This post must differ from the 1505 posts that preceded it.
There must be nothing about singing, fiction, writing, my lousy education, "discovering" the USA, learning French, RAF national service, what goes on in our kitchen, transmissions on BBC TV 4, my antipathy towards gardening, visits to Tesco, eating and drinking, cars and motorbikes, adolescence, The Guardian, a certain news announcer, unstylish clothes, my cleverclogs grandchildren, sexual timidity (Or is that covered by adolescence?), Rembrandt and Hogarth, Brexit, quantum mechanics, computers, ageing, or, God bless her, VR.
Why? I need to reassure myself I'm adaptable. Ancillary proof I've grown up.
An obvious subject: personal ignorance and (in response to Edbath's comment below) failings!
A rich vein indeed. Often a source of envy, shame, antagonism and a many other negative qualities. But let's have no false modesty. Let there be no confessions that turn out to be boasts (eg, I have little experience of tax evasion. Pop music has generally passed me by. I envy the clarity of thought of the working classes.)
Here we go.
I lack the analytical approach. That, for instance, The Wars of the Roses in conjunction with the Great Margarine Scare led to the election of DJT. Typical of why university was not for me.
People have tried to instruct me in day-to-day etiquette but I continue to blunder. No problem here in the UK, people quickly write me off as a social cripple. But this malaise has horrified women in foreign countries.
Nail maintenance. I keep on forgetting.
For reasons as yet unexplained my sense of humour is incompatible with humanity's general aims. I should be able to work out why but it seems the intellectual impulse is missing.
Tolkien. A huge zero.
Recipes. An even huger zero.
Enough for now but there’s more to come.
I am with you on Tolkien and nail maintenance, probably also on humour.
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ReplyDeleteThanks for the reminder. I'm setting off on my long walk again next Wednesday (from Newport, Wrekin) and must attend to my toenails before I depart.
ReplyDeleteI deleted my previous comment because it was off the point, and so is this one, but it had to be said.
Good try - but the second para seems a bit dependent. Agreed on Tolkien and recipes. Trash.
ReplyDeleteAll: I'm surprised. With Tolkien I thought it was me against the blogosphere. Expected stout defence from hairy-toed hordes.
ReplyDeleteSabine: Don't believe you for a minute. For me you've always been Übermensch. By the way, at some stalls in the Köln Christmas market, they did spell rum with an h.
Sir Hugh: An essential pre-ski-ing holiday preparation. The boots are so unforgiving.
Edsbath: I've modified things a bit to meet your much higher standards. But now I re-read your somewhat elliptical comment I can't be sure I've responded correctly. So let me add another failing: inability to accommodate others. And another: unwonted envy of others' conciseness.
Sorry about Tolkien. I guess he can be a bit like Marmite, but someone has to stand up for him among your blog commentators.
ReplyDeleteI read LoTR and appreciated his research. He was an Oxford professor of languages and brought much of his learning into what will stand as a seminal 20th century fairy story. Rather what Carroll's "Alice in Wonderland" did for the 19th. All the mythology had links to ancient languages and folk customs/religions.
When my children were small I used to have the delight of bedtime reading with them and read the whole of LoTR, chapter per night, to them.
My daughter (now approaching 60) has always remembered those readings, loves the books and refuses, point blank, to even see a clip of Jackson's film (which I think he made a pretty good fist of), since she does not wish to spoil those mental images, formed as a 10 year old.
She also adores Marmite.......
Avus: 'Tis a free world and I was not seeking to proselytise. This post was based on my ignorances and failings, to which I might well have added prejudices. I'd say it was the genre to which LotR belongs that I dislike except I am not even entirely consistent there. Wagner's Ring cycle embraces the hobgoblin ethos and just recently I blogged about about a streamed version of Die Walkure which not only moved me but grabbed me intellectually - a left and a right as they say in grouse-shooting. I would expect the same reaction from you regarding Elmore Leonard novels as I have towards Tolkien. Nobody reads their daughter to sleep with Leonard. But in my case admiration is tinged with envy at his way with dialogue - a miserable yet glorious world created out of just talk.
ReplyDeleteI may have the advantage of having lived a couple of years in a tropical country incl. sugar plantations just to show off that rhum is a specific type of rum. I spare you the details but should you be interested I am sure Google has the answer.
ReplyDeleteIf you visit the Medieval xmas market in Siegburg (close to Cologne) you may be able to taste the difference but depends on whether the rum stall is there this year. Anyway the Medieval market is fabulous esp. after dark.
You seem perfectly adaptable and I salute you for this post. And this comes from a foreign woman you have horrified in the past. Your incompatible sense of humor is what keeps me coming back.
ReplyDeleteAvus gives me the courage to admit that I read LotR to my little brother and so he named his first pet 'Naugrim' ... my good friend, known as the Water Rat, is a scholar who has been critical of the LotR volumes, but I cannot divorce it from my sisterly bonding with my little brother.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Colette that your sense of humour speaks to me, mein lieber Robbie, as does your love of German music (und der Rhein). I salute you with a quality ale! Prost!
Oh, and P.S., I've recently invested in a Japanese-produced footbath bucket, and it is wonderful!
Sabine: The one-upmanship game is not over. I too have spent time in tropical climes (Singapore, Kuala Lumpur) though more passively than you I suspect. Lolling in a sick quarters bed, reading book after book after book, as the medicoes made crude attempts to cure me of terminal athlete's foot. All it took was a Casevac (Casualty air evacution) flight back to dear old Blighty and the ailment disappeared never to return.
ReplyDeleteSickness forced me to cancel last year's Christmas Market visit in Aachen. I was heartslufted.
Colette: It says more about you than it does about me that I've been allowed back after my several acts of horrification. I have been honoured and I don't deserve it. And that's another thing about etiquette - apologise by all means but don't wallow in it. I sensed the wallow as I wrote but decided to let it stand. Later I'll cringe
I appreciate your flying visits. We must be polar opposites in the true magnetic sense. Your existence is embedded in my noggin. Occasionally the TV weather reports zoom outwards and reveal where our weather is coming from. Florida replaces Ireland as our westerly boundary, there are often circular disturbances which bring about a sense of foreboding. I worry about you. Meteorologically.
RW (zS): Theoretically Brexit shouldn't affect our friendship but it does. It makes it even more important. For me German is the most vital language of song and I need the comfort of being able to discuss it. And various other matters involving ingestion. Stay healthy my dear.
It might seem obvious but what exactly does a Japanese-produced footbath bucket do?