The recent fall in the
price of oil from 100 to 60 dollars a barrel is certainly dramatic
but did you know that the price was a mere 16 dollars as recently as
1999? More here.
The estimable Roger
Scruton has given us another short treaty on modern art, entitled
Lies, Fakes and Modern Art. Here's a sampler: There grew around the
modernists a class of critics and impresarios, who offered to explain
just why it is not a waste of your time to stare at a pile of bricks,
to sit quietly through ten minutes of excruciating Old words;noise, or to study
a crucifix pickled in urine. To convince themselves that they are
true progressives, who ride in the vanguard of history, the new
impresarios surround themselves with others of their kind, promoting
them to all committees that are relevant to their status, and
expecting to be promoted in their turn. Thus arose the modernist
establishment - the self-contained circle of critics who form the
backbone of our cultural institutions and who trade in 'originality',
'transgression' and 'breaking new paths'. You can read more here. And
an expanded version here. Of course, we must exclude the wonderful
Brian Sewell from any modernist taint. I will always love this eccentric critic merely for his dismissal of Damien Hirst as "fucking dreadful". Despite his negative comments on Liverpool as a centre of culture.
Thanks to a
demonstration in Malaga involving the Virgin Mary as a giant vagina, I now know that Article 525 of the Spain's Penal
Code says: “Those who, with the purpose of offending the
feelings of members of a religious denomination, do publicly, orally,
in writing or by any type of document, mock its dogmas, beliefs, or
ceremonies or who annoy, also publicly, those who profess or practice
these shall incur the penalty of eight to 12 months in prison.” Bloody 'ell. Suddenly I feel I'm back in the 15th century. Happily, in this case the judge threw out the suit from the Association of Christian Lawyers.
On the TV today,
someone used the word unbeknownst, which surely ranks alongside whilst as a relic from Middle English. But this surely can't last and
I guess neither of them is used in the USA, even on the East
Coast.
Talking of words . . .
Thanks to my fellow blogger, Trevor, I now know that ryanairing has
joined footing, etc. as bizarre Spanish anglicisms.
The first Islamic
mosque in the UK was set up in Liverpool just over a hundred years ago, in a
Georgian house which is part of an arcade that had fallen into
disrepair. It's now been lovingly restored. Pix here.
Talking of houses . . .
here's a foto of one down the bottom of the hill. As is the norm here,
it's been under construction for at least 2 years. I do hope the ugly bare
concrete is going to be faced but I guess it depends on whether the
owners are 'modernists' or not.
Ultimately . . . I
finally caught the pesky mole in my humane trap. But not before it'd created more than 10 soil piles on the lawn. Sadly, it had
expired before I got to it. If not, I'd have had to bang it on the
head. Which, as an animal lover, I don't like doing. Honest.
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