Mutterings - Dec 29

This week's free word associations from Unconscious mutterings are:

1. Business cards :: Logo
2. IT :: Arrgh
3. Liver :: Lights
4. Rugged :: Cross
5. Destruction :: Age (misremembering the Barry McGuire Eve of Destruction?)
6. Cast :: Die (probably the six sided object rather than engineering)
7. Gratification :: Delayed
8. Pizza :: Base
9. Cutest :: Cat
10. Best :: Brightest (I'm obviously getting in tune for Epiphany...)

The website appears to have a second set of words for today maybe they're next week's but I'll put these here too:

1. Once upon a :: Time
2. Winston :: Smith
3. Frost :: David (Paradine)
4. Flute :: Debussy (the start of L'Après Midi d'un Faune)
5. Antlers :: Deer
6. Jolly :: Sailor (a local pub of that name)
7. Mound :: Mott
8. Gallery :: Uffizi
9. Trades ::Jack
10. Flake ::Cadbury

The Hunt

It's a little time since I saw Vinterberg's The Hunt at Silkscreen and Christmas eve would seem to be a good point to comment (in as far as I can still remember) - one of the film's big scenes (more than one) takes place on Christmas eve. I saw it twice - I was projecting the later showing so I went to the early so that I could give it my full attention. A powerful of suspicion and the hunting of an unjustly accused man - I doubt think the film ever leaves you in any doubt as to the innocence of the principal character. But it's also a film about forgiveness but how even with that, the marks are still there. Wonderful acting by Mads Mikkelsen and his young accuser Annika Wedderkopp - some of the audience were talking as they headed out as to how depressing it was, maybe the scenes of suspicion , but the end was, for me, far different.

Teaser Tuesday - Dec 24

Teaser Tuesday
The rules are:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) 'teaser' sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title and author of the book that you’re getting your 'teaser' from .. that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you've given!

It had hung there so long - all Carrie's life certainly - that it was no longer any particular colour. It had been packed away for the summer but she knew where her mother stored it in the bottom drawer of the hall chest of drawers and she hung it as fast as she could, to block any view through the letter box or fanlight, where camera flashes were intruding with frightening rapidity.

This is a bit of a cheat as I read this book earlier in the autumn and have just seen that it never got teased. Patrick Gale's 'A Perfectly Good Man' a tale of a Cornish clergyman - I thought this was wonderful, a very powerful tale of goodness and fallibility. And that extract makes a very good teaser! I hadn't spotted that one of the characters in the book is a continuation of someone from his earlier Notes from an Exhibition. Here's the Guardian review. If you go to the author's website you'll get his view and some more reviews.

Mutterings - Dec 22

This week's free word associations from Unconscious mutterings are:

1. Drape :: Funeral
2. Visitors :: Christmas
3. Garage :: Light
4. Disney :: Mouse
5. Among :: Surrounded
6. Trend :: Statistical
7. Holiday :: Rest
8. Lightbulb :: Filament
9. Zing! :: Zap
10. Efficient :: Energy

Teaser Tuesday - Dec 17

Teaser Tuesday
The rules are:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) 'teaser' sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title and author of the book that you’re getting your 'teaser' from .. that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you've given!

'Oh, I thought he'd died. I thought I'd never see him again.

Clare Balding rattling on at a fair old pace in her My Animals and Other Family (the same as last week and our book group selection) and a more dramatic but less thought provoking teaser! The 'him' is inevitably an animal.

2013 in summary

For friends who don't follow my feed on twitter or other social media.. our Christmas newsletter is on the home webserver as a pdf - I guess most of it has appeared on this weblog at some time or another but here it is in summary.

Mutterings - Dec 15

This week's free word associations from Unconscious mutterings are:

1. Comedy :: Legs (there's probably a John Cleese connection)
2. Warning :: Shot
3. Bowling :: Alley
4. Picked :: Nose
5. Shotgun :: Riding
6. Accommodate :: Inn (looking towards Christmas)
7. Everybody :: Stand
8. Hypnotic :: Music
9. Penthouse :: Suite
10. Hockey :: Stick

Teaser Tuesday - Dec 10

Teaser Tuesday
The rules are:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) 'teaser' sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title and author of the book that you’re getting your 'teaser' from .. that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you've given!

They were invented in Norman times to get round some daft law that said only the gentry could own smart, majestic breeds like the wolfhound or deerhound. Commoners were effectively barred from owning a sight hound, in case they used them to poach game.

The 'they' are lurchers - from Clare Balding's autobiography 'My Animals and Other Family' - and explicit homage in the title to the Gerald Durrell book about his early years. This is our book group for the month - something relaxing for over Christmas! Here's the Telegraph review.

Mutterings - Nov 8

This week's free word associations from Unconscious mutterings are:

1. Games :: evening
2. Younger :: Pitt
3. Propose :: Marriage
4. Closer :: Lean
5. Cleaned :: Rubbed
6. Fresh :: Vegetables
7. Crunch :: Credit
8. Centers :: Gravity
9. Shiny! :: Surface
10. Horrific :: Scene

Liturgy and Doctrine

In its comments on the Pilling report, 'Anglican Mainstream', has this:

Anglicans believe that liturgy expresses doctrine.

And then argues that blessing of a same sex civil partnership would therefore change Anglican doctrine. Doesn't this imply that any Anglican service which isn't approved of by synod has the same effect? I didn't realise that an action by a local church had such powerful consequences. I'm off to plan a service!

And I'm sure that many Anglican Mainstreamish churches are quite happy to have unauthorized services when it suits them.

Teaser Tuesday - Dec 3

Teaser Tuesday
The rules are:

• Grab your current read.
• Let the book fall open to a random page.
• Share with us two (2) 'teaser' sentences from that page, somewhere between lines 7 and 12.
• You also need to share the title and author of the book that you’re getting your 'teaser' from .. that way people can have some great book recommendations if they like the teaser you've given!

We had not heard Boerhaave descend the companionway & nudge open my door! Torgny cried out in dismay, declaring his guilt in a trice.

A re-read of David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas - I see it was nearly three years ago that I first read and teased it.

Mutterings - Dec 1

This week's free word associations from Unconscious mutterings are:

1. Taxes :: Death
2. Deter :: Threaten
3. Regret :: Rien
4. Consume :: Feed
5. 1600 :: Pennsylvania Avenue (via Bernstein)
6. Retire :: Withdraw
7. Console :: VT (virtual console)
8. Property :: Ownership
9. Return :: Fare
10. Laughter :: Joy