Life's Plus And Minus

Waxing Philosophical -
Conrad feels that daily life is a round of small trials or tests of endurance, tempered by equally small but welcome pleasant surprises.  In case this is too vague and ethereal for you, the hard-bitten reader, allow me to exemplify*: the lift I took at work didn't go down to Floor 0; no, apparently deciding that it was time to throw wild variation into it's user's lives, it went up to Floor 8 and stayed there, until Conrad got out and pressed the Floor 0 button again.  

Don't laugh - one day it may happen to you ...

     This delay meant I missed the 24 bus.  However, it also meant I got a seat on the nice empty 181.
     The 181 requires me to debus and wait for the next 409.  :(
     However, I popped into the Co-Op in Royton and got lots of remaindered food.  :)
     Unable to share lunch with Anna, who was called to a meeting.  :(
     Shared lunch with the hilarious Carol and Hazel, comedy gold.  :)
     Stuck on phones all day long.  :(
     Thus didn't fall asleep mid-afternoon. :)

A Bunch Of Freebies
Yes, my Enormous Yet Sensibly Anonymous employer is ever having other retailers in to give away free things by the small articulated lorryload**. Normally these are edible food products <well of course edible, if they weren't edible they wouldn't be food> as the photo below demonstrates, But!  in one of those small surprises, there was a high-quality note-book in the bag as well, which is very timely as my own Medium-sized Notebook is nearly full.

Note the book

I'm sorry, I just couldn't resist despoiling a virgin page.

Liquorice
The word "Liquorice" comes from the original Greek "Glycyrrhiza", meaning "sweet root".  However, this post isn't an attempt to better educate you, gentle hard-bitten reader, but a lament that all my birthday liquorice sweets are all gone.  Gone!  As with Nineveh and Tyre, or some such poetic glop.
     The last bit certainly lived up to it's description on the box " 1 x Hard Stick", if it had been slightly longer you could have played cricket with it, or used it to hammer nails in.

Liquor.  Ice.  Close enough

Revelations
Yes, got a bit more of the zombie novel done last night, more filling in with detail as Dee arrives at the port of Southampton, ready to take a ferry across the Channel to link up with the British Army Forces in France.  He and Iq are the liaison pair nominated to spearhead their battalion's arrival on the foreign shore.  

"Contact!  Revs*** right flank, fifty metres - ENGAGE!"

Next chapter will be the last one, tying up loose ends, showcasing the arrival of American-Japanese "Hunter Seeker Technologies" at the port of Cherbourg, revealing who created and released the Omega micro-organism and why, so if not a happy ending (1/3 of the world's population gone, you know) at least it's a tidy one.
     Then I have to go back and revise it.  First draft, after all!

A Pome
Regular readers will recall that Conrad does not like poetry bar the odd classic, which is howlingly ironic as he gets asked to compose a bit of rhyme when colleagues finish at work - by no stretch of even the most uncritical admirer of all things Conrad could these be dubbed "poetry".  

But you can call it "Toetry"!  

I can't post the one I composed for Simona's leaving tomorrow as the last line involves conflating her surname with a piece of feminine undergarment, which would probably embarrass the gel terribly if she knew, and Conrad is fairly sure that posting other people's names without permission is a good way to catch flak.  The first two lines, however, don't mention anyone:

"You may not know or even care

Who looks good in underwear"

     I promise it's all frightfully clever.

I'm not sure  quite what this is, but - hey! - at least it's not boring

The Metro
Conrad had an insight this morning, whilst using the Metro to soak up spilt pop (which it is excellently suited for).  "Free", it claims.  Well, no, Conrad disagrees.  My wage comes in at £9.27 per hour and it would take me probably twenty minutes to look with scathing criticism at what this paper pretends is news, so by my calculation that's £3.09 it owes me.
     Then look at it's blatant mis-representation of it's contents.

     "4 pages of gossip and showbiz"  Except the equivalent of one whole page is taken up with adverts.  There are 16 small paragraphs dotted over the remaining 3 pages, and "dotted" is appropriate as they would take up a lot less space if in an orderly formation.  Further, photographs with only scant relation to the text take up half of those 3 pages.
     Al Murray, you have defined a niche market with your "Not News" classification as the page of guff about Cheryl Whoosit-Whatsit amounts to her being a bit late for a party.




* Mister Hand is a bit curious at this high-flown language and will watch out for pretentiousness - the next symptom of poseurism.
** Actually not articulated, the next one down from them - like that one -
*** One is not permitted to call them "zombies".  Officially they are "revenants".

Hot Russian Balalaika Action!

Defiantly Avoiding The, Frankly, Horrid Real World -
BOOJUM!, as ever, exists outside the normal space-time continuum, and so would like to put forward a little light entertainment by the Moscow Balalaika Quartet, available via that most essential website Grooveshark; currently they are playing "Korobeiniki", thankfully an instrumental as Conrad's Russian is rusty as a twenty-year old wheelbarrow*, great stuff with accordion backing.
     Last week it was Prokofiev with "Peter and the Wolf".  Russia: good for more than vodka and grim novels about introverted murderers.  Also the balalaika is a very pointy instrument and looks highly uncomfortable to play.

All edge and corners

Obstreperous
Now, Conrad has taken to trying to analyse why particular words pop into his consciousness every so often, which is a bit introverted if not a touch odd**, and is akin to pinning the tail on the donkey - rarely successful.  However, today he was reviewing his timekeeping and sickness record whilst sticking a towel in his ears (it's okay, this was after a shower, not done on a whim on the 24 bus).  "I'm not obstreperous", I proclaimed, quietly - you don't need to shout to talk to yourself.
     'Now, where does that word come from?' was my next thought.  We all know that it means to be noisy and uncontrollable, obviously - obviously! - so how was it derived?
     Latin, guessed Conrad - correctly.  The root is "Strepere", which means "to rattle", i.e. to make a noise

Here an aside: Simon Rattle.  Italian ancestors?  Conrad wonders ...

     From this comes the Latin "Obstreperus", meaning "Noisy", from the early seventeenth century.

     So.  Conrad.  Not obstreperous.  A camouflaged alien spy, yes, but a quiet one.

The poster child for "Obstreperous"

Moped

No great mystery about why this is in today's blog - Conrad saw one driving up Tandle Hill this morning and - remember, people, it is dangerous to allow Conrad musing-time - he immediately wondered where the name came from.

This child moped.  Close enough

     Well, it's a portmanteau word formed from "Mo-tor" and "Ped-al", since one of the most striking things about a moped was it daintly little pedals.  Being a very lightweight form of motorcycle, the pedals were functional in making a fast start from standing still, and (in earlier models) helping to get up steep gradients.

John Duttine gets ready to prune the flowers
Why is this here?  May I gently remind you whose blog this is?

Transient Lunar Phenomena

Hah!  Yes I know why this cropped up - Conrad bewailed the loss of two followers on Twitter, deeming (and indeed damning) them to be mere "transients", and Hay Pesto! TLP came to mind.

     What are they?  The clue is in the title.  They are observed effects on the lunar surface of a very short nature, and there is no agreed reason for their existence.  Indeed, their very reality is debated.  They may be optical effects caused by the Earth's atmosphere, meteor impacts, volcanic activity, charged particles or the Clangers banging their dustbin lids - nobody is certain.  Or certain, yet.  They might be all or none of these things***.

Watch out, Clangers!  After Comet 67P, you're next!

The Official History -

Of the First World War.  This is an assembly of books that were compiled from the 1920's to the 1940's, and guess what - Conrad has the full set.

     He has acquired them over about seven years, however, and read them, if he read them at all, in the sequence he bought them, which is not at all in chronological order.
     So, as a challenge, Conrad is going to read them in sequence.  Some he will read on the bus, some he will NOT, as they are original editions that need careful handling.  Tread carefully, that collection is worth <cough cough> hundred pounds.
    The first four volumes, top left, are actually mapcases.  These are much rarer than the text volumes and Conrad rarely exposes the maps to either daylight or the touch of human skin - notionally one should wear inert rubber gloves when handing papers this old.
  Next <Mister Hand intervenes to point out that life is of finite length and to move things on>

Top 10 Guitar Riffs
Ever one to pontificate on matters he knows little to nothing about, Conrad looked upon this chart with interest.  Here it is:

Whole Lotta Love	Led Zeppelin
Sweet Child O'Mine	Guns 'N' Roses
Back in Black	AC/DC
Smoke On The Water	Deep Purple
Layla	Derek and The Dominoes
How Soon Is Now?	The Smiths
Down Down	Status Quo
Money For Nothing	Dire Straits
You Really Got Me	The Kinks
Money	Pink Floyd

     Well.  Personally Conrad isn't that into guitar riffs, being more of a keyboard man.  Yes, yes, make all the schoolboy jokes you like about organ playing, the ghost of J C Bach will come haunt you if you do.  
     Anyway, guitar riffs.  No complaints about "Whole Lotta Love" although cliche would expect "Stairway to Heaven" there instead, so a refreshing change.  "Sweet Child O'Mine", okay, I'll give you that.  "Back in Black", ain't heard it, haven't got any AC/DC and they don't licence their music to streaming services so couldn't give a toss, really.  "Smoke On The Water" - hmm, still prefer "Burn", thanks.  "Layla", well, YES!  No more comment needed.  "How Soon Is Now?" nah, sorry, prefer "Reel Around The Fountain" and the version with Paul Carrack on organ, ta.  "Down Down" - I was going to criticise this but actually for meathead metallic mallet power it does have charms.  "Money for Nothing", can't really see it, sorry never been a big fan of the Struts.  Nor of the Kinks, either, although I suppose this can stand as a keynote of 1960's pop, now take it and go away.
     Despite being a long-time Pink Floyd fan, Conrad still never really saw the appeal of "Money", and feels "Eclipse" is better.

Coral Reef.  Close enough

* Do the Russians have these yet?
** Business as usual, then.
*** Except for the Clangers.  They live in the Asteroid Belt, not on the Moon.  Do keep up!