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Why does it always happen to me?

About forty-five years ago I came across a couple roughly my parents’ age who ran a preparatory school. Both were steeped in academia and the wife, interested in linguistics, was a huge fan of Noam Chomsky’s seminal tome Theory Of Universal Grammar Is Right; It’s Hardwired Into Our Brains [...]

November 18, 2016 // 0 Comments

Wasting my time, but not as much as I might have …

Wednesday 16th November: Harlequins v Maori All Blacks at the Stoop (part of the club’s 150th anniversary celebrations), kick-off 7.45pm: Result: Harlequins 10 Maori All Blacks 26. About three weeks ago, both because I was being repeatedly reminded of it by the club and felt something of an [...]

November 17, 2016 // 0 Comments

A welcome re-wind

Completely by chance, over the last six months, I have become involved in a semi-commercial business project – if that is the appropriate description for something that in the final analysis and scale of multi-national corporate activities is infinitely modest. As the deadline for its launch has [...]

November 16, 2016 // 0 Comments

The art of muddling through

Today I wish to begin with four famous quotations. Whilst we are all aware of Lord Acton’s famous statement ‘Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely’ we sometimes forget that it continued ‘Great men are almost always bad men’’. The American journalist and social [...]

November 15, 2016 // 0 Comments

A close shave on a shopping expedition

Sometimes, looking back, the little things that happen to you seem to give you access to insights upon more universal matters – such occurred to me yesterday. I’ve been at the stage for a while now where not only do those close to me tease about supposed ‘senior moments’ or possible [...]

November 12, 2016 // 0 Comments

Abel Gance’s NAPOLEON

Abel Gance’s epic 1927 movie Napoleon is one of the most famous, important and influential movies of all time. Way back in the 1980s I went to see a ‘live’ performance of a restored version of it (with original new accompanying music by Carl Davis) staged in London by Thames [...]

November 11, 2016 // 0 Comments

A chance meeting

Going about my business yesterday, I heard on good authority a great anecdote. Last week a former player at a leading elite sports club attended an official annual dinner for his peers. He told of how one day long ago he had jumped onto a London bus that was practically empty and after a while fell [...]

November 11, 2016 // 0 Comments

Time and life

It’s a slightly strange thing – but possibly these days a more frequent one – being an old age pensioner whilst still having one of your parents alive, but that is my lot in life. That phrase ‘that is my lot in life’ has undertones that I wish it wasn’t this way, but it won’t [...]

November 9, 2016 // 0 Comments

Remembering WW1

Yesterday I was privileged to be invited to an august institution for special screening of a new documentary film commemorating the connection between a particular sport and its contribution to the First World War. Its intentions were noble – to commemorate those players who had died or been [...]

November 8, 2016 // 0 Comments

That’s the first I heard of it

This Brexit constitutional crisis continues to dominate the headlines. Yesterday, surrounded by the Sunday newspapers, as is my habit I sat watching the BBC1’s Andrew Marr Show and later Sunday Politics (hosted by Jo Coburn because Andrew Neil is away in the Unites States covering the General [...]

November 7, 2016 // 0 Comments

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