I had a phone call from
work yesterday to ask if I could do the late shift today. Being an
obliging kind of chap I was happy to do so, and so wasn't out of my
pit quite as early as usual on a working day. Over brekkie i watched
Blake's Seven with a small dog asleep on my lap. Today our heroes
were having a fracas with Space Rats. Space Rats were clearly
supposed to be an inter-galactic version of Hells Angels. They were
supposed to be scary. However they came over as being akin to the fan
club of Co-Co the Clown's hypothetical stunt double which wasn't
scary at all.
Whilst watching lame
early 1980s sci-fi I was very conscious of today's date. September
13. The late 1970s lame sci-fi show Space 1999 all started off from
the events purported to take place on September 13 1999.
When I watched that
program on Saturday mornings as a teenager that date seemed to be so
far into the future as to be unreal. Now it's fourteen years into the
past. Where have the years gone?
As I had time to spare I
took a scenic route to work (through the fog) via Elmstead
where I picked up a geocache. The description of the cache said to
look out for the llamas; I was rather disappointed not to see any.
As always I listened to
the news as I drove. It is now official - the space probe Voyager
1 has left the solar system and is in inter-stellar space. The
pundits made great show of the announcement, and glossed over the
fact that the actual exit took place over a year ago. They also had
tame experts being interviewed who explained about galactic distances
and the impracticality of travel to other stars with today's
technology. And in a novel break with tradition the people presenting
the show took what was being said seriously.
The pundits rather
glossed over proposed
changes to the Post Office. Apparently "thousands of our
remote communities rely on the national mail network as a lifeline".
Really? In this modern electronic age do people really use snail-mail
quite so much. And if someone chooses to live in the back of beyond
then they must be able to afford to do so. Why should people who live
in sensible places subsidise them? It transpires that it actually
costs seventy quid to post a letter to the more remote parts of
Scotland, but currently all that is actually paid on such a letter is
the price of a stamp. Presumably everyone else posting letters to
sensible places is subsidising those who can already afford to live
in the back of beyond. Why should I subsidise those who are already
demonstrably far better off than I am?
Meanwhile can anyone
honestly say that they are surprised to hear that more money is to be
milked from the
Harry Potter franchise. Whilst Harry himself won't feature in
this latest round, there will be enough of a crossover to ensure that
millions of fans will hand over more of their hard-earned cash.
I wish I could come up
with a money-making idea like Harry Potter. Somehow I don't think
"Les Aventures Du Le Singe Et L'Oiseau (qui est un batard)"
will somehow catch the public's imagination.
Talking of which my
French-learning associate had a day off today so I was not able to
inspire and enthral him with the latest exploits of our simian friend
and its avian nemesis. I'm sure it will all keep till Monday.
Without being able to
impart my linguistic skills, the day was rather dull.
As I came home tonight
the weather forecast made me sit up and take notice. The BBC radio
people said that Sunday would be torrential rain and howling winds
all over the country. When I got access to the Internet I saw that
the same BBC said light winds and dry until 7pm on Sunday on it's
weather page. I wish they would either make up their minds, or be
honest and say they have no idea what the weatehr is going to do...
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