Category Archives: Text
‘The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ…’
Over the past few of months I have found it increasingly difficult to come up with suitable posts for this blog. While it has been very useful to have a tight focus for most of the content I think I … Continue reading
Je Suis Charlie
‘First, if any opinion is compelled to silence, that opinion may, for aught we can certainly know, be true. To deny this is to assume our own infallibility. Secondly, though the silenced opinion be an error, it may, and very … Continue reading
Philae: a waste of money?
An interesting strand in the online newspaper reactions to the Philae landing has been to query whether money should have been spent on it at all. One argument against such expenditure is that the money would have been better spent … Continue reading
Superb
Have just been watching the Thursday afternoon press conference at Esa, where a number of the scientists from the various teams involved explained what has happened so far to the Philae lander. In all their thinking throughout the project the … Continue reading
No Wallpaper- a Two Century Rollback?
In the last post Nick had taken us back fifty years in terms of wallpapers. On the adjacent wall he had to go deeper, revealing not only another wallpaper but also what is very probably the original lime wash/whitewash from … Continue reading
Wallpaper- a Half-Century Rollback
I hadn’t intended to do another post this week but Chuck, Nick and Alan are decorating the big bedroom for us and today this emerged from under a few other layers of wallpaper while they were stripping the walls. It … Continue reading
Wine Jug
This evening I was starting to set the table before cooking our evening meal. For a reason that many other amateur cooks might guess, I always start by putting out the wine jug. Immediately after setting it down I noticed … Continue reading
Hoity Toity Honky Tonk
‘The first music genre to be commonly known as honky tonk music was a style of piano playing […] emphasizing rhythm more than melody or harmony; the style evolved in response to an environment where the pianos were often poorly … Continue reading
Hard Power, Soft Power
I was recently rereading Robert Kagan’s 2003 book ‘Of Paradise and Power’, in which he contrasts European and American reactions to other states that oppose them. He argues (to simplify very considerably) that where Europe typically pursues its goals through … Continue reading
Hole in the Wall
Over the years we have been lucky in finding a succession of folk to do the maintenance we cannot do- which is most of it. Currently our friend Chuck and his helpers John and Alan do the building and decorating … Continue reading
Reflections 