Improvement?

I went to Glasgow yesterday morning, to plunder the university library - which has a wonderful collection of Scottish literature. I took a break mid-morning, and first sat outside for ten minutes, under a blue sky, but in minus degrees, weathering the cold to enjoy the sun, because it’s been unremittingly and depressingly wet for days, then spent half an hour in the Hunterian Museum, revisiting the Whistlers.  I'd love to work in that part of Glasgow – in fact I think I'd like to live in Glasgow; its architecture and its cultural liveliness are reminiscent of Liverpool, and so, familiar.  The library is absolutely invaluable this year. My university library is being refurbished, and although they've made some astonishingly efficient interim arrangements, most of the books aren't directly accessible but have to be ordered from store via the web-based catalogue.  This means I can’t browse.  I thought this arrangement would upset students generally, but apparently my expectation revealed only how old-fashioned I'm becoming, a fact which was brought home to me with force recently, when I was informed by one of my students, that the verb 'to browse' is derived from the compound noun 'web browser'.  This suggests that, for many, the primary meaning of 'browsing books' just is sitting at a computer and surfing the catalogue for a library or bookshop. 

The feeling of straddling two worlds is beginning to occur more and more frequently. I watched University Challenge for the first time for perhaps years, recently.  As usual, I was completely floored by most of the questions, but instead of also being awed by participants’ erudition, I was appalled both by the general lack of knowledge about the arts, and by the number of questions about football or elements of quantum physics.  But at the same time as feeling distress that the names of the protagonists in Romeo and Juliet or that of the author of Adam Bede are now deemed a challenge to up and coming academics, I am lusting after a particular digital pen which stores handwritten text, and converts it into typed text once it is plugged into a computer.   (I'm enchanted by the idea of handwriting a letter which, after swift  and painless, hi tech wizardry, you can send as an email.) 

The best stationer's I've found - on either side of the Atlantic

It's full of stationery - not computing accessories but traditional stationery, such as pencil sharpeners, writing paper, envelopes (with and without windows (in every size and many hues)); fountain pens and bottles of ink. You have a choice of pads of paper - A3, A4, A5, A6; lined, squared, blank; with and without margins; and exercise books, almost ditto. There are shelves of string, staples, glue; masking and parcel tape; lever-arch and box-files; ring binders, document wallets, filing cabinet files. It's true that they don't still stock ribbons for typewriters or for dot-matrix printers, but the assistants neither bat an eyelid nor raise an eyebrow when asked if they do - they merely fill in an order form.

Last teaching Monday of the semester!

I've decided to work from home this morning, but have spent the last hour dealing with admin email that came in over the weekend, and which I ignored (current policy, and although it makes me feel 'in control' and 'responsible', not to say 'quite grown up', at times it seems more akin to shooting myself in the foot - everyone else appears to use the weekend to catch up on admin!). Anyway, having written to a dozen students about end-of-semester assignments, and to several members of staff about end-of-semester exam boards, not to mention a swathe about an end-of-semester lunch I foolishly agreed to arrange, it's now time for elevenses of some kind, and a reward. So I'm sitting on the bed in a blissfully silent house; dog on one side, cat stretched out so luxuriantly that he's taking up almost all the other; with a pot of tea at my elbow and the duvet over my knees.  This is surely what a laptop is for!

We paid a visit to a DIY place yesterday – Himself needed to find a hinge, replacement for one from a kitchen cupboard door which broke recently, meaning that the cat can now crawl into the cupboard at his pleasure, to snooze in triumph and discomfort, between muffin tins and saucepan lids.  As usual, the DIY place was vast, chilly, sterile, and without natural light.  While this seems a suitable environment for the choice of purely functional widgets and gadgets, I've never understood how people can manage to make decisions about paint and home furnishings in as soulless a place as this.  I was captivated yesterday however.  Robins and blackbirds had flown into the building, and were perched on the the rafters. The whole building swelled with birdsong. It was, I imagine, the avian equivalent of singing in the bath.

If drinking tea was an exercise, I'd be in tip-top shape

If drinking tea kept me fit, I'd be the equivalent of someone who runs for half an hour as soon as she gets out of bed in the morning and who uses weights while sitting at her desk.



I'd be like those people who meet their friends at the gym to chat over a work-out; who only watch television from a mini-trampoline; and who, when flying, do all the exercises they tell you to do to prevent deep-vein thrombosis.



I expect the very fit never go to bed at night without first doing something to improve their fitness level, and although I can't imagine what that could be, if drinking tea kept me fit, then it would be as if I too were doing what ever that is too.

I don't get the arithmetic of A, B and C

You know, those maths problems you were set at school about three men who spent their whole lives in competition - digging ditches, rowing up and down rivers in leaky boats, racing each other on bicycles... A always had the best equipment; B had to contend with minor hitches, and poor old C always had to cope with the impossible - baths which emptied faster than they could be filled; boats which filled faster than they could be bailed out, and so forth.

I have never yet been in a situation where I've had to use anything remotely akin to such calculations, and suspect that if they ever did become relevant, I'd be more likely to think about phoning for an ambulance for C, than take out pencil and paper and start doing sums.

My business card will carry the poem 'Warning' by Jenny Joseph.

Warning

I am an old woman, I shall wear purple

With a red hat which doesn't go and doesn't suit me.

And I shall spend my pension on brandy and summer gloves

And satin sandals, and say we've no money for butter.

I shall sit down on the pavement when I'm tired

And gobble up samples in shops and press alarm bells

And run my stick along the public railings

And make up for the sobriety of my youth.

I shall go out in my slippers in the rain

And pick the flowers in other people's gardens

And learn to spit.

You can wear terrible shirts and grow more fat

And eat three pounds of sausages at a go

Or only bread and pickle for a week

And hoard pens and pencils and beermats and things in boxes.

But now we must have clothes that keep us dry

And pay our rent and not swear in the street

And set a good example for the children.

We must have friends for dinner and read the papers.

But maybe I ought to practise a little now?

So people who know me are not too shocked and surprised

When suddenly I am old, and start to wear purple.


(http://www.wussu.com/poems/jjw.htm)

This is such a wonderful poem. The rebellion now seems absurdly dated (summer gloves!), yet it works brilliantly.

Going again over old ground

The plumber (I refuse to refer to him as a heating engineer) came back this morning, to repair the damage he did to the central heating a fortnight ago, when he installed the new boiler.  For half an hour, I seethed in my study, while he hurried from radiator to radiator, attempting to bleed them simultaneously, thereby causing filthy water to spurt from several at once, damaging carpets.   As soon as he left, I  rang the contractor to complain, yet again. 

The rest of the day was all work. Since both secretaries are on leave this week, I spent hours photocopying stuff for students, and seething some more at the fact that, despite now having two secretaries, I and all the other academic staff still have to devote an excessive proportion of most weeks to the photocopier.  I exacted retribution by way of a long (and fruitful) dawdle through the library stacks, before dividing the rest of the afternoon between rereading The Spaewife and rewriting a course for next term.

More rewriting and rereading tomorrow. 

Hamster and wheel, hamster and wheel.

Another week in the Canaries, and this time I’ve come back very brown - when it was hot it was very, very hot. Unfortunately, when it was not hot is was very, very  overcast and extremely windy.  Still, I went in order to sleep and read, and managed both for huge periods of time, regardless of whether I could read and sleep in the sun or needed to retreat to the apartment.

I also read Priestley’s The Good Companions.  It made me chuckle - once I’d got used to the Yorkshire dialect.  It’s a delightful book but I can’t imagine that the TV serialisation will have been able to capture its charm, and will have reduced it to a picaresque romp. 

We stayed much nearer the strip than last time – we were almost on it.  Surprisingly noise wasn’t an issue, in part because nightclubs aren’t as numerous as in, for example, Tenerife; but also because the tourist population wasn’t particularly young. The apartment was pleasingly spacious, and largely well arranged, although a rather odd arrangement of windows in the bathroom and kitchen meant all that went on in the neighbours’ bathroom was unsettlingly obvious if we were in the living room.  

I had a couple of disastrous meals, each the result of ‘international’ restaurants, which have spring up everywhere.  It would appear that international restaurants can’t cope with spaghetti.  Still, we found a small Italian restaurant, which I liked so much that we ate there three times.  After a salad there, I’ve developed a passion for mozzarella cheese served with fresh strawberries – I plan to try out the combination in lunch-box sandwiches next week.

    

Before I die I'll ...

use a senior citizen's bus pass
I'll have made it to 60

retire
that way I get to 65

receive a higher rate Winter Fuel allowance
I'll have had my 80th birthday

open a telegram from the Queen
I'll be 100!

The Berry family at the centre of the tale are superbly eccentric. The extensions to the family are equally deliciously strange. Even the family's animals are wonderfully odd. The book will make you laugh aloud - if read on a train, it'll ensure you have a carriage to yourself; if read by the pool, you'll have a wide choice of sunbeds.

Beware - the book is not only funny; it's heartbreakingly sad too. The phrase 'Sorrow floats' will live with me for ever.

Paris

... for the booksellers along the Seine, and the paintings in the Louvre; for the crepe in Montmartre and the creme brulee in Pigalle; for the view from the top of the Sacre Coeur and the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame; for the window-shopping, people watching, eavesdropping; and the freedom of the Carte d'Orange.

The stationery athlete

For speed and precision in the use of Post-Its (aka cheap sticky notes), this woman knows no peers. In a recent brainstorming session, she astounded judges by decimating two thick pads of the same, covering both her own desk and that of a colleague with perfectly aligned, completely legible notes.

With a little more training in appropriacy of comment, this woman will go far.

If you could change one thing about your living situation what would it be?

My bodyclock has a mind of its own. When I have to be up and out by 6.30, as I do most days, it refuses to rise to the challenge, and drowses 'til noon. When I can sleep in, as is possible most Sundays, it wakes with the lark and fidgets, whining about ridiculous ideas such as filling the car with dogs and people, and heading off for a spot of hillwalking.

I know it isn’t politically correct to complain about this, but I’m going to anyway. I’ve been given another bin by the local council. To the large green bin, the large brown bin and a ridiculous plastic blue box with which the council deemed fit to clutter my garden, they have added a large blue bin.

The new bin came with a manual. (A manual!) The manual gives instructions about how to throw away rubbish.

The new bin came with stickers which are to be put under the lid of each bin. They consist of prohibitions: ‘This bin is for GARDEN WASTE only!’ etc. There are penalties for wrong use of any given bin. I know, because I once received a letter explaining that my brown bin hadn’t been collected that week because its contents were ‘contaminated’. I rang to remonstrate that it couldn’t have been my bin which was contaminated as I had never used the brown bin. I received, not an apology, but a lecture on brown-bin use. So you see, the responsibility of sticking the stickers on the bins weighs very, very heavy. I shall not be sticking just for myself - these stickers are also for the many generations of would-be recyclers to come.

The new bin came with a revised collection schedule. I haven’t got to grips with the original schedule yet. I (and I suspect, most others nearby) depend on the folk in the pensioners’ block at the end of the road. If they put out green bins, so do I. When their bins are brown, so are mine. I don’t do blue boxes.

I don’t do blue boxes for two reasons. First, I can’t work out what they’re for. I know you’re supposed put plastic bottles in them, because, when it’s windy on blue-box day, plastic bottles take off and fly around like large insects, and this is my second reason for not using the blue box. My plastic bottles, as well as those which, when the wind drops, land in my garden, go into the bin that is (or, perhaps, used to be) for unnamed rubbish, which is (or maybe, was) green.

I haver over the colour of the bin for non-specific rubbish, because a brief glance at the manual reveals that one bin has changed its purpose. Since I missed the collection this week (or perhaps last week), for this bin (the brown one), it is currently almost full, because the outcome of the lecture mentioned above, was that I finally learnt how to dispose of lawn cuttings and hedge trimmings. I wonder what I’m supposed to do with my almost, but incorrectly full bin. Up-end it and reclassify the contents? No, I’ll revert to the one-bin system I used before I learnt about brown bins: everything will go in the green bin, but undercover in black bin-bags.

Paul Simon was going to Graceland, Toto blessed the rains down in Africa – what place would you write a song about?

I'm not capable of taking part in this one, but thought folk might enjoy a poem made up entirely of place names. The poem's by a Scots poet called Edwin Morgan (http://www.edwinmorgan.com/bio_index.html) and is called 'Canedolia - an off-concrete Scotch fantasia'. [I hope to goodness the line breaks come out.]

Canedolia - an off-concrete Scotch fantasia

oa! hoy! awe! ba! mey!

who saw?
rhu saw rum. garve saw smoo. nigg saw tain. lairg saw lagg.
rigg saw eigg. largs saw haggs. tongue saw luss. mull saw yell.
stoer saw strone. drem saw muck. gask saw noss. unst saw cults.
echt saw banff. weem saw wick. trool saw twatt.

how far?
from largo to lunga from joppa to skibo from ratho to shona from
ulva to minto from tinto to tolsta from soutra to marsco from
braco to barra from alva to stobo from fogo to fada from gigha to
gogo from kelso to stroma from hirta to spango.

what is it like there?
och it’s freuchie, it’s faifley, it’s wamphray, it’s frandy, it’s
sliddery.

what do you do?
we foindle and fungle, we bonkle and meigle and maxpoffle. we
scotstarvit, armit, wormit, and even whifflet. we play at crosstobs
leuchars, gorbals, and finfan. we scavaig, and there’s aye a bit of
tilquhilly. if it’s wet, treshnish and mishnish.

what is the best of the country?
blinkbonny! airgold! thundergay!

and the worst?
scrishven, shiskine, scrabster, and snizort.

listen! what’s that?
catacol and wauchope, never heed them.

tell us about last night?
well, we had a wee ferintosh and we lay on the quiraing. it was
pure strontian!

but who was there?
petermoidart and craigenkenneth and cambusputtock and
ecclemuchty and corriehulish and balladolly and altnacanny and
clauchanvrechan and stronachlochan and auchenlacher and
tighnacrankie and tilliebruaich and killiehara and invervannach
and achnatudlem and machrishellach and inchtamurchan and
auchterfechan and kinlochculter and ardnawhallie and
invershuggle.

and what was the toast?
schiehallion! schiehallion! schiehallion!

Taken from http://www.ltscotland.org.uk/literacy/findresources/edwinmorgan/poems/canedolia/poem.asp)

More woolgathering …

although,  as partial justification, I do intend to try my hand at a little gentle techno-wizardry, for, today, I shall attempt to hyperlink (is it a verb?  Probably doesn’t matter: after all, there is evidence of neither linguistic elegance nor sophistication in compuspeak).

This post constitutes proof that Plinky works. And I believe that sentence might just be proof that I can create hyperlinks.  But I digress.  Proof that Plinky works – because, pondering how to respond to today’s prompt (see below (and, no, I’m not going to allow myself to see how to link within an entry – at least, not today)) led to thought about the ways different languages work, then to thinking about ergativity and so forth, on to Basque, and via that to Larry Trask. 

Larry Trask’s books on linguistics are wonderful: informative yet also very entertaining.  He managed to make even a dictionary readable (Dictionary of Grammatical Terms in Linguistics).  I didn’t know him, but I still felt a keen sense of loss at his death (2004) – and judging from the obituaries, others reacted similarly and for the same reasons (see, for example the Independent).

If you were a member of a Native American tribe that used names like 'Dances With Wolves,' what would your name be?

This question really exercised me.

Initial reaction: 'Wow! There's scope for fun here!' Phrases such as 'Muddies the waters' and 'Loses the plot' sprang to mind.

Then I thought about the way the name 'Dances with wolves' works: in most English-speaking cultures, it seems, names are nouns (for example concrete obects such as flowers (Iris); abstract ideas (Mercy); jobs (Carter)), but, here, the name is a verb. I began thinking about possible verb phrases: 'Stings like a bee' being one example (though no use for me); 'Sings like a lark' (ditto); 'Sleeps like a log' (better). However, I junked this train of thought - the meanings rely too heavily on the noun used.

I wondered briefly if the phrase 'Dances with wolves' works in the same way as 'spends with abandon' and 'laughs with gusto'? And decided against, because then it would mean something like dances wolfishly.

So, I needed a verb that applies to me, and which singles me out in some way from others, by using something which indicates not a *how, but a *where, or *when, or *with whom.

And then I did what I like to do when puzzled ...

[Answer: Walks in the the Rain]

I’ve been browsing through(/leafingthrough/dipping into/turning the pages of) Roget’s Thesaurus, and as is usual(routine/customary) when opening any kind of (dictionary/lexicon/concordance), am appalled(/vexed/aggrieved/bothered/distressed) by the narrowness of my active written vocabulary. You’d think that active vocabulary would increase just by exposure to what is read. Perhaps one needs to write when reading – an idea countering what many advise in case one’s writing is infected. Although, I suppose, if one is attempting to broaden one’s active vocabulary, one would like to be infected.

The problem is that one picks up another’s phrasing and cadence as well as the lexical.

There’s an awful lot involved in writing and speaking: it isn’t just a case of being able to label and name (contra St Augustine); or label, name and pop into a given grammar (contra Chomsky). Vocabulary and tense are just the beginning. You have to learn about collocation and register; and, in order to develop a voice, you need to learn how how to manipulate and exploit both. I wonder how it all happens; and whether it’s something anyone can learn to do, at any stage in one’s development. Chomsky says not: but then he’s welded to grammatical syntax, while I think (or perhaps, I think that I think) there’s something even more interesting going on – something much messier, and more akin to a lexical syntax.

But – and this is a big but – does a lexical syntax fare any better? Doesn’t connotation feature rather large in all this? Meaning as use? (Once again, I’m back to what might be loosely termed Wittgenstein’s ‘first principles’ (although I doubt he’d have approved).)

Coincidentally, while I was thinking about words and whatnot, someone sent me an email containing the following:

Olny 55 plepoe out of 100 can raed tihs.

i cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it dseno't mtaetr in waht oerdr the ltteres in a wrod are, the olny iproamtnt tihng is taht the frsit and lsat ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a taotl mses and you can sitll raed it whotuit a pboerlm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Azanmig huh? yaeh and I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt!

I had to stay for a week in a large, stuffy hotel room in a soulless, modern hotel overlooking other soulless, modern buildings near the station. The controls for heating, lighting and air-conditioning required the kind of mind that can complete Killer Suduko puzzles with one hand while solving a Rubik cube with the other. I never did sort out how to turn either the heating on, or every light off, and it was not unlike what I imagine a prison cell to be, despite the number of stars.

Let me tell you what I do

I wake-to-the-alarm-and-hit-the-snooze-button-wake-to-the-alarm-and-hit-the-snooze-button-wake-to-the-alarm-and-hit-the-snooze-button-then
waketothealarmgetupdresswalkthedogeatbreakfastdrivetowork    writethingssaythingsdrivehome(sometimesviathegym)walkthe dogmakedinnereatdinnergetintobed and f-a-l-l--a---s----l-----e------e

Who would win in a fight between a bear and a shark?

*Please let it be the bear - I *need to know *something can get the better of a shark

Dewired

On Saturday, I bought a router.  This part of becoming wireless proved comparatively easy – comparatively, as I wasn’t entirely sure what kind I needed, and the advice of the first two assistants in the shop didn’t inspire a great deal of confidence.  Setting up (possibly this ought to be ‘configuring’, but as I’m currently awash with half-digested computing terminology, equally possibly not) the router was astonishingly straightforward.  By contrast, the final hurdle was trying in the extreme: the computer recognised the router, but wilfully chose to ignore it.   However, after several lengthy arbitration sessions (was this configuring?), I have, this morning, connected and reconnected to the internet via the laptop in each room in the house (it’s too cold to experiment outside), and am almost certain that I can claim to be sans wire.

Now, it seems, I have to configure myself, as, although I have tried to write in a variety of new locations, I have migrated back to my original spot - the desk. 

The weekend was a rather an extravagance, as, in addition to the router, I bought books: Gombrich, A Little History of the World; Yates’ Revolutionary Road; a trash novel; and a replacement copy of Roget, having been driven over the edge on Friday when the state of my original copy deteriorated so dramatically that, on opening it, its pages fell on the floor like the petals of a blown rose.  But, I am still reading Proulx.

I bought the books in a Borders, a large airy bookshop, which also has a cafe which sells passable tea, and a small but interesting selection of cards  and writing paraphenalia.  As usual, I conned myself into believing I was going straight upstairs to the cafe to meet someone, and afterwards straight back to the car.  And, as usual, I made my way to the cafe via the bargain book boxes (mostly recipe books, so no use to me) and the stationery department (where, somewhat unexpectedly, I found (and bought) a teapot); and to the car via most of the rest of the shop, and the till.  

As you see, I’ve been playing with settings, and have opted against ragged edges, probably because I’m thinking ‘tidiness’ at the moment.

I’m being interviewed later this morning – something to do with the Scottish Health System. What this means, in practical terms, is that I have to fly round the house wielding cutting-edge technology like vacuum cleaners and polish, in order to haul the place above the dysentery line. I can’t begin yet, as, unlike others in the building, I believe it is extremely unkind to impose one’s domesticity (even such rare, shy species of domesticity as mine) on others, before the clock has reached double figures.

I wish I was naturally tidy. I can think tidily, but I can’t live tidily. Bank statements, bills, letters and papers are all filed methodically; I can lay my hands on just about any book I own with the minimum of fuss; but flat surfaces act as petrie dishes for everything else. Put a newspaper on a table and within 24 hours there’s a veritable syndicate of them; pencils replicate the behaviour of meerkats; slip off a pair of shoes, and immediately they breed and interbreed – and, if left undisturbed, sandals evolve into wellies.

I’m sure this failing is something to do with my upbringing. Not, I hasten to add, because I was brought up in midden, but because I was brought up in a house bursting with cupboards, and, with the exception of the occasional cull, providing a room looked tidy, what went on behind cupboard doors was not spoken of.

Here, however, I have a cupboard or two in the kitchen, one in the bathroom, which is mostly full of immersion heater, and a press in the bedroom. There are two sheds in the garden, but since they leak and tend to be raided by the bored and the mean, they don’t count. The upshot: there are too few cupboard doors, so the lawnmower, bicycle and cat basket can only be stored in the hall, while certain objects (the teapot, for example, and the hairdryer) have no option but to develop a Bedouin lifestyle.

This morning’s task, then, is to ensure that one room looks inhabited yet habitable, and that the path to that room can be negotiated even by those without commando training.

There will be serious repercussions, since only a few events precipitate tidying up, and, as far as the dog and cat are concerned, none of these has anything to recommend it. For reasons I have yet to determine, I am programmed to tidy up for burglars. As a result, I tend to develop an acute case of domesticity the night before I go away. For example, the hall is cleared to ensure intruders can get in and out easily; the bathroom is scoured and clean towels are laid out in, case they feel the urge to shower. Both animals recognise the symptoms, and firmly believe that cleaning heralds The Kennels. The cat takes the first opportunity to leap through the window and disappear into a foxhole in the garden; the dog mopes.

Consequence: by the time this morning’s interview about the health service takes place, I’ll be exhausted and cross after a bout of high-velocity housework; the cat will be heaven knows where, and remain there long after the all clear has sounded; and the dog will skulk under tables and beds. My opinion really is not worth all this.

The line 'My arm is long and my vengeance is total' is so absurd it makes me giggle. (It's also just about the only line from a filmscript I can remember (well, apart from most of the script for 'Brief Encounter' (which also means I can quote from 'Truly, Madly, Deeply')).)

Post Options

Test drive

I’ve just installed Windows Live Writer. I’m not keen on Windows Live but that’s probably because it made my last computer crash. I have a feeling I’ll be playing with this program for a while, so produce entries with OTT formats and

flamboyance extraOrdinaire

until I’m worn out by the novelty of it all.

I wonder why installing new software makes me so bad-tempered.

I was looking for a way to add links to the sidebar on my blog when I found the Writer program. The instructions for links defeated me – I am doomed to have the appearance of a neonate.*

Re: Live Writer - I quite like having more ‘room’, having more page on view, as I write (but what I’d really like is to have back the add-in/add-on/whatever-it’s-called for Word that used to be available).

I see I’ll have to go into battle with Microsoft over defaults, yet again. I realise they’re probably a godsend for people who aren’t used to formatting, but they drive me wild. (Mr Microsoft, I do not want to type using Georgia 12pt; and I am perfectly capable of creating a line space between paragraphs. (And, while on the subject, could you do something to curb your obsession with lists?)) I dread to think what the Dreaded Default will attempt to achieve on the spelling and grammar front.

I do like being able to write offline.  In theory, I should be able to write entries from wherever I please, and without the distraction of the web at my elbow.  (Now I fear the discovery that I have become dependant on distraction – that my attention span has devolved to that of a goldfish.) 

The word count is a little dispiriting, however. You write for a while; stare out the window, watching the shadows of people walking (running, trudging) up and down the steps to the flats above; remove the cat from your desk; make another pot of tea; let it brew; write some more; pour tea; sip it; remove the cat from your desk; wonder why so many people are visiting upstairs, given the vacuum cleaner has been whining non-stop for the last two hours; write some more; remove the cat from your desk; remove the cat from your desk; remove the cat from your desk; pour another cup of tea;  reply to a text message;  remove the cat from your desk; write like blazes; make lunch; eat lunch; remove the cat from your desk; and find the whole morning was devoted to producing less than 500 words.

 

*I changed my template, and, suddenly, it is easy to don blog-svelte – currently belied by appearances.

 

Don't say 'uninstall' around me

uninstall
It's unnecessary - in noncomputerland, we say 'remove'

Today I'm in Texas.

Well, not really; not in the flesh, but imaginarily (if that's a word (which it is (I've just checked))).

That's not quite true either: I am travelling (imaginarily) from Denver to Texas and have stayed overnight en route, although I'm not quite sure where, and it doesn't matter. It's bound to be more engaging than here anyway - here, where it's snowing, someone nearby is vacuuming and the dog next door is howling because lonely.

I'm travelling courtesy of Annie Proulx, That Old Ace in the Hole, which had been on my bookshelf, waiting to be read, since February 2003.

I know that it's been there since February 2003, because, once upon a time, I had enough time to read a lot, and amassed books so I would never run out. I'd order several books that appealed at the time, put my name in them, date them so I knew what had arrived when, and shelve them, safe (I thought) in the knowledge that I'd be able to follow up whatever theme, strand or idea had caught my interest within living memory of it doing so.

I'd carried out this practice for years and years, but in 2003 something seismic must have occurred, as I stopped reading enough. It must have taken a while for this to register, as there are still shelves of books waiting to be read, all with my name in them, and carrying dates between January 2003 and October 2005. Although the practice had survived through moves around the country, a move across the Atlantic, and then a little to-ing and fro-ing across the Pacific, it didn't survive whatever it was that happened in 2003, when I was some distance from any major modification in location or lifestyle. It is somewhat worrying that I can't remember what caused this particular sea change.


It wasn't so much a case of no longer reading. It was more a case of no longer making appointments with books - or groups of books.

There's always been something tidal about the way I read - not merely an ebb and flow, but a spring and neap. Sometimes, in my bleaker moments, I wonder if there is something tidal about the way my brain functions. I can read intelligibly, write, think and speak coherently for several weeks, then quite abruptly all intelligence stops for several days, and I can cope only with mindless entertainment. During such a mental nadir, I still read, but only books that require no thought; fast-paced books riddled with cliche, or books I can rely on for a happy ending - predictable books, in short. I once read a book on reading (and yes, I am obsessive about one or two subjects; and, yes, these do include reading and writing), which explained why some books act as 'comfort reads' in terms of shuffling our pre-existing concepts. The explanation made a lot of sense. At the time, it also caused a degree of discomfort, as, for reasons I won't go into now, I was reading and thinking about Mills and Boon, and disliked the idea that I possessed the kinds of pre-existing concepts required to make these comfortable to read. (This discomfort was partly alleviated when it became clear that one could (the modality used here is important) connect the format used in Mills and Boon books with that of Middle English Romance. Of course, this can lead one to the question whether the 'Happy ever after (in the Home Counties)' is, in some sense, hardwired into our make-up, but I'll not pursue that here.) But as well as discomfort, the explanation gave me some inkling of the what happens during these regular vacations of the mind.

So, it appears, I have been on a very long holiday, mentally. And have no idea why. Not a complete holiday, however: instead of comfort reading being a brief regular interlude, it has become the norm. Maybe (just maybe), my current reading indicates the hint of a tilt towards a former norm.

What this country needs is ...

to restrict the use of league tables to sport

101 things no one needs to know

1 I love tea
2 And real-vanilla ice cream
3 I live in Scotland
4 But haven’t got a Scots accent
5 I have a 17-year-old pure white, long-haired, congenitally deaf cat with odd eyes (one blue, one green)
6 I also have a small, long-haired, black dog
7 My favourite audio book is Paul Scott, Staying On
8 I reread Dickens’ Bleak House often
9 I’m (still) currently reading John Irving, Cider House Rules
10 And (still) listening to Cosi fan tutte (See 39)
11 I've never been to New Zealand
12 Or to China
13 But I’m hoping to travel around the world, between the Tropics for a month next year
14 And to move house this year
15 And to find a new job
16 One day I’ll submit a PhD thesis on Scottish Literature
17 And learn to water ski
18 I’d like to live somewhere hot and dry
19 And to work until I’m 90
20 I prefer vegetables to meat
21 And red wine to white
22 (But I usually drink gin)
23 I’m middle-aged and love it
24 And middle class and love this too
25 I tend to buck trends, but unintentionally
26 I’m not political
27 And have little common sense
28 Or general knowledge
29 But I can do pure maths
30 Read Latin
31 And write short stories
32 I can’t cook
33 I can’t ice skate
34 Or ski
35 But I can swim
36 And surf
37 And I used to run
38 (I have unreliable knees)
39 I’m fanatical about Mozart
40 And Bach
41 And punctuation
42 But not punctuality
43 I cannot understand economics
44 I think slowly
45 So I’m not witty
46 And I can’t tell jokes
47 But I have a good sense of humour
48 I’m easygoing (I think)
49 I hold few opinions with conviction
50 But can appear opinionated
51 I tend to acquire rather than buy
52 (Except for books
53 And clothes
54 And computers)
55 And (aside from clothes) buy second-hand
56 I once belonged to a wholefood coop
57 As a result, I know a lot about herbs and spices
58 And pulses and wholegrains
59 And make good bread
60 But I live on supermarket stirfry
61 And shop-bought loaves
62 And Marmite (because, well, see 32)
63 I’m unhappy without a laptop
64 Sunshine
65 (But, oddly, also wellies)
66 Tea (see 1)
67 A book
68 And my funny, intelligent, handsome, easygoing partner
69 I'm happy most of the time
70 And happiest when on holiday with my partner (see 68) and my dog (see 6) and cat (see 5) somewhere hot (see 18)
71 I wear hats and earrings
72 Jeans and Chanel
73 I’m miserable when bored
74 And (because 73) at meetings at work
75 I enjoy flying
76 But not landing
77 Although I love arriving
78 And sometimes leaving (places
79 and some people)
80 Once I used to have an allotment
81 A piano
82 And a friend called Jen, who died
83 I regret giving up the allotment
84 And selling the piano
85 And I wish I had never started smoking
86 I would like to meet David Mitchell
87 Andrew Marr
88 Peter Ackroyd
89 Boris Johnson
90 Isla Dewar
91 And E. Annie Proulx
92 I hope I never meet Jonathan Ross or Russell Brand or Jeremy Clarkson
93 Presents I remember most keenly from childhood include a set of pencils with my name on
94 And a pair of roller skates
95 Things I have lost include a Blue Peter badge
96 One pale green drop earring made by a friend out of paper
97 A copy of Robert Tressell, The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists
98 And a bicycle
99 Things I have found include a treadle sewing machine
100 And a cat
101 I wish I wore a wedding ring

My handiness

I haven't built anything since I stopped using Lego, and I've never handled a roll of duct-tape. I once attempted to repair a bicycle puncture - would that count? Probably not: I was overwhelmed by the equipment. I still don't know what that small grey oblong block was for.

Glorious blue sky and a scattering of snow this morning. Quite unexpected as it rained cats and dogs last night. I have woken later than usual - not quite true: I dozed to the radio for an hour before pattering through to the kitchen to make tea.

Tea: I've begun to use a glass teapot, and suddenly the descriptions of kinds of tea make sense - the golden glow of darjeeling, the redness of assam. I shall, I fear, become obsessive, but not a connoisseur: I like a jolly good English breakfast tea too much.

But finding good tea is proving difficult, which surprises me as tea is evidently becoming more and more popular, judging by the choice in teabags at supermarkets. There used to be a wonderful tea merchant in Edinburgh, which sold myriad teas, including coconut. I have yet to find anywhere else that sells coconut tea. There's a shop in Dundee that sells tea and coffee - leaf tea and coffee beans - as well as every kind of tea- and coffee-making utensil imaginable. This is one of the best kind of merchant because prices there show that tea is taken to be enjoyed by common or garden people like me, and not limited to the tastes of the wealthier echelons of British society, or something 'for best'.

So, every month, I travel to Dundee, to join the queue winding from a small dark shop, heady with roasting coffee beans, eavesdropping on others' conversations across the counter for hints about what to try next, and emerge with a bag full of the dark green packages the merchant has filled for me. I am becoming conversant with phrases like 'first flush', and am almost ready to refer to the colour of tea 'liquors'.

If I were naturally methodical, I'd no doubt develop some kind of strategy for exploring tea, but I'm not. I'm wooed by words, sipping from continent to continent, and colour to colour. It's hard not to be overwhelmed by choice, in the way I am overwhelmed by choice in wine. However: unlike wine, one (more accurately I) can improve knowledge of tea while both continuing a day job with at least a semblance of competence, and without leaving a bank balance in shreds.

I might start to allow my obsession, my romance with tea to infiltrate life more freely. I might, for example, choose to travel to places where one can find a good cup of tea. The best tea I had during my last trip was on the flight back: an indictment.

Still reading John Irving, The Cider House Rules and, as always, I am in awe of the man. How does he manage constantly to reference back to certain details in ways that work despite the details seeming inconsequential when they first occur? Wilbur Larch is deliciously eccentric, and Homer reminds me of Henry Mackenzie's Man of Feeling. The tale is chronologically ordered and yet seems to sweep in wide circles, like the circles in you make with your arms in Tai Chi.

Today I walked into town, looking for a birthday card. I wandered around a couple of charity shops hoping to find good books. Last time I found several; this time none. But that's just fine. That's what being able to wander allows for - not the feeding frenzy of a trip to Borders of Waterstones, when the problem is that of needing to cull the pile you've gathered as you browse the many shelves, before you reach the checkout. (Himself gave me such a wonderful birthday last week: on the plane he produced a book (Stuart McBride); and the following day,when I'd finished that one he produced another (Alex Grey, Pitch Black); and then a third (Fred Vargas); and, to finish off, I read the,book he gave me on Valentine's Day (Night Train).)

I also read No Country for Old Men. We watched the film at Christmas, but although completely absorbed throughout, neither of us really understood it. The book helped - a little: at least I now understand why it has the title it does. Wonderful spare writing. Annie Proulx writes in a similarly sheer fashion. I wish I could do that! But when I try, I become incomprehensible - opaque and obscure.

Going back to this morning's obsession, this inability to write sparely surely means I shall never tweet with conviction. I can't even text with economy - although that is partly because I loath text-speak. It's ugliness is veritably upsetting.

This is luxurious. Time to write. Time to write at home. I can't remember when I was last able to do this, this getting up in the morning in my own time, drinking tea made in a pot while looking through the window at my cat hunting leaves, rather than gulping tea made from a hastily squeezed teabag between attempts to cram papers and books into a briefcase. I might even manage a kind of breakfast today.

It's good day to be at home too - the forecast is snow.

Time to write, but life is so small at the moment that I have little to say.

Or maybe, I'm just out of practice at saying - and thinking.

There are things to do - nothing too pressing though. And no need to watch a clock, to hurry from task to task. No deadlines.

In a minute, I'll pile on woollies, find wellies, call my dog and stroll round the park (where suddenly there are swathes of snowdrops and crocuses under the trees; and, equally suddenly, it is light enough to see them in the morning before work), before picking up a newspaper. I might even buy two.

And later? Later I could dawdle through a few domestic chores - iron clothes while listening to BBC R4, perhaps; write a letter with a pen on paper (when did that become a luxury?).

I am too contrary. I am dreaming up an old-fashioned kind of day, while tapping away on a laptop keyboard.

I didn't even manage a completely old-fashioned day while on holiday last week. Yes, I read; and wrote postcards; and neither watched television nor listened to the radio - but I relied heavily on an MP3 player to create a small bubble for my existence. We lived almost simply for a week on Skye last year, but then watched DVDs in the evenings. Has it become impossible to live without the technology that just passes time?

Another question: why am I blogging (and how I hate that word!) instead of writing with a pen on pages in a diary?

I am blogging because, despite all aspirations, I love certain kinds of technology. I am enchanted by the way I can make the rest of the world disappear without effort by plugging myself into an MP3 player; I am addicted to digital radio. It's something to do with being 'in the world' without responsibility.

Is it just irresponsibility then? Why blog rather than write letters (or email?)? Is that something to do with the freedom to write without judgement? Is it all an escape from judgement? Or an escape from people? And have people lost the skills required to create, maintain and respect distance?

I am becoming aware that this train (not train - too linear: knot) of thought is somehow connected with Tweeting - or rather, with my inability at present to understand the lure of Tweeting.

OK, if that's the case, then let's try to go head to head with that.

I am beguiled by the ability to interact with others in such a way as to create intimacy without invasion. What has become known as the touchy-feely approach at best irritates me; and at worst, it sickens. It is what I'd like to describe as 'poor man's interaction' if there wasn't a danger of enraging folk through (what will undoubtedly be deemed) politically incorrectness. It's something to do with the content of interaction. Thinking is no longer acceptable - one must always feel; the intellectual is frowned upon: we may talk from the heart but not from the mind (and, on reflection, we can also acknowledge body but not soul). It is as if we are encouraged - perhaps even forced - to remain childish.

'What are you doing?': the question from Tweeter. Most people are doing exactly the same as thousands upon thousands of other people. Might a better question be 'What are you thinking?' Well, it might, if people didn't associate that with invasion. And why do they do that? Is it because, often, people know that what they are thinking is not interesting, or what they are unhappy acknowledging Might it also be because, often, people don't know what they are thinking because out of practice? All too often, we are encouraged to vent, but maybe we also be encouraged to think before we speak - not in order to protect others but to learn from ourselves.

'What are you doing?' was once a question associated by many with childhood. It is asked when a child is exploring, doing something that has been prohibited; or it is asked with a chuckle in the voice because the child is unintentionally doing something amusing. When asked of an adult, it is often coupled with exasperation, the exception being when one is genuinely interested in everything another is doing - during the wonderful, heady, early stages of a relationship when phone calls are about connecting without communicating. Here's the rub: using 'what are you doing?' in this last way is out of self-interest. You create the connection to feel better - and it works because feeling better comes just from assurance that the other is still there - wherever that is - and you are part of it, whatever it is. Like a toddler who cannot bear lose sight of a parent. And for the questioned: it is alluring because it suggests that you have value for someone whatever you are doing.

Unlike the real world, however, you can ignore a tweet when you please.

What has made all this so alluring - in some cases, to the the point of addictive? First thought: society. Something about the way we live means that, for many, we are lonely; we crave contact, yet haven't the time or situation to develop contact with others. The phrase 'quality time' once was associated with parenting but is is now common parlance when describing time spent with lovers, partners, friends. My concern: we are finding shortcuts to friendship, and will lose the ability to make and keep friends.

Just back from Corralejo - it was a superb week, but since it was, I have little to say about it beyond 'I read'. I read Stuart McBride, The Fleshhouse on the outward flight; read half a dozen books while there, stretched out on a sunbed; and read most of John Irving, The Cider House Rules on the flight home. Sometimes, but not always, I stopped reading in the early evening, when the sun went down, and walked with Himself to the town to find somewhere to eat. Excellent food, as always: paella one night, shared with Himself; tapas at the Casa Manolo (the best restaurant, I think) (Himself ordered his usual of chickpeas and tripe; since I don't do tripe, I had croquettes, and we also ate a plate of mussels); a steak house another night where we were cared for by a maitre d' with the hair and moustache of a cavalier, and where, perversely, I chose pasta, and drank rather a lot of rioja. Sometimes we browsed supermarket shelves for steak and salad, and stocked up on almond biscuits for breakfast. Mostly, though, I read. We both did. And we talked about what we'd been reading. And as I read, I listened to Cosi Fan Tutte over and over and over again.

One book stood out - so much so, that I wrote a couple of postcards recommending it to friends: Pascal Mercier, A Night Train to Lisbon. I find it difficult to describe the book as it is so peculiar, and so peculiarly rivetting. An intellectual journey for the protagonist, and so also for the reader. It has left me filled with deep envy for people who are engaged in literary research, and I'm yearning for time to return to research into literature and language. Work is holding less and less appeal as my new boss's sticky, depressive timidity becomes more and more entrenched. (I went to an interview for a similar post recently - and the enthusiasm of the managers was palpable: I felt as though I was gulping great lungfuls of fresh air.) I have little time for anything bar work, and resent this constantly and enormously (particularly as the new boss is exasperating everyone because extraordinarily lazy as well as rather dim).

I have joined Twitter! I'm not sure I quite understand the attraction, but perhaps that's because I have yet to find folk worth following. I'm not sure I'll be able to trill, tweet and chirrup, as I doubt I'd remember to write anything when (or, perhaps, if I'm ever) doing something noteworthy. I am being followed, however, albeit only people who want me to buy something. I am curious about it though. What is it that makes receiving tweets from celebrities so alluring? Is it something to do with the illusion that it is personal communication? Is it because you appear to able to eavesdrop on the great and good. (And what is it that makes it so alluring for celebrities?)

I'm away to try to finish John Irving tonight. There's something so very satisfying about reading a longish book particularly when largely restricted by time to reading only a page or two before sleep.