This morning I read, 'Uncivilisation: The Dark Mountain Manifesto', by Paul Kingsnorth and Dougald Hine. Far from being an expression of the dreams of a pair of woolly-minded Greens, this eighteen page pamphlet is a succinct, intelligent and inspiring questioning of the civilization with which we are familiar and an appeal to take up arms, (or, rather, pens) against an impending 'ecocide'. For their 'Maps in the Sand' visit http://www.dark-mountain.net/
I also read Keith Levy's brilliant little book, 'How To Live Well On A Small Income'. This A6 size, 12pp + 4pp cover booklet has but two chapters each on one page. Chapter one is headed: 'Eliminate Debt', chapter two: 'Reduce Outgoings' and that is about it. Other pages are filled with a title page and verso, a dedication, a biographical note, an author's note, an introduction, a foreword and two pages of reviews. This book will make an excellent small present to give away to friends and family. For more information Google: flyingtortoise.blogspot.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Plenty cash to waste
I copied the following from: http://andrewscottwords.blogspot.com Knowing that, through the course of a year, Andrew Scott must be but one of tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of delegates at events run by government-funded agencies, it occurs to me that making nation-saving savings ought to be quite painless.
I was one of about 250 delegates at an event run by a government-funded agency yesterday. In our welcome pack there was a free USB storage drive for every delegate. So I presume the same applies to every one of the many events this agency runs. It's nice to know there is no shortage of taxpayers' cash to pay for such superfluous gifts. I'd have thought economy drives rather than free USB drives would have been more appropriate for these indebted times. I am so naive. No question of a few sheets of A4 paper for our notes either, but a rather swish and thick notebook bound in stiff plastic manufactured with considerable expense and ingenuity from crude oil. Clearly, we are a country awash with natural resources as well as funds. It was only an afternoon meeting, a mere two and a half hours actually, but of course we couldn't be expected to endure that marathon until we had all tucked into a rather sumptuous lunch. No question of mere sandwiches and coffee for important people like me. If I was paying for such frills I might get annoyed. Oh, hang on a minute, I am...
Some of what I heard was mildly interesting. All of it could have been conveyed just as easily and much more conveniently on the organisation's website, and it is, actually. And of course most of the travel costs will be claimed back on expenses by delegates who largely came from government-funded organisations too. I can't imagine where any efficiency savings could be found. Well, I did my bit. I'm not bothering to claim my travelling expenses as it was only a 20 mile drive from my home. I hope you are suitably grateful.
I was one of about 250 delegates at an event run by a government-funded agency yesterday. In our welcome pack there was a free USB storage drive for every delegate. So I presume the same applies to every one of the many events this agency runs. It's nice to know there is no shortage of taxpayers' cash to pay for such superfluous gifts. I'd have thought economy drives rather than free USB drives would have been more appropriate for these indebted times. I am so naive. No question of a few sheets of A4 paper for our notes either, but a rather swish and thick notebook bound in stiff plastic manufactured with considerable expense and ingenuity from crude oil. Clearly, we are a country awash with natural resources as well as funds. It was only an afternoon meeting, a mere two and a half hours actually, but of course we couldn't be expected to endure that marathon until we had all tucked into a rather sumptuous lunch. No question of mere sandwiches and coffee for important people like me. If I was paying for such frills I might get annoyed. Oh, hang on a minute, I am...
Some of what I heard was mildly interesting. All of it could have been conveyed just as easily and much more conveniently on the organisation's website, and it is, actually. And of course most of the travel costs will be claimed back on expenses by delegates who largely came from government-funded organisations too. I can't imagine where any efficiency savings could be found. Well, I did my bit. I'm not bothering to claim my travelling expenses as it was only a 20 mile drive from my home. I hope you are suitably grateful.
Friday, June 11, 2010
Mother XI: The Last Post
The period between a death and the funeral of the deceased has something of a dreamlike quality about it. Emotion blurs, anaesthetised in some way. There seems to be much to do but most of the necessary work is dealt with by professionals; registrars, funeral directors, clerics, caterers, lawyers, bankers. Apart from dotting a few "i's" and crossing a few "t's" surviving family have little to do but help with the travel and billet needs of the members of the extended family travelling, at short notice, from their distant homes to be present at the funeral.
For me the dream period ended at 1.15pm last Monday, 7th June when I and a surprising number of other mourners gathered together at Dunfermline Crematorium to pay their last respects to my mother, Gladys. The 'Celebration and Thanksgiving Service' was conducted very competently and pleasantly by the Reverend Douglas Aitken. Douglas, officially retired from the church for several years, is a practised professional and I like to believe that mother would have approved of his address which he skilfully balanced between gravity appropriate to the occasion and levity to relieve its sadness. Douglas opened, and set the tone for all that followed, with the idea that death should not be seen as extinguishing the light but as putting the lamp outside because dawn is breaking.
Dunfermline Crematorium is an easy environment. It is a light and airy glass and polished wood building. At the 'business end' of the chapel, floor to high ceiling windows look onto acres of undulating grassy parkland as I listened to Douglas reciting Helen Steiner Rice's, 'Legend of the Raindrop' and sang with the congregation through 'All Things Bright and Beautiful' and 'Dear Lord and Father of Mankind', I watched through the windows eternal life continuing; birds flying through gently swaying trees answering to an unseen, unfelt breeze; cloud shadows on the grass.
After an emotional gathering among floral tributes outside the crematorium the 'Celebration' of mother's life continued, first over drinks and sandwiches at the local hotel here in Dollar, later at my sister's home. At the end of the evening, as I reflected on a day that had been far from easy for me, I concluded that emotional release is a far more powerful intoxicant than alcohol!
For me the dream period ended at 1.15pm last Monday, 7th June when I and a surprising number of other mourners gathered together at Dunfermline Crematorium to pay their last respects to my mother, Gladys. The 'Celebration and Thanksgiving Service' was conducted very competently and pleasantly by the Reverend Douglas Aitken. Douglas, officially retired from the church for several years, is a practised professional and I like to believe that mother would have approved of his address which he skilfully balanced between gravity appropriate to the occasion and levity to relieve its sadness. Douglas opened, and set the tone for all that followed, with the idea that death should not be seen as extinguishing the light but as putting the lamp outside because dawn is breaking.
Dunfermline Crematorium is an easy environment. It is a light and airy glass and polished wood building. At the 'business end' of the chapel, floor to high ceiling windows look onto acres of undulating grassy parkland as I listened to Douglas reciting Helen Steiner Rice's, 'Legend of the Raindrop' and sang with the congregation through 'All Things Bright and Beautiful' and 'Dear Lord and Father of Mankind', I watched through the windows eternal life continuing; birds flying through gently swaying trees answering to an unseen, unfelt breeze; cloud shadows on the grass.
After an emotional gathering among floral tributes outside the crematorium the 'Celebration' of mother's life continued, first over drinks and sandwiches at the local hotel here in Dollar, later at my sister's home. At the end of the evening, as I reflected on a day that had been far from easy for me, I concluded that emotional release is a far more powerful intoxicant than alcohol!
Saturday, June 5, 2010
On social responsibility
"Until the interest of an artist shifts from the personal sensation to a sense of communal service his work cannot grow."
William Soutar, in 'Diaries of A Dying Man'.
William Soutar, in 'Diaries of A Dying Man'.
Perth
http://lifesscience.blogspot.com/2009/10/nae-day-sae-dark.html
Later, back at McEwens, the necessary internet connections had yet to be restored and the payment had to be made manually by means of a triplicate paper set and a once commonplace but now practically forgotten plastic and metal machine; yet another anachronism.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Codswallop
Choosing to use the expression 'cod's wallop' in an email I used an internet search engine to check its correct spelling and found the following essay in 'Wikipedia'.
Meaning: Nonsense.
Origin: The origin of the term codswallop is unclear. The most widely quoted story has it that of Hiram Codd, an English soft drinks maker during the 1870s, who developed a technique for bottling lemonade. This process involved the insertion of a glass marble as a stopper into the neck of the bottle. When the bottle was shaken the resulting pressure from the fizzy pop forced the marble against the neck to form a seal.
The device was called, not unreasonably, the Codd Bottle.
Wallop is a slang term for beer, and beer drinkers would certainly be disdainful of bottled soft drinks. This slang term dates from around the early to mid 20th century. Eric Partridge, in A Dictionary of Slang, claims it as serviceman's slang and dates it from the 1930s. An early example of it in print comes in J B Priestley's Three men in new suits, 1945:
"It's drink... Booze or wollop... Nine times out of ten... you wake up in the morning... with the usual hangover."
It's not difficult to see how a soft drink in a Codd Bottle could have come to be called codswallop.
There's no actual evidence for that derivation though. In fact, such neat plausibility without evidence is often the mark of the linguistic mythology known as folk etymology. Look no further than these popular fallacies for confirmation of that.
The earliest known citation of the phrase in print is the script of a 1959 episode of the UK TV series 'Hancock's Half Hour'. The writers Galton and Simpson don't claim to have coined the phrase, which they say was in public circulation when the show was broadcast.
'A load of codswallop' sounds old and the Hiram Codd story has a certain appeal. The problem with the tale, apart from the lack of any supporting evidence, is the entirely implausible notion that the phrase was in popular circulation since 1870 but somehow didn't manage to get into print until 1959. That lack of printed record is despite the fact that an appeal for early citations that was made on national TV in the UK in 2006 failed to uncover any citations earlier than 1959. Also, if Mr. Codd's drink were the derivation we would expect to find early examples of the name in the form Codd's Wallop - but there aren't any such examples. That, along with the fact that the term 'wallop' itself wasn't associated with its 'drink/beer' meaning until well after Codd's death, makes the 'Codd's Wallop' derivation highly improbable.
The most likely explanation is that it is a made up nonsense word that just sounds right for its meaning.
Cod is a little-used slang word meaning 'to hoax or take a rise out of', known since at least 1873. It was used in much the same way we now use the verb 'to kid', as here in a quotation from 1884:
"Tha'st only coddin me as tha allus does; tha'l none tay me to see th' fair."
That could be the origin of the cod in 'codswallop', but that's just plausible speculation, which brings us back full circle.
Meaning: Nonsense.
Origin: The origin of the term codswallop is unclear. The most widely quoted story has it that of Hiram Codd, an English soft drinks maker during the 1870s, who developed a technique for bottling lemonade. This process involved the insertion of a glass marble as a stopper into the neck of the bottle. When the bottle was shaken the resulting pressure from the fizzy pop forced the marble against the neck to form a seal.
The device was called, not unreasonably, the Codd Bottle.
Wallop is a slang term for beer, and beer drinkers would certainly be disdainful of bottled soft drinks. This slang term dates from around the early to mid 20th century. Eric Partridge, in A Dictionary of Slang, claims it as serviceman's slang and dates it from the 1930s. An early example of it in print comes in J B Priestley's Three men in new suits, 1945:
"It's drink... Booze or wollop... Nine times out of ten... you wake up in the morning... with the usual hangover."
It's not difficult to see how a soft drink in a Codd Bottle could have come to be called codswallop.
There's no actual evidence for that derivation though. In fact, such neat plausibility without evidence is often the mark of the linguistic mythology known as folk etymology. Look no further than these popular fallacies for confirmation of that.
The earliest known citation of the phrase in print is the script of a 1959 episode of the UK TV series 'Hancock's Half Hour'. The writers Galton and Simpson don't claim to have coined the phrase, which they say was in public circulation when the show was broadcast.
'A load of codswallop' sounds old and the Hiram Codd story has a certain appeal. The problem with the tale, apart from the lack of any supporting evidence, is the entirely implausible notion that the phrase was in popular circulation since 1870 but somehow didn't manage to get into print until 1959. That lack of printed record is despite the fact that an appeal for early citations that was made on national TV in the UK in 2006 failed to uncover any citations earlier than 1959. Also, if Mr. Codd's drink were the derivation we would expect to find early examples of the name in the form Codd's Wallop - but there aren't any such examples. That, along with the fact that the term 'wallop' itself wasn't associated with its 'drink/beer' meaning until well after Codd's death, makes the 'Codd's Wallop' derivation highly improbable.
The most likely explanation is that it is a made up nonsense word that just sounds right for its meaning.
Cod is a little-used slang word meaning 'to hoax or take a rise out of', known since at least 1873. It was used in much the same way we now use the verb 'to kid', as here in a quotation from 1884:
"Tha'st only coddin me as tha allus does; tha'l none tay me to see th' fair."
That could be the origin of the cod in 'codswallop', but that's just plausible speculation, which brings us back full circle.
Monday, May 31, 2010
Mother X
At seven-thirty yesterday morning one of the team of people nursing my mother at St Margaret's Hospital phoned to say that her condition had deteriorated overnight and that they expected her soon to give up the ghost. I was not surprised by this. Since, over three weeks ago, the hospital first expressed their fears for mother's imminent demise her poorly condition appeared, until the middle of last week, to remain remarkably stable. Through recent days however, the draining of colour from her face and her need of an oxygen mask have been clearly indicative of a sharp decline in her condition.
Yesterday was a very long day. Soon after receiving the phone call, my sister and I and our respective partners, drove together to the hospital. Mother was unconscious, and although her lungs were obviously congested she was breathing regularly into her oxygen mask. The information her nursing team gave us suggested that we would not be staying long at her bedside but the morning passed slowly into afternoon with no noticeable change. We had in the room a newspaper, the truly awful 'Sunday Post', which we were each grateful to read from cover to cover. We read and re-read labels on bottles and jars, the essential trappings of hospital rooms. We talked about nothing. I was reminded of the passage in 'Wolf Solent' (Ch 24) in which Wolf, a bored schoolmaster, passes time allowing an ink-stain on his schoolroom wall to feed into his mind imaginings of escape. By early evening we were beginning to wonder quite what we should do, as far as we could see mother was again 'stable'. The hospital made a 'family room' available to us, somewhere we could, if necessary, take it in turns to rest through the night. But it was not to be necessary. Quite suddenly mother's breathing quietened and slowed until it finally, almost exactly twelve hours since the morning phone call, it stopped. Mother had lived over a month into her ninety-second year. He life had been a good life. For the better part of it she enjoyed comfortable abundance and good health; until last December she had never been admitted into a hospital as a patient. Her life ended apparently painlessly and peacefully.
Requiescecat in pace.
Yesterday was a very long day. Soon after receiving the phone call, my sister and I and our respective partners, drove together to the hospital. Mother was unconscious, and although her lungs were obviously congested she was breathing regularly into her oxygen mask. The information her nursing team gave us suggested that we would not be staying long at her bedside but the morning passed slowly into afternoon with no noticeable change. We had in the room a newspaper, the truly awful 'Sunday Post', which we were each grateful to read from cover to cover. We read and re-read labels on bottles and jars, the essential trappings of hospital rooms. We talked about nothing. I was reminded of the passage in 'Wolf Solent' (Ch 24) in which Wolf, a bored schoolmaster, passes time allowing an ink-stain on his schoolroom wall to feed into his mind imaginings of escape. By early evening we were beginning to wonder quite what we should do, as far as we could see mother was again 'stable'. The hospital made a 'family room' available to us, somewhere we could, if necessary, take it in turns to rest through the night. But it was not to be necessary. Quite suddenly mother's breathing quietened and slowed until it finally, almost exactly twelve hours since the morning phone call, it stopped. Mother had lived over a month into her ninety-second year. He life had been a good life. For the better part of it she enjoyed comfortable abundance and good health; until last December she had never been admitted into a hospital as a patient. Her life ended apparently painlessly and peacefully.
Requiescecat in pace.
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