Friday, Dec. 22, 2017 - 22:54

1. I lay in bed too long this morning, till half eleven, paralysed with the frustration of recent annoyances at work, and with the knowledge that I'll have to get with them and the associated social abrasions in the New Year. This meant I wasn't able to calmly/easily plan out the tasks I needed to do over the next couple of days. In the end a full bladder (my own, natch) pulled me out of bed and this meant I could then get started on laundry, ripping CDs to my laptop, shopping lists, drinking coffee and lovingly warping my family's gits.

2. Another Christmas song that doesn't feature in the oft-played rotation, but which has a certain appeal, is The Killers song 'Christmas In LA', which I stuck on this morning. I spent a little time trying to compile a CD for my Mum today, music I've listened to in the last year or so, but in truth I've purchased not a lot of new music, and hence I've basically been listening to the stuff I liked in the latter five years of the last millennium and the first five or ten years of this one.

3. This morning, in a fit of spontaneousness (you can't tell that I can't spell 'spontaneity', can you?), influenced partly by having seen the back of the theatre broscure on the bathroom windowsill when I went for a wee earlier, and as a consequence of the sun shining through the lounge window making me feel nicer, I bought a ticket to go see Lucy Porter at the theatre next May.

4. Twenty years ago saw the Acteal massacre, where attendees at a prayer meeting of Roman Catholic activists for indigenous causes (including a number of children and pregnant women, who were members of the pacifist group Las Abejas trans. "The Bees") in the small village of Acteal in the Mexican state of Chiapas were massacred by paramilitary forces (the paramilitary group Mascara Roja trans. "Red Mask"). The death toll was 45 - apparently soldiers at a nearby military outpost did not intervene during the attack, which lasted for hours, andit is alleged that some of the pregnant women who were part of the prayer group were stabbed and shot in the belly intentionally to kill their unborn children. How very pleasant. I didn't mention it in my diary at the time, I was too busy blethering about my dissertation (leprosy) and my girlfriend (selfish).

5. I saw a robin perched on a branch as I was coming in to work yesterday. It was a very typically festive sort of posture, with the exception of the fact all the snow melted a week or so ago. Stupid robin is late for his/her (do male and female European robins exhibit sexual dimorphism? Apparently not much, with perhaps the exception of a V or U shaped 'hairline') photo shoot. Alright, Mr DeMille, I'm ready for my close-up.

6. Happy fiftieth birthday to Rebecca Harris, MP for Castle Point constituency in Essex, and (in a study of voting prior to the General Election in May 2015) the Member of Parliament with the 4th highest voting record in the country. Active. Dan Petrescu, Romanian footballer, current CFR Cluj manager, and former doppelganger for a girl I was at college with (except for the breasts), also chalks up his half century today.

7. During dinner (salad, coleslaw, bits of chicken, flapjack, beer) I watched an old episode of 'Alexander Armstrong's Big Ask' on demand, which was pretty decent. It's a bit like an attempt to do QI but with a little more scripting, perchance. Bringing off a penguin?

8. After dinner, I stuck the radio on in the kitchen and listened to the football (see below), making use of the cleared table which I had rendered uncluttered for present enrapturing (alas this entrapment I performed without the Irish cream liqueueueur that I possibly would've fancied) to do a jigsaw. A jigsaw of the motherfuckin' world, y'know. Not life-size. Not current either - it's an old map on a jigsaw I got from t'Works. The j-saw proved to be quite difficult, due mainly to the fact the edge was fairly homogenous and there was a lot of white.

9. Scientists at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center have been studying Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai, using it as a model for volcanic shapes on Mars. In an article published in late 2017, the scientists concluded that Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai has eroded in ways that are remarkably similar to the erosion patterns seen on similar landforms on Mars. The scientists noted that this suggests Mars was once flooded briefly by water, but that the water receded fairly quickly. Further study of the similarities between Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai and Martian volcanic landforms is needed, they said.

10. I didn't read much today. I might continue with that sociology book later, but it's proving a bit less compelling than it might be. Part of me fancies reading 'A Christmas Carol' but then again, part of me is resistant to doing so because this is a bit hackneyed a thing to do. Nicolas Anelka has scored hat-tricks for three different clubs in the Premier League, as have Les Ferdinand, Teddy Sheringham and Kevin Campbell. The only player to score three for four different sides? Aiyegbeni Yakubu.

11. New Zealand police are investigating reports that 500 cows have been stolen from a farm in Canterbury. It is not known exactly when they began disappearing, as their absence was only noticed recently. Police said it was "unlikely the theft of hundreds of animals could be completed at once, and is more likely that multiple thefts could be carried out over a period of time".

12. The subject of some of the most iconic space photographs ever, Bruce McCandless II, died yesterday aged 80. He carried out free flight from Space Shuttle Challenger using a Manned Manoevering Unit (MMU), becoming the first astronaut to perform an untethered space walk, and there are several striking pictures of this. He sued Dido over the use of one of these photographs on an album cover. Despite the American not owning the rights to the image, it being in the public domain, he claimed that his 'persona' was being used - having licensed his persona for advertising campaigns, his claim is that the unauthorized use of his image hurts his endorsement value for future clients. The case was settled amicaly with Sony in 2011.

13. Bolstadøyri Station (Norwegian: Bolstadøyri stasjon) is located on Bergensbanen railway line located in the village of Bolstadøyri in the municipality of Voss, in Hordaland county, Norway. The station is served by twelve daily departures per direction by the Bergen Commuter Rail operated by Norges Statsbaner. The station opened in 1883 as part of Vossebanen.

14. The top-flight game this evening ended Arsenal 3-3 Liverpool, amongst lots of set-up with respect to when the two teams met on a Friday in 1989, and the fact it was 4-3 last season. An entertaining game - Liverpool dominated the first half but led only by Coutinho's header at HT, but they added to it via Salah seven into the second. Arsenal could've gone under, but instead Liverpool's frailness evident with Sanchez's quick reply (never so vulnerable as when you've just scored), Xhaka's piledriver from range, and Ozil taking advantage of Klopp's team having had a visit from the melty man. Firmino equalised, the sixth different scorer of the game, and neither side could find a winner (nor wanted to concede a loser).

15. Of course, 'Dark Is the Night' is a 1945 Soviet war film directed by Boris Barnet. The film is set during the Great Patriotic War. At night a burning plane crashes on the ruins of an occupied city. The surviving Soviet pilots, among whom exist some who are seriously injured, hide from the Nazi persecution. To help them comes a very young Varya, who hides them in her attic. Having lost her mother and sister, she works as a cleaner in the German headquarters. Unbeknownst to the watchmen, she provides the pilots with food and medicine. She is happy about the fact that now there is someone to talk to and someone to help. But the Nazis manage to find out Varya's secret. Having had time to warn the pilots, Varya sacrifices her life in order to save them.

16. My plans for tomorrow are a little reduced due to the fact my activities today completed more of the 'tasks to do before catching a train on Sunday morning' than would maybe have been anticipated from a two-day sharing of [something]. Wrapping, laundry, packing, relaxing. I will try to get into town early and avoid much of the rush (though I anticipated it *will* be busy) to buy a smattering of food/drink and also I might try to do a compilation CD for my mother, as mentioned. I'll try not to fuck shit up with an uzi and a bucket of crayfish.