Birthday Greeting

I love birthdays, and hence it is another one.

Happy birthday to enigmaticblues

Cheers

Bright Morning

After the abysmal dank day on Monday this morning looks sunny and bright. May it continue. I will not see much of it as i shall be stuck in the Office on day 2 of the course. Perhaps it will rain. I won't mind at all. Just hope it does not rain whilst i am walking to Sittingbourne this morning nor when i return later in the day.

Before i leave i need to get some cat litter for Florence. Her latest antic is to sit in the unused empty grate of the upstairs fireplace. Crazy feline, but lovable all the same.

Day 2 of The Course

The second day of this course was much more productive as we zipped through the first of the five modules. Our tutor, who was by my reckoning, half the age of yours truly, seemed very pleased with the general progress made. We were split into small working groups of which i became the team leader, which seems to be my forte. The guy sitting to the right of me has problems with spelling and understanding some of the course text and i found myself helping him out, reinterpreting the text into something he could understand and helping him with general grammar and spelling. He admits that he finds reading English, and knowing how to spell a word (although born an Englishman)  i difficult for him, because as a former labourer , or in his terms, a street operative,  formal training is an uphill struggle..

The lady in our little group seemed to be very quiet and reserved , and it took me awhile to coax her into contributing to the tasks at hand.

Apart from one male in one of the other groups who has a degree in mathematics, i can safely say, (and here i am not bragging) that i am the most intelligent person in the group,other than the tutor.

Actually there are eleven in the group with three females. We are all of roughly similar ages.

We finished at around three in the afternoon, and by that time i felt a bit drained after being an unwitting tutor myself to this quite jovial person to the right of me. Perhaps i have missed my vocation, although in the past i did try to tutor YTS (Youth Training Scheme) pupils who had left school without any qualifications in being computer literate when they had no intention of learning way back in the late seventies.I don't think i would want to revisit that route anytime again.

Last night i watched on catch-up the return of Eggheads , well it seemed like a return as it might have been a re-run. Got most of the questions right except for sport which is my weakest subject. I then watched the final of University Challenge , and got all the composers correct on the snatches of music played and all the philosophers correct. The team from Cambridge won in the end.

Also, some other favourite quizzes are coming back, the fiendish Only Connect and on Channel 4 15 To One.

Glenn Gould and Bach

Interesting to read papersky discovery of Bach brings me back to my favouirte interpreter of his music, specifically the eccentric and wayward Canadian pianist  Glenn Gould , and in particular his recording of the Goldberg Variations. So here is a You Tube clip of the complete variations.