Day 25 - Of this and that

After a sustained period of dark, rather chilly weather, things are looking up. It is lighter and warmer and the garden is burgeoning. Everything is fresh green and lush. The beans are climbing up their poles letting their bright scarlet flowers swing down through their leaves. The courgettes have huge yellow blooms – I might even have enough to sacrifice the fruit and to experiment with stuffing the flowers. I’ve never done that before.

The only problem is that all this gorgeous greenness is enticing the baby bunnies into the range of my predatory cats. Score so far: 2 rescued, 2 rabbit pie (cat version, not mine). Last night’s bunny tried to burrow through the mortar in the stone wall in the sitting room, literally making some headway as there is a sizable dent. I hope it didn’t return to become the mangled corpse on the bathroom floor.

Anyway, I have two fat cats fast asleep in the sitting room.

Beautiful svelte Izzy seems not to have taken part in this orgy as she is staking out the oven where the carcase of last night’s roast chicken is waiting to be turned into soup.

Experience has told her that there will be rich pickings for her if she is patient – no bones, because they are dangerous for cats, but lots of other goodies might fall her way.

Earlier this year I was asked to go on the reading panel for a literary book prize. That’s not quite as prestigious as it sounds. It’s the sorting panel. You read a book, review and score it, then a long list is drawn up and the books go to the real panel. The books have just started arriving. It’s interesting but hard as the criteria they are asking for aren’t necessarily the ones you would use to judge a particular book. For instance, I am reading a detective story at the moment. It is good - well written, good plot, good characterisation – an excellent detective story, but it has no pretensions. It is a detective story, pure and simple and succeeds brilliantly as that. However, one of the questions I have to consider is its literary merit. How do I rate that? It is supremely successful at what it is trying to do but it is not aspiring to be anything other than a detective story. No deep themes are discussed. It will not change your mind on how you view the world. Its language is always appropriate but will not blow you away figuratively. Added to which, the comment box is quite small!

In the middle of all this my keyboard decided to give up the ghost, leaving out about 10% of the letters I typed. So, online to look at keyboards, not a difficult task, I thought, but of course like everything else these days, it turned out to be enormously complicated. It all depends what you want the keyboard for. Writing, gaming, programming – one keyboard does not do all – of course not, if they can get you to buy three. I finally tracked one down that wasn’t outrageously expensive and had quite good reviews. The trouble was, if I wanted a UK layout it was twice as expensive as a US, French, German, Italian or Russian version, £50 as opposed to £20 - £25.

I wasn’t having that!

I looked at all the photos and as far as I could see the Italian version was almost the same as the UK with some interesting and useful additions and it was only £25. So I bought it and it arrived by return of post. As described it had an ergonomically tested wrist rest, adjustable tilt and it was very similar to the UK key board, except that it had in é,à,°,ç,ù,§ in addition. I plugged it in and got started. However, I found that the though keys might be different, they typed the UK layout not the Italian. So now I had a lot of keys that didn’t match what I was typing. Disaster.

I am not sure how long it would take me to learn that what said : was really ?, and that ( was now ). Too long for this life, I fear. So I phoned Son No 3, the IT expert, who was suitably scathing but he showed me how to make my computer think it was Italian. It was easy and it worked.(Gullible machine!)

There was one strange outcome. Last night when I was typing, it was refusing to proof read my spelling, grammar (You write English, but hey, I am an Italian computer, capisce?) or give me synonyms or meanings. Today, it has had a rethink and has decided, off its own bat to become bilingual. Now we are both happy. It is a very comfortable keyboard to use.

So between bunnies, the garden, the keyboard and reviewing, there has been little time for anything else.

I have, however, listened to a lot of Radio3, to keep me sane. This week’s Composer of the Week – Bach. Here’s his Double Concerto. Sorry about the ads to start with, but it’s a fabulous recording.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zRIZle3VqU

Food tonight will be simple

I have had some chicken thighs marinating in soy sauce and garlic and a spoonful of honey since last night. I shall cook them in a hot oven (180°C fan) for 25 minutes and serve with a mixed salad (lettuce, tiny tomatoes, red peppers, sliced avocado and cucumber in a simple vinaigrette).

Pudding: fresh fruit salad – strawberries, raspberries and bananas – with a spoonful of honey and cream or yoghourt depending on how virtuous I feel.

Today’s Picture(s)

How Rufus sees himself in his dreams (Japanese Textile)

             

In reality: