Monday, December 15

 

The story goes that Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the famous poet, woke up one night ‘from a fevered dream’ with a poem fully formed in his head. It is suggested he might have taken opium. The poem was Kubla Khan and it has become one of the best known poems in the world.

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

A stately pleasure dome decree

Where Alph the sacred river ran

In caverns, measureless to man,

Down to a sunless sea.

 

I had a similar experience this morning, waking early with a poem rattling around in my head and I had nothing stronger than coffee before retiring. I had to get up to write it down before it disappeared.  In fact, one line (that’s 20% of the poem) had disappeared and may never be seen again.

There are some things I need to get at the shop

And some library books I need to swap

And I wish the voices in my head would stop

If there’s whisky in that bottle, I wouldn’t mind a drop.

Saturday, December 13

 Nera has family visiting her at the moment.  Her sister with her husband and baby, and another brother arrived late last night and are driving to Hobart this morning to see the sights of the big city.  Marilyn and I were woken at about 8 o'clock with Jamie dropping off Archie on the way.

I am pondering on the details of that situation: for years I have prided myself on being up and about by 7 o'clock every morning.  You could set your clock by my regularity.  But that proud reputation has fallen in a heap and I have shown myself to be as weak as the next man.  This morning I was still in bed at 8 o'clock!  Disgraceful!  I'm blaming the physiotherapist at the exercise class who worked us too hard in yesterday's class.  Is she expecting too much of her elderly clients?

Tuesday, December 2

 I seem to have become addicted to a website called Quora.  It's a question and answer forum and mostly US-based.  The format is that someone poses a question, and other people offer their responses.  Many of the questions are political like ''Where does Donald Trump get off calling Marjorie Taylor Green a 'rino'?   The questions vary though and this morning I read "Is it ethical to keep cats as indoor pets when some people believe it's wrong to keep animals in captivity?"

It's harmless stuff, mostly, and I find myself being sucked into the nonsense.  Perhaps it's because I secretly enjoy reading how ignorant some people are and that feeds my feeling of superiority.

This morning, I realised there are other people who also share my feeling of cleverness.  One regular subscriber is called Nicholas Stone and he writes about trains in the UK.  I was surprised how many people ask about train travel in the UK until I realised that Nicholas must be writing the questions himself.  He can then show off his knowledge and attach a picture of a ,train with his beaming face in front.

I love the captions to the photographs, something like: A Cross Country XPT in festive livery,  Photograph taken by Nicholas Stone, the author of this article.

I suppose everybody needs a hobby.