On the subject of the first Ashes test, I am speechless. I note this, however, spoken by an English character in the new Thomas Pynchon novel.
'You might not as an American appreciate this, but among the last surviving bits of evidence that a civilization once existed on this island is the game of cricket.'
Pubs too, I'd say, and tweed, possibly also real muffins, not those ghastly American heart attack machines. Look, guys, which part of this sentence - Cake is not a breakfast food. - don't you understand?
Friday, November 24, 2006
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A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
Not coming from a cricket nation but thanks to Channel 4 coverage, I loved and was addicted to the last Ashes. Now however thanks to selling onto the great God Sky, my viewing and interest, like presumably huge numbers of others, must disappear. However from what I'd gathered in hte build up to this, it seemed eminently clear that England are going to get absolutely hammered.
ReplyDelete'You might not as an American appreciate this, but among the last surviving bits of evidence that a civilization once existed on this island is the game of cricket.'
ReplyDeletePubs too, I'd say, and tweed, possibly also real muffins
And a deep love of John Betjeman.
Don't be so down, Bryan. They'll improve ... a bit.
ReplyDeleteCake is a great breakfast food. Put butter on it and it's even better!
ReplyDeleteAnd I have a question for the Brits: Into which food group does Marmite fall???
Marmite, Susan, is sui generis.
ReplyDeleteA question:
ReplyDeleteWhat IS a muffin? The English kind, that is. Don't mean crumpets/pikelets,
do you?
(That's me - never afraid to ask the big questions).
There was a muffin in my hardscrabble childhood ooop north. It was soft and breadlike and toasted beautifully. But now those days are gone I feel so insecure....
ReplyDeleteBy the way Australia made an almost identical score in the 1st Test in 1954
ReplyDeleteand won it by an innings, then England (under Len Hutton) went on to take
the series. Funny old game cricket...
excuse me, anything can be a good breakfast food, so long as you've been awake all night and decide you may as well stay awake all day than get a paltry 2 hours sleep and wake up groggy & dismal. In this situation, it is necessary to maintain momentum, otherwise the body & mind will realise they've been duped out of sleep, and you'll end up doing crazy sh*t or just nodding off at work. In this situation let me tell you the BEST breafkast foods are the odds & ends left over from the last spring clean: oatcakes with mayonnaise, old Xmas pudding, cupasoups, stale cake, packets of raisins, Winalot or Pedigree Chum (never both together), unidentified Chinese herbs, corned beef, what may or may not be broccoli, and so on. Such foods confuse the body, giving it plenty to think about without getting onto the subject of sleep.
ReplyDeleteElberry, I have been there.
ReplyDeleteGot a short fix of cricket in hte BBC highlights last night and my love was re-awakened though I'm not sure that's a good thing given watching the Tests is a way of life rather than something satisfied by a mere flash of highlights. Cricket a wonderful antidote to the corrupted world of football- a kind of ghastly microcosm of all that's wrong with modernity. Contrary to the impression of my hopefully wrong feeling that England were going to get hammered, my hopes are with Flintoff and the gang. Though it'll possibly take another injury to McGrath and an infusion of resilience into some of the English team. And why is George Bush still captaining Australia?
ReplyDelete