Good timing that bottle!
So it’s been an up-and-downy sort of fortnight, full of peaks, troughs and, apparently, feathers brought on by the failure of my keyboard to hyphenate on cue.
I’ve been ill, which was horrible, since I was actually asleep for the whole time (I’m really bad at being ill; after the first couple of hours I get fed up of lying down and want to get up and do things, which tends to leave me being more ill than I was to begin with, but never mind). Still not sure I’m entirely fixed, to be honest, but never mind.
Drove to Shrewsbury for a dentists appointment, which was much better than taking the train. It used up half a tank of petrol, which means I spent about £5 more by driving than I would have spent on a train ticket, but on the other hand, I was able to arrive at the actual dentists, ten minutes before my appointment, have the appointment, and then leave again immediately, so I spent an entire three hours less time hanging about waiting for the trains to get their collective DEMU arses in gear.
Well worth a fiver. Encountered ice on Plynlymon, by the effective, though inadvisable, method of discovering my left wheels had gone crazy while skirting a hairpin a mile or two past the George Borrow hotel, and again in the valley of the Elvis Rock.
Came home via Mach. A pigawful road, but with less chance of finding a ton or two of expensive metal slip[ping] below me… and then drop[ping] with an almighty smash fifty feet to the bed of the stream…*
Shared whisky with Matt at the weekend, over House of Cards. Rather enjoyable, and there was splendidly good timing on the part of the bottles of alcohol various, because they contrived to get opened about twenty minutes after I found out that Peter, an old family friend, had died.
Currently awaiting information on the date of the funeral, so I can book time off to get back for it.
As I say, a pair of weeks with ups and downs. And now, apparently, I have to go show a work experience girl the cataloguing program. She wants to know about LC Classification, apparently, which I’ve never been called on to do, and it seems odd for me to be the one explaining actual cataloguing procedures, too (especially since I’m only upgrading very basic old records that got stranded by a system change in the late ’80s) but there you go.
I just wish I wasn’t obliged to miss out on my tea break for the sake of it…
*A tricky one. A full pint (or bottle) of beer in it this time.
Comments
Are you referring to Charlie Croker’s recently revealed-by-Michael-Caine “hang on lads, I’ve got a great idea” plan to get the gold out of the bus in The Italian Job?
That metal was quite expensive. And it slipped a good many feet. Though possibly more than fifty.
I’ve got a feeling it’s Pryce with an Aberystwyth book. Last Tango, perhaps?
How sad, and how strange, in an “isn’t it a small world” sort of way…Peter Thompson’s propagation book has helped us through a few growing problems over the years, and remains a source of reference today, and of course we had no idea of course that you knew the man.
Gardening and horticulture will be a poorer place for his passing.
Sorry for the delay in getting back on this set of comments; seem not to have had any notifications, which was shoddy…
Statto & Matt:
I’m afraid not. Although I’d missed the Caine story. Matt’s closest, but needs to go further back than Pryce (&, actually, a bit beyond Chandler, as well), but it’s the right kind of style, so I can see why you think that.
Eezageeza
Thank-you. He’d been ill for a while, and I think he had polio when he was younger, so his immune system wasn’t up to much. I think people saw it coming, but it was still very sad.
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Right, back to work. Today I am making a floorplan/map of how many shelves I have counted, and am attempting to resist the urge to put ‘Here be Dragons’ in and around the Celtic Collection…