Monday, monday...
It's been a while since I posted, one way and another. Yesterday, for instance, was spent putting the car in for its annual service - plus aircon service, as they were doing an offer - and MOT (which it passed, thank goodness) and just scraping into the warranty period for the broken electric wing-mirrors control. The car is cleaner than it has been for... well, since it was last in for its annual service. Things taken out of car before it went in included: two folding chairs, picnic blanket, four pairs of shoes, four sets of spectacles - three of which were Ina's as mine were just the one set of car-based sunglasses - three baseball caps in blue, white and pink, two stainless steel water bowls for dog, plus one folding water bottle, a dog collar, a leather lead, sunscreen, glass cleaner, screen-cleaner, half a dozen CDs, a small stuffed bear, ball-throwing stick plus ball, squeaky bone, cat blanket, three tubs of Vanish, an empty handbag, a wooden wand, a coat, a cardigan, peppermints, and a vast array of maps, identification crib charts, leaflets and a photograph of a lost cat (not mine.) Now I have to decide what to put back. (Though the big AZ road map goes into recycling as I bought a new one yesterday when putting some petrol in the courtesy car.)
We also walked the dog in Roding Valley Meadows, where I attempted to photograph mating darters, and pretty much failed.
However, we did meet a rather splendid dog called Albert
Albert is the result of a breeding programme I didn't know much about until talking to his owner, which is trying to recreate the original British bulldog (just as the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel came about as an attempt to recreate the look of the original spaniels owned by King Charles II.) Anyhow, the bulldog experiment is known, variously, as the Victorian Bulldog and the Olde English Bulldog and, judging by Albert, is a real success. You could put him into a 18th century engraving of bull baiting and he would not look out of place. Also, look at him run!
I found myself reading a lot of Primeval fanfic last week, which sent me back to the fixit fic I started ages ago. The ending of fifth season has given me an opening to rework the whole thing (and make snarky comments on the lack of scientific knowledge, logic and series continuity shown in the last two episodes.) Heyho.
Otherwise, I keep flitting from book to book, but mainly re-reading Pinker. This ought to depress me, on the basis that the very premises on which I have been working in my fiction go against human nature as depicted - incontrovertibly, I think - in the chapter on families in How the Mind Works. I comfort myself that my people aren't actually Homo sapiens sapiens and that genetic tampering is possible if not, at the current time, legal.
Anyhow, on a more cheerful note, here is Xolo, holding her position on the sofa despite there being a DOG in the room.
We also walked the dog in Roding Valley Meadows, where I attempted to photograph mating darters, and pretty much failed.
However, we did meet a rather splendid dog called Albert
Albert is the result of a breeding programme I didn't know much about until talking to his owner, which is trying to recreate the original British bulldog (just as the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel came about as an attempt to recreate the look of the original spaniels owned by King Charles II.) Anyhow, the bulldog experiment is known, variously, as the Victorian Bulldog and the Olde English Bulldog and, judging by Albert, is a real success. You could put him into a 18th century engraving of bull baiting and he would not look out of place. Also, look at him run!
I found myself reading a lot of Primeval fanfic last week, which sent me back to the fixit fic I started ages ago. The ending of fifth season has given me an opening to rework the whole thing (and make snarky comments on the lack of scientific knowledge, logic and series continuity shown in the last two episodes.) Heyho.
Otherwise, I keep flitting from book to book, but mainly re-reading Pinker. This ought to depress me, on the basis that the very premises on which I have been working in my fiction go against human nature as depicted - incontrovertibly, I think - in the chapter on families in How the Mind Works. I comfort myself that my people aren't actually Homo sapiens sapiens and that genetic tampering is possible if not, at the current time, legal.
Anyhow, on a more cheerful note, here is Xolo, holding her position on the sofa despite there being a DOG in the room.