What is your favorite type of flower?
this PERFECT flower in Singapore botanical Gardens, recommended to anyone!
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tea.
The King Of Pinecones
Nᴀʀᴄɪssᴜs
Ask @Hadacol
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I like to plan everything ahead as well. How do you handle spending a lot of time with people who prefer to be spontaneous?
We have family friends that you've described perfectly, once me and my mum visited them (they moved to France in 2009) and we were having a barbecue but Katie wanted to go out for a "little drink", then Dave started betting on his horses, then Katie was impervious to all hints that we should go back and eat and the little drink went on for four hours! So I was enraged, I don't like eating late at night but I ended up drunkenly having a barbecues at 11pm...
But did I mention I love these people and would go there at the drop of a hat, if they could ever take me, which they can't because their guest bedrooms are full of friends who love them as much as me. And when my mum complained that the house was a mess after they visited her, I said if they were neat and tidy and reliable we wouldn't have such a great time when we saw them, which we do most (not all!) of the time.
So I consider that it takes all sorts and sometimes I enjoy being taken out of myself, so long as it stops eventually :)
But did I mention I love these people and would go there at the drop of a hat, if they could ever take me, which they can't because their guest bedrooms are full of friends who love them as much as me. And when my mum complained that the house was a mess after they visited her, I said if they were neat and tidy and reliable we wouldn't have such a great time when we saw them, which we do most (not all!) of the time.
So I consider that it takes all sorts and sometimes I enjoy being taken out of myself, so long as it stops eventually :)
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RidgeBack Rogue
Do you have a sweet tooth or a savory tooth?
macaron
People you may like
Aisle, middle, or window seat?
Apposite question, anon, I'm jetting off to visit my brother who lives in Singapore, between tomorrrow and just before Christmas!
I lost my passport (in a heap of books,,, SO ME) and I made the mistake of phoning my parents, who were going too, and they were really angry. Rather than looking in a place that might seem obvious, but I got up from my "sleep" several times and found it only at the sixth try
.
I can't find the quote but I remember when GK Chesterton was told by his long-suffering wife that it really was time he mastered the train timetable, he said something like he wouldn't be the most intelligent person of the 20th century if he bothered with fiddly details like catching the right train. He wouldn't have said exactly that because he wasn't arrogant, but it was something of that kind.
And I have no such excuse, but am equally removed from everyday realities that have a nasty habit of forcing themselves on me when I'm trying to vaguely waft through life doing my photography and doing a bit of work if you're lucky. I probably should change but I've got no idea how, I see practical people who can fix cars and that sort of thing and maybe I'd envy them but how could I do things like that?
(To answer your precise question I'm not sure. The middle can be ruled out, it has no known advantages. The window has a view and is further removed from all the attendants and people walking up and down, but the outer seats allow me to go to the toilet, stretch my legs, etc. So I'll turf the other passengers off (especially the Russian alcoholics who graced the last long-haul flight I was on) and be the only occupant, thanks. :)
I lost my passport (in a heap of books,,, SO ME) and I made the mistake of phoning my parents, who were going too, and they were really angry. Rather than looking in a place that might seem obvious, but I got up from my "sleep" several times and found it only at the sixth try
.
I can't find the quote but I remember when GK Chesterton was told by his long-suffering wife that it really was time he mastered the train timetable, he said something like he wouldn't be the most intelligent person of the 20th century if he bothered with fiddly details like catching the right train. He wouldn't have said exactly that because he wasn't arrogant, but it was something of that kind.
And I have no such excuse, but am equally removed from everyday realities that have a nasty habit of forcing themselves on me when I'm trying to vaguely waft through life doing my photography and doing a bit of work if you're lucky. I probably should change but I've got no idea how, I see practical people who can fix cars and that sort of thing and maybe I'd envy them but how could I do things like that?
(To answer your precise question I'm not sure. The middle can be ruled out, it has no known advantages. The window has a view and is further removed from all the attendants and people walking up and down, but the outer seats allow me to go to the toilet, stretch my legs, etc. So I'll turf the other passengers off (especially the Russian alcoholics who graced the last long-haul flight I was on) and be the only occupant, thanks. :)
What is your favourite line from a movie?
We have a man called Mark who works in another branch of our firm and he often rings my colleague. It's all I can do to not burst out laughing when she greets him.
OH HI MARK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5utc5TOPNbo
OH HI MARK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5utc5TOPNbo
If you were kidnapped by evil scientists who told you that before they'll release you, you have to have an extra ear attached to your body but they'll let you choose where it goes, where would you have them put the extra ear?
On my forehead, then I'd have a better conversation opener than the weather. :)
Other than midnight mass, how did you celebrate Christmas growing up?
Catholic Church, catholic school (they were on the same site), December was all about how glad we should be that our redeemer was on the way (one of our first lessons was in what sinners we were).
I understand that you feel you repudiated the religion and thus don't do anything at Christmas but it was a bit different for me. Most of the parish were themselves or no more than three generations back immigrants, mostly Irish for us, some (like my granddad) Polish, a contingent of Italians and recently Nigerians too.
A double minority, a hated religion and a despised race, so it was cultural as well as religious. So even after drifting away from the religion I still have the culture the way my Jewish and ex-Muslim friends do. When my Jewish friend asked me why I cross myself and light candles for my dead family and sit in the cathedral for hours, I threw the question back at her and asked her why she goes to the synagogue at Passover and does the ritual with her family.
Plus we did secular things (though I don't like the sentimental songs and films as much as the carols) and I take a second job in December,bet so I enjoy the relief of quitting it and having a holiday from my main job and having a nice relax with my family that I don't see much. And I have to keep alive what I learnt in childhood to have a nice dinner. wild horses wouldn't stop me eating mince pies and drinking advocaat, food of the gods! :)
I understand that you feel you repudiated the religion and thus don't do anything at Christmas but it was a bit different for me. Most of the parish were themselves or no more than three generations back immigrants, mostly Irish for us, some (like my granddad) Polish, a contingent of Italians and recently Nigerians too.
A double minority, a hated religion and a despised race, so it was cultural as well as religious. So even after drifting away from the religion I still have the culture the way my Jewish and ex-Muslim friends do. When my Jewish friend asked me why I cross myself and light candles for my dead family and sit in the cathedral for hours, I threw the question back at her and asked her why she goes to the synagogue at Passover and does the ritual with her family.
Plus we did secular things (though I don't like the sentimental songs and films as much as the carols) and I take a second job in December,bet so I enjoy the relief of quitting it and having a holiday from my main job and having a nice relax with my family that I don't see much. And I have to keep alive what I learnt in childhood to have a nice dinner. wild horses wouldn't stop me eating mince pies and drinking advocaat, food of the gods! :)
PAP of your current surroundings?
My surroundings are boring, so have a picture of me eatin' fruit in Cambodia. It was 2 years ago, I was already starting to get ill with my thyroid so I look much healthier now, my hair has regrown and I have less of a chin. But it's still a good picture. I remember that man on the left, he was our tour guide and he was really good. It's obvious that he enjoyed talking to non-Cambodians (we were a mixed British, German and Korean group) because he clarified his stance on Vietnam and China in a way he probably wouldn't have dared to do with one of his countrymen. It was a good time, seeing some amazing ruined temples and drinking in this amazing cocktail bar that's randomly in Cambodia.
Do you believe that home ownership is really something people should strive for, as a life achievement?
If this is a follow-up to what we said a few days ago, I'm sorry to disappoint but I haven't given the matter that much thought :)
I think it's definitely better for people to have property, not be beholden to a landlord or the council, and able to leave things for their children, and society benefits when people have this sense of responsibility. Unfortunately efforts to promote home ownership don't achieve their ends a lot of the time.
It's not like the sub-prime mortgages were a wild success, and that's what happens when it becomes a fetish. Also, Thatcher brought in the "right to buy", it sounded great. Remove people from dependency on the state, and no one has ever denied that big housing estates are grim, and encourage them to have a stake in society.
Unfortunately the properties often went not to the tenant but to shonky "investors", many of them from ultra-wealthy Gulf states ("allied" to the people who shamefully claimed that opponents of the latest war are terrorists!!!) and the poor didn't actually gain anything.from it. So I'm doubtful about whether it's something people should bust their asses for, and it should be encouraged by society, but only if it's been thought through properly.
I think it's definitely better for people to have property, not be beholden to a landlord or the council, and able to leave things for their children, and society benefits when people have this sense of responsibility. Unfortunately efforts to promote home ownership don't achieve their ends a lot of the time.
It's not like the sub-prime mortgages were a wild success, and that's what happens when it becomes a fetish. Also, Thatcher brought in the "right to buy", it sounded great. Remove people from dependency on the state, and no one has ever denied that big housing estates are grim, and encourage them to have a stake in society.
Unfortunately the properties often went not to the tenant but to shonky "investors", many of them from ultra-wealthy Gulf states ("allied" to the people who shamefully claimed that opponents of the latest war are terrorists!!!) and the poor didn't actually gain anything.from it. So I'm doubtful about whether it's something people should bust their asses for, and it should be encouraged by society, but only if it's been thought through properly.
What do you most like to bake?
I don't actually enjoy baking, I do flapjacks or in autumn and winter the apple cake, only if I can't afford to buy something. I have pronounced views on the dessert question and if I can't buy one I must bake my own.
Which leads me to the religious experience I had earlier :)
Because of the bad weather I didn't go anywhere on the bus or train to do my photography, one silver lining to this is that I had a bit of money, so I was able to go to the farmers market and buy an especially good example of this.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sticky_toffee_pudding :)
Which leads me to the religious experience I had earlier :)
Because of the bad weather I didn't go anywhere on the bus or train to do my photography, one silver lining to this is that I had a bit of money, so I was able to go to the farmers market and buy an especially good example of this.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sticky_toffee_pudding :)
What's the last thing you bought and love?
I don't really buy much other than food, bills, and transport, since I need to catch the bus/train to do my photography adventures, which are the main recreation I have other than visiting my girlfriend. But one thing I do is baking, I have time (I only do 20 hours a week) but not money, so I buy the ingredients and bake it myself in the time I have rather than just pay for some bugger else's profit.
If you were tasked to choose among the population, one hundred people to be saved from extinction in an apocalypse, by what criteria would you choose?
No pressure there, then.
I'd choose by lot if I had to, there's no other way. You can't, for instance, choose the people with the highest iq. Because many highly intelligent people don't really DO anything, and often they do bad things, for instance a highly intelligent, skilled designer of nuclear warheads would get short shrift from me.
Then, you can't somehow objectively measure who is most useful, because while there is a place for lone genius you don't know where they'd be without their assistants and collaborators. Einstein for instance wouldn't be able to serve these 99 people very well if they were his only friends.
I am the shah of Persia so I'm meant to know these things but I'm afraid I don't :)
I'd choose by lot if I had to, there's no other way. You can't, for instance, choose the people with the highest iq. Because many highly intelligent people don't really DO anything, and often they do bad things, for instance a highly intelligent, skilled designer of nuclear warheads would get short shrift from me.
Then, you can't somehow objectively measure who is most useful, because while there is a place for lone genius you don't know where they'd be without their assistants and collaborators. Einstein for instance wouldn't be able to serve these 99 people very well if they were his only friends.
I am the shah of Persia so I'm meant to know these things but I'm afraid I don't :)
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Which Christmas movies or TV specials, if any, do you enjoy watching?
I don't watch all the tacky movies and sing the pop songs etc, I'm a killjoy like that and I'm a decorations-free zone. But I do like Christmas because I take on a second job and just before Christmas I finish that and take a holiday from my main job, and relax with unprecedented money and time. I don't go shopping or really DO much of anything, but as a good ex-Catholic there is one thing I do like (whatever you think of the religion and social sides, anyone who claims not to have enjoyed midnight mass as a child is a big fat liar)
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_hs9-Sxf9j4
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_hs9-Sxf9j4
What is the strangest thing you've ever been physically mailed?
Unfortunately I don't get much besides The Economist and the odd CD I might order, though I prefer downloading and buying books in a shop, so I don't get much of anything in the mail. But I remember you said you like this so here's a reminder ;)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qkM7Tp3IvY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-qkM7Tp3IvY
"A man's home is his castle." What does that mean to you?
I think that's definitely right... if it's his, if it's not public housing or owned by a landlord and the tenant has next to no rights, especially the ones where they deliberately keep people on shorthold tenancies. I think we do have a problem with "investors", many of them bureaucrats or businessmen from dodgy regimes, buying up property and pricing it out of the range of the average person. I'm not sure what can be done to help people find homes of their own, it has to be something that wouldn't have unintended consequences, but I'm sure Dave Cameron isn't helping matters.
How well do you know your neighbours?
I've always lived here so I know most of my neighbours, I've known some of them all my life.
The family next door one side I like them, they are allied to me. I don't get on with the people across the road but I'm used to them, better the devil you know, and much better than the situation next door on the other side. It's owned by one of these shonky landlords who hires out on short-term tenancies, seemingly each new denizen being worse than the last.
And my parents didn't like the person who used to live there, but I thought he was ok, he replaced his grandparents who died and even if you don't want people like my old neighbour what you want even less is a revolving door.
So that's why understood the theoretical arguments that as bad as people like Saddam Hussein and Basher Assad are, going in all guns blazing to get rid of them creates a situation that's even worse, one demon cast out, seven demons entering in.
I don't like my neighbours apart from one family but I don't like anyone really :) So I keep the peace with them and we all vaguely drift through life and try to avoid getting bothered too much.
The family next door one side I like them, they are allied to me. I don't get on with the people across the road but I'm used to them, better the devil you know, and much better than the situation next door on the other side. It's owned by one of these shonky landlords who hires out on short-term tenancies, seemingly each new denizen being worse than the last.
And my parents didn't like the person who used to live there, but I thought he was ok, he replaced his grandparents who died and even if you don't want people like my old neighbour what you want even less is a revolving door.
So that's why understood the theoretical arguments that as bad as people like Saddam Hussein and Basher Assad are, going in all guns blazing to get rid of them creates a situation that's even worse, one demon cast out, seven demons entering in.
I don't like my neighbours apart from one family but I don't like anyone really :) So I keep the peace with them and we all vaguely drift through life and try to avoid getting bothered too much.
If you were an immortal - by whatever definition - living amongst humanity, how would you pass the time? Would you make efforts to remain hidden? Would you wander and experience everything the worlds has to offer? Would you collect, or become a scholar? Or a master criminal?
I'd do this:
http://hitchhikers.wikia.com/wiki/Bowerick_Wowbagger :)
http://hitchhikers.wikia.com/wiki/Bowerick_Wowbagger :)
So is where you are standing in that photo one of the hills made from the mud of the giant's boots in the folklore from that Wikipedia link?
Thanks for clicking, I'm always pleasantly surprised when someone does because I vaguely assume the world is ignoring me most of the time :)
I live about 40 miles from the Wrekin, so I think the people who told those legends had barely heard of my city, hardly anyone lived here before the industrial revolution. So I'd say I was sorry to disappoint you but maybe the reality is more interesting than the legend...
http://dry-valleys.tumblr.com/post/133666316279/even-if-it-is-freezing-cold-and-an-afternoon-on
Sneyd Hill is a slag heap, slag being a word for rubbish from coal mining, so it's entirely man-made and didn't exist as a natural hill in the old days.
There are a lot of slag heaps in this city because there were a load of mines before thatcher closed them all. So in that photoshoot the fifth and eighth pictures are slag heaps. My granddad was a miner and it's amazing to think I am standing on stuff he and his pels hewed out of the earth. :)
I live about 40 miles from the Wrekin, so I think the people who told those legends had barely heard of my city, hardly anyone lived here before the industrial revolution. So I'd say I was sorry to disappoint you but maybe the reality is more interesting than the legend...
http://dry-valleys.tumblr.com/post/133666316279/even-if-it-is-freezing-cold-and-an-afternoon-on
Sneyd Hill is a slag heap, slag being a word for rubbish from coal mining, so it's entirely man-made and didn't exist as a natural hill in the old days.
There are a lot of slag heaps in this city because there were a load of mines before thatcher closed them all. So in that photoshoot the fifth and eighth pictures are slag heaps. My granddad was a miner and it's amazing to think I am standing on stuff he and his pels hewed out of the earth. :)
PAP of what you see when you look up?
It's not actually what I see- I wish- but this is where I hope to go at the weekend, it's just a smudge against the background that looks like a pimple- I was at the top of a hill in my city, and the city is in the foreground.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wrekin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wrekin
Have you seen any beautiful churches lately?
'fraid not, I've been either at work and I've taken a few photos when I could avoid rain but apart from Saint Chad's in birmingham, and even that was three weeks ago, no buildings of any kind :(
But hopefully I will go on this long distance walk one day:
http://twosaintsway.org.uk/
Then I will be reunited with some old places and meet some new places I've never seen!
But hopefully I will go on this long distance walk one day:
http://twosaintsway.org.uk/
Then I will be reunited with some old places and meet some new places I've never seen!
What's the last movie you watched?
Ooh! Thought you'd never ask, anon...
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/nov/06/leviathan-review-story-of-job
I highly recommend it, hopefully you'll be sold on the review :)
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/nov/06/leviathan-review-story-of-job
I highly recommend it, hopefully you'll be sold on the review :)
Would you ever pick up a hitchhiker?
I don't drive, anon, but I'm sorry to say I probably wouldn't. I remember one time I was walking round here:
http://dry-valleys.tumblr.com/post/132020061679/cotton-dell-and-cotton-where-tragically-saint
And when I got to the bus stop, in hope of going on the bus very soon, only then was I told that the bus "service" had been curtailed and I'd have to either wait several hours or trudge four miles into the town, Cheadle.
So I'd started to do this and some kind soul gave me a lift! And I was so thankful I lit a candle for him in one of my favourite places, Saint Giles in Cheadle.
Yes, the world needs more people like that, but sorry to say I'm not one of them :(
http://dry-valleys.tumblr.com/post/132020061679/cotton-dell-and-cotton-where-tragically-saint
And when I got to the bus stop, in hope of going on the bus very soon, only then was I told that the bus "service" had been curtailed and I'd have to either wait several hours or trudge four miles into the town, Cheadle.
So I'd started to do this and some kind soul gave me a lift! And I was so thankful I lit a candle for him in one of my favourite places, Saint Giles in Cheadle.
Yes, the world needs more people like that, but sorry to say I'm not one of them :(
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Michael Warming
What is one joke or riddle that always makes you laugh?
It is of course well known that careless talk costs lives, but the full scale of the problem is not always appreciated.
For instance, at the very moment that Arthur said, 'I seem to be having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle,' a freak wormhole opened up in the fabric of the space-time continuum and carried his words far far back in time across almost infinite reaches of space to a distant galaxy where strange and warlike beings were poised on the brink of a frightful interstellar battle.
The two opposing leaders were meeting for the last time.
A dreadful silence fell across the conference table as the commander of the Vl'hurgs, resplendent in his black jewelled battle shorts, gazed levelly at the G'Gugvuntt leader squatting opposite him in a cloud of green sweet-smelling steam, and, with a million sleek and horribly beweaponed star cruisers poised to unleash electric death at his single word of command, challenged the vile creature to take back what it had said about his mother.
The creature stirred in his sickly broiling vapour, and at that very moment the words, 'I seem to be having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle' drifted across the conference table.
Unfortunately, in the Vl'hurg tongue this was the most dreadful insult imaginable, and there was nothing for it but to wage terrible war for centuries.
Eventually, of course, after their galaxy had been decimated over a few thousand years, it was realised that the whole thing had been a ghastly mistake, and so the two opposing battle fleets settled their few remaining differences in order to launch a joint attack on our own galaxy---now positively identified as the source of the offending remark.
For thousands more years the mighty ships tore across the empty wastes of space and finally dived screaming on to the first planet they came across---which happened to be Earth---where due to a terrible miscalculation of scale the entire battle fleet was accidentally swallowed by a small dog.
Those who study the complex interplay of cause and effect in the history of the universe say that this sort of thing is going on all the time, but that we are powerless to prevent it.
'It's just life,' they say.
For instance, at the very moment that Arthur said, 'I seem to be having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle,' a freak wormhole opened up in the fabric of the space-time continuum and carried his words far far back in time across almost infinite reaches of space to a distant galaxy where strange and warlike beings were poised on the brink of a frightful interstellar battle.
The two opposing leaders were meeting for the last time.
A dreadful silence fell across the conference table as the commander of the Vl'hurgs, resplendent in his black jewelled battle shorts, gazed levelly at the G'Gugvuntt leader squatting opposite him in a cloud of green sweet-smelling steam, and, with a million sleek and horribly beweaponed star cruisers poised to unleash electric death at his single word of command, challenged the vile creature to take back what it had said about his mother.
The creature stirred in his sickly broiling vapour, and at that very moment the words, 'I seem to be having tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle' drifted across the conference table.
Unfortunately, in the Vl'hurg tongue this was the most dreadful insult imaginable, and there was nothing for it but to wage terrible war for centuries.
Eventually, of course, after their galaxy had been decimated over a few thousand years, it was realised that the whole thing had been a ghastly mistake, and so the two opposing battle fleets settled their few remaining differences in order to launch a joint attack on our own galaxy---now positively identified as the source of the offending remark.
For thousands more years the mighty ships tore across the empty wastes of space and finally dived screaming on to the first planet they came across---which happened to be Earth---where due to a terrible miscalculation of scale the entire battle fleet was accidentally swallowed by a small dog.
Those who study the complex interplay of cause and effect in the history of the universe say that this sort of thing is going on all the time, but that we are powerless to prevent it.
'It's just life,' they say.
What is the weirdest scar you have and how did you get it?
I haven't got any scars, but I've got sunrise:
What Wikipedia article have you recently read?
Funny you should say that, anon!
I want to go here again.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Chad%27s_Cathedral,_Birmingham
My girlfriend/friend with benefits lives in that city, I hope I can talk her into going here when I visit h tomorrow, it depends whether she's interested as she has less natural interest than me.
Once they were doing a service when we went there, I wanted to go and randomly join in even tho I'm an agnostic but she didn't and maybe I will talk he into coming when it's empty anyway.
That architect is a hero of mine and thankfully I live near his masterpiece and it's in beautiful walking country :)
I want to go here again.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Chad%27s_Cathedral,_Birmingham
My girlfriend/friend with benefits lives in that city, I hope I can talk her into going here when I visit h tomorrow, it depends whether she's interested as she has less natural interest than me.
Once they were doing a service when we went there, I wanted to go and randomly join in even tho I'm an agnostic but she didn't and maybe I will talk he into coming when it's empty anyway.
That architect is a hero of mine and thankfully I live near his masterpiece and it's in beautiful walking country :)
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