Sunday, October 28, 2012

zero de conduite



remembering music ... blimey ... how did a choir of country boys sing this whilst unable to read music properly ?




















the answer is ... we probably sang it quite badly whilst thoroughly enjoying our few short moments of pure joy and spiritual ecstasy

norman townsend, the wretch, was a great choirmaster and trotted his unruly tribe of trebles through two choir practises a week in the echoing shadows of malmesbury abbey before driving off to his night shift at the railway works in swindon

i am still grateful to him, despite my subsequent agnosticism and anti-imperialism,  for bequeathing this "stately" music and this "triumphalist" language which still reside comfortably as welcome guests in sunlit attics of my memory

his good taste in church music was unerring, so this is the one in B flat and not the one in C

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mbaz9T-RW-M

Sunday, October 21, 2012

Zhoen ...

finished her blog today with this sentence ...

"Church bells pealing, a wonderful sound, like train whistles and ship horns. "

so it only seems natural to plunder this picture from Shorpy ...


















... and then add a link to another aspect of my most favourite railroad photographer's work ...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbzAJoW34DM

... headphones if you have them !

schrodinger's old tom cat drops by to cash his weekly reality cheque





schrodinger's old tom cat re-considers HIS options







Monday, October 15, 2012

word verification troubles ...























I made eight unsuccessful attempts to leave the following simple comment on the FÃœNFFINGERPLÄTZE's blog after she'd written about a pang of food nostalgia ...

"Auf der Suche nach der verlorenen Zeit"

Grrr !  I just can't read those wobbly letters ...


Sunday, October 14, 2012

mother nature's riposte ... a second flower twenty-four hours after the first























... i had to stand on tiptoe with one foot on the dog's lead and arms stretched uncomfortably high to get this picture