18th April

On the 18th April 1930, the BBC announced that was no news that day – so listeners were given the opportunity to listen to piano music.

A good end to a bad day . .

A technological nightmare. My MacBook Air is displaying an intermittent fault, and it would appear that the Apple support team have no idea of what ‘intermittent’ means. If you understand the concept of an intermittent fault you would realise that any change may have an effect on the problem or it may just not have happened. Enough . . . . you see how easily I was drawn into the minutiae of technology and I have only touched on the issue(s) ?

So I reverted to technology that was under my control. I wrote a cheque and a letter with a fountain pen. I placed the items in an envelope and then with a final flourish sealed the envelope. A job completed in a satisfactory and satisfying manner. It required no PIN or 8 character password containing a Cyrillic symbol and a veiled reference to Checkov. I poured myself a glass of Primitivo and sat back to listen to Bill Evans.

Why do they do it?

Why do bookshops insist on putting stickers on the covers of books? I then feel the need to carefully remove the offending item. To make matters when I have succeeded, without damaging the cover of the book, I discover that hidden underneath is an endorsement by the Daily Express, that I would rather not have been aware of. . . .

Animal humour

The New Yorker definitely has the best animal humour!

Words for lockdown (courtesy of Susie Dent)

respair = the opposite of despair

resipiscence = return to a better state of mind

confelicity = the unselfish joy in someone else’s pleasure – the opposite of schadenfreude, I guess . . .

The last of course is the hardest in most people’s eyes, as Gore Vidal admitted ‘Every time a friend succeeds, I die a little.’

Mind you, he also said ‘I never miss an opportunity to have sex or go on television.’ I simply hope the two never coincided . . . . .