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Articles by J S Bird

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About J S Bird

A retired academic, Jeremy will contribute article on subjects that attract his interest. More Posts

Christmas Day movies

My Christmas Day television viewing yesterday was dominated by re-runs of two classic movies – Some Like It Hot (1959, black and white, produced & directed by Billy Wilder, starring Marilyn Monroe, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon, screenplay by Wilder and I.A. L. Diamond) and The Italian Job [...]

December 26, 2020 // 0 Comments

And so it comes to this

This second supposed Covid-19 “lockdown” has somehow managed both to serve up many absurdities and yet also reveal telling reminders about how slim the gap is between “life as the human race knows [or should that be ‘knew’?] it” and complete anarchy. Let me give some examples: Yesterday [...]

November 19, 2020 // 0 Comments

Zooming in to the 21st Century

Although by nature I am distrustful and sceptical about anything new or technological, I can admit to the 360 million daily visitors to this organ that, since the commencement of 2020, I have now taken part in no fewer than five “Zoom” gatherings. My prior experience of anything similar was the [...]

November 17, 2020 // 0 Comments

Is anyone surprised?

History and experience tells me that it is a universal truth that hindsight and glib, sweeping generalisations are all too easy to hatch and that – as Boris Johnson and others temporarily in possession of apparent absolute power always find out, and/or as Harry S. Truman (US President 1945-1953) [...]

November 11, 2020 // 0 Comments

Supper and entertainment

Yesterday for my sins I went for an early evening meal in the suburbs with a couple I have known for nearly five decades – and, as we remarked during our meal, that fact alone drives home both just how old we are and how fast time flies. (Only people above a certain age can say that). It was an [...]

September 13, 2020 // 0 Comments

There’s a lot going on when you think about it …

Within ten minutes or so of waking and coming to my computer today in order to tour the websites of those few UK newspaper websites still permitting free access to their pages, two things struck me. Firstly, that in the 24 hours since I had last conducted said exercise there had been a considerable [...]

September 9, 2020 // 0 Comments

What you don’t know doesn’t worry you

One of the tangential issues that the Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted for me – amongst all the others that it has brought to public attention in a more direct sense via its health ones – is the apparent disconnect between what we as UK citizens instinctively and fondly like to believe [...]

September 1, 2020 // 0 Comments

Just saying …

When you add the many tributaries that flow with the river of the Black Lives Matter campaign it seems to me – who must declare an interest because I write as a white British old age pensioner – that it all gets terribly confusing, especially since I’m both heartily in favour of ‘equality [...]

August 25, 2020 // 0 Comments

Zooming in

Yesterday I had occasion to visit my daughter Grace and her husband for a coffee and chat in advance of an online family conference courtesy of Zoom. I hesitate to use the phrase ‘killing two birds with one stone’ in this context but, being barely semi-literate when it comes to modern [...]

August 24, 2020 // 0 Comments

Unchartered territory

Regular readers will have to bear with me but – for those newer visitors attracted to this organ by its ever-growing global audience but perhaps unfamiliar with its origins and viewpoint(s) – I should explain that one of our founding principles is that we endeavour to provide a different, not [...]

August 16, 2020 // 0 Comments

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