Boadicea's Chariot

On Thursday, as I was sitting in my little office at university, I was summoned by a professor to her office. Although I am yet to have had a course with her, we have worked together on the preliminary stages of my master’s thesis. The purpose of the summons, other than to inform me that she may be in need of my assistance on Monday, was to let me know that she will recommend me for a fellowship at one of Korea’s top universities at my leisure. Both she and my boss/supervising professor have expressed disappointment in my choice of universities. While accepting that it was the best option at the time, they have both given me warning that they will under no circumstances allow me an easy go of it. They are both determined that I will produce a work of doctoral standards. The reason why I am mentioning this is not to be a prat, but to solicit edified and erudite opinions from my academic and intellectual betters on this site on this matter.

You have to understand that Mrs M is the dog expert in our family. In my youth, I never had a canine pet for reasons which I have explained before.

One cat,’Stripey’; one goldfish, ‘Goldie’, who came home in a small plastic bag from the shows (Scots for a fair) and went belly-up six short months later and one hamster, ‘Goldie’, who lasted four years but who, I later learned, had actually been three hamsters. My parents told me the truth when they thought that I was ready to face it. That was a terrible 22nd birthday when I think back. Continuing to think back, I was seriously rubbish at naming my pets, if truth be told. Continue reading “It’s a Worry!”

I recently read reviews about a small tea firm in Mie Prefecture, Japan. For the most part reviews were highly favourable, though a few buyers were rather bitter that their experiences did not match their expectations. On one occasion the buyer attacked the product as tasting “cheap and not good”. The product, in this case, being a 1 pound, 1 ounce bag of gyokuro that sold for £27.00 in proper currency. Gyokuro, for those not overly familiar with Japanese teas, is a shade-grown green tea that is among the more dear. Because it is processed somewhat differently than a typical sencha, a more potent tea, brewing recommendations are somewhat different. To obtain the same strength as an average sencha, twice the amount is needed. If one does not take into account the differences, it seems readily apparent that there will be unavoidable disappointment.
Furthermore, if an average lapsang souchong runs £8.00 for just over an ounce and a tolerable Darjeeling goes for £2.00 per ounce then it should be clear that 17 ounces of a higher-tier tea for £27.00 is rather on the low end. After all, a ceremony-grade matcha costs approximately £15.00 per ounce and the inferior cooking-grade costs a mere £9.00 per ounce.

In case anyone is wondering why I am prattling on about the price of tea and the occasional idiot whingeing about not buying gold for the price of lead I will try to make my point now. The whinger was a septic; probably someone who has the pretension of being a connoisseur. I by no means suffer from this delusion, although I humbly claim to be able to note the difference between Lipton’s at a cheap American restaurant and tea at Claridge’s.