where art collides

This is one of those time has no meaning days. I have a jobs list but nothing that won’t wait. In one sense it doesn’t make sense to use the internet on a day like this. If time has no meaning it means you have a lot of it going spare. If I use the internet the third law will kick in and that time will have gone. Decisions decisions.

I did just pop out to the back garden for a kickabout with a football with our youngest. The garden has no chance really. It is littered with cracked pots and broken plants, bashed by ball. The lawn itself is in dire need of attention, lots of muddy patches and where there is greenery it is often moss. There is really no point in doing anything about it whilst it is still used as a sports field. Perhaps I should get the groundsman from the school over the road to come in and give it some industrial strength attention.

It’s a good phrase, “industrial strength”. Handy for lots of situations though I’m not sure I can quote an example here, other than the one I just did. It’s a bit like “fair play”. Useful, generally. I’ve made myself think here, wondering what other phrases come into the same category.

The pause for thought is represented by a couple of carriage returns, invisible but hopefully obvious. I’m afraid I can’t think of another such phrase though if I do I’ll burst out mid paragraph, a kind of metaphoric “Eureka”. Eureka is also a handy word but not a phrase and really only meant to represent the fact that you have discovered something unexpectedly.

You won’t see this but I am writing this bit at a desk in the TV room. It used to be my study but that went out the door when we got a TV. It might surprise you to hear that our oldest was thirteen before we had a TV in the house. I eventually bowed to pressure from a daughter about to go up to high school who was worried she might not be able to keep up with the TV gossip in the playground, although I don’t think they call it playground at “big school”. Playground is for kids.

Although I effectively lost my study it is quite handy to have a room that I can shut the door on and not have to put up with the rubbish they have on. It isn’t all rubbish but the vast majority is. I usually end up in another room on my laptop indulging in a bit of third law, or writing stuff like I am now.

Most of my writing is done on a sofa in the living room or in the kitchen or the conservatory (with Colonel Mustard and the lead piping). That bit in brackets is an in phrase for those in the know. It isn’t quite an eureka phrase and certainly not worthy of a shout out, in case you are analysing every word for the promised expression of surprise and discovery.

That expression may never arrive. I do feel as if I should be offering a prize for the first person to spot such an expression but I won’t because I’ll probably be inundated with emails and comments with “entries” none of which will be right and all of which will be expecting some kind of response. Not that I don’t like comments. I’m a pretty gregarious individual and like to engage with folk.

That’s my rule for twitter. I only follow people who are real people and who have something to say other than “buy my left handed widget”, “offers on left handed widgets” and “sale of left handed widgets ends at noon”. I don’t even know what a left handed widget is and seeing as I am right handed can’t see what possible use I could have for one unless it is something like a fork which I hold in my left hand using my right to manipulate the knife. I might be completely wrong here. It may also be that left handed widgets can also be used in the right hand in which case they are mislabelled, misrepresented and quite possibly miss sold, though not to me as I won’t buy one because I won’t be following them on twitter. I don’t think I’ve ever bought anything through following a link on twitter. I do get a lot of my news through twitter mind you. Breaking news, you saw it first on twitter, hot action as it happens from first hand witnesses, unless that is it is just a simple retweet. In fact it is mostly going to come from retweets as I don’t know anyone who lives in a war zone and who is likely to be filling my stream with live action coverage.

I have been stranded in war zones on two occasions in my life. The first was on 9 11. I was at a conference in the USA. The whole thing fizzled out as the planes crashed on day one of the conference. Many of the attendees had not yet arrived and most who could, drove home leaving just the overseas visitors to spend a week around the pool and going out every night.

The second was during the July 7^th bombings in London. I had been expecting to catch a train back north from Kings Cross that day but instead was “forced” to spend the whole afternoon in the pub, crashing out at my sister Sue’s place in Balham for the night. It was handy having a sister living in Balham (gateway to the South) but she lives in Cardiff now which is also quite handy for when you want to go and watch the rugby at the Millennium Stadium which I am wont to do every now and again.

I remember once staying with Sue in Balham after watching England play Wales at Twickers. Sue had been the “good Auntie” and taken Joe then aged three out in London for the day. Hamleys toy shop, that kind of stuff. It’s hard work looking after a three year old, especially when you are not used to it so when I got back from the rugby Sue was desperate for some adult company, a few glasses of wine and a meal. Unfortunately I had been on the pop at a corporate jolly all day and all I could do when I got in was collapse. Poor Sue.

Sue’s a violinist you know. When we were kids we used to play the sailors hornpipe together, her on the fiddle and me on guitar. We would repeat the tune playing the verses faster and faster until we could physically go no faster. Mam and day would be quite proud when they saw people stop outside our house to listen. We still do it as a party piece. That and “The Irish Washerwoman”. Fair play 🙂

Slipped that one in, the fair play. You can’t claim it as a new phrase though because it was in the original spiel on useful phrases. Spiel is also a very useful word but like Eureka, not a phrase. I might be being a little harsh on myself here insisting on the useful phrase being a phrase rather than just a word but there again rules is rules. If you make ‘em there is no point in breaking ‘em straight away though I know that “rules are meant to be broken”.  That last phrase by the way is not one of the useful ones. It is interesting enough but not in my book useful, and this is indeed my book.

It would be no different if it was my ball and we were playing football. If it’s my ball we play by my rules. Period. Full stop. I don’t really like the word period, it’s too American and I don’t know why I used it.

3rd law part 17 here

3rd law part 19 here