Category: General

A few weeks ago I received an email from the university in Minnesota regarding open positions as a professor’s assistant. In exchange for working 10 hours a week my student fees would be waived and they would pay me an additional $5,000.00 per year. Seeing no reason why I should not at least try I applied. The process was fairly simple, my curriculum vitae and a two-page application to fill out. This afternoon I received an email from the director of the history programme informing that they have approved my application and the position, should I want it, will be made open to me. After receiving a fast notice of acceptance, a quick and early response which a seemingly favourable outcome for a nice flat, excellent help in planning my degree, and now a job offer that will make my financial future certainly more secure I can’t help but thinking that I made the best possible choice in accepting the offer to read history in St Cloud.

 

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Mission Complete – Thanks Everyone.

Since I commented at 0715 hrs GMT today, there have been just four comments by other cherished charioteers and no new posts.

I’m afraid the principle of critical mass is coming into play. Less begets less. Sad.

G’day all

It doesn’t look at though anyone is inspired this month.  Any stories out there?

I am using Outlook 2010, I want to have my emails use the banner from our website which has been done using css styles. Does anyone know how I can load this into the header of my emails?

It must be code but where the hell do I put it. All the sites go round the houses and come up with nothing.

Ta

First may I wish a happy St George’s Day to all English charioteers – may all your dragons turn tail and run.

Yesterday we paid our first visit to the London Marathon, having previously only watched it on TV.  Younger son was running this year, his big brother having completed the Boston Marathon last week.  The routine is to meet near the mile 11 post, close to Southwark park which has a playground for granddaughter.

It was absolutely amazing to see the runners, 37,500 of them, stream past.  Spanish dancers, a mole who must have been cursing the sun,  Smurfs, ghosts, fairies, serious club runners, those running for charities. I disregarded the élite runners, a small bunch of Kenyans with three pacemakers, since they get paid to be there.  This marathon is now one of the biggest fund-raising events in the world  and London is to be congratulated on organising it.  The crowds were vociferous and good natured; icecream vans were doing a roaring trade, pubs had opened early; a local evangelical church had set up a coffee stall to boost its funds.  A troop of jogging Morris Dancers arrived, to the great entertainment of our granddaughter.

Leaving aside the wisdom of running twenty-six miles, something the human body is not designed for, I was most impressed, particularly by the courage and determination of those runners who were just passing the 12 mile post when others were over 10 miles ahead of them and some had already finished.

Today France will have its first round of elections to evict Sarkozy from the Elysee, umm, I mean, elect its president. Sarkozy, initially elected only by a moderate margin, has managed the task of making himself the most unpopular president in French history. For a country that has challenged, with some success, the United States for most inept leadership, this is no mean feat.

Sarkozy, my French friends advise me, will not be missed. His style, more suited to Dallas or Miami than Toulouse or Bordeaux, has grated on the collective French nerve.
It seems that the election will not be fought so much on ideas and politics as it will be on the man. That a man who was described by Chirac as a “pup” and “less known that Mitterrand’s Labrador” will almost certainly be France’s next president can be explained no other way.

What is disheartening is that Hollande’s platform, if carried out, would be disastrous for France. Continue reading “La France Vétuste”

There is today an article in the DT, (right at the bottom) on bathrooms in pictorial format.

Apart from noting the appalling vulgarity of most of them and their suitability only for oligarchs, nabobs and third world dictators, not forgetting British politicians and wankers, sorry bankers; on further examination I noted some rather disturbing details.

It must be that the above categories of creatures, not being truly mortal, do not defecate!  In many of the pictures there is no provision made for bog paper!  Or do they have slaves on standby to wipe their arses?

Equally after they have showered or bathed there appears to be no provision for a towel, do they shake dry like a dog?  Do the peasant come and lick them dry? Not only is there no provision for a towel but no storage for clean ones either.

Another consideration, is no one in their households either old or disabled? Not a grab bar in sight, what do they do with these sad remnants of humanity?  Bang them on the head, so as not to disturb the decor?

The final horror of it all is that many of these pinnacles of bad taste have been created within Georgian houses according to the realtors!  Can you imagine butchering a Georgian house to produce this anathema to good taste?

A final comforting thought, most of these excrescences are created with no curtains and no opaque glass, one can only hope that the new owners are picked off by snipers, they deserve to be!

Sorry no linky thing.

I do not like to hog the front page after my recent post, but I have just heard a bit of sad news. Bert Weedon has died at the good old age of 91. I learnt to play the guitar from his book Play in a Day many (far too many) years ago..

Rather more importantly, the likes of Eric Clapton, Hank Marvin, Brian May and many other luminaries of the guitar world also learned to play from his book. Just swap that harp for a Stratocaster, Bert!

Our first cut of asparagus for dinner tonight, with fresh broccoli from the garden with a bacon wrapped chicken breast.

To celebrate I made a sabayon and converted it into a light tarragon and lemon flavoured hollandaise.for the veg.

Wonderful, to die for, food of the Gods!  You can stick those bloody pizzas and chocolate bars in a very dark place!  We shall now be forced to eat vast quantities of asparagus to keep up with the bed which is now seven years old and in top notch production.  I am seriously going to miss that bed when we move.  No doubt it will be wrecked within a year by some bloody peasant.  I shall make a point of never driving down this road again or else I might well invade and dish out a few pieces of my mind when the garden goes to wrack and ruin.  I am now in the throes of deciding which plants should be saved from such a dreadful fate as new idiot ownership.  Too many round here garden with a JCB!

Sad.