Yearly Archives: 2006

Scuttling rat watch

well, since it’s Boris, more scampering away than scuttling. Still, it is interesting to read that he should have known, within ten days of the invasion, that we were doomed. It’s not quite how he saw it at the time: … Continue reading Continue reading

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The price of a bishop

Last year, the energetic and saintly Roman Catholic bishop of Isiola diocese, in Northern Kenya, was bludgeoned and shot to death outside his compound after nearly forty years there. It was believed at first that he was a martyr to … Continue reading Continue reading

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Should Old Aquinas be forgot?

David Chalmers asks if anyone knows the words to the philosophers’ drinking song “Should Old Aquinas be forgot?”. This is the kind of thing at which Ecco excels. Within seconds I have extracted from its bowels eight lines: Should old … Continue reading Continue reading

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NYT, 503, Cookies

I have for some time been frustrated that I could not access stories in the New York Times from home. I could reach the front page, but every time I tried to read individual stories, I would get an HTTP Continue reading Continue reading

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worm update

It looks to me as if the worm has merely moulted, as nematodes will: I will write weekly1 on the Guardian’s main comment site2 instead. I am still going to miss my weekly chats with Ros Taylor, though. There is … Continue reading Continue reading

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Worm turned to compost

I just learned that my Worm’s eye column has been shot with immediate effect. It’s a great shame. That was one of the two or three most enjoyable jobs I’ve had in journalism — another was the long Saturday Review … Continue reading Continue reading

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A rather drastic cure for snoring

Round where I live,the cure, or at least the treatment, for Obstructive Sleep Apnoea is a mask that pumps air into the sufferer at night. At least some American surgeons are more ambitious Continue reading

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An unspeakable thought

The notion of women as property is terribly widespread. What do women get out of it? Not a lot, obviously. But perhaps more from being private property than communal. Obviously a woman in a burqa is not valued for herself. … Continue reading Continue reading

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A test of your age

I was sitting here idly listening to a 1973 Little Feat bootleg from the Internet Archive and when they got to Willin, Lowell George introduced it with the words “This one goes out to one of my favourite groups, Slade”. … Continue reading Continue reading

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Art and light

I have been in Paris most of the week (half term). Hence no contemporaneous blogging, and some notes now on all the culture around which I was dragged by the more refined members of the family: The Centre Pompidou –- … Continue reading Continue reading

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