This year, the Sage has had several long, uncomfortable and expensive visits to the dentist. He hasn't needed anything much doing for ages before this, but they all seem to be giving trouble at the same time. Think of him at 4 o'clock, preferably when you're not eating a toffee.
Before that, to cheer him up a bit, I'm taking him to look at laptops. Not with an idea to buy one, just so he can decide what size screen he wants. He looked at Dilly's a bit anxiously last week and said he didn't think it would be big enough. I assured him he can have one as big as he likes. After that, he's made an appointment with the curator at the museum in Norwich to look at their Lowestoft cat and compare it with the one from the sale before it's delivered to its new owner.
I see that there's an exhibition of 19th century photography at the British Library. I absolutely love early photography. Not the stilted studio photographs, not that I've anything against them as such, but the sense of time and place in them. I must get to it - it's on until early March so there's plenty of time, but I'll try to set a date before Christmas because I know what it's always like - I'll put it off until the last minute otherwise and then not get around to it. Actually, I had to look up where it is as I've never been to the British Library. It's free too - do go, darlings, if you can. It'll be marvellous.
Anyway, with a rare example of efficiency and earliness, I'm off to the Post Office to tax my car for the next year. With two new rear tyres, it passed its MOT and so I might as well get the job done while I think of it. I'm not doing it online - I did that last year and they apparently sent the new tax disc but it never arrived, nor did its replacement. After three weeks, they finally sent it special delivery. Since I'd sold the car by then and just wanted it back to get a refund, it was a pain in the neck. I'm not playing that sort of game again. In any case, the nice couple at the post office are despondent enough at the thought of the reduced business because of the strike, so I'd rather give them my custom.
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19 comments:
Hmmm, I could be tempted to visit that exhibition. Like yourself, I much prefer images that portray the era and the lifestyle of the time.
I've been to a couple of Nadfas lectures on early photography - one photo was of the Thames and, in the background, was the Houses of Parliament in the process of construction, with the scaffolding still up. It wasn't even the subject of the photo. I loved that.
I am looking forward to seeing how you deal with the remaining letters of the alphabet! Z should be a doddle, but the others might be a challenge.
U think so? V will have to see. Y do you think there's a problem.
W. Um. Okay, Z takes your point.
....then you begin the Greek alphabet...;-)
You know what? I've only been to anything in town half a dozen times in 33 years!!! Not a city boy...
Let's see. British Museum, Madame Tussauds and some'at else I forget when Jax was little.
A gay disco with a girl from West Ham in '81, Elvis Costello in '87 I think at The Albert Hall and most recently Sex Pistols but that was virtually Fulham so doesn't really count.
Been in The Blind Beggar pub in Whitechapel though after taking Jax back to Uni!
Dentist next month here too....urrrgh
Did you mean 19th century photography? I thought photography wasn't "developed" until 1840 or so.
Hope Sage is in good spirits after the dental visit.
My mother wanted to know why there wasn't a photograph of the subject of the biography wot I wrote. I told her photography hadn't been invented in the C18. Now I'll have to tell her I was wrong, for Z never makes mistakes.
I ordered my tax disc on-line on Saturday evening. It arrived yesterday.
Alpha sixpence... splendid idea, 4D. I live in the sticks, you know - have to get some excitement once in a while.
Whoops. Thanks for correcting me - I knew what I meant. So did you, fortunately.
I've ended up ordering the tax disc online after all. Might explain, depends what else I'm writing about tomorrow. I also - sorry, BW, because I agree that you're right and wise - paid for it with my debit card because there's an extra charge for using a credit card and, unlike Dave, I have a car that's expensive to tax.
"Developed" - heh
I used my debit card for the same reason, trusting a government website not to be full of fraudsters. I mean, how likely is it that anything to do with politicians could be fishy?
Honest as the day is long, every one of them.
Apropos of nothing except maybe your very clever alphabetisation, I've just come across this; whatever one's convictions, it's very fine:
. . .Though I should sit
By some tarn in Thy hills,
Using its ink
As the spirit wills
To write of Earth's wonders,
Its live willed things,
Flit would the ages
On soundless wings
Ere unto Z
My pen drew nigh,
Leviathan told
And the honey-fly:
And still would remain
My wit to try –
My worn reeds broken,
The dark tarn dry,
All words forgotten –
Thou, Lord, and I.
Walter de la Mare, 'The Scribe'
Oh, Christopher. Thank you for that. Splendid.
I emailed your "holiday" addy Z!
I enjoy Early Photography exhibitions too, Z...they always make me feel nostalgic :)
Cheers, Simon, I've replied now.
WG - Hah! Know how you feel.
I love to imagine the past, whether it be looking at photos of the way it was or walking up the steps in an ancient castle.
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