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Walking Commentary

Walking Commentary

Thoughts and cycling from Manchester to Rome in 2023

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Sunflower Ramblings I

August 14, 2020 by Simon Robinson Leave a Comment

I’m not a great fan of the many named Jerusalem Artichoke. I quite like their flavour but I have the digestive challenge for which the sunroot is famed. As I’ve mentioned in earlier posts, I’ve been told to increase my microbiome diversity. One way, suggested in monthly newsletters, would be to add inulin to my diet. Inulin is a dietary fibre that is fermented by bacteria. It is considered a prebiotic. Many believe that prebiotics are good for gastrointestinal diversity and therefore your health. An additional bonus may be that they’d enhance calcium absorption. Inulin might therefore be good for the avoidance of osteoarthritis. It turns out that the little tubers of the sunchoke store their carbohydrate as inulin so our biomed service suggested I include them in my diet.

The two metre sunflower reflected in the window.
I hope a squirrel doesn’t break it.
[Read more…] about Sunflower Ramblings I

Filed Under: Fake Memoir Tagged With: dna, encyclopaedia britannica, flowers, photos, rose finn-kelcey, sunflowers, tate britain, vincent van gogh

Memories of Being Short

August 11, 2020 by Simon Robinson 1 Comment

RTSP

I remember a schoolbook from when I was eight and nine. Reading To Some Purpose, always abbreviated by our teachers to RTSP. I understood that RTSP was easier to say but if you were reading to some purpose why would you abbreviate it? And why only RTSP? Why wasn’t there a WTSP? Weren’t we also being taught to write to some purpose such as expressing ourselves?

Which reminds me of catechism. The teaching style of the era involved learning by rote and one of the things to be learned was catechism. We had to learn the rules of being catholic from a green book of rules.

This Morning’s Walk in Dún Laoghaire.
Foggier than yesterday.
[Read more…] about Memories of Being Short

Filed Under: Anchoritism, Fake Memoir Tagged With: catechism, Covid-19, irish times, photos, school

Virtual Rome Journal

August 10, 2020 by Simon Robinson 3 Comments

Today, August 10th was supposed to be the day we walked into Rome. Two of us, hopefully still friends after a very long talk. 2700 km of talk.

The pre-pandemic plan was to walk from Manchester to Rome. Our departure date was going to be April Fools Day. The idea was to walk an average of 25 km, six days per week. We’d have made 114 hikes over 131 days. We still don’t know where we’d have washed, slept or eaten but we’re pretty sure we would have done quite a lot of each.

This Morning’s Walk in Dún Laoghaire.
A view towards our home neighbourhood, once again cloud shrouded.
The idea of dinner in Rome has a certain appeal today.
[Read more…] about Virtual Rome Journal

Filed Under: Fake Memoir, ManRom2021 Tagged With: avant-garde, cambridge university, Covid-19, georges perec, harry mathews, irish times, italy, photography, photos, raymond roussel, rome, simonscarves, travel, walking, writing

Despotism and Contagion

August 8, 2020 by Simon Robinson 2 Comments

Saturday was another busy day in our ongoing limited isolation.

Breakfast was depressing. Our granola and coffee were excellent and the eating of them a luxury afforded more by ongoing luck than planning.

It was the continuing bad news of the devastation and the absence of leadership in Beirut that was upsetting. It was like watching a rerun of the clean-up after Hurricane Katrina in Louisiana. That was another disaster accompanied by excellent meals for remote observers. Unless I’m wrong to believe that many of us consume our news at meal times.

Reading bench (after Lutyens).
[Read more…] about Despotism and Contagion

Filed Under: Anchoritism, Fake Memoir Tagged With: beirut, booklink, david walliams, lutyens, pandemic, paolo giordano, photos, sahel, walking

Fifth Sunflower Poker

August 7, 2020 by Simon Robinson 1 Comment

I was watching a viral video of a 45th President trying to persuade journalist Jonathan Swan of an anti-virus response that was ‘better than the world’. That’s when one-time boss of Salomon Brothers came to mind. He was a securities trader who traded on your mortgage without security.

Michael Lewis wrote of John Gutfreund that it ‘was easy for Gutfreund to say money didn’t matter. He paid himself more than any chief executive on Wall Street … His attitude … towards the firm changed once he had cashed in his chips. He and others ceased to view Salomon Brothers as an instrument of wealth creation and began to treat it as an instrument of power and glory, a vast playground in which they could be the bullies.’ Liar’s Poker (1989) is still worth a read (or re-read) if you want to learn more about leaders who don’t let morals get in the way of anything.

The Ugly Library of Good Readings
Dún Laoghaire © Simon Robinson 2020
[Read more…] about Fifth Sunflower Poker

Filed Under: Anchoritism, Fake Memoir Tagged With: booklink, flowers, investment banking, jonathan swan, michael lewis, photos

Ingenuity Engines

August 6, 2020 by Simon Robinson 3 Comments

We were living in Houston when John H. Lienhard started broadcasting a novel radio series from the University of Houston. The Engines of Our Ingenuity is still a weekday National Public Radio program having been first aired locally on KUHF-FM Houston back in 1988. I used to listen to it as often as I could while commuting and I’ve often tuned to it when I’ve been back in Houston.

The format is simple. Each episode is a three minute story to illustrate how human creativity impacts culture. Today, there are over 3200 episodes on the website free to hear and/or read.

  • Sunflower, bee and a fish © Simon Robinson 2020
  • Peacock at buddleia feeding station © Simon Robinson 2020
[Read more…] about Ingenuity Engines

Filed Under: Fake Memoir Tagged With: animation, booklink, houston, innovation, john h lienhard, ken torrance, matt ridley, npr, patents, photos, radio

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