Zuiderlucht

This edition’s contribution

Mixed messages ?

Spotted by Lesley on a jewellery site

Diamond solitaire rings are the perfect jewellery piece for asking your loved one to take your hand in marriage. This dazzling diamond ring is sure to make it impossible for her to say yes!

Artificial Intelligence

So we were sitting in the pub and Lesley and I were talking about something – I don’t know what, but we needed to check something so I picked up my iPhone.

Siri comes up with “What can I help you with ?”

Not really thinking, I said: “Go away, Siri!”

To which she responded: “What did I do to deserve that?!”

Laughing about it, I said: “Sorry, Siri…..”

and immediately got the reply:

“It’s alright Rowland. Really.”

Priceless!

Sir frigging Philip …..

So if he has done nothing wrong, why spend £500000 ensuring that people can’t talk?!

Proves my theory – never trust a man who wears a shirt with a non-matching colour!

Incomprehensible ….

I do not understand how any normal human being can derive pleasure from killing a harmless animal?

Communication Breakdown……..

BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

Former art student millionaire (and Led Zep guitarist) Jimmy Page is also a huge fan (and owner) of Burne-Jones tapestries. The somewhat awestruck/sycophantic interviewer attempted to infer a link between the subject matter of the tapestries and the lyrics of Stairway to Heaven – a source of inspiration, perhaps?

“No“ says Page “I didn’t write the lyrics!“

No pretention there, Jimmy! Well done!

Self in name …….

It never ceases to amaze me how skilfully (and frequently) Will Self can turn any topic into a moment of self aggrandisement. In commenting on the death of Anthea Bell, the translator of Asterix as well as many other works including those of Freud and Kafka, Self chooses to use WG Sebald as an example claiming that his ’eminence in the English reading world’ would not be as great if not for Bell’s ‘magnificent translations’. I am sure they are. I am also sure that the selection of this example as opposed to a better known author is designed as ever for ‘Self promotion.’

A close encounter of the Cheadle kind…

I do love bookshops and a small independent bookshop called Greenhouse Books, has recently opened near my home. They also make a good cup of coffee so I called in this morning and was stunned with the number of people who came in who the owners knew by their first names – great sense of a bookish community. The most interesting was a large heavily bearded man wearing a Russian fur hat and carrying a large rucksack. He complained about getting old and then went off at a tangent talking about Akhenaten, Horowitz, his family and many more apparently unrelated topics. I paid for my coffee and he turned towards me and said ‘you’re a musician aren’t you ? A jazz musician’ which I accepted as it was ‘close enough for jazz’, as they say. However he would not accept that he could not have recognised me from the Slug and Lettuce as I have not played at that gig! At this point, he suddenly said ‘Saint Thomas’ and then proceeded to demonstrate to me how he had developed a new conga rhythm for the classic Rollins tune! An amazing encounter!