A homage to loading screens.
In which we overhear surprise
Walking down Clare Street yesterday. Behind me was a couple, late-twentysomething at a rough guess, the woman carrying a big, quite expensive clothes-store carrier bag.
Him: How are you enjoying our date?
Her, surprised: This is a date?
In which eyebrows are raised
Overheard in the street this afternoon: a woman’s voice.
“I’m fed up of you telling people I’m a druggie. I’m not a druggie. I didn’t have any methadone yesterday. That’s why I’m feeling sick today.”
In which we learn that a stable in the back garden could save one’s marriage
As usual, the radio was on this morning, on my way to work in the car. Which means: Thought For The Day, with its standard five minutes of anodyne and non-shocking religious platitudes. Today’s thought: isn’t it great that the Queen’s marriage has lasted so long? What can modern society learn from her? I’m paraphrasing, but you get the idea.
One phrase, though, made me do a double-take. The speaker* said that in the face of the Duty which they were bound to carry out,** their marriage had been helped by: “the small things, like corgis and stables”
I’m sorry? Small things? A corgi might be able to get on your lap,*** but a stable? Not what your average couple would consider a little thing that would help a marriage along. I could just about fit a stable in my back garden, if I have to be honest, but there’s no way a horse would fit down the garden passage anyway. I’ve never really been sure who Thought For The Day is aimed at, but it clearly isn’t me, nor 90% of the people in this country. Coming soon, presumably: how contemplating the words of the 92nd psalm will help when disciplining your servants.
* the Right Reverend Dr Tom Butler, famous for breaking into a car and making a nuisance of himself whilst apparently drunk, shouting “I’m the Bishop of Southwark, it’s what I do” and leaving behind paperwork proving he was indeed the said bishop, then later denying all knowledge and claiming he’d been mugged.
** You could almost hear the capital D
*** if it managed to jump up that high
In which our eyebrows are raised when we learn that Americans all have free healthcare just like us
The scene: the office conversation, a quick conversation with a new member of staff whilst the kettle boiled. He was telling me all about his past, his former history of self-employment.
“… but you can’t do anything in this country nowadays, it’s terrible for small businesses, this government, it really is, they want to get control of every little thing…”
I thought: I know exactly what’s coming here.
“…it makes it impossible to run your own life…”
… any second now …
“it’s this Nanny State…”
BINGO! As soon as someone, especially a certain type of person, starts along that line of argument, they’re going to mention the Nanny State, which rules every aspect of our lives and tells us exactly what we can and can’t do. These are the people who believe that Christmas is being banned, or that the government has banned blackboards for being racist, and that it’s Political Correctness Gone Mad. And I don’t understand them. Do they never look at the world around them? Do they believe anything they hear or read?
He rambled on about how much better everything was in America – how life is far better, the taxes are lower, everyone is better off and lives a wonderful life without government interference.
“Yes, until they fall ill and can’t afford to pay for treatment,” I said.
“No, no, medicine is free in the USA too,” he replied.
“Really?” I said, because that really doesn’t square with everything else I’ve been told about the USA over the years.
“Yes, it’s all free, just as it is here,” he said. I was tempted to ask if the land is also flowing with milk and honey, with dollar bills and chocolate coins growing on the trees, but I’m not sure if he’d have realised where the joke was.
In which we study the markup on an import
This was seen in the large Parisian department store Galaries Lafayette* the other day, in the “Epicerie Britannique” section of the gourmet foodhall:
A bottle of salad cream that says “99p” on the label, on sale for €3.24** At today’s exchange rate – just under 68p to the euro – that’s a shop price of £2.20. Slightly less of a bargain than it says on the label, then. The shop was also selling tins of Heinz beans originally from multipacks, singly, for about £1 per tin. Ouch. How much does it cost to import a tin of beans, exactly?
* They do apparently have an official website, which I couldn’t get to work at all.
** Frankly, I was quite surprised that a shop in Paris was willing to let people know that salad cream exists.
In which we pass something on
Do not forward this email.
If you do not forward this email, nothing bad will happen to you. No terrible ancient email curses will be unleashed.
If you do forward this email, your wish will not come true. You will not receive unexpected love, or come into some money.
If you do forward this email, the missing child will not be found. Noone will break any world records. Bill Gates will not send any money to charity. Luck will not come your way.
This is not a virus, and there has never been any virus of this name. A websearch could have told you that. So don’t tell everyone in your address book about it.
Pass this information on to everyone you know.
In which we are descriptive
I’ve been tagged, by Dimitra. The idea being, I write eight things you don’t know about me. Which is hard. I mean, there are a few people reading this; and moreover there are different sets of people reading this. Some of you know things, some don’t. I’ll have to think of eight things you might know, might not. I never know who I’ve told what to.
Today, you get four things. The rest: to come. Maybe it will turn into a sort of manifesto.
One: there’s only one of me. Lots of you probably know that: I don’t have any brothers or sisters. I’ve always liked my own company, to an extent. Although I’m a social person, I have to be able to retreat somewhere, on my own, to get away from distraction and obligation. And it has to be on my own terms. Maybe it comes from being a solo person to start with. There’s only one of me, but I’m under no illusions that I’m unique in any one individual trait.
Two: I believe in second chances; but I don’t believe in third chances.
Three: I’m a heavily rational person. I believe in what I can touch, what can be proven, what other people can show from logic. I’m enquiring, and sceptical. But I’m not skeptical.* I believe in the third eye, in seeing things that aren’t yet there, that are going to happen. Or rather: I don’t believe in it, I know it can happen. When I was a teenager I used to dream things that hadn’t happened yet. Whether this means some things are unavoidable, I don’t know.
Four: I have an extremely bad memory. I can remember useless things with a worrying ease, but useful information never sticks in my head. I get by, by remembering how to find things out. Knowing where to find information can often be far more useful that knowing the information itself. Sometimes, though, it’s just a nuisance.
* yes, there is a difference.
In which sometimes things can be too successful
News story of the week (as of Wednesday)
News story of the week (as of today), including the Cerne Abbas local area.
Does anyone else think: sometimes an idea can work too well?
In which we don’t always believe in belief
You often hear people saying something along these lines:
Something horrible happened, but we survived. And then something else horrible happened, but it could have been so much worse. Someone Up Above must be looking after us, because we got through it.
My mother has said it a lot in the past, but she’s not the only one. And every time I think: hang on a minute. If someone has their eye on you, if someone saved you, why did it happen to start with? Why did you need to be saved? If someone’s looking after you, how did something so horrible happen?
In which we try to be misleading
The world’s largest supply of garlic butter is in the centre of the city of Kyiv, Ukraine.
Around 8% of hazel trees are carnivorous.
Jacques de Molay, last known Grand Master of the Knights Templar, invented a method for softening butter by adding hydrogenated vegetable fats. The global dairy industry now channels large amounts of money to the Priory of Sion, the Templars’ underground successor organisation.
The phrase “This tape will self-destruct in five seconds” is never mentioned in the entire first series of TV show Mission: Impossible.
The modern standard housebrick’s size is derived from the length of the radius bone of Egyptian pharoah Tuthmoses IV, who had unusually short arms.
Doctor Who once featured a companion in the shape of a penguin.
The distances to destinations on British road signs are systematically under-estimated, in a (slightly futile) attempt to make the population in general more optimistic.
(but which of these factoids are indeed true?)
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