it on TV with Christa many years ago.
There's another walk tentatively "on the cards" for tomorrow — we have to snatch our late autumnal and winter bursts of fresh air and exercise whenever we see the chance of a gap between blasts of lousy weather. Of course, we don't always get it right. But where would be the fun in that? [Pause] If it carries on chucking it down like it is at the moment — the moment being 22:16 or thereabouts — there can hardly be any rain left to fall tomorrow, surely?