To Boldly Split Infinitives

Last night I felt that I was a bit overloaded with the doings of Captain Kirk and company and decided to have a break from Star Trek for one night at least.  However the series has made me cogitate on the legality of using split infinitives, once a total grammatical no-no.  There was quite a lively debate when Star Trek was firsts released because of the introduction to each episode:

"Space: the final frontier. These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its five-year mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before."

Since no-one could do anything to alter that shocking use of that split infinitive the consensus was that it was perfectly acceptable in the circumstances as it gave emphasis; ‘to go boldly’ was all a bit ho-hum after all.  I don’t think that later generations even know what a split infinitive is and certainly they feel at liberty to boldly use them.

I pulled out my copy of ‘Eats, Shoots and Leaves’ by Lynne Truss but like me she is a member of the comma police and doesn’t do grammar so I went to Google where I found this:-

Split infinitive. ... A well-known example occurs in the opening sequence of the Star Trek television series: "to boldly go where no man has gone before"; the adverb boldly is said to split the infinitive to go.

As I mentioned above, there was quite a controversy when Star Trek was first released and that phrase will be remembered by posterity.

The Limerick:-

A dentist named Archibald Moss

Fell in love with the dainty Miss Ross,

But he held in abhorrence

Her given name, Florence,

So he renamed her his Dental Floss.

The formatting has gone a bit awry due to the copy/paste and I can't fix it without typing in the whole thing again.  Sorry about that . . .

Star Trek 2

I have been immersing myself in Star Trek for the last few days having finally found a medium which works for me.  Firstly I tried running it through my TV but had problems hearing the dialogue with no subtitles to help so I switched to my computer using an app which MS10 thought that I should use; it wasn't very good.

So I enlisted the help of google, asking what was the best way of watching DVDs on MS10 and there was one program which appeared far and away the best so I downloaded it and Google was quite right, it works well.

I have discovered that there are four episodes per DVD and there are 21 discs so at the rate of one per day it will take me about three months to watch every episode  -  and then there are the films.  The whole crew has not yet assembled-  Dr McCoy has not yet appeared and Scotty has, so far, made only a brief appearance but there are 80 episodes yet to be watched so I am quite happy to wait.

I have finally got around to making an appointment to see a podiatrist because I need some new orthotics.  I have a referral dated 29-6-2015 from a surgical podiatrist who was no help to me at all but pinned to it is a radiologists report on my sore toe. I am not holding my breath that this one will be able to cure the toe  -  I suspect that it is going to take an orthopaedic surgeon to fix it.

D3 came over here this morning and we went out to lunch and then to the yoga shop for her to buy a couple of blocks.  I acquired a new mat since the one which I have been using for the last few years is starting to crack in places.  The new one is purple to co-ordinate with my bolster, blocks and strap.  D3 has had a seriously bad back for years and she is finding a careful yoga program is helping enormously.  The stretch which she showed me and which she called Downward Facing Dog is actually a sort of flattened forward Childs Pose and is the stretch which is being touted on Facebook under the heading "doctors are amazed . . ." and maybe they are since it obviously works.

The Limerick:-

Despite her impressive physique
Fatima was really quite meek;
If a mouse showed its head
She would jump into bed
With a terrible blood-curdling sheik.

Farewell Apollo

In the olden days when I cycled regularly I  owned two bicycles.  One was a hybrid mountain bike which I rode to work on and the other was an Apollo Randonneur which I used for social riding and that included two 14-day cycle tours with the Bicycle Touring Association.  This bike fitted me by every method and measurement devised to calculate bike to rider fitness, including the length of seat-post/head circumference of rider ratio.  This was the bike which I brought with me when I moved into my apartment but sadly I found that with my balance problems it was scary, if not downright dangerous, for me to ride a bicycle even on the bike path along the railway line.

I toyed with the idea of trading her in for a recumbent trike but the problem of wheel span on bike paths was a difficulty as, at the time, narrow wheel based trikes were not easy to come by.  And then I realised that with nine different bus routes and a train station all within a two-minute walk the idea of commuting by bike became less attractive and the only real need would have been to transport the cats to the Cottesloe Veterinary Hospital  -  so I changed to the Claremont Veterinary Clinic which is about five minutes walk away.

An emailed newsletter asking for old bikes to be refurbished and donated to people in need finally stirred me to pass my bike on to the Nedlands Lions Club and it was collected yesterday after sitting in my storeroom for over seven years. I was sad to see it go  -  I loved that bike  -  but at least it will be useful even if it is simply cannibalised for its gortex cables and gel seat.

Christmas is over for another year and even before Twelfth Night there were Hot Crossed Buns in Coles Supermarket.  It is a bit rude and pushy but it is the only time that I ever see fruit buns on the shelves (not that I have ever looked for them) so I will probably stock up on some anyway, even though they are somewhat out of season.  At least the Claremont Town decorations were removed in a timely manner.

Poppy is back on inti-inflammatory medication and is a happy little cat.  She is currently sleeping on a pile of pillows on my bed, something which she has not done for a while and it is lovely to see her pain-free and confident again.  She is no longer attacking Parsifal so we are all happier.  Long may it last.

The Limerick:-
Political correctness alarm.

A gay man who lived in Kartoum
Took a lesbian up to his room,
Where they argued a lot
About who would do what
And how and with which and to whom.

StarTrek Revisited

One of the Christmas presents which I bought myself this year was a DVD set of the whole of the first series of Star Trek with Mr Spock and "Beam me up Scotty".  I used to watch it when it first ran many, many years ago and never bothered with the second series.  Just to make sure that they worked I watched the first episode today while I still had the box and Return Form.  I thoroughly enjoyed the absurdity of it all but was a bit handicapped by its lack of subtitles.  I had to sit closer and turn up the sound.  I might do better to watch it on my computer.

My other Christmas presents were a couple of sets of ear-bling from my favourite jeweller who has her shop just across the road from my apartment and next to the shop which sells everything 'cat' so I check out what is being displayed in the window every so often.

Also over the Christmas break I ordered a replacement for a recipe book which D1 lent to one of her friends almost 50 years ago and which I never got back.  Luckily I had added my favourite recipes to my web pages but the replacement book arrived today  -  a second-hand paperback since the book has been long out of print  -  and now I have the whole set again.

On Christmas Eve some silicon food covers arrived by mail in a very timely manner just in time to cover the potato salad and trifle.  I have ordered some more since I am trying not to use plastic food wrapping so Gladwrap is on my 'do not use' list and as of two days ago shops can be fined if they give away non-reusable plastic bags.  I still have a whole drawer full of plastic food stuff of various kinds and am not sure what I am going to do with it all.

My vertigo has almost disappeared, thank goodness, and at the moment I am sleeping better than I can ever remember so I am back to yoga after a break of almost a month but starting with some easy ones to get myself back into the routine.  I haven't yet returned to my walks around Lake Claremont  -  watch this space.

The limerick:-
This one is distinctly off-colour so read it at your peril.

There was a young harlot from Kew
Who filled her vagina with glue.
She said with a grin,
"If they pay to get in,
They'll pay to get out of it, too."

Grrrrrrr. . . !

D1 flew back to Sydney just in time before I quietly strangled her and stuffed her down the rubbish chute.  She has been mansplaining to me and a) she is not a man, b) she is my daughter and c) I know that it is possible to run the dishwasher when it is half-empty but I did not want to as I was pottering while getting things ready for Christmas and generating the odd thing as I went.

We had Christmas in the evening which was rather nice and gave me a lot more time to potter instead of the usual rush to get things done.  This was on account of D2 had volunteered to work and was not free until, officially, 6.00pm.

D3 and family arrived quite early and GB1 and GB2 spent some time in the little pool attached to my block of the apartment complex. There is a big pool over the other side and one day I might remember to tell them that they are allowed to go over and use it if they wish.

Anyway  -  I now have a great deal of washing to do and the washing machine is starting to object to too many towels at once and I need to get the bearings checked.  After I told D1 this she told me that my washing machine bearings needed fixing.  Mansplaining again: I was using washing machines when she was in nappies and the bearings and hoses are always an issue eventually.

And she tore one of my sheets which, admittedly was about 20 years old and due to be superannuated anyway  -  and the sales started today so I went downstairs and bought three half-priced bedding sets.

The reason I didn't strangle her was that she gave me a beautiful book of knitted lace patterns which I am dying to try  -  but I will finish knitting the purple possum sweater first  -  it will be an incentive for me to finish it faster.  I was aiming for next winter but might move the finish time forward and knit a lacy scarf from my new book.

The limerick:-

There was an old man in a hearse
Who murmered, "This might have been worse;
Of course the expense
Is simply immense,
But it doesn't come out of my purse."

Boomerang Drone Post Script

A few weeks ago I stated that the affair of The Drone was closed.  However  two days ago I hosted a dinner for D2’s birthday.  Attending were D3,  D3’s husband and the Grand Babies, GB1 and GB2,

GB1 has just finished school and is one of those kids who is not all that good with words but brilliant with subjects like maths and physics as well as sailing since he is clever at reading wind and waves.  He is the person I passed the drone to as I knew that, while I quite failed to get the thing flying, he would be able to get it up in the air; which he did.  And he brought it with him to the birthday party.

It is noisy, emitting a loud buzzing noise interspersed with beeps and flashing lights.  Parsifal, who I had bought it for, was not impressed and took himself off to his bed in the cats’ safe place  -  the master suite  -  and I didn’t see him again until about midday the next day.  I was very happy that I had passed it on to GB1. Parsifal normally loves to meet and greet visitors but he said that he wasn't going to emerge until that thing was removed.

However, its life is short and sweet; two if its propellers have broken and GB1 has no more replacements, having used the spares provided for necessary repairs.  I can’t say that I am sorry about that  -  I certainly do not want to see it again either although I was impressed with the acrobatics which GB1 was able to coax out of it.

So that is the very last word on the drone.

Instead of taking my knitting along to the Tuesday group last week I decided to bite the bullet and finish the repairs to the hand block-printed tablecloth which I bought in Iran back in 2006.  It had little tassels all the way round and Parsifal, during his cord-eating phase, ate all which he could reach when I foolishly left it on the table.  They were cotton and therefore digestible so I wasn’t fussed but it quite spoilt the table cloth and I had been meaning to replace them.  The string was easy but twisting it into a fringe was a different matter as there are a large number.

I went online and discovered a fringe twister sold by Ashford, the spinning wheel suppliers in New Zealand so I ordered one and after trying to work out how to do the twists I put it aside until last week when I took it along to the group in lieu of my knitting and started on the twists.  Since then I have threaded in the cotton and today I finished doing the twists.  Tomorrow I will trim the dangling ends and after putting it all through the washing machine hopefully the new twists will match the few original ones left because Parsifal was not able to reach them, still being a kitten at the time.

It is nearly Christmas but I received one piece of good news today -

"We write regarding the electricity consumption notices for your apartment at . . Residences. 

Unfortunately, the meter reading system has failed to provide us with a reading for some meters at the complex, including the one for your apartment. Therefore, you will not be invoiced for electricity consumption until the meter reading system has been repaired."

And the Limerick:-

A prolific young mother named Hall
Who seemed to have triplets each Fall,
When asked why and wherefore
Said, "That's what we're here for,
But we often get nothing at all."

Gazumped

A couple of weeks ago I started playing an online game called Minesweeper which, for anyone who is not familiar with it is a logic game with a big element of guesswork at times.  Perhaps as I become more proficient there will be less guesswork and more logic.

However, about a week ago I finished a game (I am wining more and more as I get familiar with it) and Apple flashed up a message to tell me that I had finished the basic game faster than anyone else playing the basic game.  It wanted my name for some honour site which I have yet to locate.  Last night I did it again; fastest finish in the elementary level.  Have I beaten my own score?

Poppy has now been on anti-inflammatory medication for about two weeks and she is a new cat.  the poor little girl must have been in a lot of pain.  Now she is playing with Parsifal more than fighting him and she is carrying her flag upright instead of at half mast.  It is nice to see her so happy but she has had health problems for most of her life so I am not confident that she will live happily ever after.  It is fingernail trimming next weekend and we will see then if the pain from her arthritis is diminished.

Friday is D2's birthday which will be celebrated Chez minnie on Saturday evening.  D3 is bringing the main course and because her whole family is gluten/dairy sensitive I have ordered a G/D free orange and almond cake for dessert.  D2 has told me that she wants a sultana caramel pudding and argues that as it is her birthday she has a right to have what she wants.  Of course it is neither gluten nor dairy free.  It is an argument hard to counter so I am going to have to provide one dessert for her and one for the rest of the party.  Grrrrr . . .

I have finally got serious about my beautiful block printed tablecloth which I bought in Iran and which Parsifal, when he was a kitten, ate most of the fringe.  So I have started replacing the parts of the fringe where he chewed the bottoms off.  Fortunately each little tassel is unconnected with its neighbours so the original tassels which he was not able to reach are still there as a guide to the replacements.  It is a long, slow job and I have been putting it off for seven years: it is high time I sorted it.

The limerick:-
This is one of my favourites.

There was a young girl from St. Cyr
Whose reflex reactions were queer.
Her escort said, 'Mabel
Get up of the table;
That money's to pay for the beer.'