Bill Taylor remarked that the Covid-19 Diaries had taken on a life of their own. The same could be said, with more force, about Bill's mighty contributions to the series from Toronto. Today, he's up to 18 and his daily missives really need no elaborate introduction ...
Erudite notes from the trenches:
Even after three weeks of close confinement and almost 43 years of marriage, life remains capable of surprise.
I walk by Lesley’s room. She’s on the phone with our friend Vicki, with whom she shares a well-informed enthusiasm for vintage fashion.
They’re discussing Somerset Maugham. I didn’t think I’d ever met anyone who discussed Somerset Maugham. Turns out I know two.
The best I’ve done lately in any scholarly kind of way are two brief exchanges about the Earp brothers’ culpability in the gunfight at the OK Corral (which didn’t actually happen there but, less catchily, in an alley down the street) and whether “Hells Angels” should properly have an apostrophe.
According to the Angels’ trademarked name and jacket insignia, no.
All the same, Hunter S Thompson’s “strange and terrible saga”, which in 1967 brought the motorcycle club (their euphemism, not mine) to public notoriety, is called Hell’s Angels.
And the autobiography of Sonny Barger, their long-time spiritual and philosophical kingpin, is entitled Hell’s Angel.
I leave it to minds more subtle than my own to sort that one out. I’m going back to my critical analysis of Finnegan’s Wake. The song, not the book. The book doesn’t have an apostrophe.
Lesley has been devoting some of the considerable time on her hands to doing our taxes which, now that we’re retired and any freelance income long since dried up, should be simple enough that we no longer need expensive help.
For my part, I work cheap but I’m no help at all. Not with anything that involves adding and subtracting.
Her first kick at the can, she had us owing the CRA close to 25 grand. A pension plan generous enough to bring that about would be a very fine thing. As she aptly put it, “uh-oh”.
Clearly someone planted malware in the abacus. But, having had it debugged, it looks as if we might even come out slightly to the good. Knock wood. Wash hands.
Today’s unrepeatable (wanna bet?) offer on Facebook: a blanket with curious markings that promises, when you wrap yourself in it, to make you look like a burrito.
Why would anyone… No, don’t tell me. I want to know a lot of things but not that.
The Weather Network forecast for next week is on the cool side. I’m not unhappy. It’s when the days turn really warm and sunny there’ll be a problem keeping people corralled, as our long-dormant patio instinct bestirs itself and sniffs the air hungrily. Latte-lust is a force not to be denied.
My own forecast for then is tighter restrictions, more stringently applied. And no arguments.
Meanwhile, on the home front our attention is turned to washing the windows. I think it’s so the neighbours can see how clean the house is.
Except the bathroom. But I’ll get to that today. Honestly.
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