Monday, June 11, 2007
So what are walls for?
The FIL pix shows a very impressive and ancient monument, but what was it really for? If there were people about organised enough to build such a thing, there would be other people who would not find it that hard to knock a hole through it. I would have thought that a hundred undisturbed men with crowbars and such could knock a hole suitable for cavalry in a day or so. And could you really garrison the whole thing? Who gets posted out into the wilds portrayed? Punishment for borrowing one of the emperor's concubines? Does anyone know? Maybe I will be asking Wiki shortly.
A modest senior moment today when I almost brushed the breadcrumbs from the bread board into the grocery cupboard rather than that containing the compost bucket.
The compost itself is the subject of an experiment. We have acquired several pounds of dry goods - flour, sugar, rice and the like - which had been sitting in an attic for maybe twenty years. Looked OK but we were a bit too squeamish to actually eat the stuff so it has been used to feed the compost bin at the bottom of the garden. The thing is, are we going to have a generation of obese or diabetic slugs and worms as a result of this grossly enhanced diet? Are the rats going to make serious attempts to gnaw their way through the protective chipboard at the front of the bin to get at the stuff? If pushed, I'm sure they could make it, despite the hard plastic coating. With a bit of brain power they might just tunnel under rather than gnaw through.
A rather differant sort of senior moment in the book I am reading about the Armenian massacres (which, as ever, turn out to be a more complicated - although still very evil - business than one had first thought). Lots of people seem to be called Blogs Bey or Fred Pasa (s cedilla I think). It has taken me three quarters of the book to realise that Bey and Pasa are titles - like Lord or Sir - which the Turks in their wisdom place after the family name rather than before. Pasa does not appear in my dictionary but Pasha and Basha do. The dictionary comes down on the side of the view that Pasha and Basha are the same word so I can probably roll Pasa in too.
Any yet another book, this time about Burma. It seems that Burma has never been a neat and tidy country in the way that England has been for getting on for a thousand years - and like Ottoman Anatolia contains a very mixed population - although as a result of unpleasant goings on since the last war, rather less mixed that it used to be. Not a good recipe for a rapid transition to modern nation statehood. Said transition being made even harder by North Eastern Burma being invaded by a very substantial remnant from the losing side at the end of the Chinese civil war. Also that the much hated Ne Win was, as a young man, the most effective soldier around - a quality which fuelled his rise to the top - but which did not prevent his fall from grace.
Cut up on the way to or from Cheam three times in the last week. On the first occasion, a little old lady in her little old car overtakes me and turns smartly left. On the second, I am overtaken on the inside (there being less than two feet between me and the kerb) by a postman on a bicycle at traffic lights where I was hoping to turn left. On the third, I think a variant of the little old lady but I forget the detail. No doubt it will come back when I log out.
Experimented with lemon soles last week - having arrived at the baker (this being where the fish van parks) too late for the depleted summer catches of proper white fish. Not hugely impressed. BH did an excellent job of cooking and presentation (entire, dark side up with incisions), but the flesh was a bit mushy for me, especially that under the rather substantial bone. In fact, not only mushy but thin on the ground. One only got to eat maybe a third of the bought weight.
A modest senior moment today when I almost brushed the breadcrumbs from the bread board into the grocery cupboard rather than that containing the compost bucket.
The compost itself is the subject of an experiment. We have acquired several pounds of dry goods - flour, sugar, rice and the like - which had been sitting in an attic for maybe twenty years. Looked OK but we were a bit too squeamish to actually eat the stuff so it has been used to feed the compost bin at the bottom of the garden. The thing is, are we going to have a generation of obese or diabetic slugs and worms as a result of this grossly enhanced diet? Are the rats going to make serious attempts to gnaw their way through the protective chipboard at the front of the bin to get at the stuff? If pushed, I'm sure they could make it, despite the hard plastic coating. With a bit of brain power they might just tunnel under rather than gnaw through.
A rather differant sort of senior moment in the book I am reading about the Armenian massacres (which, as ever, turn out to be a more complicated - although still very evil - business than one had first thought). Lots of people seem to be called Blogs Bey or Fred Pasa (s cedilla I think). It has taken me three quarters of the book to realise that Bey and Pasa are titles - like Lord or Sir - which the Turks in their wisdom place after the family name rather than before. Pasa does not appear in my dictionary but Pasha and Basha do. The dictionary comes down on the side of the view that Pasha and Basha are the same word so I can probably roll Pasa in too.
Any yet another book, this time about Burma. It seems that Burma has never been a neat and tidy country in the way that England has been for getting on for a thousand years - and like Ottoman Anatolia contains a very mixed population - although as a result of unpleasant goings on since the last war, rather less mixed that it used to be. Not a good recipe for a rapid transition to modern nation statehood. Said transition being made even harder by North Eastern Burma being invaded by a very substantial remnant from the losing side at the end of the Chinese civil war. Also that the much hated Ne Win was, as a young man, the most effective soldier around - a quality which fuelled his rise to the top - but which did not prevent his fall from grace.
Cut up on the way to or from Cheam three times in the last week. On the first occasion, a little old lady in her little old car overtakes me and turns smartly left. On the second, I am overtaken on the inside (there being less than two feet between me and the kerb) by a postman on a bicycle at traffic lights where I was hoping to turn left. On the third, I think a variant of the little old lady but I forget the detail. No doubt it will come back when I log out.
Experimented with lemon soles last week - having arrived at the baker (this being where the fish van parks) too late for the depleted summer catches of proper white fish. Not hugely impressed. BH did an excellent job of cooking and presentation (entire, dark side up with incisions), but the flesh was a bit mushy for me, especially that under the rather substantial bone. In fact, not only mushy but thin on the ground. One only got to eat maybe a third of the bought weight.
# posted by Jim @ 6:08 AM 
