No-one said that setting up a new PC should be easy. But my Apple love begins to show its face at times like these...
So I'm not sure why we decided to pitch in for Le Cassoulet's 5-course wine-tasting evening when I got the marketing mail a couple of months ago. Gosh, I'm so pleased we did though... It was one of those 'can't really be arsed' evenings when we went out of the house. But from the slightly awkward 'glass of champagne and make conversation' stage through the 'you're sharing a table so you'd better enjoy the company of your co-tasters' stage it turned out to be a fantastic evening. The wine commentary from O.W. Loeb was passionately engaging, the wines were superb - and perfectly matched with the food - and the food was up there with the best I've ever eaten. No accident (nor aftermath of 6 wines) that the kitchen team got four rounds of applause when they came up to talk through their choice of dishes at the end of the meal.
Only got iPhone pics and I missed the starter. But for £50 each, all in, this has to be the best evening's food and drink I've ever had. Shame I've got to go to work tomorrow... ... in doing anything with the garden this year?
I've generally been quite keen in the past - even took 12 months worth of photos back in 2009. It's a tiny plot, doesn't take a lot of effort to turn it into something pretty in a high-walled, Victorian sort of way. But this year I'm not allowed to water it, have acquired two mogs that will dig holes in everything (and shit in them) and haven't been able to get near it until this weekend, on account of the drought being characterised by local flooding. At least the tide of plastic kiddy-crap seems to be abating. But I finally managed to cut the lawn (twice), cut back a ton of ivy and wave a hedge-trimmer around in what felt like a meaningful way this weekend. And now I think I'll have to carry on doing stuff. It's just too therapeutic. Where do I start? Online privacy is almost too big a subject to tackle in one post. Child safety needs a chapter in its own right. The deliberate obfuscation of settings, coupled with a frightening level of churn in the configuration interface - designed, undoubtedly, to confuse many into exposing their online persona to the wider world - is an affront to the freedom of the individual to maintain instinctive control of their privacy. The dominance of the platform drives homogenisation of the market - in everything - reduces marketing to a quest for mass commonality in desire and, ultimately, commits us to a beige world of limited choice. But these aren't important right now. The Problem with Facebook is that it allows my 'friends' to publish pictures of a younger, more innocent timmy, solely for the entertainment of others. My name is Tim. And I like the Jesus and Mary Chain, Orange Juice, Aztec Camera and The Smiths.
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March 2020
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