I just love weather!

Sargans, Switzerland, 4 June 2024

"I just love weather", exclaimed my classmate, a young woman from Vancouver Island, when it started to rain on our school trip to one of the valleys in Costa Rica. That was in 1996. No, she was not on drugs, she simply was like that. I thought her refreshingly naive, I liked her and sympathised with her attitude which was then beyond me..

Her comment recently came to mind on a rainy summer's day in Eastern Switzerland, when all of a sudden the sky turned grey, and then dark. Thunder was to be heard, and then the rain started to pour heavily. I felt entranced by these changes. And, I think it strange that for most of my life I haven't really paid attention to weather. It is something new to me to contemplate weather changes, to realise that one moment is different from the next, and that there is no continuity whatsoever. 

The dark and low hanging clouds suddenly give way to sun rays which in turn stay for a short while before the wind comes up and a light grey starts to dominate .... To see and experience constant change is truly fascinating

It just is what is.

A World of Difference

“I’m French,” she said. “You’re American. There’s a world of difference. An American gets sick, she’s outraged. How dare that happen to her? She must have the fault corrected immediately, at once. But French people understand that first you live, and then you die. It’s not an outrage. It’s something that’s been happening since the dawn of time. It has to happen, don’t you see? If people didn’t die, the world would be an awfully crowded place by now.”

Civilian notions about unreasonable search and seizure and warrants and probable cause stop at an army post main gate.

Lee Child: The Enemy

Adrian Mole and the Weapons of Mass Destruction

An elderly woman wearing a rabbit’s paw brooch came in and complained that I had sold her Trainspotting by Irving Welsh as a Christmas present for her 76-year-old railway enthusiast husband. She said, ‘It’s nothing but filth and Scottish words. My husband had to double his blood pressure tablets after reading it.’ I swapped it for Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie.

Lord Jenkins of Hillhead, formally Roy Jenkins, died today, aged eighty-two. Had he been able to pronounce his Rs he would almost certainly have become prime minister.

I was asked to name the next book. I suggested Stupid White Men by Michael Moore. Bernard Hopkins blustered and swore and said, ‘If I’d written a book called Stupid Black Men, I’d have been had up by the race relations industry’

I asked her what she loved about me, and she said, ‘Your kind face, your gentle voice and the way your hair curls on the back of your neck.’ I was slightly disappointed; I had expected her to mention my intelligence, general knowledge and wit.

We stayed sitting on the floor, and Mohammed explained that his personal interpretation was not shared by anybody else, including his sons. ‘Each Muslim interprets the Koran in their own way,’ he said. Melanie sighed and said, ‘I’m a bit disappointed to hear that. I was hoping to find some definite rules on how to live my life.’.

… I watched the plane hurtle down the runway and throw itself into the sky ….

Daisy was up at 5 a.m., washing, ironing and packing her little trolley suitcase. I took her to catch the 7.19 train to London. On the way I asked where she got her energy from. She said, ‘Drugs’, I hope she was joking.

Sue Townsend: Adrian Mole and the Weapons of Mass Destruction

Überschriften

„Im Laufe der Zeit und mit zunehmendem Alter hat er sich dann aber ganz auf die Überschriften kapriziert. Hin und wieder zeigt er mir seine Manuskripte – zwanzig Seiten für eine Überschrift. Er hat mir erzählt, dass ihm manchmal, wenn er den ganzen Tag und auch noch abends zu Hause gearbeitet hat, die endgültige Version im Traum erscheint. Dann wacht er auf, notiert sie und kann vor lauter Aufregung nicht mehr einschlafen.“ „Sind denn die Überschriften so gut?“ fragte ich. „Mir kommen sie stinknormal vor“, sagte Mr. Margin, „neulich hat er mir eine gezeigt, an der er zwei Tage gearbeitet hat. Es ging um eine Rezension über eine Stadtgeschichte von New York City. Die Überschrift lautete: ‚So war New York’“.

Charles Simmons: Belles Lettres