Choosing a story
An afternoon spent with my mother and an opportunity to go over ground that was familiar and ground that was new. The familiar came with Uncle Clem. “Did you know he had shrapnel in his lungs?” asked my mother. I did, although when I was young I would have had no real idea of what shrapnel meant, nor had any … [continue reading …]
Begrudgers on Bloomsday
Would a Leopold Bloom be accorded greater respect on 16th June 2020 than he was on 16th June 1904? Would the anti-Semitism described in James Joyce’s Ulysses have disappeared, or is it only in polite society that prejudice becomes invisible? Would begrudgery have become a thing of the past, or would there still be as many people who would attribute a … [continue reading …]
Nay to the doomsayers
. . . or perhaps it is doom to the naysayers. Trying to keep the students in the pod engaged with learning this week, we did a general knowledge quiz on the “Kahoot” website. The eclectic collection of questions included, “According to The Times in 1890, by 1950 the streets of London would be under nine feet of what? There was … [continue reading …]
The old scams seem to work
There can be few people with email addresses who have not received at least an occasional email that seeks details that would allow the sender to defraud them. The “Spanish Hostage” scam is the oldest approach used (thus named because when it began two centuries ago people wrote letters claiming to be held hostage in Sapin and promising abundant reward … [continue reading …]
Solstice van
A green and white bus that had been converted to a camper rolled slowly northward on the M5 motorway this afternoon. The side and rear windows were hung with cream-coloured curtains. The number plate was an “N” registration – “N” the first time around. The bus was forty-five years old. The bus resembled the many that would have gathered in … [continue reading …]
A reflection for Sunday, 5th July 2020
If you look at the Gospel reading for today, it is clear that a process of revisionism has been taking place. The compilers of the lectionary feel that it is appropriate to try to cut the nasty bits from the Scripture readings in church. Do the compilers feel that the omitted verses somehow conflict with the message the church seeks … [continue reading …]
The truth doesn’t matter
One of the most baffling things about the adherents of some beliefs is proof that they are wrong only confirms members of the group in their belief that they are right. The Jehovah’s Witnesses predicted the day of God’s wrath would come in 1918. This unfulfilled prophecy was followed by a belief in the resurrection of figures from the Bible … [continue reading …]
Words without meaning
In teenage years, pop songs sung in French always seemed sophisticated, they possessed a certain je ne sais quoi which set them apart. It was only in later life, when my French vocabulary had developed beyond two words that I realized that Plastic Bertrand’s 1977 hit Ça plane pour moi was a banal tale of the exploits of a man when … [continue reading …]
Still waiting
Sunlight shone through a gap in the curtains. The sound of a tractor passing the cottage told Maggie that it was later than she thought. Her clock had stopped at some point and she had not replaced it. Normally waking at the same time each morning, Maggie had felt that a new battery for the clock was not necessary. The … [continue reading …]