A Colourful Visitor

I was looking in the fridge for the butter.

I looked for a while but I couldn't see it.

Then I moved some potatoes at the bottom of the fridge.

And I found something buttery.

But it wasn't butter.

It was a BUTTERFLY!

That's not normally found in a fridge, is it.

So I have taken it out on a piece of paper.

I let it warm up in the room.

Then I started to think about releasing it.

One of its wings seems not to be working very well, so it was a bit hard to release. When it got warm it started walking across the table towards the light. I'm sure that's a healthy sign but I knew there was a long drop coming up if it fell off the table. I tried letting it out of the window, thinking it might be happier outside even if it was damaged. But the wind was too strong! It's very windy lately.

Then I left it on my doorstep for a while. I thought it might fly away or go to a butterfly-friendly place. I looked again after a while and it was still there! I think it was too cold outside.

So now it is living with me.

I left it some lettuce at first, but it seems that's what the caterpillars eat. Butterflies eat nectar. Or they drink it. They have a long tube that sucks it out of flowers.

So I have been trying to feed the butterfly. It has been given water with honey in it, on the end of a chopstick. I think it got stuck a bit but it's OK now. Honey is rather sticky as Pooh will tell you...

I hope it will get stronger!

Let's see what happens.

Big Pudding Project

It's a bit late for making Christmas Puddings...but I think it's best to do things rather than not. So they will have at least one month to mature before any eating happens. That's something!

What is alarming is how long it takes to make them.

I have finally gathered all the ingredients after about four days of scouring the streets of London for currants (they don't have them on the streets, you have to look in shops - maybe that's why it took so long?) and have the bowls etc. Now I have read the recipe. I thought I could have them finished by tomorrow night but the mixture has to rest for two days before it can be cooked.

Do you think that's long? Every aspect of this recipe requires great patience. Here are some further figures:

Cooking time: Eight hours!

Heating time: yes, HEATING, how long it takes just to get them hot when you want to eat them - two and a half hours!!

Preparation time, as it says in the book: "two hours, to be done one to five years in advance"

I didn't put a "!" at the end of the last sentence. I think you probably put your own one in there...

!!!

The recipe is from my excellent book, "The Roux Brothers on Patisserie". They say the recipe came from a "superb English cook" called Mrs. Bradbrook about 50 years ago. I don't know, there's something about the word "superb" there. Is it "superb" and "English"? Would a Frenchman normally use both in the same sentence? It certainly has some sort of unusual air about it.

Right so they should hopefully be done by Friday. I'm making four!

ALKAN

I do like to read some nice information about Alkan. The fact that I have written it myself doesn't put me off at all, oh no.

Alkan is...well you really should know. If not find out!

Alkan is my favourite composer. Although my favourite piece is the Beethoven Violin Concerto (not by Alkan). However, statistically Alkan wins by having more pieces I like. But let's not have Alkan and Beethoven competing, please. After all, they are different. There is no comparison!

So what to tell you about Alkan? The following shiny fishes of delight, which I have gathered from Ronald Smith's book (two books in one now, Alkan: The Man/Alkan: The Music). In English it's the main book (or only book?) for reading in some depth about this great composer. Yes, great, not odd or unusual. Busoni says, in the Foreword to his edition of Liszt's Studies:

These fifty-eight pianoforte pieces alone would place Liszt in the rank of the greatest "pianoforte" composers since Beethoven, Chopin, Schumann, Alkan, Brahms.

And that's true so just think about it please.

OK good things to tell you about Alkan:

1. He entered the Paris Conservatoire at the age of six.
2. He won first prize for solfège at the age of seven and a half.
3. He won first prize for piano when he was eleven!
4. Much later, when he was teaching at the Conservatoire, he awarded a special prize to César Franck. The reason was that Franck decided his sight-reading exam was too easy so played the piece perfectly but in a different key and thereby failed the exam! Presumably Alkan thought he was worth a prize.
5. Alkan may have had (or definitely had, or something) a son known as Delaborde, who was keen on swimming. A joint natatory outing in the river Seine shortly preceded Bizet's death! Not only that but soon after Bizet died, perhaps from swimming with Delaborde, the survivor began the process of marrying Mme. Bizet!
6. Well actually these are all quite gossipy facts, aren't they. Wouldn't it be better to talk about something more useful?

Yes, I certainly will. But that's for next time...

History

I went to see the DINOSAURS. They live at the Natural History Museum. I had never seen any before which is why it was quite exciting.

I had read about dinosaurs before, especially a long time ago, so it was nice to see my old friends Iguanodon and Triceratops again. Disappointing to see no Tyrannosaurus skeleton. You could really say One Of Our Dinosaurs Is Missing (a film the racist undertones of which are not condoned by this establishment).

The other disappointment was the Blue Whale - the world's largest mammal, but here presented as a feeble plastic model. It is life size, so you can appreciate the dimensions. You can imagine the real thing of course, but I don't really like to be told what to imagine. I think that defeats the object of imagining.

Dinosaurs are really an alien thing. Nothing much like them here now - unless you look closely and think of evolution. So the skeletons are worth seeing. Also the fossils of strange and varied megafauna. And the petrified tree stump.

But as for the animals which exist on Earth today, I don't really have much interest in seeing models and so on. They exist! But these models are not really real. I suppose it's supposed to give you an impression or appreciation of the real thing. I think it may do that, but it is rather a poor substitute.

I don't know if I am not using them correctly, but the museums in Kensington are not as good as I was expecting. They are good buildings, though. And enough good things in them to justify having a look. For a good museum I'd go to the British Museum in Russell Square/Bloomsbury. There's plenty to see there. But no dinosaurs!

Charles Rosen is Here

Charles Rosen was born on May 5th 1927. On February 2nd 2007 he will play Beethoven's Appassionata Sonata and Diabelli Variations at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London. This is his eightieth year and tonight he was giving a talk in a funny room in the "newly refurbished" (i.e. not finished yet) Royal Festival Hall complex. He stood in front of the conference table and spoke from memory following a quite precise mental map of his hour-long discourse, interrupted only by anecdotes, reminiscences, and interesting facts. Behind the table was an upright piano that said "Welmar". Behind that was a door that said "Toilets". Mr Rosen didn't seem to mind. The main thing was that he was here.

Charles Rosen knows an awful lot about music and culture. I very much recommend to you his book "The Romantic Generation" which is a never-ending compendium of insight into the Romantic vein of music. He is an important man in the musical world but doesn't seem self-important. His only admissions of his own importance were a few jokes such as saying that when he had to move away from the microphone to the piano people at the back might not hear what he was saying, "But then, not everything I say is so interesting" - pause for laughter (which did come) because he obviously knows that everything he says is interesting. That's fine because he's right!

The talk was called "Beethoven's Ambition" and weaved its way through the territory of 18th century musical Europe at a time when although there were accepted great masters of art or of theatre (Raphael, Michelangelo; Aeschylus, Euripides, Aristophanes etc.), there were none of the new instrumental style of music in which Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven hoped to make their way.

I made notes when I got home and what I remembered best were the anecdotes. Is this because of limited brain power, or is it just that Mr Rosen produces wisdom in a form that is useful and can be remembered?

Here is what he said:

When Stravinsky said he wanted his music played "without expression", that was wrong - Stravinsky never conducted his music that way. It wasn't expression he didn't like, it was Koussevitzky's expression!

Haydn was asked to send an opera to be performed in Prague. He replied that the operas he had written for the court at Esterhazy would not be suitable because they were written for a more provincial setting. He also said he couldn't send a new opera because he'd just heard The Marriage of Figaro and didn't care to try his luck at doing better!

The Magic Flute was the most varied opera (in terms of different forms and techniques used within the opera) written from its time until Alban Berg's Wozzeck.

E.T.A. Hoffmann was the greatest music critic ever.

George Bernard (pronounced here BerNARD) Shaw said that we would be shocked by the music of Mozart if it were not for its lovely melodies.

The Minuet finale of the Diabelli Variations shows Beethoven's lyrical genius - something little considered, and something that came a lot easier to Mozart than to Beethoven.

OK that's all for now. I might add more as I remember them. Tomorrow is a busy day with a Pierre Laurent Aimard masterclass in the morning, a lecture by Christopher Elton on the piano sonatas of Haydn at 6.30 then dash off to hear Charles Rosen play! It sounds like I am back at college again with all this to do. But I will never think I am too important to learn things, from anybody, famous or not. That's why hopefully one day someone will write about some interesting facts I said. While I was standing in front of a door saying "Toilets".

Granados

The composer Granados was born in 1867. He was in America in 1916, and because he was suddenly invited to give a recital for the President, he missed his boat back to Spain. Instead, he took a different boat to England, and then transferred to another one heading for France. But the First World War had started and the ship was torpedoed. Granados jumped from the lifeboat to save his wife but could not and also HE DROWNED!!!!!!!!!

But his music survived.

Iceland 1973

What is this a picture of?

It is people in the town of Vestmannaeyjar, Iceland, in 1973.

They are doing something. What?

They are spraying water to stop their town being destroyed by a volcanic eruption!

The eruption started at 1.55 a.m. on Tuesday 23rd January. Luckily the fishing fleet was in harbour because of bad weather so all 5000 people could be evacuated from the town. I was very pleased with them all. Everybody was praised for their calmness, which is what you need in an emergency.

The volcano calmed down about 5 months later. Now the population is back to 5000.

The picture was taken by Svienn Eirikksen, fire marshal of Vestmannaeyjar.

English Country-Tunes

I was there!

I attended Michael Finnissy's performance of his famous piano work "English Country-Tunes" yesterday. The floor shook (and it was a big room) and everyone cheered.

It was the friendliest event I have been to at The Warehouse (home of contemporary music concerts that cost £900 to put on).

This was the last performance of the Finnissy Weekend, organised by the British Music Information Centre and directed by Matthew Shlomowitz and Laurence Crane.

I again noticed that live music is more striking than recorded sound. So let's have more concerts, please.

I also noted that English Country-Tunes, which, being music, cannot be described adequately in words, is what you get when a country has had no creativity for 300 years and then has to make up the balance!

Stag

Look! They have deer in London!

I found this one in Richmond Park. It takes one hour to get there from door to door.

I hadn't seen deer before. There are also a lot of parakeets flying around. I don't know how they got there, but they seem to like it.

OK my deers?

Surf Rescue

Johann Weißmüller was born in Freidorf which at the time was in Austria-Hungary but is now near Timişoara in Romania. Very soon he moved with his family to America. He was a good swimmer and trained hard while he worked as a bell hop at the Plaza Hotel in Chicago. It all worked out very well when he won his first Olympic swimming title in 1924 (Paris). In all, throughout his career he won five Olympic Gold medals and one Bronze, and broke sixty-seven world records. He never lost a race.

And then he became Tarzan, Lord of the Jungle.

Johnny Weissmuller was the Tarzan I remember from the films. They were black and white, and had lots of interesting things happening. I remember the Elephants' Graveyard, trains of native bearers carrying the white man's luggage, Cheeta the chimpanzee, giant spiders and their deadly webs, and the strange fauna of the jungle. There was always a dinosaur somewhere in the jungle for some reason. It was a Dimetrodon, I seem to remember. And don't forget that Tarzan could speak to the animals too. "Ungawa!" meant something. "Simba!" meant something too. It is Swahili for Lion and he said it to lions so that makes sense.

Let's go back in time and find out something else.

When Johnny won his first Olympic medal, he beat someone. That person was called Duke Paoa Kahinu Mokoe Hulikohola Kahanamoku and he came from Hawaii. When you hear the phrase "The Big Kahuna", you now know that it originally referred to him.

Duke (named after Prince Alfred, the Duke of Edinburgh) had set the world record that Johnny broke in 1922 (that was before they met at the Olympics). He won many medals himself, but is more famous as the inventor of modern surfing. He experimented with many improvements and alterations to surfboard design but his best-remembered board was the one he called his "papa nui". It was 16 feet long and weighed 114 pounds (4.8m, 52 kg). That was the board he was using on the day the big waves came, one of which would take him from surf zone to surf zone in the longest ride of his life. Let's hear him tell about it now.

But the day I caught 'The Big One' was a day when I was not thinking in terms of awing any tourists or kamaainas (old-timers) on Waikiki Beach. It was simply an early morning when mammoth ground swells were rolling in sporadically from the horizon, and I saw that no one was paddling out to try them. Frankly, they were the largest I'd ever seen. The yell of 'The surf is up!' was the understatement of the century.

In fact, it was that rare morning when the word was out that the big 'Bluebirds' were rolling in; this is the name for gigantic waves that sweep in from the horizon on extra-ordinary occasions. Sometimes years elapse with no evidence of them. They are spawned far out at sea and are the result of cataclysms of nature -- either great atmospheric disturbances or subterranean agitation like underwater earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

The danger lay in the proneout or wipeout. Studying the waves made me wonder if any man's body could withstand the unbelievable force of a thirty- to fifty-foot wall of water when it crashes. And, too, could even a top swimmer like myself manage to battle the currents and explosive water that would necessarily accompany the aftermath of such a wave? Well, the answer seemed to be simply -- don't get wiped out!

From the shore you could see those high glassy ridges building up in the outer Diamond Head region. The Bluebirds were swarming across the bay in a solid line as far northwest as Honolulu Harbor. They were tall, steep and fast. The closer-in ones crumbled and showed their teeth with a fury that I had never seen before. I wondered if I could even push through the acres of white water to get to the outer area where the buildups were taking place.

...Bushed from the long fight to get seaward, I sat my board and watched the long humps of water peaking into ridges that marched like animated foothills. I let a slew of them lift and drop me with their silent, threatening glide. I could hardly believe that such perpendicular walls of water could be built up like that. The troughs between the swells had the depth of elevator shafts, and I wondered again what it would be like to be buried under tons of water when it curled and detonated. There was something eerie about watching the shimmering backs of the ridges as they passed me and rolled on toward Waikiki.

I let a lot of them careen by, wondering in my own heart if I was passing them up because of their unholy height, or whether I was really waiting for the big, right one. A man begins to doubt himself at a time like that. Then I was suddenly wheeling and turning to catch the towering blue ridge bearing toward me. I was prone and stroking hard at the water with my hands.

Strangely, it was more as though the wave had selected me, rather than I had chosen it. It seemed like a very personal and special wave -- the kind I had seen in my mind's eye during a night of tangled dreaming. There was no backing out on this one; the two of us had something to settle between us. The rioting breakers between me and shore no longer bugged me. There was just this one ridge and myself -- no more. Could I master it? I doubted it, but I was willing to die in the attempt to harness it.

Instinctively I got to my feet when the pitch, slant and speed seemed right. Left foot forward, knees slightly bent, I rode the board down the precipitous slope like a man tobogganing down a glacier. Sliding left along the watery monster's face, I didn't know I was at the beginning of a ride that would become a celebrated and memoried thing. All I knew was that I had come to grips with the tallest, bulkiest, fastest wave I had ever seen. I realized, too, more than ever, that to be trapped under its curling bulk would be the same as letting a factory cave in upon you.

This lethal avalanche of water swept shoreward swiftly and spookily. The board began hissing from the traction as the wave leaned forward with greater and more incredible speed and power. I shifted my weight, cut left at more of an angle and shot into the big Castle Surf which was building and adding to the wave I was on. Spray was spuming up wildly from my rails, and I had never before seen it spout up like that. I rode it for city-long blocks, the wind almost sucking the breath out of me. Diamond Head itself seemed to have come alive and was leaping in at me from the right.

Then I was slamming into Elk's Club Surf, still sliding left, and still fighting for balance, for position, for everything and anything that would keep me upright. The drumming of the water under the board had become a madman's tattoo. Elk's Surf rioted me along, high and steep, until I skidded and slanted through into Public Baths Surf. By then it amounted to three surfs combined into one; big, rumbling and exploding. I was not sure I could make it on this ever-steepening ridge. A curl broke to my right and almost engulfed me, so I swung even farther left, shuffled back a little on the board to keep from pearling (nose-diving).

Left it was; left and more left, with the board veeing a jet of water on both sides and making a snarl that told of speed and stress and thrust. The wind was tugging my hair with frantic hands. Then suddenly it looked as if I might, with more luck, make it into the back of Queen's Surf! The build-up had developed into something approximating what I had heard of tidal waves, and I wondered if it would ever flatten out at all. White water was pounding to my right, so I angled farther from it to avoid its wiping me out and burying me in the sudsy depths.

Borrowing on the Cunha Surf for all it was worth -- and it was worth several hundred yards -- I managed to manipulate the board into the now towering Queen's Surf. One mistake -- just one small one -- could well spill me into the maelstrom to my right. I teetered for some panic-ridden seconds, caught control again, and made it down on that last forward rush, sliding and bouncing through lunatic water. The breaker gave me all the tossing of a bucking bronco. Still luckily erect, I could see the people standing there on the beach, their hands shading their eyes against the sun, and watching me complete this crazy, unbelievable one-and-three-quarter-mile ride.

I made it into the shallows in one last surging flood. A little dazedly I wound up in hip-deep water, where I stepped off and pushed my board shoreward through the bubbly surf. That improbable ride gave me the sense of being an unlickable guy for the moment. I hoisted my board to my hip, locked both arms around it and lugged it up the beach.

Without looking at the people clustered around, I walked on, hearing them murmur fine, exciting things which I wanted to remember in days to come. I told myself this was the ride to end all rides. I grinned my thanks to those who stepped close and slapped me on the shoulders, and I smiled to those who told me this was the greatest. I trudged on and on, knowing this would be a shining memory for me that I could take out in years to come, and relive it in all its full glory. This had been it.

I never caught another wave anything like that one. And now with the birthdays piled up on my back, I know I never shall. But they cannot take that memory away from me. It is a golden one that I treasure, and I'm grateful that God gave it to me.

Duke appeared in 13 films in various parts, and in 1925 he used his surfboard to rescue eight men from a capsized fishing boat in heavy weather in Newport Beach, California.

It's nice to know that exciting things happen sometimes. Also that fun can be useful. Playing is not just a waste of time!

Secret Citadels

Originally uploaded by philiphoward.

When I took this picture of some ivy I had no idea that it was ivy covering up the Admiralty Citadel, "located just behind the Admiralty building on Horse Guards Parade (London). It was constructed in 1940-1941 as a bomb-proof operations centre for the Admiralty, with foundations nine metres deep and a concrete roof six metres thick"!

It is still used today by the Ministry of Defence - and ignored by me!

Crown Clowns

The Crown Jewels of England are well known. I suppose they are the number one thing in this country to try and steal. Or, you could just admire them at the Tower of London without resorting to crime, which, after all, does not pay.

We had some other Crown Jewels, but one of our Kings (John of England) lost them. Yes, he lost them! He was near the bit of sea known as The Wash, and they got washed away. Deary me.

Then Oliver Cromwell took over many years later. He was not a King but a "Protector", and what he was protecting us from was Kings, among other things (he also protected us from theatre, Christmas, and fashionable haircuts). Having examined the record of one previous head of state, we can be glad Oliver was also protecting the Crown Jewels (which obviously need a lot of protecting, particularly at high tide). However, he didn't do a very good job, because all that is left of the Jewels of that time is three swords and a spoon. And you try fighting with a spoon. Possibly this is why he stopped protecting us, gave up and a big nest of Kings started growing again as Charles II returned from France where he had been visiting relatives for some time. Now that the English had resolved to stop cutting off the heads of Kings etc, it was safe to return and start thinking about new crowns and so on. Crowns are known for being uncomfortable, but let me tell you, you'd be glad of the feeling as long as it meant you still had a head to keep the crown on.

Right, who's going to lose the Jewels next? Oh, and have you looked behind the fridge?

Boy

I like this one. By Henri Cartier-Bresson.

Wind

Today there are many many ways of making things go fast and a long way. But remember the first discovery that sent ships scudding across the horizon into adventure - the wind! Imagine the first time someone saw a leaf blown away and made a sail for his boat. Imagine!

Sailing ships were beautiful, it is true. But steamships and their successors could go in a straight line without having to wait for anything. No more tacking and hoping and clinging to the wind by the skin of your teeth.

So now things go fast all the time. But we are still at sea. And we are not machines. So be glad when the wind drops and you have to rest. And even when the sky seems made of concrete but for a little tiny gap of blue at the top, and there is only the noise of traffic not rushing winds, feel the air around you and look up at the sky and remember!

Set sail for...?

Paderewski's Parrot

Paderewski had a parrot. He got it in New Zealand. It would scratch at the door when he was practising. Then when it was let in, it would perch on his pedalling foot. At certain moments it would exclaim,"Lord, what beautiful music!"

I read this in The Paderewski Memoirs. There is no mention of the parrot on the Internet, which is why I had to tell you the story myself. If you ask me, there is something wrong with people. Fancy not knowing about this parrot!

Art

I have found an online video of Art Tatum playing in 1954! Video, Vi-de-o! It is him!

Now you can see it yourself.

What do you think?

Reminiscence

Tasten: the Ballhaus, Berlin – it was May
What really happened? It’s not easy to say…
The programme read “Ian Pace: Verdi Transcriptions”
A charming idea full of tuneful inscriptions.

For thirty-two years they had grown more and more
Until they encompassed Books One through to Four.
But the composer Mike Finnissy, Verdi’s arranger
Unknowingly put Ian Pace in great danger.

The first and the second books went by quite calmly.
But out in the night was a whispering army…
By the light of the moon they rose up to embrace
Their campaign to silence the pianist Pace.

“You were OK at first, but the next book’s the worst!
We wish that you’d never sat down and rehearsed!
You should never have thought about starting to learn it!
But you did, and that’s why we say Ballhaus: Let’s burn it!”

Then a bottle was thrown
And it fell like a stone
And unFinnissy flames billowed out.
Men ran round in a panic
Increasingly manic
And Jeremy started to shout.

Folks looked up from their paella
At the blossoming fire
Their faces all lit up with red.
In the ensuing fracas
They all dropped their tapas
And ran out to see who was dead.

Would they find Ian Pace
Lying flat on his face,
The piano a pile of ashes?
Would the Tasten be stopped
Since the bottle had popped
And consumed it with murderous flashes?

“NO! I triumph over anti-imperialist subversives!”
Shouted Ian majestically over the sound of the flames.
Or something similar.

But the army receded
Defeated, conceded
The flames never gathered the power they needed.
The Ballhaus was saved
So the audience waved:
“We’d prefer if this concert proceeded!”

And it did.

Ian knew if he stopped and he failed to finish he
Might risk the rage of the powerful Finnissy.
After Books One and Two, he returned with the Third. He
Continued and finally finished his Verdi!

The rest of the festival? It was much calmer
With more of the music and less of the drama.
The black and white keys sounded notes by the million
And people came in (some police, most civilian).

Magda attacked the piano, her performance thus leading
To displays full of energy…also some bleeding.

For a good cup of tea, how far will a man go?
The answer, in music, came from our friend Django.

With a burning of rubber and soundtracks galore
This bass player goes with his foot to the floor
He finishes the course while the others are starting
A long-distance driver, we thank him – he’s Martin!

Tasten, Tasten…

Masked men came there to fight but floated into the night
They all ran away and are free.
The fire never stopped it, so Tilbury topped it
With Feldman’s Palais de Mari.

THE END

Thanks Magda, Michael and Jeremy!

My Dream Has Come True

All week I have been reading the weather forecast. In the temperature column I was watching the number "24" (Centigrade)...to see if it would, as usual, turn into "4" when the day arrived (or "-4"!).

Before I went to sleep last night, I had only one wish. It was a simple wish. Please let it be sunny tomorrow - was my wish. Yes, readers, that was the only thing I wanted in my whole life, as of last night! Maybe it is a sign that I have become simple-minded. Shouldn't I have been wishing for a million pounds? A fast car? A swimming pool?

So - my dream came true! And, even better than that, I have just checked the weather page and it says it is TWENTY-FIVE DEGREES! So I got at least one degree more than I was offered!

So now everything has come true, what do I ask for from life? What do you give the man who has everytthing? I don't know, I'm quite happy!

Right, now I'm going back outside. See you out there!

Wild Flowers

Don't say I never send you flowers!

Mister Men

Something strange is happening to the Mr. Men!

The Mr. Men is a series of children's books written in the 1970s by Roger Hargreaves, and published first in England. Roger died in 1988 so after that his son Adam carried on writing the books. He still does, but the whole Mr. Men "brand" was sold for a lot of money - so much that if you spent all the money on Mr. Men books and laid them out end to end, they would stretch round the earth five times! (They cost £2 each and I hope I worked that out right!)

Actually, they are worth more than that. They are very good.

I have two that were printed in the 1970s (because I was produced in the 1970s!): Mr. Sneeze and Mr. Funny. At that time, here were the other books you could get:


And, on the front, this is the kind of thing you would see:



Today, the only difference on the front covers is that the signature by Roger Hargreaves doesn't slope anymore. It is upright:

That's ok. Which do you prefer? (PS Mr. Silly looks funny, eh?)

The other changes are not so OK, in my opinion. First of all, look at what has happened to the back cover line-up of Mr. Men. They have all changed! Look at Mr. Funny and compare him with his picture above:



This is not the same Mr. Man! I don't think the colours came out right here, but one major difference is that his gloves aren't the right colour! Mr. Funny's body is green and his gloves are yellow. In the new picture his body and his gloves are green. Hmm, not good I think. Then look at the eyes. This is the most disturbing change. What is wrong with the eyes? Look at them! They are completely different now, and have no character! The bold lines of the original have been replaced by this hideous cosmetic surgery nightmare operation look. Maybe someone thinks he looks more human? Well, these days, perhaps that is true - when so many people in the public eye do have this weird plastic surgery/botox injection eye-look. Is that what it is? Has Mr. Funny had botox??? I don't believe it! He would never do that! This is the man who cheered up all the animals in the zoo when they had colds! But now they would have us believe that he is a fading star of the 70s, clinging on too long to his share of the spotlight and sinking ever deeper into a whirlpool of alcoholism like many before him (Krusty the Clown?)

Hmm. The Mr. Funny inside the books is the same one as before. Perhaps this back-cover image is some look-alike or impersonator they used for publicity material. Obviously Mr. Funny, like Saddam Hussein, is a person of such importance that he has many doubles for use in public work. I understand.

Having suggested that the insides of the books have not changed, I am afraid this is not true in the case of Mr. Dizzy. What on earth has happened to the images? They look like they have been scanned in by dogs. Or hamsters! (They find it harder to operate the mouse. Which wasn't supposed to be a joke. But I suppose you could see it as one if you want). Just look at Mr. Dizzy's edges:


Dear me. That's what it looks like in the book, I am afraid. Not good!

So you see, I am not completely happy with the state of the Mr. Men books today. But I can tell you: if you want to read them, they are all still with us, even if there is something strange on the back, even if there are a few odd things about them today. The insides are the same (except Mr. Dizzy and I haven't checked all of the books so I can't promise everyone else has escaped this treatment).

They come highly recommended (by me). They have been translated into 20 languages, so you should be seeing some near you! In fact, you are reading this in English so I would recommend you look for the English ones. They are the first and best!

Let me know what you think.

Thievery

I've been reading about Stradivarius violins.

They are famous for their sound, but I suppose they are more famous for their value. Of course they have a musical value as great instruments, but because of this they also have a monetary value.

There are up to about 700 Strads around in the world today.

First I read about one of the instruments David Oistrakh (1908-1974) played. He had others but this one is referred to as the "Oistrakh". It was made in 1671.

What did I read next? "Stolen in 1996 and still missing".

Yes, it was stolen and has not come to light.

Read on.

Le Maurien (1714) - stolen in 2002, still missing
Lipinski (1715) - missing since 1962
Colossus (1716) - stolen in 1998, still missing
Davidov-Morini (1727) - stolen in 1995, still missing
Herkules (1732) - this belonged to Ysaÿe, was stolen in 1908 and is still missing
The Ames (1734) and Lamoureux (1735) are still missing

Some thieves know how to steal but do not know how to look after what they steal. Sometimes things go wrong. Other types of accidents can happen too.

Can you believe that very valuable objects can be sold to private collectors, regardless of where they came from, and can be kept hidden?

That's another possibility.

I'm sorry to say that all kinds of things go on in the world, and some of them are not nice.

I'm not just talking about "owners" of stolen property. There are other kinds of illegal hobbies, I would imagine.

There are people alive today who are not nice people. We do not know them, I'm glad to say.

Some people are selfish. And some people are very selfish indeed.

How silly to take things for yourself. Does a fish try to keep its own private water, does an eagle breathe only its own private air? No, they are each free to travel where they can. They share it with many others.

Everything we have on this earth is for us. Not mine, not yours. We can't keep it, we can't just do what we like with it, we don't own it, we have to take care of it all. But it is for us. All of us! Together.

So when you take something and hide it for yourself, you are taking it from...yourself.

It was yours anyway! But you took it and concealed it. And then you couldn't share it with anyone, and that was no fun.

A bit sad.

But we don't have to be sad if we share!

You see? The violins can come out of their cupboards, and be heard. And then we can all hear them, and they will be ours again. Because a human made them. A human just like us. He made them from wood, which was living just like we are now. All part of our world, all knitted together like old clothes. Our world.

Not "me" and "them".

We, us!

Jingle Pot

I have a book called 1001 Natural Wonders You Must See Before You Die. I wish it were called 1001 Natural Wonders You Must See. Of course I will see them (if I do manage to see all 1001 of them) before I die. Or should all books change their titles now?

"OXFORD DICTIONARY OF ENGLISH - FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT DEAD"

"THE DA VINCI CODE - BESTSELLER, READ BY LIVING PEOPLE THROUGHOUT THE WORLD"

"THE PICKWICK PAPERS - THE TIMELESS FAVOURITE OF THOSE MILLIONS WHOSE FINGERS WERE ABLE TO GRASP ON TO LIFE SUFFICIENTLY TO BE ABLE TO TURN ITS PAGES"

The girl at the checkout looked at me with a funny look. As if she thought I was going to die in the next month! Maybe I accidentally picked the book out of the 'Terminal Illness' section? I don't think so.

I have seen several books called "Something Something, Blah Blah Blah, ...BEFORE YOU DIE". I suppose the publisher imagines the title will lend a certain urgency to your book browsing. You must buy the book ...BEFORE YOU DIE!

We could add it to all sorts of things we want to sell. Decoding Skin - Philip Howard's Solo Piano Album of Music to Listen to Before You Die!

Back to the 1001 Natural Wonders book. I didn't count them. I believe there are 1001. They said it, that's good enough for me. And they are all very natural and wonderful, just like it says.

I don't know the meanings of foreign place-names, but some of the English names are quite funny. Things are often odd or eccentric in England - it is good, one of the main positive features of this country in my opinion.

There was one I remembered. A cave somewhere. Pothole is a word for a hole in the road, or apparently also for a cave - a very big hole in the road, I suppose. That could explain a little bit about the funny name...

JINGLE POT

Well, I liked it!

Crayon Carry-ons

Wax crayons are very popular. People like children to use them because they don't have sharp points, so you cannot cause injuries with them. This seems quite a reliable principle to go by. However. There is one documented instance of crayon-induced harm that I know of. As a child, Homer...


...Simpson, fond of putting crayons in his ears and nose,


got one stuck. Not realising this, over time the crayon found its way into his brain. Detected by X-ray photograph,


it was removed surgically. The surgery effected a radical change in Simpson's brain-power.



The new Homer, unhappy with the responsibility of free thought, started to yearn for the old days when all he had to think about was where his next beer was coming from. His daughter Lisa's fears were realised when she noticed her powder blue crayon was missing...So perhaps crayons also bring tragedy, of a kind. But let's hope there is a lesson we can all learn from the story of Homer Simpson.

Remembering at all times to keep crayons clear of the orifices of the head, let us look at the evolution of the wax crayon colour rainbow. In the beginning, there were only eight colours. This was in 1903 when Binney Smith & Co. first started manufacturing the Crayola crayon. The colours were black, blue, brown, green, orange, red, violet and yellow. Quite good choices! No controversy so far.

In 1949 another 40 colours were added. Lemon Yellow, Burnt Sienna, Periwinkle, Thistle - more exciting names. One of them was changed in 1958 - "Prussian Blue" was thought to have no meaning at that date, since it was decided children no longer knew of the deep blue colour of the Prussian army uniform. OK, I understand I suppose. It turned into "Midnight Blue".

Some of the names were a bit too exciting. Oh dear, what's this one - Flesh? Well, it was a pinky colour. Except not all flesh is that colour, is it? So they changed the name to Peach. That was the Peach that we used at my school. It was the one that always ran out the fastest. We were always drawing people, of course, and seemingly the people all had Peach-coloured flesh - yes, flesh was "Flesh" at that time. Not surprisingly, because I never saw any other colour skin for many years. One of the dinner ladies was Italian, and I thought she looked a bit strange! Where did I go to school, you may ask? Nazi Germany? No, it was an ordinary English school. So we thought. Anyway, I have seen lots of different skin types now. And I'm not sure I would use Peach for any of them - though it does come in handy as a base, if blended (I'm really talking about coloured pencils here; I haven't used wax crayons recently).

So goodbye Flesh. 16 further colours were added in 1958, among them Indian Red. The name referred to a famous type of pigment used in paint. But I suppose people were a bit nervous. They thought about the Native American (name for the people who lived in America before the Americans lived there) and remembered they were called "Red Indians". That's what we called them too, once - and yes, I learned all about them at my school. But they weren't Indian, and they weren't Red any more than I am Peach or Marcus Aurelius Garvey was Black.

Nervous people thought Indian Red could be seen as Red Indian, so it became Chestnut in 1999.

The strange thing is that in 1998, when the latest addition to the Crayola rainbow brought the total number of colours to 120, one of them was called Fuzzy-Wuzzy Brown. Hmm. "Fuzzy-Wuzzy" is a racist term for a person of African genetic origin. A Brown person, one might say (or "black", I suppose, though I already exempted M. Garvey from being painted with that exact colour. I would like to say that I don't find anybody to be quite black. Some people come close-ish - a very nice colour of skin I think! Other colours are nice too, of course. Please can't we just say everyone is human-coloured?)

So there was a crayon called Fuzzy-Wuzzy Brown. There still is, as far as I know. It didn't get changed. But Indian Red did. How odd, to me. To you?

Please note that I have refrained from giving examples of possible other upsetting names that crayon companies may wish to mysteriously overlook. There is no "good taste" control on my humour when I'm being harsh, and I'm not trying to offend people today. Please imagine your own. In fact, don't imagine them. You don't need any practise thinking like that. We've had enough racism now. We've all seen enough of it. Come on, think of some nice names instead. And if there is a skin colour you don't like, think harder. Give it the most beautiful name you can, please.

Thank you.

Takk and tak

As part of my travel plans for the future, I'm back to learning Polish. There is this word, 'tak', which means 'yes'. So far so good, that's all quite clear (in some pronunciation you can even hear a bit of a 'd' sound at the start, so you can think of 'da' in Russian and know for sure that this word means yes). But in Norwegian (which we discussed at length, starting on 25th June) the word takk means thanks. I get just a little bit confused as I try to decide whether I'm saying yes or thanks. Solutions: get focused into speaking Polish and not have any other options for the 'tak' sound in my mind; or, concentrate on the different sounds between the two words - which are very different, if you get close enough to see all the differences - and associate different pictures and feelings with each one which will always be there when I use the words.

It may seem a small thing to be talking about. But once you know bits of a few languages, some of the bits can fall into some of the other languages, so I'd like to know what you do about that.

One great linguist (polyglot, or by definition, hyperpolyglot - speaking more than six languages fluently) - the first that I think of - is Richard Francis Burton, the great English ...well, there isn't a word for what he was, he was everything - and everything England was not, so we can be thankful for having him (1821-1890). He was one of the first Westerners into Mecca - he went in disguise, linguistically as well as everything else (you can read about this in Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Al-Madinah and Mecca). He translated the Arabian Nights (the Alf Laylah Wa Laylah, or "Thousand Nights and One Night") and the Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana - among others. Burton, who was supposed to know 29 languages, was an incredible man who went everywhere and did everything - fantastical, unlikely, impossible, but he did it. He even discovered the source of the Nile. Read something by him or about him. Then have a think about what you have to do to qualify as 'being alive'. Lord Derby said of RFB: "Before middle age, he compressed into his life more of study, more of hardship, and more of successful enterprise and adventure, than would have sufficed to fill up the existence of half a dozen ordinary men".