This time I am griping because although amnesty do good work, they are still acting so self-importantly. Their petitions begin (for example) : "I call upon the Sultan of Ruritania to immediately release the prisoner and let him go free."
Who are we to "call upon" the guy with the power? who are we to say: "let him go free"? Under the tyrant's laws, and within his worldview, the prisoner is a scumbag, so why should he go free?. The most we can do is beg for clemency. Amnesty does not seem to have noticed that they are being ill-mannered, with their "call upons". They make me ill-mannered when I sign, even if my heart is totally in it.
Saturday 31 January 2015
Sunday 25 January 2015
My ridiculous New Year Resolutions
Recently I made some of the above. Well, it was New Year. I had forgotten my previous coming-to-terms-with-resolutions wisdom and I made the WRONG kind of resolution.
I decided that I must concentrate more on my work and less on the things that I love. The result would be that I would not feel anxious about being behind with my work, which is how I feel pretty much all the time. When I had got into a position of being ahead with my work I could do other things like: read books and newspapers. One of my resolutions was not to get into reading any kind of narrative, because that sort of thing takes over one's tiny mind. OK, my tiny mind. Everyone else's mind holds more equipment and can do many more things. So I thought I would read art books instead e.g. The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman by Grayson Perry, and The History of the German People by Mr MacGregor of the British Museum. I could pick them up, muse awhile, and put them down, muse finished.
The significance of this image is explained here: review of Unknown Craftsman
And I decided I would stop "buying" the Guardian when I popped into Waitrose just because it is free if you spend £5 and I always spend £5 because things in Waitrose are somehow slightly nicer than the average foodstuffs and more expensive (what a strange coincidence) without being ridiculously gussied up for the wannabees as they are in Marks. Because I get into the Guardian and find its columnists worth reading as long as you take a bit of time over them. Therefore, the Guardian is wasting my time and my brain when I should be working. (To start with, I found the Guardian impenetrable. But you get used to it, and the effort it takes to read. You get to like it. Just like the crossword, which is REALLY hard.)
Anyway, I have failed to stick to these resolutions (apart from reading narratives, I have not read a novel or story since the Christmas hols) and I am rather glad, because life shouldn't be all horrid. There should be some changes and developments, and although my idea of narrowing was only temporary (the next 6 months), I can't bear it because my work is OK but not my passion.
My original resolution was: eat mainly soup. This is not a bad idea either because I am very overweight and I never have been overweight before. I have lost the knack of losing weight. Also, I really like soup, so it's do -able. The trouble is, I also have a husband and son for whom I cater and they are not satisfied with soup.
So far this year I have cooked dishes I haven't cooked before (duck with cherry sauce, last night, and something with meatballs (very good idea, meatballs, quick and tasty)) and that's a much better resolution: cook some new dishes!
And although I really wanted to get involved with the Green Party this turns out to be not do-able either, as my local branch meets on Wednesday evenings, when I teach until 9 pm. I could do without teaching until 9 p.m. Basically, I want to do something worth doing with other people whom I might like, but this longing is being stymied at every turn.
Sad: I never saw the Germany exhibition at the BM (all over now) and I never saw the Rembrandts. Just never took the time out of my busy but meaningless schedule of working and hoovering, etc.
I decided that I must concentrate more on my work and less on the things that I love. The result would be that I would not feel anxious about being behind with my work, which is how I feel pretty much all the time. When I had got into a position of being ahead with my work I could do other things like: read books and newspapers. One of my resolutions was not to get into reading any kind of narrative, because that sort of thing takes over one's tiny mind. OK, my tiny mind. Everyone else's mind holds more equipment and can do many more things. So I thought I would read art books instead e.g. The Tomb of the Unknown Craftsman by Grayson Perry, and The History of the German People by Mr MacGregor of the British Museum. I could pick them up, muse awhile, and put them down, muse finished.
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| Mobile Shrine to Alan Measles |
And I decided I would stop "buying" the Guardian when I popped into Waitrose just because it is free if you spend £5 and I always spend £5 because things in Waitrose are somehow slightly nicer than the average foodstuffs and more expensive (what a strange coincidence) without being ridiculously gussied up for the wannabees as they are in Marks. Because I get into the Guardian and find its columnists worth reading as long as you take a bit of time over them. Therefore, the Guardian is wasting my time and my brain when I should be working. (To start with, I found the Guardian impenetrable. But you get used to it, and the effort it takes to read. You get to like it. Just like the crossword, which is REALLY hard.)
Anyway, I have failed to stick to these resolutions (apart from reading narratives, I have not read a novel or story since the Christmas hols) and I am rather glad, because life shouldn't be all horrid. There should be some changes and developments, and although my idea of narrowing was only temporary (the next 6 months), I can't bear it because my work is OK but not my passion.
My original resolution was: eat mainly soup. This is not a bad idea either because I am very overweight and I never have been overweight before. I have lost the knack of losing weight. Also, I really like soup, so it's do -able. The trouble is, I also have a husband and son for whom I cater and they are not satisfied with soup.
So far this year I have cooked dishes I haven't cooked before (duck with cherry sauce, last night, and something with meatballs (very good idea, meatballs, quick and tasty)) and that's a much better resolution: cook some new dishes!
And although I really wanted to get involved with the Green Party this turns out to be not do-able either, as my local branch meets on Wednesday evenings, when I teach until 9 pm. I could do without teaching until 9 p.m. Basically, I want to do something worth doing with other people whom I might like, but this longing is being stymied at every turn.
Sad: I never saw the Germany exhibition at the BM (all over now) and I never saw the Rembrandts. Just never took the time out of my busy but meaningless schedule of working and hoovering, etc.
Saturday 3 January 2015
A Hard Day's Night
This is the first Beatles film, and I have seen it a number of times. It was on again this week so I had another look at it (it's only an hour and a half long) and I found it interesting enough to find out about it.
I found out that the Beatles did not only suggest the director, Richard Lester, but also the writer. The director had made a short, goonish film with Spike Milligan called the Running, jumping and lying down film, and they liked the style, which is included in the sequence where the Beatles escape from the theatre down the fire escape and start running around a field. It is choreographed but seems like a game, has visual jokes based on confounding expectations. In this scene, Lester took John's place as John was off in London signing his book, In his own Write. After this the style was always included in the Monkees TV Series, which I was more familiar with BEFORE I saw this film, but the film was the origin of the style.
The Beatles also chose the writer, Alun Owen. The screenplay was written by Alun Owen, who was chosen because the Beatles were familiar with his play No Trams to Lime Street, and he had shown an aptitude for Liverpudlian dialogue. McCartney commented, "Alun hung around with us and was careful to try and put words in our mouths that he might've heard us speak, so I thought he did a very good script."[6] Owen spent several days with the group, who told him their lives were like "a train and a room and a car and a room and a room and a room"; the character of Paul's grandfather refers to this in the dialogue.[7] Owen wrote the script from the viewpoint that the Beatles had become prisoners of their own fame, their schedule of performances and studio work having become punishing. The screenplay was nominated for an Oscar.
Because the Beatles weren't actors, the script is full of one-liners. This makes the film fast and snappy too. However, although John and Paul don't seem to act, George has a scene with a marketing man who is trying to sell merchandise to teens in which he seems to remain his own man, and Ringo just seems to be enjoying himself - has a great scene chatting to a boy by the Thames in Twickenham (which every reviewer mistakes for a canal).
The writer seems to have noticed that John was the one with the bolshie personality; although it is Ringo who runs away it is John who has their manager saying "You're a swine, John Lennon" at the end of the movie. You notice that John looks older than the others: he looks as though he is just outgrowing the idea of a rock band in suits and ties, he is probably fed up with not being able to wear glasses - he was very short-sighted, he is happiest singing his own music but eventually he will take a dislike to the whole idea of show business. The wonder is that he stayed with it for so long.
The writer picked up on the fact that John and Paul had Irish ancestry - so he makes Paul's grandfather Irish and in a scene at the police station, the latter recites a list of crimes and tortures the English had practised on the Irish. It's within a Keystone Kops kind of scenario where the police ask if their arrestees want a cup of tea before they all go running around ineffectually, so it's like finding a hand grenade in a bag of tennis balls. If you want to be reminded of realpolitik it's right there. And there is also a scene right in front of a bombed out church - this is the early 60s and the UK was still too poor to deal with bomb sites - and every shop and pub in this film full of snapshots, indicates poverty and hand to mouth living. Men had authoritarian voices and barked orders, indicating that they had done national service and were used to hierarchy. This is how the country really was, and this is what the Beatles, and the rest of us, were escaping from.
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| Fun with mirrors: John decides he doesn't look a bit like himself: and a great shot of a light reflector too! |
The Beatles also chose the writer, Alun Owen. The screenplay was written by Alun Owen, who was chosen because the Beatles were familiar with his play No Trams to Lime Street, and he had shown an aptitude for Liverpudlian dialogue. McCartney commented, "Alun hung around with us and was careful to try and put words in our mouths that he might've heard us speak, so I thought he did a very good script."[6] Owen spent several days with the group, who told him their lives were like "a train and a room and a car and a room and a room and a room"; the character of Paul's grandfather refers to this in the dialogue.[7] Owen wrote the script from the viewpoint that the Beatles had become prisoners of their own fame, their schedule of performances and studio work having become punishing. The screenplay was nominated for an Oscar.
Because the Beatles weren't actors, the script is full of one-liners. This makes the film fast and snappy too. However, although John and Paul don't seem to act, George has a scene with a marketing man who is trying to sell merchandise to teens in which he seems to remain his own man, and Ringo just seems to be enjoying himself - has a great scene chatting to a boy by the Thames in Twickenham (which every reviewer mistakes for a canal).
The writer seems to have noticed that John was the one with the bolshie personality; although it is Ringo who runs away it is John who has their manager saying "You're a swine, John Lennon" at the end of the movie. You notice that John looks older than the others: he looks as though he is just outgrowing the idea of a rock band in suits and ties, he is probably fed up with not being able to wear glasses - he was very short-sighted, he is happiest singing his own music but eventually he will take a dislike to the whole idea of show business. The wonder is that he stayed with it for so long.
The writer picked up on the fact that John and Paul had Irish ancestry - so he makes Paul's grandfather Irish and in a scene at the police station, the latter recites a list of crimes and tortures the English had practised on the Irish. It's within a Keystone Kops kind of scenario where the police ask if their arrestees want a cup of tea before they all go running around ineffectually, so it's like finding a hand grenade in a bag of tennis balls. If you want to be reminded of realpolitik it's right there. And there is also a scene right in front of a bombed out church - this is the early 60s and the UK was still too poor to deal with bomb sites - and every shop and pub in this film full of snapshots, indicates poverty and hand to mouth living. Men had authoritarian voices and barked orders, indicating that they had done national service and were used to hierarchy. This is how the country really was, and this is what the Beatles, and the rest of us, were escaping from.
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| There's more fun with mirrors in this scene. |
.jpg) |
| An impossible shot |
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| and more fun with mirrors here |
Friday 2 January 2015
Good times
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| Robin S and the best view ever from Cat Bells |
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The view from Borrowdale last Sunday
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| Also, you can see Derwent Water. |
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