Fruity

So, I indulged and bought it. The keyboard looks like this:

The performance is mind-bending. It’s true, once you’ve tried Mac, you never go back.

Dop

Is this real? I’m not sure…

Copts and robbers

In a startling piece of serendipity, The Art of Eternity began last week on that most wonderful of channels, BBC4 – this meant that I have seen on full colour many of the treasures of Eastern Christianity mentioned in Dalrymple’s book (you must all read this immediately if you have not yet done so). This is not one of the pieces of art that has been shown, but it is part of the Egyptian-Netherlands Cooperation for Coptic Art Preservation (ENCCAP)- dedicated to saving the masses of old Christian artefacts in some of the oldest monasteries in the world – under threat from declining numbers of monks, the environment, Islamic fundamentalism and simple theft – as with all works of art, these change hands for a great deal of money, and most of the older monasteries in Dalrymple’s journey have suffered repeated thefts, both in the distant past, and in the last couple of decades – the monks he visits on Mount Athos, for example, have had to deal with armed raiders attacking them by boat to seize manuscripts, icons and relics.

Wow, all of that work just to use a dreadful pun as a title.

Mortality

So my bank think it is necessary for me to take out life insurance before my 30th birthday. They have never contacted me about this before. Do they know something I don’t? Especially as is there is no lump sum at the end of the policy, and they frequently refer to the fact that my dependents will receive a payout if I should die within the first 15 years of the policy.

Is another 15 years really the best I can hope for? If so, that is two thirds of my life over with already. And it means that I was middle-aged at 22 – something that probably won’t come as a surprise to most of you. And I certainly feel it. My back has been bad this week – it went whilst cleaning the kitchen floor. It is almost back to normal now – after 2 days and repeated hot baths it seems to have clicked back.

It caused enormous hilarity for the other residents of Ealing as I hobbled down to the Tube station on Wednesday morning – even the mentally ill Irish woman I pass at precisely 9.52 looked at me with pity, rather than screaming obscenities at me as usual – this was, of course, compounded by the ’snowstorm’ that hit Britain and brought London to a halt once again. I no longer have either the energy or the inclination to rant once again about lack of preparation/Tubes/trains, etc. And it makes no difference – an inch (2.5cm for the European readers) of snow. I will point you back to my Grossman/TFL post, as this explains it all.

Ebay feedback from andy46477

Here.

Remember the rules: no hesitation, repetition or deviation.

A new CD in the offing to celebrate my impending transformation to an Apple user. No two tracks of the same genre. Post or e-mail to get a copy.

The 50 Greatest Cartoons

or at least as many of them as could be found online. Cityrag tracked down most of the 50 greatest (Western) cartoons, as voted for by the industry in 1994, in December of last year. Some are well known. Some are very much of their time. Some are very questionable. Some are just well, odd…

Now, if I could just work out how to get them down on to my Ipod, tomorrows early journey to work wouldn’t seem half as bad.

Vasilii Grossman versus TFL

“…After Unecha, we travelled in a freight car. The weather was wonderful, but my travel companions said this was bad, and I realised this myself. There were black holes and craters from bombs everywhere along the railway. One could see trees broken by explosions. In the fields there were thousands of peasants, men and women, digging anti-tank ditches.

We watch the sky nervously and decided to jump off the train if the worst came to the worst. It was moving quite slowly. The moment we arrived in Novozybkov there was an air raid. A bomb fell in the station forecourt. This train wasn’t going any further…”

Vasilii Grossman, A Writer At War

“Throughout the day, fallen trees and other debris have caused disruption to most open sections of the Tube network.

Speed restrictions have also been introduced on some open sections of the Tube network for safety reasons.

LU is working with infrastructure companies Tube Lines and Metronet to remove debris from tracks as quickly as possible but inevitably this will result in disruption to services.”

TFL

Paranoia

OK, so my X-box 360 has just given me a heart attack. DVD tray would not open. Repeatedly. For 45 minutes. Finally managed to open it manually. Then it wouldn’t close properly. For an hour. Cue visions of my entire day off tomorrow being spent on the phone to a call centre. Turn to trusted British tradition of shaking faulty electrical items. Magically starts working.

I am sure the corporation that produce it have been spying on me and are punishing me for using Mozilla and being in the process of buying an infinitely more fruity laptop. Or maybe not.

Jammy

No, not

But the Jamaican producer – 4 double CDs of his 1980’s tracks have come my way… Mmmm Ipod on the Central Line tomorrow…

But in the meantime, a video of the man himself at work: