The Safest Course Is To Accept Everything At Face Value

"If you seek to understand your motherland, you're already on the road to becoming a criminal" Ai Wei Wei.

This is clearly true if you're Chinese. But also true,  less obviously, if you're a citizen of one of the so-called democracies- where annoying the powerful can bring deniable penalties on a sliding scale from being banned on Twitter to having your car come off the road.

No nation- by which I mean the powerful people in that nation- is particularly tolerant of criticism. The Johnson government is only the latest in a long line British executives to want to hobble and intimidate the already innocuous BBC.

Meanwhile what is being done to Julian Assange carries a chilling message for us all. I have never understood how the USA has managed to persuade itself- and its client states- that Assange- who is Australian- should be subject to its laws.

Exposing the nefarious doings of a foreign power (which the USA is to Assange): how can that be a crime?

But apparently it is- which means it's not only dangerous to seek to understand your own motherland- seeking to understand other people's motherlands can be dangerous too.

Ai Wei Wei, having been persecuted at home, moved to Germany, but feeling that Germany was becoming too chummy with China, has since moved again. He now lives in Cambridge. Not Cambridge, Massachussets, but Cambridge, Cambridgeshire...

Good Morning

Isn't This The Truth?

Wednesday Wistfulness

Well folks, another day in which the weather decided to play ping-pong. We had substantial rain in the morning, followed by a windy dry spell, and a heatwave late afternoon.

Makes it difficult to know what to wear.

Anyway, I had to pop into Sittigbourne to see my "work coach" - right - if ever there was a misnomer - but I was only in the office for no more than fifteen minutes, and then hot tailed it to Penge East to grab some more free books. They have cut down the choice of bookcases to two and the choice of good ones has somewhat thinned out. Nonetheless, I came away with fifteen interesting ones. Some will be distributed amongst the ladies here whilst the others are for keeps or resale.

Dinner was a hot chilli beef dish with extra jalapenos!!

Just Wondering

So, tell me, how does your garden grow?

Have you ever been a fan of Pokémon? If so, what was your favorite character?

Did you ever have a pet rock?

Good Night