2010 — 2 June: Wednesday
It may take me a while, but I sometimes get there in the end. I mentioned a while ago my astonishment at the idiocy displayed by a continental neighbour's decision to copyright images of (inter alia) the Atomium. This evening I found an unexplored / unscanned photo album Christa had assembled, and can thus make good on my whimsical threat:
Will the land of the saxophone sue me, do you reckon? She and Peter had been over in Germany on holiday (in July 1993 for a couple of weeks) while poor ol' Dad slaved away1 in the IBM orifice. The (17 straight) days out were very much enjoyed, even the 10 that C&P spent in Germany. They came back a day early, somewhat traumatised by their first visit to the parental graves in Meisenheim. But the proverbial good time was more or less had by all. And it was at least as hot as Florida (where we'd been on holiday a year earlier).
It's now 00:57 or so. I'd intended my evening's guilty pleasure to be watching the Blu-ray of The Last Starfighter again, but with production designer Ron Cobb's commentary. Mike and I watched this not all that long ago on HD DVD. The graphics were a lot crisper than the film (which was the last one Robert Preston appeared in, by the way). In the event, I swapped emails with Shary Flenniken, did some photo scanning, and generally just pottered, which is what I've always done best.
Yet more cartons to be stuffed, of course. But first, since the BBC's Late Junction is just winding down, it's obviously time for some more sleep. G'night.
Skimming idly through...
... a 1,000+ list of cheapish Blu-rays I was on almost the final screen before finding a genuine oddity from 1980 that I promptly ordered (though on DVD — a) I'm a cheapskate (aka pensioner) and b) with the Oppo's VRS scaling technology I rarely feel the need for the hi-def variant, with the obvious exception of films such as "Avatar"). It will be the first film in my little stack that contains Richard Feynman! I leave its tracking down to any curious reader :-) because it's time (10:34) I had some breakfast. Clue: widdershins.
I almost felt like apologising to the "green bin" lads this morning, having stuffed the thing so full of discarded paper files and what-not in the last ten days or so. I usually barely manage to fill either bin to half its capacity during each fortnight
The IBM Muppet Show?
Given what I was saying a few hours ago about the surreal world of IBM, how cool is this?
Thanks for the link, Brian!
Later
For post-lunch exercise I'm taking what may well be the final four cartons over to the warehouse. The total there will be 120. I've just had a faintly spooky email from GWR but my Google connection seems unwilling to let me reply appropriately. I shall give it a while to cool down. Then — just maybe — I shall report on the blissful influx of listening pleasure that Mr Postie was shovelling through my pint-sized letter box this morning, until I opened the door. It's 14:39 and quite sunny out there.
Right. As of 17:32 there are now 122 cartons in store; my little room is about half-filled. Meanwhile, in the unreal world, there are "at least" 12 people shot dead in West Cumbria. Words fail me.
And this isn't much smarter.
Having just been called...
... by my plumber, who'd prefer to take a mini-break between jobs, to sort out his van, and so on, I now have a reprieve until Monday on the actual start of the upheavals. This is a relief,2 if I'm honest. It gives me another handful of days to sort out and tidy up the mess I've created hereabouts by the simple act of packing stuff away either into cartons or (much worse) odd corners "out of the way". The trouble is, of course, there's really no such place as "out of the way". Must be something to do with the conservation of matter, or incipient senility. Mind you, he sounded quite impressed at the thought of 122 cartons of stuff already out of his way.
It's 19:13 and I'm definitely peckish. There's a prawn salad downstairs with my name on it.
Audiophilia dept.
As I mentioned last Sunday, several old favourites from my youth are now available on CD properly re-mastered... Along the top row here we have the three albums "Jackson Heights" released on the Vertigo label in the early 1970s. I actually bought my original vinyl copy of Ragamuffin's Fool while on a convalescent3 day-trip to Bristol by train with Christa in mid-1975. (I was introduced to this group — formed after the breakup of "The Nice" — by the BBC DJ Andy Finney on his marvellous "Fresh Garbage" Sunday evening radio show.) Then we have King Crimson's Lizard (sounding crisp and gorgeous an incredible 40 years since its first release, and a mere 39 years since I bought my vinyl copy in Cambridge) and the strangely "lost" second Buggles album from 1981 Adventures in Modern Recording which now has ten extra tracks in this definitive re-issue. Trevor Horn is a massive talent.
Add to that a further 15 hours of Haydn's solo keyboard music on a 4-disc Blu-ray release with carefully engineered digital simulations of the original environments in which this music would have been played. Amazing stuff.
The Yamaha DSP-1 A/V amp...
... I bought in 1998 was taking the initial steps in this direction with its digitally sampled concert hall and music venue DSP settings used to shape playback in a way that supposedly simulated these environments. (Some of the occupants of my house took a slightly jaundiced view of the need for 7.1 channels of amplification and the loudspeakers to go with that, it has to be admitted. The six holes in the ceiling above the plasma screen are all that remain of that experiment.)