busker

My nervous first taps in Blogger. A popup window alerts me that 'virus spyware' has been detected. I click 'Yes' to remove and IE is whisked from under me. An omen?

I pour a sensible slug of 'Secret Santa' Rebecca's gift of a bottle of Bushmills and await that lucidity and decisiveness that will guide me thru these first ramblings.

I want it to be cheerful, but not to the point of scraping the bottom of my skull for thoughts that aren't there.

Thinks (bubble bubble):

• Lamentation about the state of the world being one of life's unfailing pleasures, the world is a greater source of satisfaction than ever.
  
• Because I write - songs, cheeky emails, Letters to the Editor - Life is good. As soon as something happens, my first thoughts will be how to penit for the Blog. Great way of distancing myself from my own displeasure.
  
• The songs I compose are suspiciously humorous for such a sulk and curmudgeon, but those I hear from others sound as if they *want* the world to be boring, to justify their own lack of interest in it. To be bored and disabused seems nowadays to be taken as a sign of spiritual election or superiority, as if the world does not quite come up to their exacting standards.
  
• The masterly Theodore Dalrymple:
  

  
  With the right things, very small things, such as an inscription in a second-hand book, can be kindled enthusiasm and joy. Recently, for instance, I bought a booklet published in 1816, entitled The danger of Premature Interment Proved from Many Remarkable instances of People who Recovered after Being Laid out for Dead, and Others Entombed Alive, for Want of Being Properly Examined prior to Interment.
  A pencil inscription of the same era on the title page reads, 'Any person who delights in good cock-and-bull stories, here he will find them to his heart's content."

  
  
  Imagine the person who wrote this brief message to posterity. So long as the world is inexhaustibly interesting, we have reason to be cheerful.
  
• One thing I know is to stay clear of musings on the actual technique of writing.

I forget the precise wording or who it was who said: The onlyway to write is well, and how you do it is your own damn'd business.