2016 — 12 April: Tuesday
Had I the sort of mind that classifies such things1 I'd say that what seems to be going on "out there" at the moment is a full-blown Autumn mist. Given the second tulip that's now appeared in my back jungle, however, I'd say that was unlikely.
My recent habit...
... of making not-so-recent episodes of "Late Junction" my constant audio companion — 151 and counting, so far, after casual inspection of the contents of the "Heard" sub-folders I pop them into once, erm, heard — is probably re-wiring bits of my brain. No Bad Thing.
Concentrating moonlight...
... will indeed (I'm assured by an overnight email) not be capable of producing a fire. But not for the reasons presented by XKCD. Which inevitably raises the question: "What if XKCD's "What if" is wrong?!" (Link.)
My faith in the Second Law of Thermodynamics remains unshaken, but I don't propose to get into an argument about it. That could last until the Heat Death of the Universe.
My faith...
... in what I was taught by the late Molly Ivins about the utter stupidity (there's no other phrase for it, I fear) of the process that produces gun-related legislation in Texas is similarly unshaken by the appalling piece here. (It's not the piece that's appalling; but the "concealed carry" permitting guns on campus certainly is.)
There's some high-falutin'...
... vocabulary on display in this deliciously bad-tempered piece. Source and snippet:
You might be tempted to think that this verbal confetti is meaningless. That is not quite right. It is evidence of cognitive failure, no doubt, and an even more thoroughgoing moral collapse. But such verbal productions are not quite meaningless. They are so prized in the academy because they are effective ambassadors of a message: not an intellectual message, to be sure. As the philosopher David Stove observed of such writing, the intellectual content of feminism, Marxism, deconstruction, etc. is 0 + 0 + 0 = 0.
Being but a bear of little brain — and not even a polar (or bipolar) one at that — I shall now nip out on an errand or two.
If I'm to retain...
... my ability to chew for much longer I must now, it seems, eschew my beloved plums'n'cranberry stewed fresh fruit mix atop my morning bowl of healthy high-fibre cardboard sludge. I have therefore stocked up on a little bunch of FairTrade bananas. It's perhaps as well that I somehow failed to mention — during the hygieneist's relentless probing yesterday — the grapefruit, Kiwi fruit, cooking apples, blackcurrants, and lemons that are also a feature of my dietary life. Offset, doubtless, by chocolate with a touch of chilli.
"Five a day"? Pah!
Had the impressive...
... gang (if that's the right collective noun) of neuroscientsts and MRI technicians merely eyeballed Robert Crumb's sketchbooks across the course of the summer months of 1966 they could have saved both time and money. "Neural correlates of the LSD experience revealed by multimodal neuroimaging" indeed. Whoever heard of such a thing? Though it's good to see one of the guvmint's (many) discarded drugs advisors still keeping busy, I'm not sure I see why this represents "the Higgs boson" of neuroscience. I clearly need to increase my drugs intake. (Link.)
Here, we have...
... a pair of black hats bracketing the Black Death. I used to think Scorsese could do no wrong though I'm more cautious these days. And I've not seen much by Michael Mann lately. I've read nothing by Connie Willis, either:
Still, the DVDs were £4 each in Asda. The young people tell me they can easily pay nearly £20 each for a cinema outing up in the Smoke. Popcorn included, of course.
I've just read our...
... guvmint's pro-EU booklet. Seems reasonable to me. I'm sure Christa would have agreed, too. [Pause] One who knows also tells me I have a "terrific read" ahead of me in "Doomsday Book". How come I've not read anything by her before? Beats me.
I've also just read...
... the latest rant from Trevor Potts in "El Reg". It's a cracker :-)
When the "bumph"...
... pushed through my letter-box is as nice as this...
... then how could I object? So that's where Stonehenge is! And "Mallard" still chuffs from Alton, does it?