The car in front

(Cycling in Cardiff)

I ignored the red light, sped up and cut in before an oversized truck. Then I looked up and saw that the car in front was a sexy cyclist.

About a woman

My most exciting philosophical discovery* yet:

the Universe project is about a woman.

*or theory, when I'm calmer.

It's Scottish to me

I knew I could be coming across like a complete idiot, but because of my soft spot for Scots, and more importantly - whisky, I carried on with the conversation.

'Yeah', 'True', 'Ha, ha', 'Really?' Based on his intonation, facial expressions and single words I managed to make out, I kept responding in an uncommitted way to what the friendly Scot said, thinking that at least if the no-nonsense Haggis eaters and image-unconscious Caber tossers do go their own way, they'll have the bonus of being able immediately to have a foreign language. Whereas the poor Welsh, regardless whether they'll stay in or get out one day, will have to content themselves with a mere bad accent.




P.S. I've just seen 'Sunshine on Leith' and was wondering how they could have forgotten about subtitles. Then I remembered that it is a Scottish production and somebody must have decided to save a few quid. (But then again, they must have spent a fortune spreading the shooting over three or four years to be able to do all the sunny scenes...)

The Enforcement Question

"NO BORDERS, NO ARMIES!"

screamed an anarchic slogan from a window of an ugly modernist building in Canton. Fine, I thought, but who will ENFORCE IT? Anarchists, you see, have many healthy instincts, but no healthy brains.




P.S. Shoot from the hip!

I passed that ugly structure so many times. It must have been under some anarchic authority for a good disorganised while, because every other window was sprayed over with a line or two from their creed. Whenever I was in the vicinity, and I was there quite often, I promised myself to bring a camera with me next time and document this piece of the fleeting anarchic universe. But then the resolution kept slipping my anarchic mind.

When I finally did bring it with me, all the radical inscriptions were gone and some other authority, with completely different aesthetics and politics, had moved in. 

 

Why so meek? How about 'No Borders, No People!'

Staying put?

If it's somewhere in town after all and you find it, read carefully what it says there, in a few languages, and do what you're asked to: return it the relevant bureaucrats (then the bureaucrats may return it to me; after engaging some 27 national and international departments).  

This is serious: has anyone seen my passport?

I'm planning to cross the Channel and then a few borders (by flying over them) soon and some piece of bureaucratic paper with an outdated photo might come in handy (I don't want any bureaucrats or politicians - if they are not one and the same thing these days - shoot the plane down, do I? Those bloody idiots are famous for inventing new tasks for themselves - to keep them in employment, department expansion, promotions and pay rises - and who knows what they've managed to come up with since I last crossed their bloody borders).

I realised the document in question wasn't lying in its usual spot on the floor a while ago, but I comforted myself I'd lost it,  along with a briefcase, somewhere in town, where there would be some chance of finding it. Now the situation has just turned uglier: I've spotted the briefcase (more or less where I put it after coming back from town) and the passport isn't there. Which means the worst case scenario: I lost it in my flat, where it doesn't make the slightest sense to look for it.




P.S. But then again, I somehow did find the briefcase; but then again, only because it was hanging by its strap in the shower and I don't think even I would have been as imaginative with my passport, even if I say so myself.

Non omnis moriar

The baguette I lost, found and ate for breakfast the other day... I think about it from time to time. Maybe it wasn't fully eaten after all.

Well, it was, but who knows, maybe it just knew something and was murmuring to itself, or whatever baguettes do before their extinction, 'I shall not wholly die', or rather 'I shall not wholly be eaten'.

Because one day when the Universe has been cleared of everything, including evildoers and junk, (if they are not one and the same thing), someone - I sincerely hope - will be clearing the Internet of everything, including junk and what evildoers put there, and when that someone comes across that post, just before they click delete they may - I sincerely hope - take a quick look at it and think for a second of the baguette, maybe even of me, and...

(really, I have no idea what then - sigh, yawn, smile, tap their forehead? - and I quite like the suspense).

No trust, ever

John Humphrys and his guests on BBC R4 are discussing the case of a woman who colluded in torturing her child to death, got a 5-year prison sentence, the minimum allowed by law for such a crime and is now set  to go home early, thanks to a decision by the Parole Board. The discussion includes both harsh criticism  and support regarding the decision. At the end Mr Humphrys says "Shouldn't we trust the Parole Board?"

The question wasn't directed to me, but let me answer him: no, we shouldn't. Why on earth, or in Britain, should we? How - knowing what we know; why, knowing what's just been said on his programme! - on earth, or in Britain, could we??

The truth is, the fact is: no state institution, on earth or in Britain, can be trusted. Not to mention those which time and time and time again have let people down or, if you let me paraphrase, fucked things up big way. And Mr Humphrys should know better, he's been covering all this for a century or so now: the local Parole Board doesn't work, the local system doesn't work, the local state has collapsed.

 

The state has collapsed and Baby P. should know a thing or two about it: one body after another, one blow after another, his home was assessed as safe for him, his mum as kind to him; even as he was being killed.

The Queen of Wine

A vintage day (that the Lord has made,

nudged by the Queen of Wine)

 

As some of you may have noticed (but it was probably lost on my readers from Indonesia), my fascination with Mary, the Mother of God (c'mon: blow me up, you Muslim! stone me, you Jew!) has recently been getting out of hand (I managed to cling on to the Rosary, though), and I hope a relevant sentiment has been following suit.

Today, the fascination and infatuation are having their wedding day. I've opened the Bible -  have you? -  and am reading about certain nuptials somewhere in the land of Galilee. I've heard of them before, I've read of what Jesus did there, I've always known that Mary nudged him to do it.

But only now did it came to me - like a wave of the vintagest Vosne-Romanée which I believe (because of certain financial aspects of my situation) I'll be able to surf only in Heaven* - that it was about wine she decided to intervene and it was thanks her that more wine, and divine wine at that!, was put on the table.

Beautiful Mary, Queen of Wine - you, and your gift, make me dizzy! You're vintage!






*what a bad metaphor; vintagely bad. (And yes: the Litany of Loreto needs to be extended. I'll drink to that!).

I am sorry

Richard, my manager, told me to get a teddy bear from one of the small conference rooms. I didn’t like the idea, because I’d just been doing some thinking about teddy bears and realised that they might be contributing to general metaphysical confusion in the West. However, the task was connected with supporting a charitable organisation and a bunch of tired, sleepy kids who were about to set out for London, so I grudgingly – a sentiment about which Richard never learnt – agreed and made my way to the room. 

It was still before 7am. We’d already served some simple breakfast and lots of hot drinks to our exceptional guests and I hadn’t managed to have my consciousness-giving espresso yet. When I opened the door, it turned out that I didn’t need any espresso after all: the size of the thing I’d been sent for made me fully awake in a second. Soon I was crushing into all sorts of things while carrying down the corridor a soft toy which was bigger than myself and made it impossible to see what was in front. 'What kind of bloody sins have I been committing to suffer like that?' I was wondering.

The bear and I somehow managed to reach the ground floor and we found there all the kids ready to board a coach parked just outside the hotel's main entrance. Someone from the charity which organises fun-packed trips for terminally ill children thanked Richard for our hospitality and the kids started getting in.

I was standing there with the ridiculous beast and waited for instructions where and how to dump my embarrassing cargo. The kids kept disappearing inside the vehicle and a small military band was playing some bracing music. A little boy with a very pale face and no hair looked at me, or at the bear. He was too sleepy, or too devastated by his illness, to smile. But I did. Whether I wanted it or not my smile said ‘I am sorry’. And it wasn’t ‘sorry, kid, that you’re dying’. It was ‘sorry that I’ve killed you.’

Progress

I must be getting something right, philosophically. Today I looked at a girl's perfect bottom and I saw God.




P.S. In another recent situation that confirms my philosophical progress I was telling a young and rather attractive woman about my theory, which I was just about to commit to paper, that there will be sex in Heaven. The woman said it sounded interesting and she'd like to know more about it. I said I'd let her read it, somehow, when it's ready. And it was only after she walked away that I realised it wasn't an elderly priest I'd been talking to and I didn't even get his, or her, phone number. A sure sign or a true philosopher.

Go, Bluebirds, go!

A local football team, the one that is in Premiership now, is playing today against some Anglo-Saxons from far, cold North. I'm happy for Cardiff to be in the limelight for a moment, but you just can't kill the fair man in me. So I shout: Go, Bluebirds*, go! And let the better win...




*I'm ignoring the new red dragon. There're enough of the ugly beasts around as it is; in fact it's about time to start slaying rather than multiplying them.

Food for thought

No relation of the one in or on (philosophical) question

I popped out to buy a baguette* to go with my breakfast (well, actually to become part of my breakfast, if I want to do good philosophy), came back, put it somewhere and now - the scrambled egg's getting cold - can't find it. How frustrating.




*please, excuse my decision to immortalise this minor (not from the baguette's point of view; if I want to do good philosophy) event: I so rarely pop out to buy stuff for breakfast - normally I eat whatever I come across in the fridge, or its vicinity, that doesn't move, or doesn't move too much for my taste - that I though it worthy sharing with the Universe.

(Speaking of which - I seem to have lost all of my Indonesian fans. I just hope they're not on their way here to get me..., but anyway: to cheer me up I've gained a dozen or so American readers. Howdy! (I know, I know: cheap and probably not funny; but then again: I heard that American humour sucks too; how about that as a little ice-breaker? ...No, that's really sad; Slowly but surely I'm becoming an ever more miserable git.




P.S. Just found it. You're not gonna believe it, but it's true: it was lying - now, this is really funny - on Alexander Moseley's A to Z of Philosophy. And it's a fact, whatever facts are. (Actually, let me look them up in Moseley's book.)


P.S.2 The closest Mr Moseley gets to facts is 'fallacies'. Well, a caustic - and childish - reviewer might comment then that there are no facts in the book.

Roberto Devereux, ossia Il conte di Essex or God of last resort

Mine is - it struck me (in these words; the gist has been with me for 45 years) during a scene in Roberto Devereux, ossia Il conte di Essex*  by Donizetti/Cammarano/Ancelot - God of last resort.



*staged, rather boringly and confusedly, in Cardiff.

Print on

Another intellectual achievement of the West in economics:

printing your way out of own-made deep shit.

What's all this fuss about U.S. federal shut-down about?

First of all it sounds like a good idea: the more of the federal government - or actually these day any Western government, federal, state or local  - you close down the better.

Secondly, what do they mean when they say 'we need to find a solution': can't they simply print more money, as usual?

Sword of Allah

I don't like Islamic fallacies, but it's hard not to be impressed with Muslims' energy and zeal. Whenever I talk to them I immediately know: their business may be misguided, but they mean it.

In this context, it's interesting to see how - no doubt after my mention of Muhammad, whom I* obviously regard as a false prophet - the circulation of my blog has increased from a dozen or so to a few hundred in the last few days, solely thanks to readers from Indonesia.

Sa`lam!






*well, along with all other Christians, religious Jews, worshippers of Vishnu, Buddhists, and most other people on this planet.

A certain uncertainy

I bought three litres of fruit juice yesterday and topped that up with one and a half litres of some isotonic stuff. I've just drunk the last drop of the lot.

I really don't know what to think about it.

(But I don't feel guilty).

Global warminng: please leave

 

Bring it on! Do we deserve any better?

Some under-informed woman (Clare Balding; otherwise quite a sensitive, intelligent woman) on the radio reminds me that some financially and intellectually corrupt intergovernmental panel or something has announced that they are 95% sure that a certain alleged 'global warming' is man-made and that financially and intellectually corrupt governments should intensify their dumb efforts to limit an increase in global temperature to 2 degrees or something as absolutely absurd as that. Please leave.

If any intergovernmental or other bloody body tries to tell you that something happens to global climate - where the number of factors, their extent, their interdependence, their measurability, their consequences are incalculable, which any half-dumb kid knows - with ANY certainty or probability exceeding 32.5%*, it is NOT science, it's not even news - it's massive unadulterated bollocks.

And if any governments, let alone financially and intellectually corrupt ones, even mention that they would like to - not to mention really attempt to - intensify their dumb efforts to limit an increase in global temperature to 2 degrees or something as absurd as that, they should be locked up, for good. After being told to leave us alone.

(Yes, I can see the problem: are the noble deeds - i.e. telling them to leave us alone and locking up - to be done by the same people who are paying Ms Balding and who have elected the nitwits she's reporting on in the first place? Oh dear. Thank God I quit drinking: I'll write another post instead...)




P.S. If you ever mention 'global warning' to me, I'll set you on fire (and not in any romantic or sexual sense, however hopeful you may be...)



*just like 69.3% of statistics this one was made up on the spot, too.

They went into Labour and delivered...

Labour's annual conference: duds delivering duds

Apparently most of the Labour Party gathered a while ago in one place.

I'm not following the news too closely these days, but I sincerely hope someone did their patriotic bit and nicked the whole irresponsible lot, moved them to a place of long-term internment and  is now preparing a massive intellectual sanitation programme*, for those few Labour cases that offer any prospect of recovery; and for others... - well, not all can be discussed on a blog, can it**?





*no, actually I don't believe there's any intellectual hope for anyone who has ever joined the Labour Party.

**a question to guys from MI1, MI2, MI3, MI4, MI5, MI6, MI7, MI... - n - and their E.U., U.N, U.S. and Google blog/email reading equivalents.

Moving out

Speaking of Billy Joel

The other day when I was enjoying fine wine, even better Mozart and generally feeling quite good about being as ideal, spiritually and otherwise, as I may ever get in my life, I suddenly got hit by something. It bent me in half, spun my head and started suffocating me*.  Just before it was going to kill me, it seemed, I managed to utter a mental whine "I want perfection  - or I'll die."







*I must moderate my verbs and adjectives, or I'll start coming across as some metaphysical diva, or hypochondriac, prone to slightly too regular eschatological fits.

Honesty

*

I was praying today with a bunch of good, old-fashioned Christians in the middle of a youngest capital of Europe (an interesting place, which - if I'm to be perfectly honest - is on the verge of becoming funny due to overdoing self-made, self-centred hype), when a passer-by rudely hissed our way her much too honest opinion about us and our noble cause.

I turned my head to look at her, a short fat and ugly woman and thought, slightly too honestly: “A sevener** “. Then I took another quick glance and corrected myself, even more honestly: "Or niner”.

 *Yes, you got it: phallic. I thought the - I admit: unsettlingly so - erotic strand in this moving short story might justify a reference to the phallus. Was I right? (Generally my faith in my classical style et exquisite taste is as solid as any of the remaining Doric columns of the Parthenon, but sometimes - I'm just a human, don't forget, however tempted you may be - I have second thoughts...)***

**after getting married. Being a good old-fashioned Christian I don’t believe in sex before marriage. Bu if I am to be completely honest, looking at that minger you could stop believing in sex after marriage, too.

***I realise there is a chance I may have to apologise one day for my classical style et exquisite taste: this whole phallus strand - it's a close call in extremis; either outrageously funny or an absolutely hopeless, off-putting dud.

(Stumbling onto) A higher philosophical plane

Does worse mess lead to better philosophy? Discuss, Mr Pollock

I've often asked myself - as philosophers tend to do, tripping on this and that - 'What is the nature of tidiness?'. At some point I even gave this problem considerable thought, which I noted down and put somewhere.

Yesterday I took the reflection one philosophical level up, when I was lying flat on the floor, with my face pressed against 'A to Z of Philosophy' by Alexander Moseley (published by Continuum in 2008), on which it landed after I unexpectedly encountered 'My Life Story, A Diary For Your Whole Life' (published by - now, this must be some marketing mistake, or at least ordinary mistake - SUCKUK) and asked myself: 'Tidiness - what the heck  IS it AT ALL?' as it seemed to me I had no previous experience of it; or even if I had, it got lost in the mist of time.

Sending her up. (No way, Jose!)

 

 

If I were a gentleman of leisure*, I’d spend a lot of my time following** various feminist meetings, conferences and other hilarious events. The fun I’d have – and the occasional tension I’d cause – would be priceless!

 

P.S. Woman’s Hour is all in a flurry chattering and gossiping away about a prospective female Malaysian astronaut, elected through some ridiculous & democratic (if they are not one and the same thing) facebook competition, and then discussing – and I swear: I’m not making this up in order to send you up  - “the status of women astronauts” (…actually, excuse me: I know it’s inappropriate as part of my own post, but I just must: Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!)

No, but seriously – if you can talk seriously about stuff like that at all: what’s the big deal? What kind of news is that? What are the womenfolk getting so unhealthily excited about? Are they going to look into periods in space, the effect of lessened gravity on the perkiness of breasts or what?

P.S.2 There might be a serious angle to the minor story: how sending a Malaysian woman into space (and bringing her back, hopefully) may affect the status of women in that country and vicinity.  But WH never went there (however, sometimes, with other stories, they go for depth - I have to give it to the broads).

*well, in a way I am – in a twisted and most irresponsible way (Lord, forgive me! But you know I do want to save the Universe, single-handedly…)

**which, in a way, I do when I listen to Woman’s Hour and quite a few other similarly un-serious and thoroughly entertaining programmes.

P.S.3 What a gripping story! Thank you, girls, for distracting me from metaphysics and taxation.

The Malaysian Insider fills me in: "Astronaut hunt turns into sexist nightmare for female finalist" and adds: “A competition on Facebook by a MALE GROOMING BRAND [funny that WH never mentioned this bit of the story] to send a Malaysian to a space camp in Florida, USA to train to be an astronaut turned ugly when the only female finalist was “trolled”, drawing sexist comments from netizens.

Post-graduate student Roshini Muniam, who is one of the top five finalists of AXE deodorant’s [you know which one: the one known for its utterly sexist ads; this is turning out to be genuinely good stuff! ] Apollo Space Race competition, was discriminated against online due to her gender.

A comment posted by Syed Wazien on Roshini’s profile, featured in AXE’s Facebook page, expressed surprise over a woman’s desire to go to space:

“What – a woman?! No way, hose [the uneducated male chauvinist meant 'Jose', I presume]!!!” he said.

 

 

 

Minor prophet, major prophet. (But who cares?)

I couldn't even be bothered to check whether he's stil lying and thieving

at the head of that ridiculous U.N. something something

The Intergovernmental something something has just announced something something about global climate, or something.

Who cares?

(Except themselves and a few confused students.)



P.S. I bet Oscar - a few years ago, when Climategate broke out and the lying and thieving wankers at East Anglia University and the United Nations were exposed - that the head of that lying and thieving Indian wanker at the head of the whole bloody lying and thieving outshoot of that bonkers organisation (i.e. the U.N.; but by the sound of that story East Anglia Uni isn't much better) would roll before the following spring.

When the deadline was approaching and the ugly head, sadly, was still on, I began to worry about my reputation as a minor prophet and even considered launching a major PR venture to galvanise global public opinion and pressurise the U.N. into chopping that ugly, lying head off.

In the end I decided that the world would be better served by a few more blog posts on my part than by my intervention in the personnel politics of the United Nations. And I'm sure you'll agree that I was right. (You know, I've grown wise enough to see the unruly boy in the world. And boys will be boys: so the world simply has to be allowed to bang its head occasionally against own-made mistakes, break a leg or an arm and get lots of scratches, before it realises that the advice I've been giving it all along was bang on, or thereabouts; then it'll come to me with a bottle of decent Bordeaux to say  'thanks' and 'sorry'; I'll be long dead by then, judging by how slowly this little idiot learns...).

I wrote those few additional posts and... forgot about the whole matter. However, a year ago or so - when another 'sensational' piece of invented news about 'global warming' went completely uncommented not only by me, but by everyone else - I realised I'd won the wager, and in a more spectacular way than I'd imagined: not only did the whole lying man, not to mention his head, had gone into obscurity, but the whole ridiculous circus, so embarrassing for our civilisation, began to melt down. Yes, the Western economic downturn, various angry Muslims and a few other disasters, had helped, but all in all: forget a minor one, I turned out to be a major prophet.

So hopelessly stupid

 

Jenni Murray,  her BBC mate Jane Garvey, joined occasionally by another confused piece of skirt, such as – most recently -  Harriet Harman MP keep banging on about why there are so few women in politics and even fewer in its more influential regions.

Well, let me tell them: because, if those three are anything to go by, they’re so hopelessly stupid*.

 

 

P.S. On cue, Jane Garvey and her confused guests are debating - even as I write this - why there is no parity between penis and pussy/breast exposure in the media. (One smart listener - a male - has just pointed out that a 2:1 ratio should be used when discussing the penis/breasts situation. Good point. Funny that a man spotted that).

 

*which, of course, isn't the case. The fact that there are so few women in politics - at which they're hopeless anyway and which they dumb down when they do join in - is evidence of their sublime, cute wisdom.

Missing each other

*

Perhaps it was ten years ago, perhaps five. The woman - a chance acquaintance made at a party in Warsaw - was older than me and I could see that. But she was still attractive and a faint whiff of her lost youth was lingering about her.

We were sipping on something, nibbling at something else and talking. My wit wasn't lost on her and her body wasn't lost on me. There were gaping emotional holes in both of us and for a moment we considered, secretly, filling them with each other. I could be wrong, but I felt she was ready to go all the wrong way in filling hers - and fast.

How ironic, I thought: I was there looking for a pure young woman dreaming fairy-tale dreams that she might have been many years earlier and she was looking for a confused young man dreaming dirty dreams that I was many years earlier, perhaps at exactly the same time, perhaps at another party where we could have been standing next to each other, chatting to wrong people...








*phallic, in case my graphic effort has been lost on you. It's a rather simplistic take, probably not worth mentioning, not to mention committing. However, because of the erotic strand in the short story, I thought something phallic, even if simplistic, would enhance the whole thing artistically. Besides, the story's quite simplistic too. (And isn't the phallus? At least graphically...)

 

 

 

 

Bloody Islamist Nutters (Crusade!)

Someone needs to sort out those bloody Islamist nutters at long last: I’m utterly fed up with sword-wielding confused idiots hijacking one news bulletin after another!

 

P.S. If you add to them the ridiculous U.N. Climate Change Something - incorporating the lying and thieving wankers from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - and compounded by the messed-up Greenpeace kids mixed with and an assortment of other undereducated numb heads - there’s so little room left for reporting on the gripping, up-lifting stuff: beautiful women, good wine, the lowering of taxation (I guess it must happen SOMEWHERE in the world) or the global demise of democracy.

 

QE

(Religion; Lord, punish them!)

From the Book of Amos (today's reading):

“When will the New Moon be over

that we may sell grain,

and the Sabbath be ended

that we may market wheat?”—

skimping on the measure,

boosting the price

and cheating with dishonest scales,

buying the poor with silver

and the needy for a pair of sandals,

selling even the sweepings with the wheat."

 

- Oh, Lord, please punish severely those lying, thieving central bank bastards!*

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* And even more severely the democratic politicos who - apart from being lying, thieving bastards -  installed those lying, thieving central bank bastards in the first place, both of whom keep robbing orphans, taxpayers, widows, beer drinkers, savers and everybody else, even as they keep pocketing bonuses as undeserved as they ever got since the Phoenicians invented money (if they did).

Who*?

If the Lord isn't the lord, I just don't know who* can be.

* 'what' would be offensive not only to the Lord, but also to our intellect.




(Illustration) - we lost it temporarily, but we'll get it back.

Random commitment

 

(Random; but I guess it touches on religion)

Trying to make my way to the toaster this morning and stumbling against all sorts of things in the process, as you do, I was reflecting on my character. I realised, with some satisfaction, that even though I can say a lot against myself, I can still say something for myself: I am a man that is not afraid of commitments. (The follow up is a slightly different story, though).

In this context another - and quite random, I must admit - thought struck me: because I am so pro life, pro lively sex and pro live (right through to a happy delivery) pregnancies – yes: if such a need arose, I'd stand up, be counted and give birth to a baby. (Finding it afterwards in my flat might turn out a bit of a problem, though).

 

 

 

 

 

 

(No, not again...)

 

Unbearable

I'm listening to No.26 and am tossed between wanting to kiss him, as his father and his Father would, and wanting to sort him out, as - according to Peter Shaffer - Salieri would.

Whichever I'll end up with, psychologico-metaphysically one thing seems certain to me: if there were no God, such genius would be unbearable.

(And we're talking about a concert that has been receiving mixed reviews! Lord, mercy!)



P.S. A wrong illustration (both 20 & 21 are coming up, though), but the right colour for the blog's colour scheme. And what a cute Polish face... actually, I'm tossed again: should I kiss him for the music - and cute face - or sort him out, for his cruel hair and youth?

Randomly Intellectual

I don’t know how to handle random intellectual urges, small fits of disinterested curiosity.  So I give in to them. This morning, out of a sudden, I interrupted a very, very important task to start listening to the radio, which I had switched off just an hour earlier after considerable mental struggle. It was a tormenting choice between crucially  important things to do and outstandingly important things to find out about.

I could hear a little intellectual angel, or demon, whisper into my ear: “You’re missing something on BBC Radio 4. How are you going to understand the Universe without that bit of info??” What was I to do? Have I got enough faith to trust that my intellectual greed will be satisfied if I don’t ruthlessly go about satisfying it myself?

One of my biggest concerns, in this context, regarding the afterlife is whether my thirst to know all will be finally quenched. And being wise enough now to know that you  learn more from the Universe itself than from stuff written about it, and often more from trivia (but never small talk!) than treatises, I sometimes care less whether I’m going to find out what conversations Carl Menger had in the pubs of Nowy Sacz, how things turned for King Oedipus (whose story I dropped mid-way, barely able to take in the profundity of the first hundred verses), why the hell major Central Banks have decided to ruin the global economy by ruining their respective currencies*, or who else  Ulysses** ran into after deserting Calypso and before he reached again and re-consumed Penelope – than whether I’ll be filled in on those mind-boggling, Universe expanding facts that happen on a daily basis all around us, and which are tirelessly reported in random conversations in post-office queues, tabloids and lighter radio programmes; facts such as the one I would have missed if it hadn’t been for my decision to commit a random distraction, prompted by the whispering of an intellectual angel (or demon):
 

“I got a frozen chicken as a prize for taking part in Waiting for Godot.” **

 

 

 

 

 

*not the one by Joyce; I’m sure it would be more educational for me to write a book like that than to read one.
**This morning's Saturday Live on BBC Radio 4

(Painting: Herbert James Draper; poster: it was taking too long to establish who it's by and I gave in to another random intellectual urge...)

Oxygen v. Heat

 

It’s the middle of the night, or thereabouts, and I’m torn between oxygen and heat. My intellect argues for the former and my body whines for the latter. And just to think: autumn, according to me, is supposed to be the thinking man’s season… *

Which reminds me of another night, a winter’s one, in a tiny flat somewhere in a suburb of Varsovia. I had just realised that the place was stuffy with hundreds of thoughts mercilessly coming out of my mind, compounded by whatever was coming out of my lungs.

I put my sheepskin coat on, pushed a huge ground-floor window wide open and stood in front of it for an hour or so. It was  –20° C and I kept taking in the reviving Masovian air and the moon-lit whiteness of the snow, not quite sure if I was managing to introduce some order into my thoughts, and life, or if they, along with my life, were simply freezing into ever slower motions.

(Little did I know that my landlady was observing me, which resulted in her assessing me as mad**, which resulted in her trying, a few days later, to win me over to her assessment, which resulted in a bit of a verbal fight, which resulted in me kicking her out of my place, which resulted in her kicking me out of hers…)

 

 (definitely not my ex-landlady)

 

P.S. She may well have been spot on, but my point - which I just couldn't get across to her - was that you don't establish that kind of fact by seeing me standing for one hour dressed in a sheepskin coat in front of a wide open window in the middle of a -20° C Masovian night.

 

 

*well, I must admit I had complained a couple of days earlier about the heating not working properly.
**another low in my blogging history: referencing myself. Shame. (But that other post is not that bad, mind you).

 

An indecently run school show

When the state runs the education show...

As you may have guessed yet - unless you're dumb - I'm in favour of privatising everything except the Holy Roman Catholic Church*.

Matt, that high priest of humour, has recently illustrated some of the dangers of state-run education, the worst aspect of which, in a state-dominated environment, is the fact that any centrally imposed folly turns into a weapon of mass mis-education and is bound to take its toll on millions and millions of kids with one stroke of a dumb minister's pen.

(Not that a privately-run environment would eliminate all dangers: it would simply limit their scale, so that they would affect fewer kids... among whom - I have to admit, looking at the cartoon - for a brief moment of an adolescent boy's weakness I longed to be...)



P.S. As a bonus (only for those who have read the post twice and at least tried to understand it):

 

 

*which is, it's just struck my silly head, privately-run already, and more privater than any other private property, actually the most privetest of all. Well, I must be dumbestest. I need to get more education, and not necessarily from Miss Roberts. (On the other hand...)

The Moment of A Woman

So please don't fade away*

Watching beautiful women fade and wither - as beautiful women; not as persons or not even as women, by no means, not! - is one of the most profound - existentially, philosophically and religiously - experiences that I ever experience.

In those few years, a decade at most, when a beautiful woman is truly and fully beautiful she sustains life, joy and faith in the Universe and wisely orientates them towards the ideal, the sensual and the sublime. Then the passage of her beauty - which can happen so dramatically fast, nearly overnight, it seems sometimes - tests our life, our joy and our faith; and somehow, no doubt miraculously, reinforces them all; oh so poignantly.





*I believe in random. A randomly bought acoustic Texas CD prompted my long-postponed sharing with you of the old thought (and rekindled my old crush on this beautiful woman, now fading and withering, as a beautiful woman). Then I randomly chose this track  as an illustration - the one I'd first gone for didn't want to load - and got this line a random bonus.

The First Message Ever (That Still Holds True)

Whatever that's about

Preparing a Christmas Quiz - what? If supermarkets can already feel the thrill of Jesus' foetus developing safely within Mary, why can't I? - I ran out of ideas, so I started pinching questions from other compilers. Among many boring historical, religious and theological ones, this attracted my particular attention:

"What did the first ever SMS text message, sent December 3rd 1992, read?"

I was sure it would be 'Can't talk now', 'Battery running out', or 'The meeting is so bloody boring. Boss - complete asshole. Lunch together later at 'Roberto's'?' But no: apparently* it was 'Merry Christmas!' Cute.

(But a little strange. Shouldn't some kind of foreword about the whole idea - remember: it was allegedly the first text message ever - have proceeded it? I'd freak out if suddenly my talking machine started displaying life-changing texts...)

I must be freaking old:

I remember when mobiles used to look like that

*Well, must be true: Wikipedia says so: ...SMS messaging was used for the first time on 3 December 1992, when Neil Papworth, a 22-year-old test engineer for Sema Group in the UK^[2] (now Airwide Solutions),^[3] used a personal computer to send the text message "Merry Christmas" via the Vodafone network to the phone of Richard Jarvis...^[4]  





P.S. Just in case, because I'll probably forget, knowing myself: Merry Christmas!


Photo

Educating Greenpeace

Only they didn't notice they were Russian ships.. (he-he)

 

(Remember: I've never written Russia off.*)
 

I don't know if holding a gun to someone's head has any beneficial effects on their intellect, but I guess it's worth a proper try**. So Mr Putin, extend the education of those poor, confused kids for another few days, please.


(However uncertain whether he qualifies as a political role-model or Russia as a state role-model, I must give it to the ex-KGB officer and his contorted country: your noble effort, however hopeless it may seem, to educate those dangerous, ignorant green loonies from Greenpeace deserves highest praise.

Mind you, locking the whole stupid bunch up for good would be even better and, if anyone at all, Russia could actually get away with it...)




*A little frighteningly, if someone asked me 'yes' or 'no', I'd say - after a moment's hesitation - 'Yes. Write Germany off. Nothing good will ever come out that state.' (Not out of the people, mind you).
**as a teacher, I'd be interested in conducting some more structured research, and on less hopeless cases; not all young people are as dumb as Greenpeace.

I want to live

Arsenic was found in the old man’s body and in the drink he’d taken just before he died. A young woman had overhead, allegedly, John saying ‘I’m going to kill my granddad’. A milkmaid said she knew no bad thing about him. His adopted dad was the first to report him to the police, no doubt expecting his son to end up on the gallows. Half-asleep, I couldn't make much of it, except that it was a confused tale about confused people. I had no idea why BBC Radio 4 was broadcasting it. It was neither a great story nor great literature: ordinary people misunderstanding each other, lying to each other and killing each other. Banal content told in banal language.

Then, the jury interrupted the judge’s summary: he didn’t need to go on, it wouldn’t change anything now – they had a verdict. Suddenly I was fully awake, my eyes wide open, my breath faster. The late morning nap was ruined, I quickly turned up the volume in the headphones and, identifying for some reason with the young man in the dock, I didn’t care anymore whether I was innocent or guilty, whether I had killed or not. I just gasped ‘Oh God, oh God, oh God – I want to live.’

 

P.S. The young John was acquitted, just as Jesus - in an equally confused finale  - should have been.

Light Breaking 69

I don’t smoke, but I felt like a cigarette. The remaining one, half exposed, was lying next to me. ‘Sure, put some music on, if you feel like it. I’m easy’, I would have said to it if it had asked me. I’d started stripping it off a moment earlier, but then left the job mid-way - my organ hadn’t fully recovered yet and wasn’t ready for another session: echoes of violent waves of pleasure were still knocking about in my mouth. I was staring at what had triggered them: the shiny wrapper, partly torn, covered only half of the Indonesian* thing. But I couldn’t look at it without some reaction. I reached out my arm to touch it.  For a moment it hovered above what I wanted to desire... but still wasn't able to, so I dropped it. Ten years ago I would have carried on, but now I’ve learnt – well, I was taught by my age - to take my time with pleasure; that is if there was any pleasure to be taken.

I was relaxed now, at ease with Crunchie (buried somewhere deep in the bin), at ease with Cadbury, at ease with myself, at ease with life and even, I deluded myself, at ease with death. It’s only appropriate to eat garbage, because we think, do (and write) even more garbage. Wouldn’t it be offensive to some higher forces, if we were careful not to allow it into our bodies while we allow so much of it into our minds and souls, and - what’s even worse - allow so much of it to come out of our minds and souls into the Universe?

As to Cadbury's ripping kids off, it’s the way of the world, isn’t it? Money flows from the confused to the ruthless, so that the confused at long last bang their stupid heads against poverty and start thinking of gaining true riches; and so that the ruthless at long last start drowning in the emptiness of wealth, panic and stretch their arms out for enriching poverty.

As to being at ease with myself, my life and my death – I didn’t have any good excuse, except the fact that I was sweetly numbed by pleasure. Well, I had been a minute or two earlier, but philosophy sped things up, as philosophy does. So I turned round and undressed completely what remained of the Indonesian sweetie - and took it. Because there is time to understand the Universe and there is time to experience - and enjoy – it. Again.

 

Decent lips, indecent content: it looks like

a piece of something awful produced by Cadbury.

*I turned out to be a little bit of a cheat: instead of staying loyal to Madagascan Godld (Sambirano 71), I went for Indonesian Gold (Javan Light Breaking 69**); two squares in each box, which is fine: I can't do more than two in one afternoon these days.

 

 

 

The lips