Poetry can never be too concrete but it can be too abstract
Discuss
Can you have an abstract meal in any meaningful sense?
Please write 5,000 words now.
If mathematics is a game what are the rules. Why or why not is this related to Wittgenstein’s ladder
You can write on both sides of the paper at once if you like on otherwise just write on one side but make sure it’s the right side or you will fail immediately with no appeal. We are not talking about sex here but what are we talking about?
Why are the older colleges in Oxford more beautiful than the newer ones?
What did Plato think about beauty?
That’s all one question so take plenty of paper. No you do not need to go to the toilet before you start. We have got some paper here free.
We can’t even give it away now. Wanting a heated toilet seat? Just set our paper on the fire and it will do the trick.
Posted on November 11, 2017 The summer heat made cobblestones like stoves The Coronation happened, I know now We played with melted tar, industrial bairns.
My mother’s hands were black and much beloved The coal and coke had tattooed her, we sa The summer heat made cobbles hot as stoves.
In the road, we played our ancient games The older children passed the knowledge down We played with melted tar, industrial wains.
The bully boys were cruel , did not heed love A little boy had tried to be a clown In summer heat, they beat him on the stones.
We were silent as they flaunted power again; But in our hearts, we knew we’d let him down We threw warn melted tar, industrial wains
And in our phantasy, he was alone. No-one knew who threw the vicious stone The summer heat made cobbles feel like flames We played with melted tar, Christ died again
s to make preparations before you begin something new or to learn something or to create something.
There is another problem that we humans have is that we get nervous about beginning a task especially if we believe it’s difficult so we can spend a long time preparing so that it becomes almost impossible to start
This happened to me my first art class where the teacher asked us to take something to draw
I believe we were using charcoal so I sat there clutching my wooden decoy duck in my left hand and the charcoal in my right hand and I watched as everybody in the room except me began to draw
This went on for half an hour and then I thought I’ve got to do something even if it’s terrible.
At the time I didn’t think it was very good but since then I have seen it in a different light I think it was very good
But the most important thing was I did not leave the room and go away never to return. Of course I had paid in advance so that was a factor, but that was not the main reason
The main reason was that if I gave up at that point I would never ever try to draw anything again.
And there are other situations in life where withdrawing is not a good idea
And I think the most horrible kind is when someone is going to get married and they suddenly run down the aisle of the church before they made their promises.
Well they will certainly never have a church wedding again
That’s not too bad in our society because you can have a civil partnership or if you can live together without being married.
So if you are in that position do not run out of the church unless you are sure that you are making the right decision
Don’t run out just because you are feeling tense and nervous as many people do in churches or theaters or places where it’s difficult to leave because therefore the people whose eyes to look very threatening to person of edge of panic
It’s an illusion because people are not hostile to you when they’re sitting behind you in church or sitting in front of you in the theater
The truth is more painful that most people don’t notice you and you can get up and do a handstand in the middle of the aisle and lots of people wouldn’t notice or if they did they wouldn’t be interested. We are not as important to everybody elsewe sometimes feel especially when it’s a negative feeling.
I calculated that I was in the top 0.1 % of I Q in the USA
But I don’t understand what 0.1% is in ordinary language. Can someone explain it to me ?
I can remember reading the information on the cornflakes box when I was only 18 months old. I have never read a book since then.
My own IQ is very low it is one standard deviation below the norm that means I’m in the lowest 25% of the population and yet I have been to university and got a degree
This proves it is not of any use to work out what your IQ is as it says in the Bible
Thank you for telling me certain free services from my local pharmacy.
If you think I need free contraception am I allowed to tell you that I would like to have a child now even if it’s a virgin birth. But do you think it’s safe at my age?
I am still young enough to get the free RSV vaccine.
I understand that you want to keep elderly people out of hospital in the winter so can I catch a disease in the summer and spend some time in the hospital in July?
As long as they have air conditioning I don’t mind. But please don’t give me steroids.
I see there are about 10 services I can get from the pharmacy but the main problem I have is that I’m not mobile.
Do you think the pharmacist will come to my house or have the receptionist who wrote to me made a mistake and looked up the wrong person on your computer?
I must repeat this if you really do believe that I can get pregnant now please inform me as soon as possible then I can try to find someone to oblige or failing that maybe you could ask God to send the Angel Gabriel round to my house.
God knows that I am disabled and indeed deformed in certain ways but Angels see the beauty in everybody. I do have very beautiful eyes despite everything.
Emile woke Mary up at 7am.It was a Sunday in late October, grey and damp though the sun was still not too low in the sky Go away, she told him.The clock has changed.It’s not 8 am yet.I have to wash my hair as well.Get the Observer out of the basket for me,please. I can’t read. the dear animal replied.And why don’t you rebel and stick to Summer Time? I know Stan wanted to send you to Eton but we couldn’t afford it.Yet you understand days and calenders, Mary joked sorrowfully She got up and found her fleece dressing gown; it was conker brown covered in coloured spots.She went downstairs and gave Emile a Whitby kipper.Then she made some tea and took it upstairs so she could drink it while she came round from her dreams Suddenly Annie ran into her bedroom wearing a long black vinyl coat and red knee-high boots You never locked the back door, she howled like a lost leopard which has had no food for weeks I don’t suppose anyone wants my old TV as it is only 19 inches.And my Chromebook is not something worth re-selling.I do have a new coat. How about Ray Monk’s life of Wittgenstein, Annie asked her defiantly, her apricot lips pouting childishly as the Riemann of Paris lipstick glittered uncannily like an imaginary number in a dream of Godel. The people who might enjoy reading it are by virtue of that , not the sort to steal or buy it on the black market. That is very racist, Annie told her.You should say:the beige market! Then nobody would know what I meant, Mary said lovingly Anyway, do you want to come to Marks with me? They have some beautiful coats in I’d like a pink wool coat, said Mary thoughtfully Quite right ,said Annie.Bring back feminine colours Actually, gay men might like pink coats, she continued.But if they go on the bus they might get dirty.Come to think of it, so will women’s coats They will have to buy pink puffa jackets and we can wash them at 30 deg.Mary whispered Using a special detergent, Annie asked? I have never seen a detergent for washing gay men.I don’t think they will fit into the washing machine.On the other hand, you are small so you will fit in Shall I get undressed first, Annie asked furtively. Yes, I’ll try to put you on a short wash for 15 minutes but it is your choice.Maybe a bath would be safer? No problem, said Annie intellectually.Are you having one with me? You’d better be careful, Mary ad-libbed.It might be sexual harassment. Well, I am not gay , said Annie. You never know till you try, Mary giggled ,like a child behind the school canteen Why, we might become gender fluid and then who knows? And so say all of us Miaow
I left a pan of curry on the stove Hot as ash combined with burning coal Yet when I went back in a cat stood there Eating this strong curry with no care.
It must have had thick skin inside its mouth Before I looked ,it ran out of the house To think it gobbled up our supper so Leaving me with nothing but a glow
So then I made a chilli beef and beans My heart ached as I listened to puss scream Can cats learn that pans are out of bounds? I’d hate to hear again its anguished sounds
Be sure to close the kitchen door or else You too will suffer torment from cats’ yells
I am sorry that I read stories that are deliberately trying to make people anxious.
For example there’s a lot of rumours and even published articles claiming that the government are going to means test state pensions
State pensions are taxed in the usual way if the state pension plus your job related pension or any other pension rise above the personal allowance which is round about 12,000 pound per annum
The state pension will never be taken away from anyone ( unless they move out of Britain)
If if the state pension rises above the personal allowance then the excess will be taxed in the normal manner
To my mind that’s rather low if that’s all you’re living on
But these newspapers and websites publishing the frightening stories make me very angry because they pretend to be helping people by giving them useful information but in fact it’s all lies or mostly it is
The headline is frightening and then the article when you read it is actually saying the opposite of what they are suggesting to you but how many people will read all of those?
So much misinformation around really it’s not just Donald Trump and his fellows
Because they want to affect our emotions they want to cause distress and that may possibly in some cases lead to riots or troubles in society.
And that can lead to complete tragedy
A 61-year-old man was put in prison after being involved in the riots in and believe Rotherham and very sadly he has committed suicide after a few months.
And I blame some of the media for these sort of things because a lot of people don’t understand what’s going on and they don’t know what asylum seekers are as opposed to illegal immigrants and this should not be happening.
I suppose I’m over optimistic because people always like to gossip and create rumours but it’s dangerous now because of the spread of the internet and the devices we have
I apologise for the American spelling of some of these words when I use the dictation and maybe I’ll be able to change it if I do a bit of work
It’s already difficult in this country with rising prices still going on etc and why let your blood pressure be raised by fear. Well a lot of people are not literate or numeric enough to be able to understand what’s going on and they rely on some kind of media but now we’re told the BBC is very left wing so that poly deters some people
Let’s face it some people enjoy being frightened and creating trouble and frightening other people and I suppose it’s always been so and it’s always will be unless we try to stop it.
If you have problems with mobility, you may think it’s better not to use a stick or a crutch or that dreaded object the Zimmer frame.
But if without some support you are unable to stand erect and walk about amongst other people having your eyes at the same level as most adults then it’s better to use a walking aid.
It’s rather like spectacles. I met a new colleague a few years ago who had a very good reputation was very interesting and intelligent but all I was aware of when I was with her was the fact that she obviously needed spectacles: that she was very short sighted
But clearly she believed that she looked better without her spectacles on. I’m not sure why she would do this in a staff room when you’re not normally signalling your availability to be someone’s sexual partner but even if you were I think it would be better to wear your spectators or contact lenses rather than peer about.
Maybe I’m just a bit dim I didn’t realize that the staff room was the place for picking up partners of any kind. But would you rather date someone who was going blind or someone who was wearing some very attractive spectacles and seemed lively and interesting?
After all you can take the spectacles off when you go to bed.
If you wear lipsticks which doesn’t last long on your lips then you can either just forget about it or you can do what some women used to do namely keep reapplying their lipstick every 20 minutes or so regardless of where they are or what else is happening.
This makes you seem like an airhead.
If that’s what you want then fine but if you don’t want to look like that then you either need to give up wearing lipstick or do a bit of research into how to make it stay on your lips longer. It could be you just need to buy a more expensive brand.
It could also be a nervous tic that you’re not really aware of. The other people will notice you constantly fiddling in your bag or your pocket and then applying this unguent to your lips
It’s very distracting when someone appears like this
But it’s not as bad as reapplying your deodorant to your armpit while you’re in a meeting whether it’s a mother’s meeting or a business meeting or a religious meeting
Of course applying lipstick can be very seductive similarly so is powdering your face in certain circumstances but these are unlikely to occur in most situations in life.
And anyway it’s a waste of money buying lipstick. Don’t you wonder why it doesn’t last very long? In the past I remember one of my teachers at school saying that scientists could have found out why our nylon stockings were always getting ladders but they didn’t want to.
Well we found the answer which is to wear trousers which do not get ladders in them strangely. I wonder why that is
But anything that you can do that makes you feel more confident or improve your posture etc then do it if you can afford it. But when it comes to face lifts.. probably best avoided.
Apparently you should turn socks inside out before you put them in the washing machine all the bowl of water because there will be dead skin inside.
So it might be a good idea to wash your feet before you get into bed
In fact if you wash your entire body before you get into bed you might not need to change your sheets as frequently.
Because it’s expensive washing a lot of things frequently so the more you can minimize the better
So wash your body frequently to avoid having to wash your clothes frequently n
One very sensible hint is that especially in the winter you wear some cotton leggings or pyjamas underneath your trousers and then you can wash the undergarment frequently and wash your trousers less frequently
Since trousers may need to be ironed you can also save yourself work by wearing these cotton leggings underneath your trousers as long as you do not get the urge to iron the cotton leggings every day or every week
It is true though that ironing your clothes will kill bacteria
So if you can’t wash your trousers then iron them with a hot iron
Did you ever get the feeling that skirts were easier than trousers in some respects ?
Skirts are looser and don’t sit so close to your body and when I was younger and wearing skirts we wore petticoats underneath which is a similar principle to wearing cotton leggings
And if you wore tights then you would wash your tights every day and they would have absorbed some of the sweat from your body and the dead skin from your skin etc
My god I’m going to have a nervous breakdown thinking about all this dead skin and the sweats and so on and so forth.
Maybe it will be better to move to a hot country where you can spend your time wearing very few clothes and the dead skin will get washed off because you maybe going into the sea frequently to swim or whatever.
It makes me wonder why does our skin die and drop off into our underwear or socks? I’m not sure of the answer but skin is fragile
But once it’s dead it’s not removed then it will attract bacteria and sometimes this can be the explanation for the horrible smell coming from your socks.
Still it just seemed rather cruel to deprive the bacteria of their food as God made the bacteria just as he made you.
It’s a puzzle listen to it it seems that every creature except for cows and the ruminants eats another creature
Bacteria are very kind because they eat dead skin cells which don’t feel pain because they’re dead.
So on balance bacteria seem to be very kind creatures which is good because they can’t get married and buy houses and buy clothes and washing machines
And sll the other fun things that we humans have to do
I mean what do bacteria do to pass the time?
They can’t watch the television. They can’t read they can’t talk to each other as far as we know but would we ever be able to detect it?
In fact are they really alive! They mutate but I don’t think they have sex as we would understand it
So what is the purpose why are they alive?Dieæ this mean that some beings are alive but they’re never enjoy any pleasure but since they have no brains they can’t think consider don’t know about pleasure and deprivation.
In a sense they have a very restricted life but they don’t have to get a job they do not have to comply to the wishes of others and develop a false self as we have read human beings do when they are not in the right environment.
Well I wish that Netanyahu would develop a false self
Perhaps he could take Putin with him for a respray
True or false well at least they would look better with some new paint on them which could be washed down regularly but the bacteria would not be there because when you’re outer shell is paint it has no nutritional value at the moment but it’s possible that creatures may evolve that can live on bits of pain there’s a dropped off cars or human beings similar to what might happen to lipstick that drops off women’s lips
I feel I’m going in the wrong direction and perhaps I need a new brain
Might make it difficult if you live near a lake or river.
Or it’s been raining and there’s a puddle on the payment mother told you never to pass it in public
Never skate on our water until it freezes
Passing water can be hard for the elderly so remember this when you’re drawing up your walking expedition. Don’t take them to the lake District.
Now moving on what about passing out?
I once passed out at the dining table but usually soldiers pass out after they’ve completed their training. That’s why they look so numb
Some drugs make me pass out the main one being gtn or glycerol trinitrate. This is a treatment for angina which blows open all your arteries. But if you are inexperienced and use too much of it you will feel as if your eyes can’t see properly your scalp will start to sweat profusely and the world will shrink around you
If you feel like this try to kneel down or lie down on the floor to avoid injuring yourself when you faint. Is there any happened to me once and it was horrible
Remember not everybody is drunk when they act in a strange way because it can also because by diabetic medication to lower the blood sugar.
If it goes too low you can actually pass out or even die
But your doctor won’t get into trouble because they were giving you the treatment recommended the fact that it affects you more than other people it’s nothing to do with the doctor.
They are all terrified of being accused of doing something wrong
Well that’s only right isn’t it?
By the way if you pass large amounts of water and feel terribly thirsty that may very well be a sign of diabetes.
If you get to the point when you’re losing weight it is not because your drinking half a point of water before every meal. It is that you’ve got diabetes your body cannot take the sugar out of your blood to feed the cells and for some reason which I don’t quite understand it begins to digest your muscles.
I’ve known two friends who were so happy they were losing weight until the real reason was found.
One of them had an eating disorder and she could eat very few foods so she concentrated on cheesecake as being full of protein
You can’t live on cheese cake
You could live on bread and cheese plus salads and maybe some boiled eggs, tomatoes etc
You maybe pleased to learn that under the last 14 years of conservative rule 673 public conveniences or bathrooms as Americans call them have been closed.
This makes it very difficult for some of us to go out. If you are near a shopping centre or a department store that might be okay but what about in the evening when these places are closed?
It’s the least we could expect and moreover there are now a lot of people traveling around delivering parcels or into the vast increase in online shopping.
In many cases there is literally nowhere for them to go.
And buying incontinence products is very expensive and moreover why should people be forced to become incontinent just because they’ve got weak bladders or their elderly or they’ve just had a baby?
These are the minimum requirements for a city or even a town that there should be enough provision in the evening or in the morning before shops open for Peter who need to go to the toilet.
I know what happens near me. There’s two phone booths by the general post office and I’m glad I no longer have to use them because the floors are always swimming in urine. If you are a man who likes to drink a lot of beer kindly urinate before you leave the pub not after though I understand that it could be difficult for you.
Trust the unknown force that grew you,
From the joining of two cells.
Act of love and of self giving,
Creating then a new born self.
Trust the dark,the unseen aspects
Of the life we all do live.
Trust that there is wisdom elsewhere,
To your emptiness to give.
Wait in patience for the time
When inspiration comes at last
Trust in darkness,silence,lowness.
Opposition forms the cross.
Pain is bearable in lowness,
Like the worm in earth I dwell.
When I look I see the sunrise
And I trust all shall be well.
How my heart sings 