As I walked in I noticed the LGBT rainbow flag flying over the humanities building. My immediate happy reaction was: good!

Instantly this was followed by a second, unhappy thought as I reflected that these days, flying the rainbow flag is about more than just LGBT rights. Equally, it’s a statement of which side you are on, which public figures you approve of and which you disapprove of. How depressing.

And then my thoughts took a third, bitter turn. Who’s to blame for polarising us? It’s Trump and the Republicans.

All this in five seconds upon seeing that rainbow flying in the breeze.

[28 January 2020]

I don’t exactly often write notes of the kind you might find in the family section of a newspaper. But Kate and I have stumbled upon a delightful game and we’re thrilled to have found it. Try it next time you and a friend are on a drive for a few hours.

Simply pick a word or a theme and take turns choosing songs that mention the word or touch the theme. The magic is, nowadays it’s easy to call up any song on your smartphone and play it over the car speakers. To play the game, the driver drives and the passenger manages the electronics, but you take equal turns picking songs.

We’ve had half a dozen drives like this so far. The theme of “cities” led to Molly Malone, Brownsville Girl, and Jamaica Farewell (along with twenty others of course). “Work” led to the Lumberjack Song, Easy Wind, and 9 to 5. “Sky” led to Penny Lane, Over the Rainbow, and Clouds. “Railroads” gave us King of the Road, This Train, and Casey Jones. We’ve done flowers, girls’ names, animals, American states,….

Happy driving!

[22 January 2020]

حصلت على هذا البرنامج النصي من جوجل ترجمة

Arabic script is beautiful, isn’t it?

I find it fascinating that readers of Arabic are incapable of seeing the script as I do. Of course they too can see beauty, but it will be beauty of a different kind, for they can’t turn off the message.

For me there’s a similar effect in the gulf between musical pieces I know and those I do not. I can get pleasure and even emotion from listening to a piece I don’t know, but it’s a formless experience, without any of the meaning that takes over when I’ve heard the piece ten times. Listening to a piece I know is much more satisfying.  But once I know it, I’ve lost the ability to hear those sounds as sounds and nothing more.

[3 January 2020]