Monday, June 29, 2015

Monday Forum - as you will

Another as you will forum.

The death of actor Patrick Macnee marked another passing for many of us old enough to remember the Avengers (1961-1969) or the New Avengers (1976-1977). I saw it first in 1967 and became quite addicted. It's still running on pay TV from time to time.

The photo comes from a BBC piece,
Patrick Macnee: The last great bowler hat-wearer. I knew nothing about the history of the bowler hat, so found the BBC piece very interesting. By the time I visited London for the first time, it had largely disappeared from the city. I remember being mildly disappointed. I hadn't realised that the bowler hat had a practical origin.

The Greek end game has become quite chaotic. It appears that the first that anybody knew about the proposed referendum came via a tweet. I don't know what the Greek PM was trying to achieve. He seems to have had a brain snap, something that is a feature of decision making under pressure when one side or the other ends by saying "well, bring it on."   

Well, there are two potential topics. Otherwise, feel free to go in whatever direction you want, including picking up any of the earlier things that we have talked about.

Postscript

Interesting article from Nick Miller on the Greek crisis. 

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well, in view of your coming out in favour of ssm in your post "I support gay marriage: let's push" I think it worthwhile to at least note the US Supreme's decision in recent days. While I agree with the result I must say I'm less than impressed with the majority reasoning. Or lack of. So forgive, but I found this purloined comment particularly funny: "Kennedy and The Four Penumbras' new hit record is: Starry-eyed Decisis"

Secondly - books: I very much enjoyed LE's novel; one of the few books I've been spurred to read in lengthy sessions, ignoring more 'important stuff'. So, well done - and do publish!

Which leads me to DG's Rats and Lice: what a fascinating read! Best recommend from me, with sincere thanks to DG for the reference. I can't offer my copy for a lend because I've underlined a lot of passages, in second reading.

kvd




Anonymous said...

Also, and last because it is more important, I would like to record my pleasure in receiving a newsletter from Rod's family, recording the purchase of a motorised wheelchair for young Faith.

It restores mine.

kvd

Jim Belshaw said...

Good afternoon, kvd. I haven't read LE's draft yet. I can't read docx on my computer, so I had it translated to RTF. However, its on my list for this week. And on Rats and Lice, how about a summary?! What makes it good?!

I am glad that you recorded the fact of the US Supreme Court decision. For those interested, you will find the full decision here http://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2111822-obergefell-v-hodges-decision.html#document/p1

And good news indeed on Faith.

2 tanners said...

James,

I'm appalled that docx hasn't yet made it to your machine. If you are running XP, kiss goodbye to your docs in a malware attack sometime soon. If you are running Win7, there's no excuse. Ditto if you are on a Mac. .docx is about 7 years old. The places that takes me to in my memory, and the heartache and wasted hours it caused me, on behalf of other people, does not bear thinking about.

I'm also disappointed in your use of "?!". In my view, it's a mixed poor usage at best. A much better option is "??".

Finally, while reamining trivial, FB allows you to paint your profile picture with a "rainbow". Even if it wasn't an information-grabbing scheme by FB, ignore it. The result is ugly in the extreme. I posted a beautiful picture of a rainbow, and that's it. There really are more important issues in the world than if two men who have peacefully lived together for over 60 years can get married. They may feel otherwise.

I did love The Avengers. I must have first seen it in 1968 or so and I still remember bits of the episode. I also love Jamie Oliver. (I am rather taking this comment where I will.) Where I live you can, rather amazingly, get dried porcini mushrooms. The smell of them, the aroma, filling my apartment as I braise them over heat is gorgeous. But not half so good as they will when I mix them with edam and eggs and they become my morning breakfast.

Anonymous said...

tanners

How dare you question Jim's use of "?!"?! :)

kvd

Jim Belshaw said...

I haven't, I don't think, eaten porcini mushrooms. Clearly something I must remedy. There are just so many more mushrooms on the shelves now that I haven't fully moved out in experiment mode.

Won't comment on operating system, although that's not the problem. Years after I installed and registered Word, MS decided that I had pirate copy. So I get messages about this each time I load. One side effect is that I haven't been able to download the patch that would allow me to convert docx. It's only recently that this has started to be a real problem.

kvd. Absolutely correct. ?? does not mean the same as ?!.!