A beautiful morning. Blue skies have got the students out. The grass on the Quad already filling up with early risers sipping their pre-exam Americanos. The grass is roped off in a half hearted attempt to keep people off it. GLWT !
Give it an hour or two and the pavement bars will be overflowing with youngsters either celebrating the end of exams or doing their best to forget what lies ahead. When you're nineteen there's a lot of lessons to be learnt about mastering the balance between confidence and self doubt. Those that choose not to be politicians will manage just fine.
A very large seagull eyes the al fresco breakfast crowd at the bar near the kirk. The gulls are in nest building mode. Give it a month and the sound of hungry chicks will be interrupting the town folks sleep patterns. Another four months and it will be two full years since we left France. Perhaps the biggest lesson in life the students have yet to understand is that time speeds by the older you get.
Angus buys some grouting. He's surprised to find a 330g tube costs £8.99. How can something so mundane be so expensive ? This thought reminds me that my transition into my father is now complete.
Outside the hardware store a variety of plastic animals ( hedgehogs, puppies and rabbits ) have been set out on a garden bench. They mutely seem to be enjoying the sun. An array of bright pink and purple buckets make a startling street art installation.
A variety of motorized wheelchairs attract the attention of the coffee drinkers at the cafe on the beach.
So begins an almost summery day in a small town where a lot is happening very quietly.
10 comments:
That music is divine !
The article on TSMC was quite a read! I can only imagine the amazement and ridicule in many countries when our unemployment, off sick and social payment figures are released and again when looking at construction times and costs. Sadly, we've become a throw away society in more than one way. I was very glad to listen to the music.
The TSMC article was very well done. It reminded me so much of the cultural clashes that occurred when the Japanese companies entered America - or for that matter, when we American lawyers entered Japan back in the '80s. It takes quite a while to rub off those hard edges of "our way is better" so that real communication can begin. Taiwan's work force, like Japan's, was educated for mass production, America's has moved beyond that, for good and for ill. Americans in general are better at innovating, improvising, responding to unforeseen circumstances, not so good with authority. With China breathing down Taiwan's neck, TSMC has every incentive to make this work and I trust it will over time.
Hari OM
The wheelchairs are not motorised, Angus. They are push-along only. I wrote about them in my Monday post this week. They are provided by a local charity and were if not for that rollator, I would not have had a wonderful hour on the West Sands... YAM xx
Recently I read about the devastating virus that threatens the chocolate supply. Big decision - do I start stock piling now, with the threat that has to my waistline, or be sensible, buying the occasional bar and hoping a solution can be found before I run out!
How annoying that the weather has taken a turn for the better, now that exams have begun.
All very interesting links! But the one about chocolate, in combination with others I've read, is forcing me to begin to contemplate the possibility of a real crisis. Like Coppa's girl, I need to do some thinking about possibilities. Because, seriously, life without chocolate just doesn't work.
Nina
Self doubt, in the form of an unhealthy fear of failure, drove some of us to study much harder than we really needed to, and maybe achieve more than we were destined to. The buckets look are a sign of beach season approaching.
I agree!
Enjoyed today's links. Eli Jenkins' prayer was gorgeous listening and the TSMC article fascinating. Many moons ago when I worked for an American oil company I was ashamed to find that all my colleagues in the company HQ in Bartlesville, OK, considered the Brits in the London office to be idlers who drank to excess on company time. (To be honest, these criticisms of the London office drinking culture in the 1980s were entirely fair.)
Cheers, Gail.
A chip company is building a factory in Arizona doesn't make much sense. The chip making industry is a thirsty one, needing vast amounts of water to cool its machinery and to clean its components from dust and other debris. The American southwest is in a water crisis and there's a lot of dust. The glass walled office buildings don't makes sense, either. The sun is intense.
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