Conclusions

Grateful for a space of time in which I can breathe over the weekend I've been finishing things off, and most enjoyably so. I surprised myself by completing the most sustained act of viewing of the small screen in my recent history by watching the last three episodes (out of seven) of Tinker, Tailor... yesterday. I immediately informed the Missus, who'd passed on the experience this time, that I'd be happy to watch it again along with her if she so desired. She's thinking about it.

And then it was on to completion of Jared Diamond's Guns, Germs and Steel, a tome, I'm embarrassed to tell you, I actually got started on as long ago as January. Completely bought into the main argument, but got a wee bit lost in some of the detail. There's a note in the back from the good prof in which he comments on his own dispassionate account of how peoples conquered and slaughtered other peoples and he recommends something with the passion he distances himself from as a corrective. But I thought his distanced perspective itself conveyed an extraordinary moral power and sense of outrage: there is no excuse for what we do to harm others, even if we seek one in the mess of history. It was, it is, all about domination.

In between all this we watched the first half of my newly acquired As You Like It DVD, the one filmed at the new Globe. Noi got hooked by Act 1, Scene 2. Who said the story doesn't count?