My piss boiled over
brekkie. "Dyslexia" boiled it for me. When I was
younger dyslexia
was a horrible thing; it made reading incredibly difficult for so
many people.
It still does, but
increasingly nowadays the word has been hijacked. There are those who
truly suffer from that condition, and my heart goes out to them. But
more and more the term "dyslexia" is being
shamelessly used as an excuse for laziness.
One particular article I
read on-line wound me up this morning - I'm not going to highlight it
(that would be mean). But I would say that leaving aside the
awful spelling and complete lack of any attempt at correct grammar,
in a page of ranting there wasn't a single full stop in that article
anywhere. In the author's defence he claims it's written like that
because he's dyslexic. I disagree. It's written like that because
he's not taken the time to stop, pause and re-read what he's written.
He's banged out some words and pressed the "send"
button without a second thought.
And this fellow wasn't
alone this morning.Over brekkie I read several nonsensical posts on
national and local groups in various aspects of social media written
by friends, acquaintances, family members and total strangers.
I wish that more people
would try a little harder to have their written words understood. The
truly dyslexic people of my acquaintance do make that effort.
I took "Furry
Face TM" for a little walk whilst my piss
cooled. As we walked we found a shopping trolley on someone's garden.
This trolley bore a note saying that the trolley should be left where
it was; the nice man from Asda was coming to collect it. I must admit
that I was surprised to find a trolley so far from the supermarket;
as we'd walked we'd seen half a dozen such trolleys that had been
thrown in the river. I was amazed the trolley hadn't suffered the
same fate.
We also saw a jogger.
This one was odd; he had what looked like elasticated bungee cords in
each hand with the other end of each attached to each shoe. As he
jogged he seemed to be using these cords to somehow pick his feet up
as he ran. Very strange.
Home, where I got on with
a little more housework. As I worked I had a phone call. Every day I
have loads of phone calls from people trying to sell me stuff. One of
today's was cheeky. The chap on the phone had heard that I was
plagued with nuisance phone calls. He claimed had added me to a
scheme which (by some wonder of technology) would ensure I
would never again receive a nuisance phone call. And then he asked
for my bank details so's he could scam money from me.
You have to admire these
people.
I then did more of my
"Origins"
course. Today we learned about insect evolution, and I learned
something. Many years ago (thirty four, to be precise) I can
remember my biology teacher explaining how insects breathe. Because
of the way their bodies are built there is a physical limit as to how
big an insect can get. With most land animals the limit is dependent
on body weight. Not so with insects. With them the limit is dependent
on their ability to get oxygen into their bodies. And insects today
are about as big as they can possibly get bearing that limitation in
mind. I can distinctly remember Mr Reeve explaining it all in great
detail, and then he produced a picture of a fossil dragonfly which
was about the size of an eagle. As he held up that picture he smiled
an said that one day he'd like to be able to teach a theory which
could explain how dragonflies were once the size of eagles.
It turns out that the
theory he taught me was correct. But what none of us realised was
that millions of years ago atmospheric oxygen levels were far higher
than they are today. And so insects could grow bigger.
Not that anyone cares
about insects..... But I got eighty per cent in the test.
Steve phoned; did I fancy
going for a spot of lunch? We met up at the American Diner at Bybrook
and had a rather good bit of scoff. Steve had to zoom off after
lunch; I went into the garden centre. I had planned to get some
tropical fish. After twenty minutes of being ignored I walked out. As
I walked out I stopped some people who were walking in to the place,
explained to them that I'd been waiting for twenty minutes and told
them that I was going to take my money elsewhere. It was only at that
point that the spotty oik at the counter put his magazine down and
looked up.
Too late....
I came home and spent a
little while watching the telly with my dog until the evening. And
then ten of us gathered for a game of cards. It's a great shame that
it's physically not possible to get more people round a card table. I
can think of (at least) thirty people I'd like to have along
for a game of cards. But the physical limitations of the thing meant
that I had to restrict the evening on gronds of how far people have
to travel and on whether or not people regularly (or
semi-regularly) play cards.
But we had a good time.
In a rather condradictory fashion at one point I was trying for a
straight whilst hoping for a queen; which is something which takes
some doing....
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