Not a Merchant Banker

Muhammad Yunus sought an ending
to extortionate lending.
He thought microfinance more appropriate
and became a Nobel Laureate.

So What's a Little Isaiah between Friends?

A lovely picture of Izzy Stone and his wife at the start of a New York Times review of the biography by Myra MacPherson. I was led by a film of his life to Middleton's selection of his Weekly to the Trial of Socrates. It is a journey I am glad I made.

The quote in the title comes from an article of 27 Jan. 1969, vol. 17, no.2 and contrasts the hypocrisy of presidents at the time, swearing the oath on a bible open at Isaiah- quote "Come let us reason together" as they bombed the F... out of various small nations. Particularly apt that Nixon had the book open, allegedly, at the page where the prophet speaks of beating swords into ploughshares.

Hands up anyone who thinks this has a certain resonance today!

Thanks to John Naughton for the link in his blog.

Secretos pequenos de mi pueblo 2

Traveling out of the village the other day I hit a pigeon. Since I normally travel on narrow country roads with a domingero like concern for safety and the wildlife I suppose it was inevitable that the poor bird was not killed outright. I got out of the car prepared to finish it off. The driver behind me had also stopped and gone to the bird and it had disappeared. I assumed he had killed it and put it in the hedgerow where it belonged. I asked if he had finished it off and thanked him. He hesitated and then said that it was dead but that it was now in the boot, for the ferret. He claimed to hoover up a lot of road kill.

I related this to A at the dinner table, the story goes well with Spanish red.

She asked if the ferret man was wearing a pink shower cap with his hair sticking out through the holes! It was only when she speculated that he might have been called Skink that my confusion was resolved.

Which reminds me, we have books about direct eco-action in the swamps of Florida to give away or sell.

Blogging Crease

You know how you fall into conversation on trains. We had said god knows what anyone makes of our discussions. Earwigging on a journey recently I was captured by the idea of the blogging crease and the angle of tilt of the laptop.

We had joined a train south. It was crowded and I had completely failed to establish it was going in the right direction. I wanted to say is this the train to Peterborough. I could only form the words for is this the train to Penzance! Needless to say I remained mute!

Having found seats, I was staring out of the window purposefully and listening to the man next to me. He was bemoaning the fact, to his mobile phone, that he was in the middle of a messy divorce and that he had been made redundant. The man opposite was bemoaning the fact that he had had to take an employee out to lunch who he had made redundant, while discussing another employee who he had not been able to make redundant because he had a sick note. Both were using phones and typing away furiously. There was an unequal sharing of the space of the table between them given they were using similar laptops. Immediately I saw the need for a blogging crease down the middle of the table. Then I realised that would not be enough and that the angle of tilt of the laptop screen would be crucial and that one contestant/traveler would be able to sneak an advantage by tilting their screen forward!
Ah but if trains had men in long white coats festooned with pullovers and sunglasses with floppy white hats they could adjudicate and sell tea and cakes at the same time.

Arturo Perez-Reverte

A day spent opening boxes, sorting possessions and sifting through the detritus of a life.
Some good things though! Books that you definitely want to keep.

And so to the first limerick:-

Arturo Perez-Reverte
Said I love it when you talk dirty.
His wife said Art
Don't be such a fart,
It's late, it's well past ten thirty!