For one who has turned self-effacement into an art form, ‘doing’ this blog doesn’t come naturally, especially when – inevitably – little autobiographical details emerge from time to time. Nonetheless, today I’m going to lift the veil just a little bit more. Rest assured that absolutely no self-aggrandisement is intended. I’d frankly rather pull out my own teeth than start vanity publishing.…
Impelled by the desire to reassure my small but perfectly formed readership that I haven’t turned my toes up just yet, I thought I’d better do something. This isn’t so easy. I’m quite heavily reliant for inspiration on the daily prompts, but since most of those recently seem to have been recycled from last year’s…
Some people swear that “It’s impossible to eat badly in France”. Well it isn’t. It’s certainly possible to eat extremely well in France – often in the unlikeliest and unpromising places, which is part of the country’s great charm. But restaurant quality is as variable here as anywhere else. Contrary to the image that they try to…
Back before the advent of blogging, I would sometimes give an idle thought to writing a book about my experiences in the investment industry. It wouldn’t be fiction because, trust me, you couldn’t make this stuff up, and there’s certainly no shortage of humorous, not to say surreal, material in that strange world I left,…
Eh? Now what’s he on about? Let me explain. My highly educated readership will obviously know what ‘pretentious claptrap‘ is: I assume that’s what drew them here in the first place. ‘Hermeneutics’ might be a bit more challenging though. Especially if you turn for enlightenment to the Stanford Dictionary of Philosophy: “The term hermeneutics covers both the first…
So, have you missed me? It’s been almost a fortnight since my last post. Thought not. I blame the good weather. Not that I have any objection to seeing the sun shine, but it does bring with it certain time-consuming responsibilities in the grass-cutting department. Although, as a happy update to my earlier post, I do seem…
After a mild winter, the life cycle of the flora that surrounds us here at Tranquility Base is already well advanced. The forsythia is budding, the Narcissi are in bloom, the air is filled with birdsong. And the grass needs cutting. This year, we have a new weapon in the unending war against nature. I’ve cranked up the shock…
Hard to believe I know, given the absence of any residual physical evidence, but I used to be a bit of a gym rat. No, really. Not for very long, admittedly, and to nothing like the obsessive extent of the creatine-guzzling monstrosities that you might see pictured on the cover of magazines with titles like ‘Bulge‘, ‘Musclebound’…or maybe ‘Transformers’.…
My passport went off for renewal last week. Naturally, the application process entailed getting some new identity photos. Or, as it’s also known, a reality check. Compared to ten years ago I’m rather paler (the Abu Dhabi tan has long faded) and the face fungus is still a comparatively recent addition. Otherwise, not too bad really: a little more…
As a general rule I deal with the day-to-day vagaries of modern life by, if not quite ignoring them, at least treating their impingements on my consciousness with what I like to think of as a placid stoicism. By and large, to use a modern idiom, IDGAF. Sometimes, though, only a rant can help. Like…
the only deadhead in the hameau 