A great grate

Zoe has very strict food ideas, which we follow whenever we are at home together. She believes in eating only uncooked fruit and vegetables. There is some evidence that such a diet is good for you so I don't mind having that for a few of my meals

But Zoe does have her own food preparation ideas. She does not cook but likes to grate most of her food. That certainly helps a big lot of fruit and veg to go down. So she is a dab hand at rapidly grating lots of food. She is however getting a bit tired of all the grating so has just bought herself an electric grating machine. It's a bit like a juicer where you eat the pulp instead of throwing it away. Greenies would approve! (The National Socialist German Workers Party would too)

She brought the machine over to my place as she got it from the shop and proceeded to set it up for the first time. She recently did that with another machine she bought. She must feel that I can give her at least moral support if she has trouble putting a machine together. She does however have a degree in mechanical engineering from the university of Belgrade so does not seek my help initially. As it happens, the new machine was a bit of a puzzle to set up so I did make a suggestion that she found helpful.

Anyway, below is the recent dinner she put in front of me with output from her new machine. It features grated parsnip. grated beetroot, grated carrot, chopped onion, chopped spinach, and chopped avocado. She chopped the onion in her machine too. It has a variety of cutters

The machine

A small trick to help absent-minded people

As we all now know, the Greenies somehow bullied governments into abolishing the disposable plastic carry bags that supermarkets used to give out free to help people to take their purchases home. Instead we are offered more robust carry bags for 15c which we are meant to keep handy and bring with us every time we shop. They are "reusable".

The new system is a lot more inconvenient. We often pop into a supermarket without having had the foresight to bring a "reusable" bag with us. So we have to buy another such bag for 15c. The cost is trivial but we soon end up having a large stash of such bags and nothing obvious to do with them.

I am one of the sufferers from that. Being chronically absent-minded, I often forget to bring a bag and so usually have to buy one -- meaning that I have a rather large number of 15c bags cluttering up the boot of my car.

But I have found a solution to that. Supermarkets DO still provide disposable bags -- ones used to gather together fruit and vegetable purchases. They look small at first but are actually surprisingly large when opened out. And there is no reason why you have to use them for fuit and veg only. If you are in the shop only to buy a few things, you can often fit ALL your purchases into them. So that is what I now do. I use the "fruit" bags for everything and get my purchases home quite well that way. See a pic of one of my recent purchase in such a bag below.

The authorities knew the vaccine risks all along

At the bottom of my comments below is a link to one of the many accounts about the bad effects of Covid vaccinations. My comments below were in response to it. I wrote them for one of my political blogs and also posted them on Facebook but the comments do contain a substantial personal element so I think they have a place here too.

I had two vaccinations with the British Astra-Zeneca vaccine. I had them under duress. I needed them to be permitted to go to certain places. On both occasions I had zero noticeable effects from the vaccination and I have also not apparently had Covid. So I would appear to be a "success" of the program

I personally don't think I am. I have a very good immune system and I think that was what defeated the harms from both the vaccine and the virus. Everybody I know who had the vaccine reported side effects from their shot: Side effects akin to the flu. And they got Covid anyway. I occasionally get flu symptoms but they vanish within 24 hours.

But in any case, I have no personal reason to be critical of the Covid vaccination programs. I look on with horror at what others have suffered but I have no personal beef

So the major point that I want to make is that the official response to vaccination side-effects was WILDLY out of keeping with the normal official response to medication side-effects. When a drug appears to have only a few reports of serious side effects, it usually gets banned in short order.

A case in point is Vioxx -- a very good nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug that had been used by millions with no problems. There were however a handful of very serious cases attributed to the drug and publicity about that put the manufacturer under great pressure, causing them to "voluntarily" withdraw the drug from the market. By vuoluntarily withdrawing it, they left the way open to re-marketing it if vindication of the drug emerged.

I was at the time critical of the furore surrounding Vioxx. If millions have used the drug with no ill-effects and only a handful of adverse cases have surfaced, how do we know that the adverse effects were due to the drug? Which body of evidence is persuasive about what the drug does: the millions who have used the drug beneficially or the handful who SAY that their illness was caused by the drug? Is it not by far most likely that the adverse cases were mere coincidence? Yet the drug was effectively banned on the basis of those possibly coincidental cases.

And that has long been typical: Only a few cases of adverse effects from a medication are usually sufficient to ban it. If aspirin had been subject to modern approval scrutiny, we would never have had it.

But with Covid vacines the pendulum swung WILDLY in the opposite direction. Far from bad side-effects getting maximum scrutiny, they were actually COVERED UP. Why?

I think it was the Chinese example that ruled the day. When stories emerged about the Chinese authorities actually welding people's doors shut to enforce quarantine, our Left-leaning elites salivated. They saw a golden opportunity to go Fascist. They saw a way of getting the sort of control over other people that they had previously only dreamed of. They NEEEDED the vaccines to be effective and problem-free in order to justify their dreamy descent into authoritarianism. In fact, as it is now clear, the vaccines were NEITHER effective nor safe. So they had to cover that up as long as they could.

As I said from the beginning, the only public health measures that might have been justified emerge from the fact that only a tiny number of deaths were among people aged under 65. So it would have been justifiable to give maximum support to the over 65s to enable them to isolate themselves voluntarily

See:

https://theblacksphere.net/2022/11/attny-tom-renz-exposes-dod-data/

Student shenanigans

Some readers of this blog liked my story below about Rhodesia, a prank that I got up to in my student days in the famous '60s. In the cirumstances I thought I might redirect readers to something else I did of that kind at around the same time. I rather risked my safety in provoking Leftists this time, Story here

Rhodesia

I do not appear so far to have put online one of the more amusing episodes from my student days in the '60s. So:

The former British colony of Rhodesia was at that time a well-managed self-governing entity democratically run by the white minority of its population. It was effectively a very prosperous independent country but Britain retained some sort of suzerainty over it.

Britain's Labour Party government had however become concerned that the black majority mostly did not have a vote in the running of the country so various moves were afoot to unseat the white minority government. That became a major international cause for a while.

I saw in the Leftist outrage about Rhodesia at the time an opportunity for some fun. I joined with some other conservative students to found "The Australia-Rhodesia Society".

The student Leftists rolled up in force to our inaugural meeting and tried to disrupt it with shouting and leaping about. They ensured that no meeting was possible. Later they also managed to get us banned from using any further university facilities (rooms etc) for any subsequent meetings

And they claim to believe in free speech! They don't. I know. "By their fruits shall ye know them". Anyway we had our fun with them. We knew them for what they were. Stalin's remark that there was complete freedom of speech in Russia for anyone who agreed with him just about sums up what all Leftists aspire to.

The "Australia-Rhodesia Society" was of course never meant seriously. It was just a bait that the Leftists swallowed hook, line and sinker. It is rather frightening how easily Stalinism emerges. The fascism of student "anti-Fascists" has to be seen to be believed.

White rule over Rhodesia was eventually overturned. It is now "Zimbabwe"

Gradual progression to majority rule in Rhodesia was already well underway before any outside intervention but that did not comport with the Leftist need for instant gratification

"Down the coast"

Going "down the coast" is a frequent activity among Brisbane people. It refers to the drive of over an hour to get to the surf beaches to the South of Brisbane -- Surfer's Paradise etc.

I used to make that trip in my early 20s with some frequency but it is now around 50 years since I visited Surfer's Paradise. I am not an outdoorsy type.

But today was Z's birthday and she wanted to go "down the coast" for it. So we went. She lived down there a few years ago so knows the area to some extent. She particularly wanted to go to the Q1 building, the tallest one there. She luckily got a parking spot just outside the building and I paid the $58 to get us to the observation deck on the 77th floor of it. Views don't come cheap.



But the views were indeed striking and the coffee and Tiramisu we had while we were there went down well.


The birthday girl on top of the world



Myself in a serious moment. I had just told her NOT to take a photo of me


Some scenery. Ignore the spotty guy in the corner

Some very good scenery

Z has very strict Vegan dietary views so the cake was a concession for her. Rather than doing any more dining at the restaurant she provided a picnic lunch for us, which we had in a shelter overlooking the water. It was very good and tasty, based on fruit and vegetables. She makes an exceptional apple crumble, which has long been a favourite dessert for me.

I paid over $100 to fill the petrol tank for the trip "down the coast" so that was rather striking to me too. It inspired the thought that people who go on motoring trips, particularly with mobile homes, have to have considerable funds for it. It is not a cheap holiday now.

On the drive home Z gave me an extended lecture in moral philosophy. She likes Erich Fromm's rejection of relativism. I said nothing in response but I was familiar with her topic. I have had a few academic articles on the topic published. See here

Z adheres to the idea of moral absolutes, which is perhaps the most frequently held view of the matter. Analytical philosophers normally regard such views as naive and I once did too. I have had second thoughts on it in more recent years however and conclude that there is indeed an objective referent that people have in mind when they use such language. See here

While I am talking of going "down the coast", I thought I might take the liberty of recounting an episode from my youth (approx, 1975) when I made such a trip. I was driving my little sky-blue VW at the time. And a VW beetle at the time did not have a fuel gauge. It had a "spare tank". And to access that "tank" you bent down and moved a lever to a different position. So I was driving along with a friend beside me (Jimmy Johnson) when the motor began to splutter as it usually does when the fuel runs out. I therefore bent down to move the lever to reserve -- only to find that I had already done that. My lifelong absent-mindedness had betrayed me.

I was sailing along at a fair clip however and I saw a petrol station not far ahead of me. So I simply coasted into it and pulled up at a pump in the usual way. No inconvenience at all. "That was arsie" said Jimmy. "Arsie" in Australian slang refers to undeserved good luck. It tends to be admired.

Some good shopping

Nobody is as keen an OpShopper as Jenny but I do rather a lot of it too, often after breakfast with her. With her driving, we range far and wide around the Southside. And I usually take Anne Opshopping after my breakfasts with her.

Zoe is also a keen viewer of secondhand goods but she usually goes to markets and garage sales, though she and I did go OpShopping together on one occasion recently. Anyway, I thought I might put up some pics of our recent successes.

The first is a bracelet I bought for Zoe when she was not present with me. I have a fair idea of her taste and I had a hit with that one. She really likes it and does wear it



And below is one of her purchases, which she got from Ipswich market. It is a mini Aladdin's lamp. Very cute. It lacked its glass chimney when she bought it but I was able to give her one out of my collection. I also had lamp oil to put in it. So I got it fully operational for her.



And below is something I bought for myself. It is a lemon squeezer. Zoe puts lemon juice on some of the food she prepares for us so I had that in mind when I bought it. But I thought it was cute anyway. As you can see, it has even got a lid -- so you can use it as a storage container for the juice once you have extracted it. It is branded underneath as "Preparo", which is a word in Brazilian Portuguese. I have never seen such a thing in local shops so it probably comes all the way from Brazil. That makes it a good example of something I like about OpShops: You see stuff there that you never see anywhere alse

In the picture I put it beside my orange juicer for scale. Also one of the lemons we have been using. Lemons come in a range of sizes but small ones are common.



My favourite among the recent purchases I have bought for myself is a carved Chinese camphorwood chest, normally used to store woollen blankets. The camphor smell repels insects. Below is a picture of it at the foot of the bed in my guest room



I normally buy things for Jenny only when I am with her as I am not sure I understand her taste. I have known her for 40 years so that is a bit strange. She recently was looking for a necklace to go with something and showed several possibilities to me when we were down at an OpShop at Capalaba. I did not like the first two she showed me but we did finally agree on the third. She is wearing it below



I also recently bought Anne a mini HiFi, which, despite its size, puts out excellent sound. Anne uses it to play her CDs. See below.

A Japanese lunch

Anne and I do not have a regular lunch date but when we do lunch together it is on a Thursday at Southgate Avenue in Cannon Hill, which has a really good strip of shops.

We normally eat there at their Coffee Club, which has excellent service -- unlike some other Coffee Clubs -- and I like the flat grills I get there.

But for a change we went today a few doors down the shopping strip to the Japanese restaurant.  Anne had the tempura prawns, which were very good.  Anne is very fond of tempura.  I had the Chicken Katsu Don but it was not a good version of that dish.  I also found the chairs uncomfortable so will be unlikely to go there again

For coffee we went a few doors further down the strip to an Italian place.  To my surprise, the place was furnished with Bentwood chairs. Ir's a long time since I have seen those.  They were in fashion about a century ago. So the art of wood bending must still be alive somewhere. See below

Undaunted

If somebody has a bad experience with a place, they tend not to go there again. It's normal and can be wise. Being a bit autistic, however, my feelings tend to be low key and that includes fear. I am not easily bothered. So yesterday I took Z to lunch at the small Spanish cafe at Stones Corner called "Buenismo"

Mr Stone's little shop is long gone from his corner but he has left his name to a rather humble strip of shops nearby that include a lot of places to eat, none of which are very fancy but some of which serve very good food.

And going to "Buenismo" is the point of this post. It is where I fell on my back last April and broke my sternum, which took 4 months to heal. But suddenly I was going back to that place. Z was actually with me when I fell so it was a return visit for both of us.

But neither of us were mindful of our past there. We went because they offered a most unusual dish that Z likes. She has very particular food preferences but that one passes muster. It is called a vegetable salad. And that is what it is: Vegetables served together with salad and nothing else, all on one plate. Mothers always seem to be messianic about getting their kids to eat their greens so they should perhaps take their kids there.

Anyway we both ordered it amid some hilarity. In her usual assertive way, Z kept cutting in with instructions when I was trying to order -- which was lot of fun. I am myself assertive so cope with Z's ways without difficulty or resentment. For instance, when asked what milk she wanted in her coffee, she said, "Skim, and for him too". She ordered skim milk in MY coffee too! Very assertive but I admire her spirit so I just laughed.

Anyway, we ate our salad and visited the nearby OpShops later, where I bought her a plate that she liked. She was a bit peeved that it cost only $1. I also played a little prank on her there but I had better not go into that. It was a bit evil of me. It cracked me up, though. She forgave me.

Serb girls

The picture above is one I uploaded around 20 years ago and tineye.com tells me that it has been uploaded hundreds of times over the years. Nobody seems to know the origin of the picture but I am obviously not alone in finding it very attractive

So it is a pleasant coincidence that I now find myself with a Srb girl as my partner. She is in her 70s so calling her a girl might seem to be a big stretch but older ladies often refer to one-another as "girls" so I am not alone in that either.

Below is a picture that I like of my Srb girl. Her name is not really "Zoe". That is just a pseudonym for privacy purposes. Her real name is very Srbian and rather pretty





UPDATE: My own Serb girl sent me some more pictures of Serbian girls, this time in folk dress. See below.

A fall

A lot of the personal news I post here is positive. But, as the Inkspots once sang, Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall -- and some rains in my life recently have been rather pesky. My rains have been falls. No old people should fall over but sometimes I do.

Last March I had a fall which broke my ankle and last April I fell and cracked my sternum. That second one took 4 months to heal fully. Thanks to support from those close to me, neither break dislocated my life very much so I remained in reasonable cheer. But I was glad to get past it all.

There is a religious song that says "You will never walk alone". It is a great comfort in adversity to many people. But I am humbled to say that I have that support in real life. When it comes to religious songs, I cannot go past Regula Mühlemann singing "Exsultate Jubilate" by W. A. Mozart



Now just past midnight on Wednesday, I had another fall. I was coming out of the shower when I slipped over on the cork floor in my kitchen. Cork is very forgiving so I broke nothing this time but it left me feeling stiff and sore. It was painful for me to walk on Thursday but by the afternoon today, I can walk with only minor pain. So my good old immune system would again seem to have come up trumps.

Incidentally, did you get the reference to the Inkspots? They were a black American group of singers in the 1930s and 1940s. They did marvellous harmony. My father thought highly of them. They are on CD.



Sunday 23 update:

I am now fully recovered from the effects of my fall and in very good spirits. My usual breakfast with Joe went well, as did dinner with my Serb girl

I am now "with it" (but only in one way)

When digital music in the form of CDs first came out, many people complained that they didn't give quite the sound quality of the old black vinyl 12" LPs. I was inclined to agree. Analog sound was somehow more life-like. But LPs are a bit fiddly so CDs and later DVDs soon took over. Shops simply stopped selling LPs.

I went with the flow and duplicated my vinyl collection with a comprehensive collection of CDs and a few DVds.

But LPs never quite disappeared. Disk Jockeys continued to prefer them, as did a few audiophiles. And music publishers did eventually restart their LP presses in a small way.

And in recent years there has been a distinct revival of the old music formats: Open-reel tape recorders, audio cassettes and LPs. The opinion that analog formats give more lifelike sound now has quite a few devotees -- to the point where old analog recordings have become a collectors' item. So I am glad that I still have my collections of them. My old collections have made me "with it" today

As I mentioned recently I have decided to get my old music machines going again -- even including a VHS VCR! So my audio cassettes and my record player are up and running again. My CDs and audio cassettes are hooked up to quite good sound systems, ones including woofers.

My record player was however hooked up to a sound system that was pretty basic, with no woofer capability. I might seem a bit fanatical to be worried about woofers but I do have a special reason for that preoccupation: I like the music of Philip Glass and I like wind-organ music. Organ music is of course famous for good bass notes, particularly if the organ includes 16' pipes.

In contrast, Philip Glass mostly produces electronic music, using symthesizers. And synthesizers are VERY good at producing the deepest of bass notes. So to enjoy such music to the full, you need good woofers in your sound system.

My record player is pretty good aside from the speakers. The turntable is a Sony and the amp is a high-quality Onkyo from Japan. So I looked around for a better set of speakers. And I acquired one -- a set of high quality Sony speakers, each of which contained TWO woofers. So, with Jenny's assistance, I got them hooked up to my record player and suddenly had a sound system that did full justice to synth music. It is a great leap forward. I have been playing my LP of "The Photographer" by Philip Glass, which has a lot of profound bass notes.

I am now on the lookout for an open reel tape recorder that still works. I have some good tapes for one


My new Sony setup

Closeup of speaker

A VERY sociable day

My days are not usually very sociable. One social activity per day is my norm. But today was a distinct exception. I had my usual Saturday breakfast with my friend Anne plus a trip to the Annerley Vinnies afterward. The food was good (calamari for me; smoked salmon and big mushrooms for Anne) and Vinnies was even better. Anne had remarked to me quite recently that she rather regretted giving her Kenwood Chef mixer away so it was a pleasant surprise to discover a Junior Kenwood for sale at Vinnies for the very modest sum of $15. So we bought it. It looked new so that should work out well. Neither of us had been aware that there was such a thing as a Junior Kenwood.

When we got home we mainly listened to a recording of "The Photographer" by Philip Glass. The bass in that comes over well on my HiFi speakers. Anne was dressed in her favourite colours -- shades of brown. See below






My girlfriend Zoe in the same setting

Then I had another social occasion for lunch. Two old male friends from years back -- Henningham and Croucher -- joined me at the excellent "Sunny Doll" Japanese restaurant at Buranda. Croucher spent many years teaching in China and is going back soon to sell his properties there. He needs the money and they should reap a goodly sum. We mainly discussed the situation in China and citizenship issues there and in Hong Kong.

For our lunches, both my visitors ordered the traditional Japanese raw tuna. Both have visited Japan. I shouted. I ordered chicken Katsu, which is always good there


Croucher and Henningham opposite my stooped self at the "Sunny Doll"

Then that evening Jenny came over, as she often does. Like me, she had eaten well during the day so didn't feel like eating at dinner time. So I just had a mug of Sustagen for my dinner and we had a cup of tea afterward. Jenny is a very practical lady so we spent some time discussing new speakers for my recently revived record player

Memorable

This is just a call-out to Allsports Physiotherapy and Sports Medicine Clinic at Toowong. The shockwave therapy that they gave me worked a treat. A particular thank-you to Adrian. I am not quite a new man but definitely a renovated one. So my good news continues.

Another good thing is that I have regained a bit of my old energy from years back. I have been collecting recorded music for over 60 years. I started with 78 rpm records and a wind-up gramophone when I was about 13.


A fondly remembered 78

And it went on from there: LPs, Open-reel tape recorders, audio cassettes, CDs, DVDs and now I mostly watch YouTube. And in each era of recording I accumulated many recordings in the medium of the day.

Recently, however I decided to rehabilitate the old recordings. I got my record player, a cassette player and my CD player fully set up to play all my recordings in those media. Getting the old machines working took quite a bit of effort but I can now access music in obsolete formats. I have some audio rarites in the old formats so I am pleased I found the energy to revisit the old machines Some of the old machines were not working but there were enough that did

I even have one of my old VHS VCR players working. I have a lot of tapes for it. It is set up in my garage, together with setups of 3 old computers, an Amiga 500, an Atari ST and an IBM DOS machine

A geriatric lunch

Last Tuesday I put on a simple lunch on my verandah for two old friends from my army days. Those days were back in the 60s, but friendships made in the army tend to endure. And because it is all so long ago, all three of us are pretty geriatric these days, I am on the brink of 80 and Rod H is too. Peter H is already over 80.

I gave the lunch to celebrate two happy recent events in my life: A PET scan and the surprising popularity of my academic writings these days. Papers I wrote way back in the '70s are still getting frequent attention -- which is pretty surprising. Of all academics worldwide I seem to be in the top 5% for citation frequency. I am very glad I lived to see that. My writings were not popular in the day but it seems that I did not labour in vain in researching and writing them.

And the PET scan revealed something else surprising: A total absence of cancer anywhere in my body -- including my prostate. Earlier scans showed me as having metastasized prostate cancer. Prostate cancer does not usually disappear so the recent news was most remarkable. The immunotherapy that eliminated my stomach cancer seems to have had unexpectedly wide reach. So most of the conversation at lunch revolved around prostates and other medical matters. Peter H in particular has had a lot of prostate problems

The meal was savoury mince with pasta and we finished with apple pie

More Amazement

I really am much read by my fellow academics. ResearchGate reports that my papers had 159 reads last week, including frequent mention of two that I regard as among my more significant papers. I am glad I have lived long enough to see it.

The two articles referred to are:

An "attitude to authority" scale

and

Half of All Racists Are Left Wing

It should be noted that almost all my papers are research reports rather than theoretical articles. And research reports stand as facts. You can disagree about the implications of the facts reported -- theoretical articles do that -- but you cannot disagree with the facts as such. The findings stand but what a reader does with the findings will be variable.

How much influence a reading of my papers will have is unknown. Since my findings were often uncongenial to a Leftist viewpoint they will no doubt often be read and then ignored. Leftists are good at ignoring reality

The funeral

I very rarely watch TV but I had a bit of idle time between 10 and 11pm last night so watched the funeral procession of HM the Queen through London. I was glad to be watching from the comfort of my living room rather than being out there standing up at the actual event. I got a better view that way anyhow.

I was a little surprised that the Orb and sceptre accompanied the Imperial State Crowm on the bier. They are symbols of rule and she could hardly be ruling while she was dead


The Orb and sceptre are visible above

The procession was of course a huge and magificent show -- principally because many units of the British armed forces have striking dress uniforms -- from the bearskin hats of the Coldstream Guards, to the plumed helmets of the Household cavalry to the Tudor splendour of the Yeoman Warders. Even the military police in their red caps looked good. There were in fact several uniforms that I had not seen before, often featuring plumes. See below for the flat green hat with plume. No idea where they are from



Detachments of any unit worth looking at must have been present.

I had expected a significant detachment from the Royal Regiment of Scotland. They would have to be the most magnificently dressed soldiers in the world. But I saw only a couple of Scottish troops. Strange. Some might have been deployed abroad but hardly all of them

I might have missed them, though. I read that the Queen's own piper played a lament during the procession.

And all the marchers were paid for out of the military budget, not paid for as part of the Royal Family. All the troops present were in fact working members of the armed forces who often see active duty in the field. They are real soldiers

It may have seemed odd that the Navy got the honour of drawing the gun carriage. Why? Simple. In Britain the navy is the senior service and is proudly referred to as that. They trace back to Alfred the Great, long before any army unit. The earliest army unit goes back only to the civil war and Cromwell's New Model Army. Traditions matter in armed formations.

I was pleased to see the King looking Kingly as he marched behind the bier


The king looking Kingly

But it was sad to see the red hair of Prince Harry. He actually has spent more time in the army than other any other member of the family so was well entitled to wear military uniform. But his downgrading was on his own head. He seems to be a bit dim -- like his mother -- and that American bitch he married has filled his head with nonsense and caused him to alienate his family beyond all reason. She has a lot to answer for



UPDATE: The headgear I wondered about would seem to be Scottish. It strongly resembles the headgear adopted for a meeting of the Clan Buchanan. See below

I am a lucky man

A lady in my life often tells me that I am a lucky man. She is right. For a single man in his 80th year to have three ladies calling on him regularly is indeed lucky. And I appreciate all three.

I particularly appreciate my intimate companion Zoe. As I have pointed out previously, there are some big incompatibilities between us but, countering that, there is much else:

She is just about as good-looking and as fit as a lady of her age can get, she is very bright, well educated, has a broad awareness of high culture and even is strongly moved by the music of J.S. Bach. That latter would mean nothing to most people but it is huge to me as I feel the same way about Bach. We also have lots of laughs and she fits very nicely into my cuddle

So that is pretty lucky. Just a high IQ and a liking for Bach would probably have tied me to her but there is much more besides

A wedding

Yesterday (Saturday) I accompanied Zoe to a wedding. It was in the Srbian Orthodox church at Wacol. It was the first Orthodox service I had attended and many details were different from the Presbyterian services I am used to.

For a start, people stood for the whole service. In Presbyterian services we stand up only to sing hymns. There were no hymns at the Srbian church. There were some seats down the side for the frail elderly such as myself. I was glad of that. Another difference was that all the men stood on one side of the church with the women on the other. Muslims and Haredi Jews would approve

The whole congregation of the bride's church must have turned out for the wedding. There were large throngs of both men and women in attendance. One thing I noticed was that lots of the young women were amazingly thin. Srbians could maybe teach other women a few things there. There were a lot of young men in formal dresss who also looked good. I did wear my sole and only suit with a white shirt and tie but some of the young Srbs wore shirts with studs. It'a long time since I did that.

The ceremony was also different from my experience. There were long speeches from the priest in Srbian which I understood not at all but I had a fair idea of what was being said. I conjecture that it would have similar content to a Tridentine mass. There were lots of opportunities for responses from the congregation and most of the congregation responded well.

An amusing thing to me was that the bride and groom were both given small crowns to wear at one stage. I had not seen that one anywhere before

The bride looked gorgeous. Being tall and slim was a good start on that but she had a great appearance generally. Her dress was fine but rather practical: No great billowing train etc. It was white with golden trims so was in perfect taste.

Both the bride and groom had been to my place for lunch a little while ago so it was good to see them tie the knot. A wedding is a very happy thing.

It was good of Zoe to get me invited to such a special occasion

The church was ornate internally but only with paintings. No statuary or carvings.

Below are two views of the couple during the ceremony






Exiting the church

More on my academic status

I have just received another interesting email from ResearchGate.

They report that last week I had 6 citations. That means that someone somewhere is citing one of my papers at the rate of nearly one a day. I am rather stunned by that. And half of my reads were from academics in the USA, followed by India.

Several of my papers did refer to India so the interest from India is not too surprising

What is surprising is that my most-read article is one that appeared way back in 1971. So maybe there will be someone reading my papers long after I have gone. I like that thought

Clarification:

ResearchGate has a comprehensive database of academic publications. They are a sort of academic Google. If a paper is cited by someone already in their database they will try to add that paper also to their database. So they would appear to have just about all the academic papers on the internet. And if a paper they see cited is not already on the net they will ask for a copy of it and put it on the net

The list of "reads" is different. They refer only to reads from the ResearchGate database. Many people will of course have read the paper in its initial appearance elsewhere. So it would probaly be safe to say that the total number of reads of any paper is at least twice what ResearchGate records. But the reads that they record could be seen as a useful estimate of total reads

Fathers' Day

Fathers' day in Australia is on a Sunday and my son Joe and I normally breakfast together on a Sunday anyway. And it was a good breakfast today -- running from about 9:30 to 11:30. So we talked a lot.

We mainly discussed our relationships but also American politics and electric cars. We noted that Mr Trump still seems to get more publicity than anyone else in American politics. Joe was more positive than I am about electric cars but we didn't disagree after we had discussed it.

The breakfast was as usual at the local pie shop where they do a very good bacon & egg burger with lashings of bacon. We also bought some delicacies to take away. They do unusually good jam donuts there so that is what I had. I like a jam donut to have lots of jam in it and the one I got certainly did. We took our delicacies home to have on my open verandah, which is always a pleasant setting. Joe shouted the breakfast

Joe told me rather a lot about his personal life that sounded very positive so I was pleased to hear that. It made a very good fathers' day for me.

Zoe arrived later in the day at her usual hour of 4pm so we then had an early dinner prepared by her. She and I will be attending a wedding next week so she brought over a big range of dresses for me to look at. She said she trusts my taste so wanted my opinion on which dress looked best on her for a wedding. After much deliberation we decided on one.

Zoe left to drive back to her place in Western parts at about 7pm. We spent most of our time together lying in bed. To look down on a pretty face smiling up at you is one of the better experiences for a man in his 80th year

Monday Update: I was pleased to get a nice newsy Fathers' day greeting by email from my stepdaughter Yvonne in New Zealand