Gone? Well, we'll see. Bryan I know to be a man consitutionally incapable of 'taking a break' in any normal sense of the words, so we'll see - keep the faith, Brymaniacs. Meanwhile... As one who last appeared in Blogworld apparently (I use the word advisedly) sporting a comedy nose-moustache-and-glasses combo, I have no idea why I shld have been picked to keep the sacred seat warm. In fact I thought I'd more or less said No, but then technololgoy took over. Ah well, here we go...
It's nearly 11 on a Sunday morning and I'm conscious that by now, in normal times, B would have posted half-a-dozen piercing insights into the Zietgesit (complete with gags and links), read and reviewed a couple of books, and untangled a knotty problem in Kantian metaphysics - all before breakfast. At which point, it occurs to me, I have something to say: Breakfast cereals. Nothing wrong with them, except that they require drenching in milk. Why on earth do humans consume the milk of another, entirely unrelated species in industrial quantities? It has no nutritional advantage that can't be acquired elsewhere, and in its raw state it's vile, unless chilled to the point of tastelessness. Along with most of the non-English-speaking world, I regard it as something unfit for human consumption unless processsed into cheese or, at a pinch, yoghurt.
By now, also, Bryan wld also have devoured the papers - not me, tho I have caught the odd snippet on the radio. I like the story about the 'Naval hostage' putting his Chinese suit - a gift from the Iranian people - on eBay and selling it for, I believe, 99p. How did I miss that bargain? The act, of course, earns him a drubbing as a traitor, etc. I also heard an almost interesting Point Of View (R4) by the dreadful Lisa Jardine. In this she revisited the great 1580 eathquake off Kent (I'd put a link in here if I'd worked out how to do it yet). The response to this event was, of course, a stream of lurid pamphlets - A Burning Fiery Messenger, etc - urging prayer and repentance for the end was nigh. From here Jardine gets to global warming and the media response to the warm April. Why, she asks, doesn't any of the alarmist coverage tell us what we can do about it? Well, she almost makes the link herself, but surely what she's identified here is the religous nature of the global warming faith. Emotionaly, she wants to be urged to repentance and acts of atonement. We all do - it feels right (what is the trip to the recycling bins but a debased - and easy - act of atonement?). That is why the faith has taken such deep root so fast - and it is why we shld be vary careful and duly sceptical about the whole business. When such powerful emotional and (unacknowledged) religious impulses are driving something, clearly it's gone way beyond Science.
Anyway, that's more than enough - I can assure you I shan't be emitting on this scale very often, if ever again. But I must just comment on the short-sleeved-shirt-and-tie debate, which I only noticed belatedly. As ever, Homer J Simpson has the last word: 'It's good enough for Andy Sipowicz.' (Doesn't make it look any better though).
Sunday, May 06, 2007
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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.
This Bryan Nige passover all seems a bit like the passing from faith in one deity to another. The King is dead, long live the king. How do we know the previous posts purporting to be Bryan announcing his departure weren't in fact already Nige having done a Macbeth on the noble, generous Duncan? Disturbing.
ReplyDeleteBut life goes on. I like the idea of the recycling bin as a kind of confessional box. Here's the shadow of that which I shouldn't have done/consumed. Now I am purified. What about the poor old priest though? What does he do with this spiritual/psychological effluence?
As for your thoughts about milk...hard to argue with but up till now this was probably correctly viewed as a taboo area- one should not think too deeply about milk. Though then again I suppose we have entered a new religious era -Nigeism, so old truths are questioned. However as Christianity could be seen as including a movement away from the Law of Judaism and its focus on commandments, perhaps we are now under the guidance of the beneveolent despot, Nige, moving back to the Law: "Thou shalt not consume the milk of the cow, unless processsed into cheese or, at a pinch, yoghurt." Perhaps freedom has failed...we need commandments.
Why on earth do humans consume the milk of another, entirely unrelated species in industrial quantities?
ReplyDeleteI believe that it's simply a carry-over from when food was a lot harder to get, and milk was an easy way to exploit nature - the cow eats what humans cannot, and we eat the milk.
Regarding global warming, whether or not it will be a real problem, there is indeed a doomsday cult built up around the issue. I gut the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report here.
No - not Bryan, who wld surely have managed to key in the word 'technology' without giving the appearance of obscure wordplay involving goyim. Thanks Andrew anyway - if it's a new age, it's an age of terminal confusion I can assure you. And thanks for the link Oro - great stuff.
ReplyDeleteNige (honestly)
In the 1970s when Brian Wilson had been digging in the sandpit for rather too long and the rest of the Beach Boys were missing his mercurial talent they did a song called Brian's Back (despite the fact that he wasn't really). Can we expect a song when Bryan returns?
ReplyDeleteWhy does it say "posted by Bryan Appleyard" instead of posted by Nigel Squirrelface? I am still suspicious that you, Nige, are simply one of Appleyard's alters.
ReplyDeleteWhen Frank Wilson's co-blogger, John Brumfield, posts something, it gives his (Brumfield's) name, not Frank's.
Explique-moi, s'il vous plait....
Yes, the morning thing with B, I had taken it to be somewhat religious. Which religion, was the Q. I heard, somewhere around Oxon that boys climb towers to sing in the dawn, while strong buxom lassies 'gather nuts in May'. But that does not sound like B.
ReplyDeleteAs to the green issue, for the first time in many a year, your likely to be straped to a tree and burned, in a renewable way, of course.
That's all we need, Nige, a deity who doesn't have a clue what he's doing. You're supposed to be creating order from chaos.
ReplyDeleteAh that's better - back in the old (non) identity. The other mystifying thing, Susan, about my morning emission is that the time at the bottom bears little relation to the time I posted, as is proved by internal evidence. All v mystifying. Order out of chaos Andrew? I fear not, not yet...
ReplyDeleteNige (verily)
Which religion, was the Q. I heard, somewhere around Oxon that boys climb towers to sing in the dawn, while strong buxom lassies 'gather nuts in May'. But that does not sound like B.
ReplyDeleteAs to the green issue, for the first time in many a year, your likely to be straped to a tree and burned, in a renewable way, of course.
The other mystifying thing, Susan, about my morning emission is that the time at the bottom bears little relation to the time I posted, as is proved by internal evidence. All v mystifying. Order out of chaos Andrew? I fear not, not yet...
ReplyDelete