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Archives for: "January 2018"

Present perfect

Fri 26th January 2018

Doss of a week. School's been closed because of the cold. more »

I know nothing

Mon 22nd January 2018

We've got our second day off in a row today, because of the Icold. The Met Office reckons it "feels like" minus 46. I wanted to see what that really does feel like. more »

4 comments »

Teach Yourself Semi-Modals in Non-Stative Verbs

Sat 20th January 2018

I discovered I had a drinking problem yesterday. I hide my empty bottles behind my armchair, as I'm not sure whether NDN comes in occasionally to have a look round the flat. more »

10 comments »

Expensive French perfume is wasted on the Kazakhs

Tue 16th January 2018

I arrived at school this morning having had my usual bottle of wine the night before. "Er...are you wearing cologne?" asked Lidia, once we were in my tiny office. "Well," I said unsuspectingly, "I wear Coco Chanel. Is it a bit strong?" "No, I just… more »

11 comments »

My lovely horse

Thu 11th January 2018

Last Sunday, NDN, my next door neighbour and minder here in Kaz, took me to show me the school. First we went to buy some paper for the school. NDN, a retired Kazakh Government official, pointed out Nazarbayev's portrait, looking up at it with starry… more »

17 comments »

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looby, n.; pl. loobies. A lout; an awkward, stupid, clownish person

M / 60 / Bristol, "the most beautiful, interesting and distinguished city in England" -- John Betjeman [1961, source eludes me].

"Looby is a left-wing intellectual who is obsessed with a) women's clothes and b) tits." -- Joy of Bex.

WLTM literate woman, 40-65. Must have nice tits, a PhD, and an mdma factory in the shed, although the first on its own will do in the short term.

There are plenty of bastards who drink moderately. Of course, I don't consider them to be people. They are not our comrades.
Sergei Korovin, quoted in Pavel Krusanov, The Blue Book of the Alcoholic

I am here to change my life. I am here to force myself to change my life.
Chinese man I met during Freshers Week at Lancaster University, 2008

The more democratised art becomes, the more we recognise in it our own mediocrity.
James Meek

Tell me, why is it that even when we are enjoying music, for instance, or a beautiful evening, or a conversation in agreeable company, it all seems no more than a hint of some infinite felicity existing apart somewhere, rather than actual happiness – such, I mean, as we ourselves can really possess?
Turgenev, Fathers and Sons

I hate the iPod; I hate the idea that music is such a personal thing that you can just stick some earplugs in your ears and have an experience with music. Music is a social phenomenon.
Jeremy Wagner

La vie poetique has its pleasures, and readings--ideally a long way from home--are one of them. I can pretend to be George Szirtes.
George Szirtes

Using words well is a social virtue. Use 'fortuitous' once more to mean 'fortunate' and you move an English word another step towards the dustbin. If your mistake took hold, no-one who valued clarity would be able to use the word again.
John Whale

One good thing about being a Marxist is that you don't have to pretend to like work.
Terry Eagleton, What Is A Novel?, Lancaster University, 1 Feb 2010

The working man is a fucking loser.
Mick, The Golden Lion, Lancaster, 21 Mar 2011

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Archives for: "January 2018"

Present perfect

I know nothing

Teach Yourself Semi-Modals in Non-Stative Verbs

Expensive French perfume is wasted on the Kazakhs

My lovely horse

looby, n.; pl. loobies. A lout; an awkward, stupid, clownish person

Rummage in my drawers

The Comfort of Strangers

"Just sit still and listen" - woman to teenage girl at Elliott Carter weekend, London 2006

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