I do not look 'down'. This is contemplative perplexity.

-Frasier Crane, Frasier - Series 10

I loved this phrase as soon as I heard it. :)

Sunday

I just watched a movie called The Brothers Bloom. I enjoyed it. The style was unusual but I really liked it and it kept me guessing, was mildly comic and interesting. But then I flipped the case over and it said the genre was comedy, only I didn't really find it hilarious. As I said, only mildly comic. But I thought, maybe I didn't really get it? I only really was able to come to this conclusion though because I had to think very hard about the ending to come close to getting the whole movie. It was a con movie, and there was a few overlapping cons, but I think I got it. And I've come to the conclusion that the case was wrong and it's not comedy as such. It's amusing but, its sort of more like Hustle. Anyway, I enjoyed it, so check it out.

Sonnets from The River Duddon: After-Thought

I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide,

As being past away.—Vain sympathies!

For, backward, Duddon! as I cast my eyes,

I see what was, and is, and will abide;

Still glides the Stream, and shall for ever glide;

The Form remains, the Function never dies;

While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,

We Men, who in our morn of youth defied

The elements, must vanish;—be it so!

Enough, if something from our hands have power

To live, and act, and serve the future hour;

And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,

Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower,

We feel that we are greater than we know.

By William Wordsworth

Define:

Freer is a very strange looking word. It looks as though it should be pronounced FREAR, like fear with an extra 'r' stuck in.it's just such an odd word, and the spelling does not match the sound at all.

But then, how else would you have it spelt?

Easter

So I had an excellent easter. I hope you did as well. I spent it getting my head full of God's word, so I hope some of that decides to stick around and make itself useful. And as I couldn't do this on Easter Sunday, I'm going to say it now, because it is no less true: Christ is risen, He is risen indeed! One of the speakers over the weekend taught us to say that in Russian, but...mimicking sounds is quite different to transcribing them in a foreign alphabet. I would like to say more about my excellent Easter weekend and everything I learnt, but there's way too much to say in a blog post which I'm using to put off writing a history essay.

The reason I'm actually writing is because I saw a quote on my wall and I thought "I should blog that," but I couldn't just blog another (science) quote after easter, so you got my well-wishes as well. And here is the lovely little quote by the brilliant Mr Niels Bohr (by-the-by I heard a reference to Bohr on tv(?) the other day, but it was along the lines of I'm not just a Niels Bohr, and I though '!!'. just a Niels Bohr? the man was pretty intelligent.)

"One must never be satisfied with doing what one can; rather, one must always do what one really cannot" - Niels Bohr

One of the Things I Love

Picking up a novel after spending a few weeks on non-fiction. It's the best. Northanger Abbey was my latest novel read, and it took me about 5 days even though I was busy because I couldn't put it down! After reading non fiction you 'forget' how engrossing novels are - non-fiction just doesn't read like that, interesting though it may be.

Long story short: if it's been a while, pick up a novel and give yourself a slab of time to read because it's better than tv.

Also, read Northanger Abbey - it's really amusing and a lovely story. Despite Henry Tilney being paid out in the paper a while ago I liked his character, and for once an Austen heroine had a living, likeable, pretty strong mother. Only S&S lives up to that. It's also quite an easy read compared to the others, from memory, but maybe I'm just used to the language now....

Anyway, that's the overflow of my mind at the moment. Novels and Austen. Hope you enjoyed.

Looking out at Adelaide

Two Weeks Later

When does the word 'concise' stop being correctly applied simply through relativity and start being just the wrong word to use? Today I found 'The McGraw Hill Concise Encyclopaedia of Science' - or something along those lines. However, the encyclopaedia had:

a)two volumes on the shelf

b)about 4000 pages in each volume

c)very large surface areas

I wouldn't have called that concise. But apparently it had been adapted from the McGraw Hill Encyclopaedia of Science. I.e not concise. So in other words, concise is a relative term meaning, 2 volumes long instead of 10. But surely there's a point where concise just doesn't really apply. If you cut it from 20 volumes to 10 it's shorter, but if the entries are still quite long its not concise. Right?

My point? Food for word-thoughts. Love it

Ever Thought...

About how online chatting is so different to real life chatting? I usually don't try to have three real life conversations at once and write a blog post. I don't usually abandon a real life conversation fro 2-3 minutes to finish a chore I forgot about without telling you. There are a few more differences but I'm talking to three people so I have to make this quick - think about it.

I found this on my phone, and I don't know when or where I took it, but i like it anyway. :)