One day Topsy the terrier woke up and found she’d turned into an afghan – or if not an afghan at least a spaniel. While it’s not as dramatic as the Mexican lion, by coincidence, a couple of weeks before Julia sent me the lion pictures my daughter had given Topsy a new do.
She deliberately left all the long curly fur on the ears, effectively turning Tops into a spaniel or a miniature golden retriever.
I’m pretty sure Topsy doesn’t mind.
A Bad Guide 
I love Topsy!
My dog changes dramatically with his haircuts during the year. It’s like having two or three different dogs…
It would be interesting if we, humans, could do the same: two or three different husbands/wives along the year… sounds like fun.
Sounds expensive – I mean haircuts, not divorce and remarriage, although that too.
Well, in fact this would avoid divorces and remarriage
We males, Julia, do tend to change our hairstyles, albeit on a longer time scale. Close observation reveals that we stop growing the hair on our heads outwards and start growing it inwards, so that it eventually emerges from our ears and nostrils.
You’re completely right, dearieme.
And in my particular case (my husband’s, actually) changing the hairstyle it’s out of the question. Hair it’s out of the question…
There are bald cats and dogs too, I don’t know whether it’s both sexes.
The International League of Topsyphiles – join up now!
The International League of Topsyphiles
Count me in!
Topsy looks very elegant. I suspect you have (Alma has) some very cool tools for grooming. Our fluffy dog [the velcro one, not the teflon one] has also received a spring coif (by me) and does look so gamine now (despite my having no cool tools)–only a bit ratty.
News from East Angular: in spite of a pronounced shortage of goats,
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1377903/Country-life-best-happiest-Britons-live-South-Cambridgeshire.html
Sitrep, Operation Daffodil:
All “gone over” here.
Regrets.
Topsy is a Wheaten terrier, no? Wow. Sure looks different without the fur. We have two Wheatens in the park, but they’re clipped to have, hm, how to describe? Kind of bushy faces. I never knew there was such a cute nose under there.
Daffs in full stride here (not that there’s ever any shortage of narcissism anywhere). Tulips coming into their own, too.
Just on the off chance that the reason conversation came to a halt is that anybody thinks I was being mean-spirited and calling somebody here narcissistic, let me explain that I wasn’t: I was just making idle conversation, enjoying the spring flowers, enjoying the word “narcissus”, enjoying and displaying the fact that I know that the daffodil is a kind of narcissus. I like the word “daffodil”, too.
hahaha!
No, empty, I myself just had idiomatic problems … and didn’t get the pun.
But it’s nice to mantain the conversation while our host is away.
Did he go somewhere?
London, he said
(I believe it isn’t classified information… otherwise I’m in trouble =s )
Yep, and this is the wrong year to have hoped for daffs at Easter in London. We are now enjoying better-than-summer weather, in that it’s hot but not humid. We’ve turned our Aga off, we’ve put the summer duvet on and we’re watering the garden. The farmers have got their spray irrigation going. It’s all very splendid, because we still have lots of Spring blossom about.
Nicked from Futility Closet:-
About the year 1772 there died at Mile End, England, a well informed goat, if traveling and seeing the world would make it so. It twice circumnavigated the globe; first in the discovery ship Dolphin, with Captain Wallis, and afterward in the ship Endeavorer, commanded by the celebrated Captain Cook. The Dolphin sailed from England August 22, 1766, and returned May 20, 1768. It visited many lands, including numerous islands of the Pacific, on this voyage. The goat did not remain ashore very long, for the Endeavorer sailed from Plymouth August 25, 1768. The vessel touched at Maderia, doubled Cape Horn, spent six months along the coast of New Zealand, and visited many other strange countries. It got back to England June 12, 1771. In the three years Cook lost thirty of his eighty-five men, but the goat returned in apparent good health. Arrangements were made to admit her to the privileges of one of the government homes for sailors, but she did not live to enjoy them. She wore a silver collar, with a Latin inscription prepared by Dr. Samuel Johnson.
– Albert William Macy, Curious Bits of History, 1912
I suppose they were going to eat her but decided against it at some stage. Or they wanted her for milk, perhaps. I wonder what Dr Johnson’s inscription said.
Dearie, I got back to daffs in our garden in Norway. We have lovely sunny weather, though not as hot as London.
London gets too hot and sticky very easily, in my opinion. I’ve never liked the place, except once when we holidayed there for a week in late September/early October: that was the best I’ve known it. On the whole I prefer Paris.
If I had a free hand in where to live in these islands, I’d choose Edinburgh or Oxford, with a summer retreat somewhere on the south coast – for example at Studland Bay – and carte blanche to spend part of May and June in the West Highlands.
Funny you should say that. We were in Oxford, partly because my daughter’s looking at British universities. Someone we know there, who has been at both Oxford and Cambridge, was telling her that Edinburgh was the best and most underrated university he knew in Britain – academically better than Durham or Bristol or St Andrew’s, but without the town & gown business of Oxbridge. Though it’s a lovely place, Alma found Oxford both intimidating and stuffy.
I’ll have to look up Studland Bay…
Can you tell us what does she wants to study?
(In Hispanic literature, for instance, Edinburgh had very renown professors, like my beloved E.C. Riley)
E.C. Riley, that’s good to know. She’s got two more school years before university, she has time to change her mind a few times. She’s taking philosophy at school next year & she’s thinking of philosophy or English for university. I’m hoping school won’t kill off her interest by making philosophy dull and all about exams.
Well, Riley died ten years ago.
But of course, she has lots of time to think, change and choose what she wants. Trini (11 years old) now says she wants to be an architect, let’s see… The good thing is that here it’s not a custom that kids has to leave their parents home to go to university.
I had hopes that your lass would be a vet, Crown. Is it too late to persuade her? There are vet schools at Edinburgh, Cambridge and Glasgow. Perhaps some of the Johnny-come-lately universities have them too.
Mind you, tell her not to be intimidated by Oxford. If Philosophy is her treat, it’s an awfully good place for it. It’s said to be the Oxford equivalent of chips – you can combine it with anything. My favourite is the one that let’s the undergraduates say “I’m reading filth at Oxford”. That is to say, Philosophy and Theology.
Here we are, but which do a Goats option I don’t know.
http://search.ucas.com/cgi-bin/hsrun/search/search/StateId/QMaTRokvH6_IqJdTuyEJ6S6PTGDS_-VW_I/HAHTpage/search.HsKeywordSuggestion.whereNext?query=1609&word=VETERINARY+MEDICINE&single=N
Oh, thanks very much, dearie. I’ll show her that. She would love to be a vet. She’s very good at all the science subjects, but she doesn’t think she can get into vet school with her maths, she’s had trouble with it in the past year.
I didn’t know you could combine it at Oxford. This bloke we know was telling her she’d have to do Greats – which I suppose is Greek, Latin & Philosophy – or Modern Greats (i.e. PPE), if she wanted to do Philosophy at Oxford. He’d done Greats himself and he said he found the Logic part to be really hard. He recommended Cambridge for Philosophy even though he liked Oxford better otherwise.
Julia, anything Trini wants to know about architecture I’d be glad to answer – if I can, and if you can translate…
“I didn’t know you could combine it at Oxford. ” I think you have no choice. There’s also Philosophy and Psychology. There may be others too.
“…said he found the Logic part to be really hard”: it’s notorious that the formal logic that seems easy-peasy to youngsters who’re good at maths can be found to be tough by those who are not. But if you struggle through it in your prelims (first year exams) you can avoid it thereafter. Or, at least, that was the case a few years ago.
Anyway, my memory is that the vet school at Edinburgh used to have a place out in the sticks where the undergraduates managed to spend a lot of time on horseback.
P.S. It’s one of my proudest boasts that I once played Number Eight for the Edinburgh Vet School – as a “ringer” – vs the University of Strathclyde, on the hallowed turf at Murrayfield. We stuffed them.
Oxford University (O33) qualification
Mathematics and Philosophy (4 years) (GV15) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Celtic (4 years) (VQ55) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Czech (with Slovak) (4 years) (VR57) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and French (4 years) (VR51) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and German (4 years) (VR52) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Italian (4 years) (VR53) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Modern Greek (4 years) (VQ57) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Portuguese (4 years) (VR55) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Russian (4 years) (VRM7) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Spanish (4 years) (VR54) 4FT Hon BA
Philosophy and Theology (VV56) 3FT Hon BA
Philosophy, Politics and Economics (L0V0) 3FT Hon BA
Physics and Philosophy (4 years) (VF53) 4FT Hon MPhysPhil
Psychology and Philosophy (CV85) 3FT Hon BA
The University of Edinburgh (E56) qualification
French and Philosophy (RV15) 4FT Hon MA
German and Philosophy (RV25) 4FT Hon MA
Italian and Philosophy (RV35) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy (V500) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Economics (VL51) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and English Language (VQM3) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and English Literature (VQ53) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Greek (QV75) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Linguistics (VQ51) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Mathematics (VG51) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Politics (VL52) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Psychology (VC58) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Scottish Literature (VQ55) 4FT Hon MA
Philosophy and Theology (VV56) 4FT Hon MA
Russian Studies and Philosophy (RV75) 4FT Hon MA
Scandinavian Studies and Philosophy (RV65) 4FT Hon MA
Spanish and Philosophy (RV45) 4FT Hon MA
All very interesting, dearie. You certainly know your way around this stuff. I’ll pass it on. And amazing to have played at Murrayfield and kept quiet about it here for so long. There’s a remote chance that Alma would make a good number eight, but there must be easier ways into vet school.
This is the source of my knowledge.
http://www.ucas.com/students/coursesearch/
P.S. Take care or I’ll ramble on about my other sorties at Murrayfield.
Thanks, and do please ramble on.
All in good time.
Julia, anything Trini wants to know about architecture I’d be glad to answer – if I can, and if you can translate…
¡Thank you!
Her grandfather was an architect (he died in 2006), and she loved him very much, but I do think she likes architecture for more reasons than her love for his grandpa. Now Diego (although he’s not an architect) runs the architect-studio of his father with the partner of him, which is an architect (otherwise it wouldn’t be much trustworthy…)
Say it ain’t so!
http://www.wvgazette.com/News/201105020871
That’ll teach you to read the West Virginia newspapers.
In Cambridge we read little else.
Food for thought:
(Hat Tip: WUWT)
Love it every time I watch eat (or I should’ve said “it”?)
I love that video. It’s just like my dog. I love it.
I can’t watch this again, it’s just too sad.
Things to be grateful for (in addition to Topsy, Dancing Goats, etc) number 1: geological stability.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110509/ap_on_re_as/as_japan_earthquake_changing_terrain
That’s interesting. Are there earthquakes on the moon, by the way? Not that I’m thinking of moving.
Does the moon have a hot, liquid centre with tectonic plates floating on it? Not if it’s green cheese!
Aha, a silly question, then.
Would a moonquake be called an earthquake? How would they say it in French?
Great post in LL, thanks, Empty!
“Alunizar” is similar to French “to land on the Moon” (luna = moon)
But in English you have it easier in English converting earthquake to moonquake. This would be impossible in Spanish or French, I believe.
Earthquake = “terremoto”. What can we say, “lunamoto”? It has no sense, sounds like a motorcycle for the moon…
Have you heard there were some earthquakes in Spain?
I love the lunamoto for getting around on the moon!
There is a recent discussion of similar terms on Language Log (May 5: Grilling, staging and landing)(I don’t know how to link, but you can google).
The French verb for ‘landing on the moon’ is alunir (like atterrir on the Earth), and the noun alunissage (like atterrissage), which I find silly and overly specific. For ‘earthquake’ we say tremblement de terre, so ‘moonquake’ would be tremblement de lune, which sounds even sillier. Applied to even more planets (some exemples on LLog), such words become ludicrous.
Yes, m-l, I also love the idea of a “lunamoto”
So much talking about the Moon, we need some of this, don’t you think?
Correction: Sorry, I gave the wrong Language Log reference: it is “Don’t try this at home”, May 10.
Golly, I can’t bear Sinatra.
Don’t worry, m-l, that was what I read guided by empty (he linked it before).
Sorry, dearieme! (What else can I say?)
I’ve found a very attractive alternative to Sinatra.
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/05/9-of-the-best-recordings-from-the-library-of-congress-new-music-service/238749/
Those won’t play from my computer at work – I’ll have to try them over the weekend.
I wonder what’ll happen if I paste this?
Broad grins
Trying to compose a coherent text or blog about the shooting of our dog (who has survived) is harrowing. I haven’t managed it yet. But:
A student has cheered us all up by sending us this: http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=EVwlMVYqMu4&vq=medium#t=125 Sorry I am still too shot away to cite it more elegantly. I hope it amuses a few of you…???
Oh, Dearie, it is beautiful.
Anyone seen Crown?
Has he ascended bodily into kitten heaven?
Or is he behind the camera hold some catfood skywards?
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Is it Supercrown?
Oh, my God, those kittens!!
I hope Crown listen to their prays, you can see how desperate they are looking for him! (Or is it too much catnip?)
What is this “Naked Capitalism”, and why do they have these screenshots of animals? That’s an odd-looking goat as well.
Tomorrow is the seventeenth of May, Norway’s fourth of July. Unlike anyone else in Norway, we will be celebrating with ravioli and fish soup.
What is this “Naked Capitalism”: a blog, that is to say ……you know, you used to do one yourself.
why do they have these screenshots of animals? Because the proprietix likes ’em.
That’s an odd-looking goat as well: tell that to his mother.
Oops: proprietrix.
I’m very glad you send us pictures and videos, dearie. I don’t mean to sound ungrateful. If anything you’re keeping the blog going, singlehanded. I promise to resume writing things soon.
If only we knew that you’re not tired of us… =)
The sainted AJP has not been idle. I am sure he has family, quadrupedal, and other concerns, and I know he has devoted time with computer forensics to help us try to catch our local would-be canicide. I expect he has exchanged personal and other sorts of messages with others among the badly guided…And we get to look at Dearie’s photos in the meantime! Mr. Crown’s recovery from a be-spectacled face-washing injury may be taking longer than prognosticated…P.S., Dearie, a long time ago I wanted to find your comment here about Sherlock to comment, and I couldn’t find it. I “went” and watched all three episodes, actually, and enjoyed them. I had something else to say about them, and when I remember what it was, I’ll probably put it here to help keep the blog going! Chins up! Stiff upper lips all ’round. &c.
When I was very little I thought he was called “Sherbet Holmes”.
I know, catannea I was just kidding! But we can’t deny we all miss our regular news from Asker… Don’t we?
And AJP it’s such a dear that now he added comments in all my lasts post at my blog.
Crown: you know we’re unconditional followers and we love you even if you are silent as a stone goat.
La proprietrix is feeling in need of a cuddle, it would seem.
P.S. why do these links end with “png”? She’s not from Papua New Guinea, she’s a Noo Yawker.
I cannot say. I am as silent as a stone goat.
Oh, those pictures, dearieme!
Hey, Crown, we said we love you EVEN if you remain as a silent goat, not BECAUSE you are one. So please, speak! ;-)
I don’t know. It’s very powerful imagery, Julia.
Portable Network Graphics is a bitmapped image format and video codec that employs lossless data compression. -wikipedia
For a minute, I thought you’d been turned into spam, Catannea.
Ha! I needed a laugh.
Here, we call it “Espamo”.
I think you don’t read Language Log…but as long as I’m spam, I might as well post a link…
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3145
I promise it is not too statistic-heavy…
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/may/18/horse-carriage-man-tries-board-train-pony?INTCMP=SRCH
Sunny music but perhaps too brisk for dancing goats?
If small animals are allowed, why don’t you try travel in the train with Vesla? She would enjoy the new landscapes…
This music sounds perfect for dancing goats, dearie!!
I regret to announce the death of one of ours cats, “Black Nemesis Bringer of Death.” We are keenly cuddling our other one.
Oh, I am so sorry. All nine lives gone, then? Poor baby.
I’m so sorry too!
Perhaps a new kitten bring back joy to your home.
Though your other cat would prefer a big bowl of cream for comforting
I’m very sorry to hear that, Dearie. Poor old thing. I agree, you’ll have to get another little Bringer of Death.
Here’s a lovely thing: hat tip to a commenter at the Telegrapg blog.
http://www.assadbrothers.com/
Thank you, dearie. Here’s someone else’s video version of Piazzolla, History of the Tango: Bordel 1900
Our false summer has long gone – it’s gloomy, windy and wet here. What we need is a nice bit of Swing guitar, from a countryman of Julia’s.
I loved it, dearieme! If it’s a consolation autumn is definitely installed in B.A. And we can only wait for the winter coming… I hope tomorrow will be less gloomy here because we’re going sailing: we’re going to salute our barco escuela (training ship?) that leaves for her annual journey.
And now I realized I’ve forgot to comment the wonderful video AJP shared here. Amazing!
Here you are another guitarrist. He’s not exactly my country men, but he isn’t a complete alien: Yamandú Costa from the South of Brazil.
And here, “la Fragata Libertad”
I love that guitarist.
Something for dancing goats to emulate.
Boy, that really does look like the goats. I’ll do a dancing video of them one day when everything goes right.
I quite liked this one too. I agree with the person who wrote “I’d no idea how badly Radiohead needed a saxophone player” – or is it saxophonist? Probably not. Apparently this process is called a mashup.
Oh, why? I can’t see dearie’s video!
(There’s a blank space in the comment thread)
AJP, about the video you’ve been promising, just three words:
RES
NON
VERBA!
;-)
The thing not the words. But it’s hard to get them to do it when you want, rather than when they want.
Here is dearie’s, I hope you can see this:
Julia, I suggest that you copy and paste the address below into your browser and then replace the leading “8” by an “h” and the trailing “4” by a “d”. Do let us know whether that works.
8ttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_yExwkQYcp0&feature=relate4
Very clever. That should do it.
Why “84” though?
hd – a mnemonic. I have a lousy memory.
Thank you both! This was great, Unsquare dance!
AJP, you should play that music to the girls and see what they do…
(And I love your other video too)
About the long-ago-promised-video… of course I know it’s not easy at all!
I always wanted to film the acts my dog and cat perform in the evening, but each and every time we catch the cammera for doing it, they stood still looking at us. Perhaps still in an awkward embrace, but not anymore doing their usual kick-boxing show. So, I understand you, you’re forgiven.
Yes, the goats can give me a blank look sometimes that makes me feel like a fool. Sometimes they do it when I baaa at them.
Dearie, h is from http and is the 8th letter and d is the 4th, from “related”, but where is the nmemonic? Also, do you know the numbers of all the letters of the alphabet – that’s good memory, not bad.
“do you know the numbers of all the letters of the alphabet”: I can work out the first ten if I take my mitts off. If you are cursed with a poor memory you work out stunts for helping to remember things and then they become a habit. But I’ll grant you that 84 isn’t as much fun as Most Engineers Prefer Brunettes Anyway.
or Please Try More Vole Soup.
The vowels are all odd. I’ve known that since my formative years. Even Y and W. Well, I don’t mean “even”. I mean, um …
Not J, though.
I’ve known J was 10 since my formative years, it being my initial. I didn’t know that about vowels until today, though. Who thought up the order of the alphabet anyway? It’s not especially rational. If it was a Greek I think we should know their name. And while I’m back there, does anyone know if the Romans used commas or any other punctuation?
“Even Y and W”: jolly handy knowledge for Welsh-speakers, then.
Who thought up the order of the alphabet anyway? It’s not especially rational. If it was a Greek I think we should know their name.
The Greeks inherited it from the Phoenicians — ‘alif, bayt, ghayn, dalet etc. — who (together with the other Semitic peoples of the Levant) in turn got the glyphs from the Egyptians. The Egyptian hieroglyphs encoded words and morphemes, but some of them also acquired a phonetic value used to spell unknown and foreign words, and that’s essentially how the northwestern neighbours applied it. The glyph usually started out as a drawing of the object. ‘A’ is an oxhead.
Hey, that’s not me! My wife has been using my computer again.
Trond, for a moment I thought we have a new girlfriend…
I’m really lost here: Can someone explain me why you say “vowels are all odd”?
I think there were no punctuations in classical Latin.
In the 26 letter version of the Latin alphabet that English uses, a e i o u y are letters number 1, 5, 9, 15, 21, 25. What Null wanted, I dare say, was that someone enquire about the voweliness of w and j.
… and 1, 5, 9, 15, 21, 25 are all “odd” letters (2,4,6,8,10 are “even” letters).
Helene! Tusen hjertelig takk! Your English is as good as Trond’s. Do you know if there’s any reason for the order alif, bayt, ghayn..? Why not ghayn, alif, bayt, for example?
Aaahhhh! “odd” in that sense! I was thinking ‘strange’
I believed you were being metaphysical not mathematical
I always forget that sense of “odd” but I like it because for me odd numbers are awkward while even numbers are nice and friendly (in Spanish you don’t get that idea: just like in Latin “par/impar”) .
And of course, as everybody know, vowels are nicer than consonants.
For inherited read got
For northwestern read northeastern
I don’t think anyone knows why the Semitic scribes settled on that particular order. I suppose it might have worked as a mnemonic of some sorts. Or maybe there was an order like that in Egyptian and we just don’t know about it. I’ll ask my wife.
“Why not ghayn, alif, bayt, for example?” Don’t be absurd; if you did that you’d have to write from left to right.
I can still drive on the left hand side; I recently tried in London after a 25-35 year lapse. Now I’m hoping if I drive (appropriately and regularly) on both sides of the road, like being bilingual it will inhibit my getting Alsheimer’s.
My most vivid memory of driving on the wrong, I mean other, side of the road is one time when I got off a plane, rented, I mean hired, a car, and drove through central London in the wee hours, like 4AM or something, through nearly empty streets, with big trucks, I mean lorries, rumbling all around me but not so many cars and maybe a faint pinkness of dawn peeking through smoggy skies, thinking of Douglas Adams’s Long Dark Teatime of the Soul (though it was really as far as possible from teatime, I mean in the time zone I was in, not that teatime means much to me) with its Norse gods dwelling somehow in King’s Cross, which station I was heading for to meet my soon to be ex-wife who for some reason I was getting together with for a little holiday in Wales before I went to Germany for a semester. It had a surreal feel, that morning.
You mean you did all that and drove on the wrong side of the road?
Yes, often feeling as dim and foggy inside as out, and of course encountering rotaries, I mean traffic circles, I mean roundabouts, which are the hardest thing about switching sides, don’t you think?
Yes they are. I still remember those… rotaries? on Cape Cod when I first moved to the US from England.
– I should add that the car the other day had a voice, calmly giving me directions via a satellite. So she would say “Turn left now”, which helped quite a lot at the roundabouts.
They recently introduced roundabouts in Norway as a way of easing traffic congestion. Unfortunately, Norwegian drivers are so polite: “After you…” “No, after you!”, that it has slowed things down no end.
she would say “Turn left now”, which helped quite a lot
Now I’m having a strange fantasy of a driver who is so addled by jet lag and the left-right reversal that when the voice says “turn left” he thinks it might mean right.
I don’t really need jet lag, I do have trouble telling left from right, but for some reason I managed it. The ladies who hide in the glove compartment are a wonderful addition to driving in a city you don’t know (or have forgotten, in this case). It was my first time with one. If you take a wrong turn, she immediately recalculates the directions in an apologetic tone. It’s almost as if she’d made the mistake rather than me. There are no raised voices, I liked her.
Beware of rented cars. My daughter and her boyfriend were zooming along the motorway recently and the motor suddenly conked out. It transpired that the previous renter had filled up the tank of the petrol-engined car with diesel.
P.S. Isn’t it odd that our government feels entitled to interfere in almost anything in our lives in fine detail, and yet when something comes along where government action would actually be useful – such as insisting on suitably different nozzles on petrol and diesel pumps – it does nowt?
That’s a good idea, not that I’ve ever had trouble remembering, myself. I heard that petrol engines run very powerfully on diesel (until they conk out) or perhaps it’s vice versa.
Has anyone built a wind turbine-powered car? I’ve been wondering if you couldn’t create a self-propelled vehicle by fastening a windmill to the top of one of those old electric milk floats they used to have in Britain.
I’ve been driving a rented car recently because mine is in the repair shop. It was the victim of some idiotic driving–not mine.
I realized today that chemistry undermines my easy familiarity with the numbers of the letters by using H, B, N, F, P for some odd atomic numbers and C, O, S for some even ones. Thank heavens for potassium.
“Potassium” would have been P-something. You mean Kalium.
Good point. Well anyway, ashes to ashes.
We’re going to try some goat butter from Marks Expensive.
Crown’s whereabouts discovered!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1394322/Armchair-astronaut-sets-internet-alight-using-Google-discover-space-station-Mars.html
We’re going to try some goat butter from Marks Expensive.
Well?
Crown’s whereabouts discovered!
Not Mars this time. Once again I have been in England; I went to Leicestershire and Ham. Ham is near the River Thames at Richmond; it has horses and a lovely duck pond on Ham Common with unusual ducks, swans and something with long legs like a stork.
Heron?
Goat butter: awaiting the chance to use in a trial run of bovine-milk-free living. Goat milk now in fridge too. Goat and ewe’s cheeses bought. Eyes open for goat yoghurt. Then it’ll be Operation Capricorn. Or something.
That’s interesting, dearie. Why are you going bovine-free, if you don’t mind my asking?
Yes, it was probably a heron. I didn’t realise they were so big.
If you are ever in Ham or Richmond Ham House has a very nice café at the orangery in its gardens (the wisteria wasn’t still in bloom, but the oranges and lemons were ripening). I went to enquire next door if my daughter could ride there next time we came (I knew it was a stable because I could smell the horses); but the people looked too rich and rude, so I didn’t bother.
I like the casual way Swan B seems to be declaiming at a somewhat cowed Swan A.
Do cows ever look cowed? I don’t think so. We saw cows nearby, in Richmond.
A friend has recently explained how much good it has done her, especially her digestion. My hope is to reduce my perpetual problem with catarrh. I’ve already discovered that I must avoid citrus fruit – a great pity since I think that the wide availability of freshly-squeezed orange juice was one of the best developments of the 90s. But there you go.
It’s too bad no one ever advises giving up something you hate. I would be happy to give up pineapple, for example.
Wot, even those acid-free ones?
I hadn’t heard of acid-free ones, but I hate everything about pineapples except the way they look.
That’s funny. Cande, my youngest daughter loves every fruit and vegetables but hates, hates, hates pineapple. She can’t stand to smell it in the fridge. And the rest of us love it…
Ooooh, you must try the acid-free ones. They converted me from a firm disliker to a distinct liker.
No, I can’t stand the smell either. I’ve never heard of acid-free pineapples. I wonder if we have them in Norway. I’ll have to go down to the Turkish greengrocers (and have a conversation in Norwegian where we smile and nod a lot and neither of us has a clue what the other is saying and in the end he shows me the cans of Latvian fish).
You have perhaps just identified a business opportunity – Crown Pineapplecorp: the pride of Norway.
Acid-free Norwegian pineapples? No less likely than the Norwegian blue parrot.
Happy Birthday, Mr. Crown!
Thanks. Very kind of you. It’s Frank Lloyd Wright’s birthday today too – or it would be if he weren’t dead.
Yes, and the fellow who invented the web. And my sister.
Tim Thing…
Happy birthday to your sister, clearly a person with very good taste.
“Yes, and the fellow who invented the web. ” What, it’s Al Gore’s birthday?
No, no, Andrew Frank Lloyd webber.
Do we not have birthdays anymore when we’re dead?
No we don’t. Though you and I can celebrate dead people’s birthdays, they can no longer participate.
Small child: “Daddy, was Jesus crucified on Good Friday?”
“Yes, dear.”
“So he didn’t get his Easter egg?”
““Do we not have birthdays anymore when we’re dead?”
“No we don’t.
How can you be so sure, Crown?
And happy birthday, again.
Oh all right, I can’t. But your age becomes a bit more complicated after you’re dead: are you really 127 or are you just plain old (91 + 36)? I think it would make more sense to celebrate deathdays. Some dead things are ok: pressed flowers are very nice, for example, and vegetables. I don’t one-hundred-percent believe there is no life after death, either; although the concept has great possibilities for philosophers and fiction writers, perhaps even more possibilities than life after death does.
And thank you again.
Did you read this at Language Hat comments on 6 June:
Surely the single largest category of folk names for mushrooms is the one having to do with evil and death, and with the beings who bode and bring these: Witch’s Hat, Death Cap, Destroying Angel, Poison Pie, Lead Poisoner, Corpse Finder, Witches’ Butter, Devil’s Urn, Goat’s Foot, Dead Man’s Fingers.
Posted by: darlen at June 6, 2011 10:53 AM ?
You might take issue on the inclusion of “Goat’s Foot” among “Evil” things. I believe goats have delicate unicorn-like hooves.
Wow, that’s a bit bloody much, isn’t it? Evil and death? Extraordinary. Thanks for noticing; I was away, I didn’t pick it up. Goats do have lovely little hooves. I must rush over there and lodge a protest.
Belated birthday greetings from me too. I was in London and saw this very strange film “Le quattro volte” which prominently features a herd of Italian goats, I think you need to see it if it is shown anywhere near you.
Thanks. I vaguely remember hearing of it. Perhaps they have it at the library.
here
Thank you. I’m glad to see there’s someone of my age who still has an intact memory.
Well done, Ø ! I must admit, I found parts of it pretty boring and listening to an old shepherd coughing isn’t my idea of entertainment, but I’ve never seen a film where so much time was devoted to goats (which makes it all the stranger when they suddenly disappear about two thirds through the film, never to be seen again).
“Dead Man’s Fingers” – isn’t that some of the disagreeable stuff you find when you are preparing crab? But worth it, given how good crab is, eh?
I didn’t know that, but I love crab. We used to get dressed crab in East Angular when I was young , but that was on the Norfolk coast. Do they have soft-shell crabs in Britain? I don’t think so.
“Dead Man’s Fingers” means several different things. I didn’t know about the crab-gill meaning. The phrase has a special significance to me and my son, because of a vivid shared memory of a day when he was about ten: I took him and a friend of his out to dreamily explore the estuary in the swiftly running tide in the late afternoon sun, and one thing that we kept finding was some kind was some kind of slimy orange underwater fungus (I suppose it was fungus) which we called exactly that. I still don’t know its right name.
If you move this clip to about 13:oo you’ll find, if you are patient, that some jiving breaks out that you might like to show the goats, Crown.
P.S I poured goat semi-skimmed milk on my morning muesli. Still alive.
That’s great. The first couple were the best. I think the goats would be very good at this kind of thing, but you’ve got to remember that their arms won’t rotate sideways only backwards and forwards. It limits the waving of the arms. I’m not sure they could cope with the shiny floor; sandpaper would be ideal, I think.
By the by, I’m finding goats’ milk and goat butter very salty.
Is that a ferret?
I don’t think it’s a ferret. Ferrets are quite small, pencil-thin almost. I think it’s an otter.
I forgot to ask how you liked your new diet. Perhaps there’s another brand that adds less salt? I like the idea of it, if it works for you I may try it.
Ah, yes, it could be an otter.
It makes me think that it has been a long time since I don’t go to feed the coypus of the Palermo gardens, not far away from home. Coypus aren`t related to ferrets or otters, actually they are rodents.
Very nice. I expect they’re related to capybaras.
I’ve had a websearch for unsalted goat butter without success. The problem is that we’ve been eating unsalted cow butter for ages, so all the salt came as an unleasant surprise.
Dearie – my impression has been that you have a nice lawn…get some goats! Make your own unsalted goat butter
! I am so convinced, if I had even a handkerchief’s breadth of actual land, I’d get a couple of goats (one would be too lonely) right away. But I doubt they’d thrive on the roof terrace, sharing with Ruskin and Sandy. Sigh.
What a good idea.
Metamorphosis.
Posted on 16 April 2011
It looks as if things are still frozen in Norway. How can spring be so late this year?
Yeah, I know, Sig. I’m hoping to get back to writing something about goats fairly soon.
“The crux of the matter”, as some people say…
In Britain when we say that a point is moot we mean that it is “the crux of the matter” but in the US they mean (I believe) that it is of no importance. Zat right?
Nope, zat wrong.
OED:
I find I use it as in the US examples – which I think is better than the UK way, because I can’t think of another word that would do the same job.
My husband is English and he uses moot the same way I do. It means more like…not salient, than “of no importance”…I believe. You can talk about it, but it’s not practical and unlikely to be resolved by talking.
Around here, anyway…
Hang on. The citation of the American use is just what I said, and the first use is compatible with what I said. That is to say, the American use dismisses the point as nugatory, whereas the British use says that it is unsettled (and, in my experience, not only unsettled but important to settle). So I am right. Bah!
You are only approximately right. A point can be debatable without being the crux. And to call a point moot in the American sense is to say more than that it is of no importance. Still, in my opinion Crown’s “zat wrong” was a bit much.
By the way, I’m told that the erroneous variant “mute point” has gained ground.
Sorry, dearie. The customer is always right and I defer to you and Ø.
Rather than unimportant the US version means more like “of no (or of doubtful) significance to this argument”. So if you say “Hurry up, the pub’s closing in half-an-hour,” and Empty says “Not on Sundays, it isn’t”, Catanea might say “The question is moot, because the publican died, and the pub’s closed until further notice”.
God, I hope not. When I need a pint of 6X, I need a pint of 6X.
What about “tabling” a motion, then? Again quite different in the USA, no?
Yes, the verb “table” may be the best example of Separated by a Common Language. Though “pants” and “vest” are good, too.
Goats may be in short supply, but
http://dailyotter.org/
Kye news.
I was wondering: does the Spanish translation here catch the double meaning inherent in “the deep blue sea”? Can Spanish (or French or German…) catch it?
I loved the otters! (I saw them all)
What is the double meaning in “the deep blue see”? (I guess your question is answered with my own question…)
We saw a group of otters recently at the London zoo. I think everyone likes otters.
Kye – haha (that’s Northern Irish pronunciation of “cow”, you can hear the man in the video say it that way) – that just goes to show they’re very smart, although I don’t know why people are always surprised by that fact (the same with the gang of sheep who rolled over the cattle grid in Yorkshire). It also shows how strong cows’ tongues get from pulling up grass.
Julia, “deep blue sea” may refer both to the colour of the sea (blue) and its shape(deep). Or, it may refer only to its colour – deep blue.
In Scotland we say “You’ll be waiting till the kye come home”. Mind you, we also say “I’m going til Aberdeen”.
Oh, I didn’t know that. “Til Aberdeen” would be the Norwegian too.
Clearly Scots must have invaded Norway at some point.
They eat oat porridge, but I’ve never seen any evidence of haggis.
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=puffins&hl=en&rlz=1I7SNYK_en&prmd=ivns&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=-gYCTvHpIpKJhQeR2e2XDQ&ved=0CDYQsAQ&biw=1023&bih=612
This looks like an interesting conversation…
We used to live a ten minute cycle ride from the beach. Half a mile offshore was an island covered with these wee chaps. We miss it all still.
Where was that, Dearie? Scotland? I’ve no idea where they live.
I don’t know about that conversation. The one puffin looked pretty indignant, but I suppose you can’t tell by appearances.
Several islands in the Firth of Forth are alive with them – Isle of May, Fidra, Craigleith.
Djangofest
http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/
A new memory trick: there’s a blue South African flower I like, but whose name I could ever remember. Now, I just have to think “Aunt Agapanthus”: works every time.
Yeah, that’s pretty good. I can imagine it working, I’ll try it. How can we expand it to work with other plants? Is it the alliteration? We can’t call all plants aunt & uncle.
“We can’t call all plants aunt & uncle.” Let’s ask Prince Charles.
Is there isn’t any tiny little photo from your summer, Crown?
(We miss the girls!)
Aunt Dahlia
I suddenly noticed that Norwegian media has been reporting important goat news for days.
It seems to take a dozen people and a couple of collies to herd half-a-dozen goats,
which, I was going to observe before I so rudely interrupted myself, shows lower productivity than Crow and Topsy.
All you really need is to display a bowl of grain-mix feed and shout “Come!”.
I shall post some pictures, but not until it’s raining. Otherwise I feel I ought to be outside.
That’s very wise. Enjoy your summer!
We’re freezing here in our 10ºC winter (that must be a laugh for you northerns)
All you really need is to display a bowl of grain-mix feed and shout “Come!”.
Is that your job or Topsy’s?
When I saw that again, I saw “Come!” as “Camel”. No, Topsy can bark orders with the best of ’em.
10ºC seems pretty cold to me by now. I think it’s about 21. I read that in Britain it’s been in the upper 30s. No wonder there are palm trees everywhere.
-O,2ºC in Buenos Aires. Will it snow?
http://www.lanacion.com.ar/fotos/ver-todas/6349
http://www.larazon.com.ar/ciudad/Ciudad-cero-ola-polar_0_254700153.html
It should! I’m glad I’m up here in Norway!
I’ve just see hundreds and hundreds of motorbikes go by, plus a few (rather fine) motortrikes. It’s in remembrance of the members of the British, Canadian, American, and other Aliied forces in the Second World War and since. Bloody impressive!
They are finishing their rally with a short service at the American Cemetry near here. http://www.alliedride.org
Did I ever tell you, Crown, that the Free Norwegian forces were based in Dumfries during the war? They were locally popular, which not all allied troops were.
Interesting. It looks like they’re all on Harleys. I suppose Ducatis, BMWs and Kawasakis would be in bad taste. All great bikes, though.
My family knew some Italian prisoners-of-war who were farm labourers in Cambridgeshire. When they went back one of them opened a hotel and we went there every summer for years*.
*Sadly, this part isn’t true.
“A scholar is just a library’s way of making another library.” — Daniel Dennett
(from Futility Closet)
A new project for you, Crown.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2012746/Gorilla-midst-The-enchanting-story-couple-adopted-baby-Digit-let-share-duvet-13-years-on.html
Thanks, but I’m trying to give up.
Very interesting, though.
I said to my wife “How would you feel about having a creature around the house which could rip you to shreds in a moment?” She said “But I do”.
Gorillas don’t do the washing up, that’s what you shoulda said.
Swing
http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/
not swing
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2014344/Alaskan-Brown-Bear-Yolanda-falls-asleep-river-fish-caught.html
A lovely photo, a fish in the hand.
And that’s not swing, it’s heavy metal. Should I buy some silver?
Silver: less need if your savings are already in a sound currency.
Meantime, I am besotted with this.
I see that WTC is both World Trade Center and Well Tempered Clavier. I hadn’t seen that before, it probably explains a lot.
Bad guide: the evenings are discernibly drawing in.
Good guide: hedgerow plums and brambles on the dinner table this evening.
I suppose it’s a blessing that the sun is going down a little earlier, but I hardly notice. It’s been hot here for days, and getting hotter. Friday is supposed to be the peak. It will be “family day” at Amadi’s day camp, and I am incensed to learn that there is rule that visiting daddies are not allowed to avail themselves of the swimming pool.
Then on Saturday we will be attending a very dear friend’s wedding (in which little Amadi is the flower girl and big Asa is providing music). There is a certain déjà vu about this: When we got married 20 years ago, the wedding came at the end of another week of outrageous heat.
I have just bought myself a special new pair of trousers and a special new shirt for the occasion, but I will be damned if I will wear a tie or a jacket!
It’s nice to hear from all of you!
You too, Julia.
Dearie, I’m very interested in that video, I can’t wait to try it with my mother’s cat.
Congratulations on the new trousers, Øn. It’s a lot of work going to the shop and trying them on; shirts are much easier. What sort of special shirt and trousers did you buy?
It’s still daylight past eleven here, but I took some pictures of a badger in our garden at 11pm the other day and they were a bit blurry, so it can’t have been as bright as midday. The weather is frightful, torrents of rain today; moss has replaced the grass on the lawn – actually I rather like that. We have cherries, raspberries and wild strawberries in our garden at the moment; currents and gooseberries are nearly ripe, blueberries not yet, the plums not for at least a month.
They’re not that special, and it was a very last-minute thing. Linen below and silk with big floral patterns above. I am slightly afraid of being the most casually dressed adult at the wedding.
Don’t be afraid! It sounds very chic and a suit would be very silly on a summer’s day. And always better to be the most casual than the most formal. I like the pictures of Lucien Freud they’ve been putting up – I’d much rather dress like that, casual sleazy, than like a bank manager.
Dear God, just seen the news. Are the Crowns all safe and secure?
Crowns are all fine! Thanks for asking. One advantage of living miles from anywhere is that you dodge the bombers. Now there’s shooting at the young Labour party people’s summer camp, so I’m quite intrigued to find out who’s responsible for this. I do wish they’d phone ahead warning of these explosions. It seems so irresponsible to involve bystanders.
And always better to be the most casual than the most formal.
Related.
Ah, was about to ask. Good to hear you’re all right.
Now they’re saying it was lone gunman…
Oh dear, Mr Crown, sounds awful there. I’m glad you and your family are okay — I hope your friends and family are fine, too. You have my sympathy. It sounds horrendous!
The news about the shooting are horrible. Is that island near your home?
Ø, the phrase from our host you cited should be written in gold!
I’m sure you’re going to do better than Louis XVI today.
(Nota Bene: I was also thinking about you when I wrote my greetings for “Friend’s Day” -20th July in Argentina) http://melioralatent.blogspot.com/2011/07/con-ejemplos-bestiales-en-el-dia-del.html
Thank you all!
Yes, it’s about 20 minutes drive from here. In the winter Alma has skied home from a place nearby. We drive past it quite often, the island is one of several in a very beautiful lake that has mountains along one side – it’s a lovely drive, actually. Everyone knows about the Labour Party youth camp (though I didn’t know it took place there), because many bright young people who are interested in politics go to those things. Stoltenberg, the prime minister, used to go as a teenager. It’s all very sad, but now it’s happened I’m sure the Norwegians will handle it very well – they are sooo sensible – and I’m glad it was perpetrated by just one local crazy person and not by alqaida or some other never-ending mess.
The big 17-storey concrete building they show on tv with its wooden windows blown out has the prime minister’s office on the top floor, but it’s also the whole administration’s offices; it’s going to be a tricky problem, I don’t know where they’re going to live while it gets fixed up.
I’m glad it was perpetrated by just one local crazy person and not by alqaida or some other never-ending mess.
Yes, I agree that’s better. Though much more difficult to deal with for Norwegians.
Yes, but every country’s got one crazy person, probably.
Of course!
My deepest sympathies. I suppose it’s better that it was a lone madman rather than an organized group, but still — so horrible. Those poor kids! And their families. Just heart-breaking.
I don’t get how he had all those weapons. I thought only in the US could you buy a mini-arsenal.
>A.J.P. Crown
I’m also glad you and your family are okay.
Me, too!
For me it is impossible not to compare the Norwegian reaction to this with US reactions to 9-11 or Oklahoma City.
One thing that bothered me a lot after 9-11 was the widespread assertions (aided and encouraged by Bush et al) that this is an attack on “everything we stand for” or on “our freedom”–as if anyone who hates us must hate us for exactly that which we (sometimes merely reflexively) pride ourselves on. Your PM made a statement that reminded me a bit of that–about the nation’s democratic ideals or values–and I wondered what he meant exactly. Of course, one major difference is that in Bush’s case you could see the thought springing up: “We can justify a war with this! We can call this the beginning of a war!” You probably don’t have to worry about that.
Another detail that struck me was that in a preliminary statement about the attacker a police spokesman said that one thing we know is that he is “a right-winger”. I can’t quite imagine that happening in the US. If the FBI got up the day after a mass shooting and said such a thing, the right would be offended (and quite rightly, I feel–I know I would be offended if the crazy man was said to be a leftie).
I would feel differently if they were providing details of some group that he belonged to, but somehow this broad statement seemed odd.
.
>mab
I think it’s too easy unfortunately to buy some products like fertilizers; anyway in Spain, for example, you have to justify what you buy it for, although if you are a farmer it’s not a problem.
You can read this information about an accident which was the origin of a research that gives the explosives most employed in the world: the ANFO (ammonium nitrate and 4% of fuel oil): http://www.local1259iaff.org/disaster.html
“this broad statement seemed odd”: I assume it’s code for “not al-Q”. When you reflect on it, it’s a very odd code: apart from the fact that some of their sympathisers are lefties, it’s hard not to classify al-Q as right wing. That, in turn, probably just shows how limited the usefulness of the left-right distinction is the moment you are not dealing with socialists vs liberals/conservatives.
hat tip: naked capitalism
Some of those sloths could use a double espresso.
Our dog’s scared of fizzy water. Of course, she’s not an alsatian.