The master didn't have any work for me today (barring a journey to the Post Office) so spent most of the afternoon reading. Managed to finish Alistair Cooke's Letter from America. Had been dipping into that since May. And I mean dipping in literally - as the chapters are short (around 5 pages per broadcast) the negation with the bathtub is easy - you don't have to leave the bath mid-chapter or anything like that. Not that I dipped the book itself into the bathtub. Nor did I try to read it in the shower.
It's a funny sort of book, Letter from America. For a start it isn't really a book - it's a selection (of about one hundred) of British-born journalist Alistair Cooke's weekly radio broadcasts he produced for the BBC from, as you may have gleaned, America. Usually from the New York studio, the city where he was based. He broadcast every week from 1946 until his retirement in 2004 (he died the same year, aged 95). It was my memories of these later broadcasts which led to to buy the book in the first place.
Though his style always seems to be that of the consummate moderate (as he seems to be in his American Journey and his documentary America (spot a common theme?)) it is funny how Cooke becomes mildly more whimsical and subtly irreverent as the years go on, becoming in my eyes (and ears) something of a Roald Dahl figure.
There are a few recordings of his letters here to give you a taste.
Having spent the afternoon in bed reading (although unlike Alistair himself, I had two, not three pillows) I had to stretch my legs and went for a quick run around the park to ventilate my brain, which had just spent the last three hours in turn-of-the-millennium America (needless to say, the letters are presented in chronological order).
The odd and interesting thing is what happened when I got back. Though the run was not long, it was conducted at a decent pace, and so on my return to house I was moving quite slowly, worn out as I was. As I entered the first thing I saw was the strong if rather weird yellow light coming through the landing window, which made everything a little hazy. From the kitchen I heard the song Blue Moon by The Marcels, except that this was a slowed down version from the film Grease. So my walk up the stairs was rather surreal - the music was in slow motion, my footsteps were in slow motion, and everything was in a weird, yellow haze.
Last time I went running I saw a discarded apple core outside the Coptic Church in Davigdor Road. This made me laugh pretty hard. But in case you haven't made the link (God knows I have to explain many of my jokes these days, as the last post attests to) the reason for my mirth was the fact that 'twas the eating of the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden that proved the origin of all mankind's sin. And so to see one eaten lying outside the church (unintentionally I am sure) proved the origin of my laughter.
It's a funny sort of book, Letter from America. For a start it isn't really a book - it's a selection (of about one hundred) of British-born journalist Alistair Cooke's weekly radio broadcasts he produced for the BBC from, as you may have gleaned, America. Usually from the New York studio, the city where he was based. He broadcast every week from 1946 until his retirement in 2004 (he died the same year, aged 95). It was my memories of these later broadcasts which led to to buy the book in the first place.
Though his style always seems to be that of the consummate moderate (as he seems to be in his American Journey and his documentary America (spot a common theme?)) it is funny how Cooke becomes mildly more whimsical and subtly irreverent as the years go on, becoming in my eyes (and ears) something of a Roald Dahl figure.
There are a few recordings of his letters here to give you a taste.
Having spent the afternoon in bed reading (although unlike Alistair himself, I had two, not three pillows) I had to stretch my legs and went for a quick run around the park to ventilate my brain, which had just spent the last three hours in turn-of-the-millennium America (needless to say, the letters are presented in chronological order).
The odd and interesting thing is what happened when I got back. Though the run was not long, it was conducted at a decent pace, and so on my return to house I was moving quite slowly, worn out as I was. As I entered the first thing I saw was the strong if rather weird yellow light coming through the landing window, which made everything a little hazy. From the kitchen I heard the song Blue Moon by The Marcels, except that this was a slowed down version from the film Grease. So my walk up the stairs was rather surreal - the music was in slow motion, my footsteps were in slow motion, and everything was in a weird, yellow haze.
Last time I went running I saw a discarded apple core outside the Coptic Church in Davigdor Road. This made me laugh pretty hard. But in case you haven't made the link (God knows I have to explain many of my jokes these days, as the last post attests to) the reason for my mirth was the fact that 'twas the eating of the forbidden fruit in the Garden of Eden that proved the origin of all mankind's sin. And so to see one eaten lying outside the church (unintentionally I am sure) proved the origin of my laughter.
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