More Than Average Funk

Another great hunk of funky Scottish soul from the AWB LP -

Average White Band - Got The Love

It was brilliantly used as background in the BtVS episode
Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered.

Possibly one of the funniest episodes of the second series, “Bewitched, Bothered & Bewildered” takes a slight detour from the season’s story arc to present a story revolving around Xander. Reeling from the breakup of his secretive relationship with Cordelia, Xander seeks out Amy the witch to cast a love spell. As would be expected, there are disastrous results. The love spell works on everyone but Cordelia. The Average White Band’s “Got the Love” plays during the slow motion entrance of Xander at the onset of the spell’s effects, turning the awkward second fiddle into the object of every girl’s affections. And there’s Sarah Michelle Gellar in a really skimpy bathrobe. That’s all I’m sayin’.

All Done, Thank Goodness

Seemed to take longer than normal but,i have just finished my reports from yesterday as i had a lie-in this morning. I then vacuumed around the house, and then filled in the reports. Cousin had to go , again , too see hos mate Colin in Canterbury hospital and to pay his chiropractor £105 for three sessions. He said he cannot afford any more to me this morning , after having spent alot last month doing so.

I have not got any work till Monday when i am supposed to go down to Brighton to do two in the city and the other in Hove. Then there is the lunch club come Thursday, and yet the next pay check ins on the Friday after, Jeez, things never go smoothly.

Football Can Be Hell

This is so funny -

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/06/18/mordor-2026-fifa-world-cup-bid-video_n_7613656.html?utm_hp_ref=tw

Book 38 - Terry Eagleton "Across the Pond: An Englishman's View of America"

Terry Eagleton "Across the Pond: An Englishman's View of America" (W.W Norton & Co.)




Authors from Alexis de Tocqueville and Charles Dickens to Alistair Cooke and Bill Bryson have, over the years, made “America, seen through foreign eyes” an evergreen literary subgenre. Literature scholar Terry Eagleton, a Briton who has lived and taught for years in the United States, joins their ranks with Across the Pond.

Eagleton’s subject here is not America but Americans, and (by extension) the English and the Irish rather than their respective homelands. He’s interested in people rather than places, and specifically in the shared habits of belief, thought, and action that makes one clump of people collectively different than other another. Done badly, this kind of thing can degenerate into crude stereotyping, but Eagleton does it well. His observations are sharp, his conclusions insightful, and his ability to weave them into a coherent picture considerable. Better yet, all this comes wrapped in humorous prose that, at its best, attains a level of comic surrealism reminiscent of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Here, for example, is Eagleton on (seemingly) the most mundane of cultural differences, pronunciation: “I once rang an American colleague and reached his voicemail, which announced: ‘This is Mike and Marie. We do not reply to silly questions.’ Perhaps they had been besieged by callers asking to know how many triangular pink objects they had in the house, or how much it cost to rent a lawnmower in Kuala Lumpur. Later I realized he had said ‘survey questions.’”

The artistry with which Eagleton blends serious (if impressionistic) anthropological observation and humor becomes fully apparent in Chapter 3, which discusses Americans’ physical bodies, and attitudes toward them. There, and only there, he turns (almost) completely serious without announcing or, seemingly, realizing it. The observations are still as sharp, and the insights just as unexpected, but the absence of humor transforms the experience of reading them. Had the book been written entirely in that style, I would still have read it and counted the couple of hours invested in it as time well spent. I’m very glad, however, that I got to read this version instead.

Book 39 - Mariet Westermann "The Art of the Dutch Republic, 1585-1718"

Mariet Westermann "The Art of the Dutch Republic, 1585-1718"




It was strange that only this week i got talking to an older gent in Tunbridge Wells about Vermmer. We were both in the Oxfam shop and he was looking for a picture or photograph of the famous Girl With A Pearl Earring. He was uncertain that the painting was by Vermeer , and i confirmed it was having read this book and other books over the years about the Dutch Republic painters. Neither of us could find a suitable book in the charity shop which depicted it. Strangely nor does this one, which is the only caveat i have about it.


Anyway, the paintings covered in this appealing book by Mariet Westermann were intended to not only please, but to serve as a kind of visual catalog of the period. Whether the subject was interior or exterior, the paintings provide an almost photographic record that bring to life the physical surroundings of the Dutch people of the 17th century. In doing so, they provide insight into their hearts and souls as well. And Westermann proves to be a capable guide through the era.

Recent Snaps

Some recent photos, done mostly with the Lumix camera.

( Photos here )