satguru 
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The week has passed safely, and preparing crowns has indeed speeded up a few times since my first which required a sleeping bag and flask. Almost. If the prophylactics survive the period until the replacements arrive all will be well. I now have a wedding to 'look forward to' (I only look forward to my own, the rest tend to be varying ordeals to uncomfortable to utter torture, since the tea dance in 1977 where I fell in love with a blonde I danced with who apparently gave me a false address) a few days prior to the prosthetic teeth being fitted, which to be fair is a fairly short service followed by another tea dance (saving money I suspect) in a venue I used to spend many weekends in for our youth club, and of course will be asking Grace who darn well ought to come with me.
My new phone is already gathering dust, although now on its brand new cover, the supplier estimated 5 days plus weekends for the sim card I need to use it, ten days later bugger all, while the cover was ordered yesterday on Amazon, estimated 8 days and arrived today. So the phone is in its nice new cover and turned off. I emailed Virgin today as I suspect the operator didn't understand enough English to know what I wanted. Asking me to take it up with the retailers was the major clue, after telling him the phone worked perfectly, and not appearing to know when and where to send the card has pretty well confirmed the suspicion.
Ahead it's pretty clear, there's an old council sign a couple of miles from another place in Kent I've just been to, if I can get there in daylight on a Sunday to avoid the suburban traffic via Croydon, more to cover some different ground than the sign which doesn't get in the main collection. I haven't heard from the couple about New Year either which is important as they require as much food as everyone else between them and need to know what needs buying. The crisps, filled rolls and salad usually kept me going a week or more as I always got more than was eaten, but this is a late one so just snacks as most people will have eaten already and probably end up with enough cakes left over for a month which is not a good thing. It's a shame everyone here lives so far away as I could have added a good many more if not.
Looking back on 2012 (it's almost time really) I did more than the previous few put together. Having more energy was the main reason, plus my photo project, and being invited to a number of parties and events locally which weren't outside my frame of safety. A simple example was when I used to take my pupils to court for their law courses, and found some where they opened the door to the gallery and people could drift in and out at will. It's not the places as such which get me but the obligation to be there for a fixed period. Like the dentist. And that's brought me right in a circle.
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Reply #1221. Dec 21 12, 8:30 PM
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satguru
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After 105 minutes I was only in Sidcup and almost dark, the main reason I went was to cover new areas on the map and the sign was a council one I hadn't got but not an essential, and turned back while I still had the ability and returned, having gained a good number of new red squares on the map which was why I went there otherwise I could have gone at night and hardly got any. Half an hour to Christmas, it's been with my father since our last one with my grandma in 2008, so just got enough family as they divorced long ago so can't see them both at once for any events.
With the photos done I can relax for a while and take more when I feel like it, planning a trip somewhere I've been before but on a new route. Grace will be accompanying me to the wedding next month, as one of my teachers says I am surrendering as whatever else I try she is there and no others except the serious pains in the rear end and worse. The attraction of certain events whatever we do to make others happen or avoid them tells me we can't beat the system, we think we do when we get what we want but all we're really doing is being drawn into something we were meant to do, and when we don't it's because we can't really make much happen at all. Even my recent photo trips have been touch and go as I've overslept and missed some, while being delayed and cutting some short like today.
If my new phone gets on the road in 2012 I will be pleased, but again phone, email and threaten (that's next) if they aren't prepared to play it's when they want it not me. The global's over now and learnt a new trick, if you want to be on the rating top list then don't just play selectively but stop when you're winning. I played div 8, didn't know 3/4 of the new questions and dropped off within a week. No place in history but won't happen again as if I reach 1800 I'm sticking next time. Unless I play hard core. |
Reply #1222. Dec 24 12, 5:42 PM
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satguru
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Christmas is over, I added a small area of uncovered Surrey before it got dark, and while I was coming back heard Winifred Atwell's number one record from 1954, with a familiar guitar strumming in the background, which my father confirmed would have been my grandpa. He wasn't interested in fame or chart success, only playing well, but I am and remember learning recently when I came home from holiday in 1976 to hear he was number one as a soloist (uncredited) playing Aranjuez Guitar Concerto, only to find this year the BBC made a mistake, played it and then said sorry, it was number three.
So although this wasn't his record or solo assuming it was him (90% till I can track it down) he did make it at least once, and probably far more as he was the guitar Tommy Steele played (ie Tommy held it and strummed while the sound was grandpa behind the partition), and reached number 3 in 1956 with the Ying Tong Song, again uncredited but at least now online somewhere (it may have been me...). He would have cringed me posting all this had he been alive but the number of people who knew him and learnt from his books who come back every time I mention Ivor Mairants means I am keeping his name alive, which at least gives me a better excuse. Two clicks later and various sources do confirm his presence as we thought, so although he was the last person to care that's one number one in the bag one way or another. I think the operative thing here is fate, as without being in the car with my father I may have worked it out, but he told me seconds after it began who it was and with the internet I have now ferreted it down to the details. It looks like they got another number one in 1956 as well with Poor People of Paris. I remember watching her on a stripped down piano in the 60s and started me off playing ragtime and boogie at an early age.
For a change I am now free for the forseeable future. I plan to return to Crayford at the weekend a different way as the 'direct route' is not always the best. Basically Bromley is always best avoided in and out and will in future, unless I'm going somewhere like Bromley. There's plenty to do in the house, use shopping vouchers this week before they run out, and maybe go to Essex if up in time. I'm phoning Virgin tomorrow, maybe I'll get a British operator this time (it seems to depend on the hours you call) who will probably find no such order and get me a new card within the week. Or not.
That's about all the repeatable news (and unrepeatable) for now, Spock out.
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Reply #1223. Dec 25 12, 8:06 PM
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| lesley153
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This one?  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umJxL4Gmx3Y
Imagine a piano medley being a Christmas number one now! She's on YouTube, playing all sorts of music, from honky-tonk to samba, Rachmaninoff to Rimsky.
How bizarre, to have an uncredited soloist. That's at least as daft as a song credited to a big band with Vocal Refrain.
Will we get the unrepeatable if we're patient?
Reply #1224. Dec 26 12, 7:45 AM
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satguru
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Yes, that's him. As far as I know he was always her guitarist on the recordings, certainly the two number ones and other hits. That has quite a good guitar introduction on the second one so a lot clearer than the others playing in the background. His solo was as part of Manuel and the Music of the Mountains, so the named artist was the orchestra and he was only paid a fee for the job and no further sales. He got a watch engraved as a gift for his success but little more but he didn't take any notice of charts, that was my department.
I think one way of making money is through poor customer service. I turned the phone on today to find it cut off, and called the operator, the woman yesterday deactivated it as soon as she ordered the new one, meaning no phone for about a week. I had a spare simply as sim cards come with new phones a lot of the time (no idea why as more people buy them as upgrades), and was credited enough to let everyone know the temporary number and a whole pile of free minutes from sheer embarrassment. That's a lot of calls but as I only used about 15 minutes of the last 90 given as a free promotion I don't know how I'll use all these as I only get a month. I expect I'll think of something, and am now using the new phone as the old one won't do anything anyway unless I put the spare card in.
The lectures I heard online recently refined my knowledge of the system. We can attempt anything we want in life but must accept the results the flow takes us as we only suffer when we fight it. It balances the active and passive sides and means although we have and use free will we can't be attached to the results. |
Reply #1226. Dec 27 12, 11:42 AM
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| lesley153
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Finding the clip was pure fluke - an hour before I spotted your forums post. I had no idea he was her long-term accompanist!
Thank you for reminding me, I haven't made a complaint for ages! I've had money from the supermarkets for bad produce, bad service, bad attitude; and a £15 voucher from Debenhams after a girl (they all knew who she was, but can't get rid of her: I have no idea why not, if she's lying to customers and losing sales) told me and another customer that the fitting rooms close 15 minutes before the shop closes. No they don't - they close when the shop closes. I still haven't used it.
Reply #1227. Dec 27 12, 2:44 PM
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satguru
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I am drifting in the wind (not mine) at the moment, a day off yesterday and scanned a load more old photos in, my mum's computer lesson today (having a famous grandpa/father means a lot of time for a new user to get through all the material), and then following up all his fellow musicians who are all our old friends and music teachers. My mum taught piano after her real job until I was born, so part of the school staff as well, who taught many of the actors and comedians how to play as well as pure musicians. Being before my time, as the school was sold in 1962 and a new shop was opened I met my musicians only through the shop, the most frequent visitors being The Spinners (all of them usually) who came for afternoon tea and often played a few songs afterwards. Many concert guitarists came in to select new ones, as well as the TV and folk regulars who came in for strings and considering it was their job wondered how some could remember the notes if they couldn't work out what strings they wanted after 30 years in the business.
I hope I can get to Crayford on Sunday, Monday is possible but have my usual visitors for New Year and would be a bit of a close call to get everything done in time. The gym closes early tomorrow so must shoot off, an hour late probably as I've got a booking, and need to tidy the place for the visitors which is looking more and more as if they will be doing it for me. But as I won't be there that day will be returning in time to open the door and put the food out. I'm not going to inconvenience myself too much missing dinner or whatever it takes to get an hour or two's grace to get it done first (my work booking used the time I was planning to use) and as long as people can sit down and put their food down on tables it's good enough. And then it's 2013, as if it makes a difference. |
Reply #1228. Dec 28 12, 7:31 PM
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satguru
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David's 2013 blog:
My visitors have now left and catching up on the second life online as usual. Odd and interesting things are happening already, ie more than usual. Firstly my friend's young son who added me on Facebook after his last visit to England (they left in 2002) replied to the first post of mine for months and says he unfriended me today. Now since the app has been running only a couple of surprises have done so, the rest being the sort of people who put someone's opinions ahead of their personality, who I can do without anyway. I disagree with the great majority of both my old friends and family on most aspects of life and politics so we rarely talk about them and carry on regardless. In life we are all equally given the freedom of our own opinions, and unless someone's go against me directly then it's their business not mine. Opinions being where it is a choice like food or music or books, not on facts where some people choose to guess one way or another where either no one really knows, or worse still they do yet they choose to stick with the idea they prefer as the reality freaks them out. No examples here or I'll probably start another bloody argument...
Anyway, you like a person first and their opinions are simply part of who they are. I've met loads of people who share my ideas and are absolutely nothing like me and not worth hanging out with at all, like the women on dating sites who are perfect on paper. As his parents are in touch with me I wonder what the outcome will be, as it's not so easy to cut and run when there are still connections.
Then after I predicted Obama would avoid the fiscal cliff by minutes yesterday he delivered as I virtually guaranteed, not because I use a crystal ball but because these things are planned in advance and staged to mould public opinion. So it wasn't really a prediction as based on a decision made long ago I just worked out as I know how politics operates behind the scenes. Unlike the Greek non-default this was announced so close to the event (rather than non-event) no one had the time to forget and had it in writing clearly enough to remember. I hope it will make a few people think how politics isn't a random set of actions but an engineered choreographed sham which gives the impression of two sides working for the common good but really one side working for their own good. You need examples, I have now offered two.
Along with the bad and the ugly, here's the good. It's also bad and ugly, but the outcome is good. I just discovered a major political pressure group (no time to look up the name) run by scientists (what, did someone say 'What's politics got to do with science?') claimed the acidification of the oceans by 2050 would make coral die out. Coral is over 400 million years old, and the CO2 levels then were in the 1000s of parts per million, so they have both exposed themselves as idiots, and then when they continued the claim (it was first made in 2009) after someone pointed out it was impossible, as liars. I have never made claims about nefarious activities before I knew they were enough to convince a jury, as that is my own training, rather than science. Like the Crown Prosecution Service really. If people want someone caught red handed before they will believe any wrongdoing then here it is, QED. |
Reply #1229. Dec 31 12, 10:42 PM
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satguru
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The new year has been and gone, all my visitors arrived and as usual have enough snack food for a month or more as more was brought than needed. Yesterday was a day off, the shops were nearly all closed but got a cable so the new printer could go in the same room as the computer and oddly enough although it has a scanner I didn't need it and the other packed up. Today I was scanning and pressed the wrong button and the broken one started up again, and is actually still better than the new one (certainly doesn't turn out junk) although 12 years old as when you're dealing with imaging you must have the best as you keep the results all your life saving a few pennies is pointless.
Today was doing my mum's garden, it was pouring with rain but other than having no hat as I wasn't expecting her to ask me when I got there was protected below there so just cleared the dead plants till it got dark. It's yet another Big Brother series tomorrow (since it was taken up by a different channel they've run a third per year which although fun wipes out many evenings I ought to be doing something else) so no way is Grace going to get me anywhere or anyone else. She rang before I got home this evening but was a 2 hour detective programme on and unfortunately unless she decides to become my actual girlfriend I don't miss TV for anything else unless it furthers my career.
So no other plans, I did get to Greenwich last weekend for a sign I'd lost the first time and some more places, and Crayford is pencilled in for the next Sunday I can as it's the best day to cover 20 miles of solid suburbia. I've also made a couple more calls to the radio this week as they've been talking politics, and turned out to be my best subject in school. Funnily enough my mother told me to take sociology instead of politics in my second degree option, and got one of my two best marks in it. I never found much excitement or more than common sense stating the obvious but that was probably why I did so well in the end as it just seemed descriptive. Politics is based on logic in its pure sense, while the ideology is more either emotionally based or a lack of information about the logic of serving the most people with the least resources as is the standard problem faced by politicians.
In fact I'd say the majority of political activists do so as they don't know the practical consequences of their ideologies, most of all that many would dislike the country they would create if they actually managed to carry out their extreme plans. We have a portion of them already here, with the human rights laws putting criminals ahead of victims, and offering benefits to illegal immigrants. That's my money they're giving them, yet if I went to most of the countries they came here from do you think they'd give me anything except a boot up the backside and a flight home at my expense?
I am currently conserving my energy for the next trip, getting photos scanned, tying up various loose ends in the house which normally get passed over when taking and entering photos, and hopefully will hardly ever forget anything again as my new phone has an organiser on it. But only when I enter the reminders. I also have to find somewhere to refill my ink cartridges or I can't print the latest photos and fed up buying new ones. |
Reply #1230. Jan 02 13, 6:09 PM
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satguru
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It's been a really quiet week, besides doing my mum's garden and shopping I've been nowhere, and spent over a day scanning as many old photos I could find not yet added to the computer, which doesn't leave much time for other things, yesterday besides TV in between I spent 9 hours doing them either side of the programmes, and only stopped as it was tomorrow morning and had to sleep.
Carole from the north is coming tomorrow, I put her off last week twice so only a matter of it coming back from the delays. I don't know where to go, if she wants to go to the park (and they're open) I'll manage, the garden centre close the cafe till the spring and there's another one I saved if required and she wants a change. I'd rather have nothing and wanted to go shopping as I have my M&S vouchers again and wanted to go to the big one in Kew with a car park as I was heading that way later anyway. She misses the odd trip for various reasons and tomorrow would be a good one to miss for me as well.
I got another sign and new area last weekend (bear in mind it gets dark at 4 and well over an hour to get anywhere new, often two), and hope I can do the final planned one east on Sunday. The next known is the dire wedding in two weeks, the only other wedding I ever want to go to again is my own, this is local and only an afternoon, but apart from the dancing Jewish weddings and funerals are amazingly similar. That includes food, gossip, family members you haven't seen since the last one, prayers (most are the same with extra ones for the occasion added), and in their favour funerals last a fraction of the time.
Till then I'm free so far, I must phone my new friend as I haven't heard from her since she said we must meet up before Christmas and I then sent her an email. The major problem is where she lives as it's too difficult for either of us and only manage somewhere to meet as an exception rather than a rule. You can only really go with the flow- getting dark after lunch is a very clear example as you can't beat nature, and the smaller events are no easier to avoid than the sun setting, but because they are smaller people think they can beat them, but if they're outside our field of influence we just have to deal with it, like where my friend lives. Trying to move fixed points is never going to work. |
Reply #1231. Jan 04 13, 8:50 PM
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satguru
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I think I got guided today. When a woman (it's only women) is arriving for a date, either I work out somewhere I don't mind going to or am stuck with their choice (if it's one I like that's fine, but spent years letting them decide in case it won them over, it never did). So working my way round the local cafes which are still open the old cake shop was next, and as my friend in America's wife worked there when it was only a cake shop with no coffee on site when the boss arrived (he only had two or three shops maximum and always been on the premises since we moved there in 1965 or so) kept him up to date with them, and turned out the woman in front of me (she had her back to me before so didn't see her face) was a regular customer in the shop he owned and I worked in so had a message from both of them to pass on. We then went for a walk in the park I used to live up the road from and drove round Muswell Hill which she hadn't seen before. I did have two other things to do if not but can wait till next week.
Having just read the most thorough analysis of climate figures so far by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (one of the top institutions in the world for science) showing it's almost impossible to find any man made influence it basically means if the UN keep to their story they are now deliberately rejecting new data, which is a crime. They are not scientists but politicians, so if they pick and choose data to suit them and grow rich as a result, they are running a major racket and should all follow Bernie Madoff for 150 years. Such studies are the highest level available, above NASA, East Anglia etc, as besides NASA not being a climate organisation the others work for the UN so are being briefed as to what to spend their grants on and outside the independent scope of an outside university. When Berkeley did the same thing and found the opposite (almost, the caveats were damning) the media blasted it worldwide, as if it was good news the climate was going down the toilet!
This, which should be the best news for everyone as it almost guarantees man made warming is absent, has not been reported beyond the internet. In fact unless the media have been working overnight when I look again it won't be. That tells me far more than the data itself. |
Reply #1232. Jan 05 13, 5:53 PM
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| lesley153
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I think I've seen a suggestion that global warming has stopped (we knew that) and won't start again till 2017 (clutching at straws?). Five years ahead? is that like the minicab operator's Five Minutes, Luv?
Reply #1233. Jan 05 13, 9:01 PM
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satguru
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The simple answer is they haven't a clue. I've pulled apart hundreds of years of lines, and the decadal oscillations, solar activity and el nino cycles clearly caused 99% of all before 1850, as besides the volcanoes which did the rest that was it. They couldn't be predicted then either as each works independently so would mean predicting a minimum of four known phenomena which are partly cyclical and partly random, plus the solar is divided into rays, spots and distance, so further complicated. So besides the Met. Office downgrading their own guess for the 2010s (from a hockey stick to a hockey pitch) what it does say is they pretty well know it's unlikely to be heading up as there's no other cause from it than added CO2, and its effects seem to be wearing off now (as if they ever started, but that's the perception). But good news either way.
I got to Bexley yesterday for the sign and new places (see the forum for the photo), the Crayford border was actually just along the main road, and looking at the geography needed a large block to be rounded to add more red spots to the map, and after well over 1 1/2 hours needed to save my energy to get back, I'm no longer 30 when I could drive 8 hours without noticing and then go and teach somewhere else for an hour. Some days it gets me tired and must now pace myself regardless if people 20 years older can still do 8 hours, I am not. But I went back a different way and covered a little more ground that way.
Today was shopping, two very cheap old records, another cheap Observer book (I got a bunch when being made in the 60s and 70s and occasionally add to it as they are part of history), and after being told twice the new phone couldn't be heard at the other end took it in and they said it sounded fine, and I tested it myself at home and it did (I should have listened myself in the shop just to be sure), so apparently a short term thing. Tomorrow's free (not an idea in sight) besides my late visitor as always, I may go to Grace on Wednesday to sort out her printer ribbon order (that's a relationship from heaven isn't it...), and doing my mum's garden again Thursday and a work booking in the evening.
It's gone a bit quiet and will just see what comes to me tomorrow. I have written a piece on extremist politics of the past and present which hopefully will teach a few people what to avoid, and linked my fraud website to Facebook now to increase its coverage. It covers every aspect of organised fraud, from historic examples to current ones, compares them which is very easy as they all do the same thing in different ways, and how they get away with it by exploiting people's natural weaknesses. The theory being the more people can see the signs the fewer will miss them and see through the illusion. Basically once you know you can't be fooled so see one and you can see them all, and unlike the climate this is darned easy and incredible anyone ever gets caught more than once or doesn't learn from past examples.
I am hoping something else interesting will pop up, I'm looking for signs again as only really the ones in deepest Sussex left which would be dark till about March before I can try and get them as totally remote. Everything else is a mystery. |
Reply #1234. Jan 07 13, 9:29 PM
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satguru
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| I was waiting to hear from Grace today in case I could go there and do some things on the computer for her, and found plenty on my own so when she didn't call had better things to do so not exactly worried. I'm doing my mum's garden again tomorrow as her gardener's away for the winter and that's about it for the moment. Otherwise I'm just getting on with whatever comes my way, there's TV at 8pm onwards so no arrangements made tonight, and am doing my best to get the new Israeli climate study out to the media. The Met Office revision of their decadal temperature predictions is a tiny start which thank goodness all the media picked up straight away, but would all be wiped out if the major studies were reported as well. There must be a good reason for that. |
Reply #1235. Jan 09 13, 12:20 PM
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satguru
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It turned out Grace thought I was free from 4 not at 4, but did her bit on the phone and will have to see her next week instead now. Everyone else has a sore throat although mine was very mild and virtually gone but now feeling a bit feverish but probably not. I've been up most of the last few nights as there were so many new climate reports affirming what I'd said for years at long last- NASA's massive study showing far greater solar effects than expected, future estimates being reduced and the Hebrew University's totally unreported analysis showing there almost certainly was never any global warming. Having graphs showing correlations with long term ocean and solar cycles and almost none with CO2 already it's clear to anyone who looks the causes of temperature rises are nearly all accounted for already, and blaming me and you despite other studies showing the CO2 followed the temperature rises as the ocean releases it when it does we are stuck with a 'consensus' which is 101% (to use their own style of science) political.
Unless I find another sign I'm pretty well stuck till the end of March now for new photos, anywhere worth getting would be far too late when I got there so will look for other things to do, something usually comes to me at the time, and sent Carole packing for tomorrow as I'm not going anywhere else until I get rid of whatever I've got. She and Louise had something like it when I saw them but so did my mum who didn't. I'm still working with the angels and wondering what they have for me next. |
Reply #1236. Jan 10 13, 8:51 PM
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satguru
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As I've done so little this week it's time to look around and see what ideas I can come up with. Besides having the same cold everyone I've seen this week has (at least it's mainly the borderline fever and tiredness rather than the usual respiratory activity which is far worse) it hasn't stopped me doing whatever I had to, and a great excuse to miss out Carole although I had to go to Marks and Spencer over the river tomorrow regardless and couldn't see here either way. Despite three tests now some people still can't hear me on the new phone (some can so improving) but no idea what could be causing it.
It's just over a week now till my friend's wedding, maybe easier if started a bit later but otherwise just one of those small sacrifices we have to make in life occasionally. I'm far too old and bitter to really be interested in other people's successes with the opposite sex as if I should celebrate, do they celebrate when I get something published or on TV? Now if they were filming it for TV I'd change my attitude, but spending an afternoon (thank god it's only an afternoon, the all day ones almost killed me back in the 80s) locked in a hall with all sorts of people and appearing to enjoy myself is beyond the call of duty. I think most people wait till around 70 or 80 to become proper miseries but I didn't need nearly as long to perfect the art.
Otherwise I have been up all hours doing research online, and have collected vast amounts of recent climate data which even if only one reaches the general public would blow a major hole in their case. The media and politicians are taking one of the least important and verifiable issues of history and treating it as if the aliens have landed in War of the Worlds. Mass hysteria is a genuine phenomenon, and I have little idea as to how to influence it from outside to bring it to an end. Normally it affects a minority so although just as real it is unable to affect society as a whole. This time only the ones with a recessive gene can remain immune, and have no ability to communicate with those affected. That's the next study on my list. Meanwhile they all get posted on my website, on a good day 50 people can read them, but that's an exception. Unless many thousand read anything, better a million you're talking to the wall. Nice bricks, by the way. |
Reply #1237. Jan 11 13, 8:14 PM
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| lesley153
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Mazeltov to your friend!
Is Grace accompanying you? It might help focus your mind on your own path. That's if you need help.
Yes, same bricks I talk to. Nice colour.
Reply #1238. Jan 12 13, 1:01 PM
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satguru
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| She is, if I have to go through it I may as well take the edge off somehow. I see anything like that like work nowadays, and have to pay as well. I may be cynical but had years to learn. |
Reply #1239. Jan 12 13, 4:44 PM
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| lesley153
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Do you expect anyone to pinch your cheeks and say "Please God by you"?
Reply #1240. Jan 12 13, 6:46 PM
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