Centennial

– There you go. What do you think?
– Impressive. What am I looking at?
– It may not seem much, but it represents a significant achievement.
– Excellent... And?
– And there it is. The hundredth post.
– Of what?
– Of this blog.
– Oh, right. You still writing that?
– Yes. I have written one hundred posts. Here they all are. Would you like me to read them to you?
– It's kind of you to offer, but perhaps not just right now. I'm sure I'll get round to them one day. Something to look forward to.
– Perhaps a few highlights?
– Are there any?
– Well, in a way. Perhaps there isn't much of a unifying theme to it all: no over-arching storyline. Or common thread. Or anything, really. You might say it veers towards being unstructured.
– Structure isn't everything. People make too much of it sometimes.
– Exactly.
– Sometimes it's better to just go with the flow. See where it takes you.
– That's what I was trying to achieve. I think.
– Although, having said that, it can give the impression that you're just making it up as you go along.
– Does it come across like that?
– It's not for me to say. Not having read any.
– Of course. But do you think it's worth continuing with?
– What are the alternatives?
– That's what I keep asking myself.
– I could draw up a few suggestions, if that would help.
– I don't know. Perhaps I should persevere. Perhaps this is my true calling in life.
– Really? Let me draw up a few suggestions. It's not a decision to be made lightly.

Wizard

– And how was the film?
– It was very good. Not as many hobbits this time, compared to the previous ones. Mainly dwarves. You get many more dwarves for your money. And about the same number of elves. And various other more gruesome things. There's quite a lot of gruesome things, to tell the truth: orcs and goblins and trolls and irate albino wolf things. It all gets a bit overwhelming at times: there is so much going on that you can't always take in all the details, even on the big screen. And then things leap out at you, in a three-dimensional sort of way. And it goes on for hours. It was difficult for me to keep awake at times.
– I thought it was full of fast-paced action and not so mild peril.
– Definitely. It's not a film to doze through, particularly if you don't want horrific orcish nightmares. The problem was I didn't get much sleep last night. Food poisoning, I think.
– Someone is trying to murder you? That sounds quite serious. You ought to tell someone about it. The police usually take an interest in that sort of thing.
– I mean, I think it was just something I ate. Possibly even something I cooked. Which is a pity, given I'm usual careful about that sort of thing.
– You can never be too careful about hygiene in the kitchen. You should wash your hands.
– Yes. I do. And the vegetables. And work surfaces.
– Glad to hear it. Perhaps you forgot to cook the meat.
– Perhaps.
– Still, it may be worth informing the police. Just to be on the safe side.

Patch

– There. Fixed.
– Excellent... What's fixed?
– The laptop. There were several things not working. Seemingly unrelated, but clearly they were related. Because they are all now fixed.
– So, how did you fix it?
– I don't exactly know. It was something technical. There was a discussion of the problem on the web. And a patch. It seemed to work. So far. But it might yet all go wrong again.
– That's the thing about computers: they are intrinsically delicate. You have to pamper them. And hope they don't go wrong. You sometimes think they should be a little simpler.
– As in fewer keys on the keyboard?
– I mean, you get the impression that the underlying software and operating systems and applications and whatever are forever getting more complex and interconnected and interdependent, with new updates pasted on top of older ones, and patches upon patches, till you get a system that will collapse into chaos next time a butterfly flaps its wings in the general vicinity. Sometimes you just want to make everything slicker, start afresh with a blank piece of paper, get the design right first time. That's how I used to try and write software in my youth. Clearly it wasn't doing anything particularly sophisticated, generally just saying "Hello, world", but the idea is the same.
–  I could find you a blank piece of paper if that would help.

Vacation

I have been struggling, over the last few days, to sort out holidays, and travel arrangements, and a myriad of related topics. Not my favourite task, as it takes me a while (or, more correctly, an eternity) to decide what I want to do, and when, and for how long. Not to mention having a back-up plan in case it should rain. And it's not the sort of thing that you can take your time over: the clock is ticking, metaphorically. (Most of the clocks in my possession seem pretty silent nowadays, which will rather weaken the metaphor for future generations. Another unintended consequence of modern technology.)

There was once a time when you could stroll along to your high street travel agent, and explain to them, in a hand-waving sort of way, what type of holiday you were after; such as sitting on a beach, or by a lake, or on top of a mountain; with, if you were particularly into these things, some rough indication as to the country or continent you were most interested in. And they would smile sweetly at you and thumb through a few brochures and tell you that your perfect holiday was this or that, without giving you much of a say in the matter, unless you particularly objected to the hotel décor, or had some moral qualms regarding the form of government practised in the country in question. But now you are expected to do it all yourself, spending hours online searching websites that purport to address all your travel needs in one go, but which, you suspect, are actually there to make money for lots of people other than yourself, especially as they frantically encourage you to complete your booking this instant before the special offers disappear for ever. But, on the plus side, it is certainly interesting to able to see all the options available to you rather than be presented with whatever your travel agent happens to be keen on, even if the choice can be somewhat overwhelming. Though I notice that, on these websites, the advanced search dialogue box rarely gives you much choice over the hotel décor, let alone your preferred form of government.

Sledge

It's cold. There is snow on the ground. The centre of town was unusually quiet this afternoon, as if people didn't see the point of venturing out. Presumably because of the cold. And the snow.

Children were dragging sledges, though if truth be told there was not enough snow for a decent slide. The grass made every effort to poke through.

In the distance, the hills looked whiter. And colder. If any sheep were out in the fields, they were not easy to spot. Perhaps they had more sense.

It is difficult to drum up much enthusiasm for January. Maybe this is a particularly low point, now the festivities are well behind us, and the next pay day at some ill-defined time in the future. The sales are petering out, along with a few of your favourite stores. The New Year's resolutions of shedding weight and getting fit seem somewhat futile when all you want to do is curl up on the sofa with an Ovaltine and an Eccles cake.

A bleakly crumbling ruin. I can sympathise with it.

Economics

Too many business are closing down at the moment: well-known high street chains such as HMV and Blockbusters are heading towards administration, following the demise of Jessops and Comet in recent weeks. Perhaps January is a particularly sensitive time of the year, when the critical Christmas profits start to look a little thin, and creditors decide there is a limit to their patience. The companies that go under tend to be ones that have not kept up to speed with technological advances in the marketplace and changes in consumers' shopping habits: folk no longer go down to the shops to rent a DVD, or buy a camera, or a CD, or a book. Or pretty much anything else, it seems. The massive choice and bargains available on-line only serve, in the long run, to reduce our choice and narrow our horizons. And along the way, long-established brands disappear over night. It is, they say, a necessary pre-condition for economic recovery: the pruning of the deadwood to give some chance for new growth to make headway. But along the way we seem to be losing so much. We still mourn the disappearance of Woolworths, and not just for the pick-and-mix. Our high streets are the poorer: limited now to fashionable coffee shops and charity shops and not much else.

This is hardly a cheerful post, but there are times when you rightly despair of being in the economic doldrums, and the lack of inspiration demonstrated by our leaders for doing anything about it, or even acknowledging the reasons why we have ended up in this position. Perhaps it is time to try something different. I could start my own political party and challenge the ineffectual two/three-party system that has dragged us to these depths. I will have to think hard about this. Sound economic policies may be useful, but then, on reflection, other parties seem to do quite well without them. You can, I believe, to a large extent just make it up as you go along.

Sprinkle

– The first snow of winter. A white carpet, carpeting the landscape as far as the eye can see. In whiteness.
– It's a bit disappointing, really. Hardly a carpet. More of a sprinkling. Sort of melted as soon as it landed.
– But you can use your imagination. Or if you put your mind to it, you could even gather all the snow from the garden together in one spot. So if not quite a carpet, at least a rug.
– But do we want everywhere covered in snow? It may look pretty, and Christmassy, but I've rather moved on: I'm already looking forward to spring, and the arrival of daffodils, and daylight stretching into a decent hour of the evening, rather than wanting to be reminded of Yule logs and brandy butter and that sort of thing.
– It's nice to have a little bit of snow once a year. Helps to bring to mind the gentle passing of the seasons: how Nature is slumbering peacefully, awaiting the rebirth of the warming spring sun.
– Not to mention the difficulty of travelling anywhere. Roads never get gritted, the drive to work is twice as slow, impossible to walk along the pavement without serious risk of injury.
– You're not really into winter, I can tell.
– I just think it hasn't really been thought through properly. It's all very well to have things looking pretty, but there are practical aspects that have been left out of the equation. Take Cat for an example: Cat understands what I mean. She is motivated by a blunt pragmatism, such as the need to pay a visit to the garden once a day. Which becomes difficult when it's covered in several inches of snow. I think she still holds bitter memories of last winter.
– True. It's not her favourite season. She's barely gone out this winter even before the snow came.
– We could suggest hibernation to her. Leave a box filled with straw next to the radiator and see if she takes the hint.

Caffeine

I have got into the habit of doing a suduko first thing on a Saturday morning. This is the suduko from the Sunday paper. Last Sunday's paper. But it takes me all week to get around to do it, and the thought of getting another newspaper tomorrow with another suduko inside somehow adds to the pressure. These things will start to pile up if you're not careful. Especially as these particular sudokos seem quite tricky. There are plenty of easy examples out there, which you can complete in a matter of seconds, boldly filling in cell after cell in ink from the off. Whereas the ones in the Sunday paper have precious few obvious clues, and you find yourself having to annotate practically every cell with minute scribblings in pencil before you spot the single clue that unlocks the whole puzzle. Unless I am doing it wrong. Which is also why it ends up being Saturday morning when I complete it. I often start on a Friday evening, idly going over the suduko and accompanying crossword, only to end up getting stuck after 5 minutes, convinced that both puzzles are fatally flawed and I have been held back by misprints or deliberate, if not wilfully malicious, red herrings on the part of the compiler. And then on a Saturday morning, refreshed after a pleasant night's sleep and having recovered from the irritating stresses of the working week, with the sun streaming through the kitchen window and the cat purring contentedly next to the radiator, I positively whizz through these things. The large cafetière of coffee probably helps too. And there was also a jam doughnut this morning, a little tired compared to the plump freshness of yesterday, but still not bad at all, considering.

Antelope

So, I managed to buy a new television yesterday. It seemed about time I upgraded to something a little more modern. And the sales are still on at the moment, which encourages you to go for any bargains on offer. Though I'm never quite sure how much of a bargain some of the bargains actually are. Perhaps I'm not trusting enough.

I always agonise over purchasing major items of household equipment. Years can go by before I make my mind up, in which time the technology has moved on. And with televisions, technology marches on fairly briskly. Part of the problem is that I get put off by the enormous choice available: when you walk into your local electrical retailer, the multitude of televisions that confronts you is rather like witnessing vast herds of antelope roaming the African plains; literally so, if some wildlife programme is being shown simultaneously on every screen. And how are you meant to decide on which one to buy, other than rejecting the large fraction of screens that are actually wider than your living room wall. Unless, of course, you want to have the screen placed diagonally across the middle of the room, which would give you a bit more space to play with, but may make it difficult to get to the kitchen. It is another of these instances where you start to wonder whether technology is running away with itself, while at the same time leading us by the nose, and whether a simpler life would not be less stressful.

At least the thing is installed and working now. I'm not sure how I managed it, other than by carefully unplugging the old television and ensuring all the wires were fitted back into vaguely similar holes on the new one. If I had to follow the wiring instructions in the manual I would still be struggling with it until the sun grew cold, at which point whether it was connected correctly or not would become pretty much irrelevant.

Epiphany

– There. That's it all done: Christmas tree dismantled; decorations put away; last of the turkey and pudding finished off.
– Well done. Is there a problem?
– It all seems so – final.
– Until next year. Or rather later this year. In 11 months' time, or so, it'll all be out again.
– It always feels as if you're packing away a large chunk of your life. And then burying it in the loft, out of sight.
– True. But otherwise you'd only get weary of it: even the tinsel would start to pall after a few months. And the tree would just get in the way if you wanted to hoover, or hold a party, or whatever. It's better this way, believe me. And then it will all be fresh and exciting again next December.
– I suppose so. Perhaps it is because you put such a lot of effort into trying to make this a jolly time of year for everyone, you feel deflated when it's over and done with. And you realise you have to return to the grey drudgery of work tomorrow.
– Ah yes. Work. Is it really grey?
– Compared with tinsel, yes.
– But it's a time to start again: renewed, refreshed; possibly even sober by now. As in the words of the popular ditty:

The old year now away is fled,
The new year it is enterèd,
Then let us now our sins down tread,
    And joyfully all appear.
Let's merry be this holiday,
And let us run with sport and play,
Hang sorrow, let's cast care away,
    God send you a happy new year!

Wall

– Nice to see the weather improving. Or at least, not raining all day long.
– Rain is all very well, but you can have too much of it sometimes. Tends to dampen the spirits. Metaphorically. And somehow also literally.
– Talking of rain, the river looked pretty high yesterday when I was visiting Chester. Not sure it was really meant to be spilling over the sides the way it was. Sort of got in the way when I was trying to stroll along. That and the swans.
– It's always wise to be wary of swans. They are inherently unpredictable.
– But the weather was good, mostly. It's nice to be able to take time out from the hustle and bustle of life and just wander aimlessly along the river. Watching the boats bobbing along; happy families having a day out feeding the ducks; seagulls huddling together, wondering how to get back to the sea.
– Cities with rivers are always interesting. And walls. Chester has walls. Gives you a sense of security to have walls around your city.
– Although they have to be picturesque mediaeval walls, with the occasional tower.
– True. Modern concrete walls with barbed wire along the top are somehow less comforting.
– I walked all the way along the walls. I wasn't sure if it was possible: whether there would be a bit missing.
– As in a sudden chasm? With maybe only a flimsy rope bridge to get across?
– Well, perhaps, or maybe just a bit of pavement or dual carriageway to navigate.
– The rope bridge would have been interesting. Or a vine to swing across.

Appraisal

The second day of 2013. No resolutions broken to date. But then neither, for that matter, have I managed to make any.

I should try harder. But making resolutions takes such effort. You have to reflect deeply on outstanding flaws and defects in your personality and/or lifestyle, and decide how these might be redressed in terms of moderately challenging yet ultimately achievable goals. And then go out and implement this programme of self-improvement for as long as possible, or at the very least till mid-January. At which point, the fact that you have failed doesn't seem so bad, as you have at least made an effort to overcome your deficiencies, even if at the end of the day you still have them. And possibly a few others, such as a proven inability to complete a simple set of self-improvement tasks. I have enough of this sort of thing with my annual appraisal at work. It is not particularly motivating.

It was drizzly again today. To be topical, I thought I would post a picture I took on Christmas Day.  The white stuff is clouds, descending quite low, rather than snow, which has yet to appear around these parts.

Christmas Day. View from local hill. Mostly cloud.

Beginning

Good morning. And a Happy New Year.

I don't usually write in the morning. But I thought this would be a positive start to 2013. And would demonstrate to the world that I am actually awake. Like getting up in the dark to feed the cat, and opening the living room blinds in order to impress the neighbours, before slinking off back to bed.

My apologies for a somewhat downbeat post last night. But I have been severely ill since Christmas: feeling generally out-of-sorts (or, more descriptively, yuck) and sneezing uncontrollably. In this condition, I find it difficult to come out with inspiring prose to welcome in the New Year. I hadn't even had any intoxicating drink at the time of writing last night, but a diet of party food and nibbles does not do anything to improve your spirits or digestion. This morning I tried to gain some helpful vitamins by finishing off whatever continental fruited bread products I could find in the kitchen: thus the remains of the panettone, and the stollen; and to keep the festive theme going, some brioche, which does not contain any dried fruit, but can be made more nutritious by gentle toasting and smearing with brandy butter. I am not sure I would recommend this as a hangover cure but it at least helps to make the kitchen less cluttered.