Nicolette has the right of it, it was Strong Medicine (see post and comment below). The other thing I saw which I couldn’t remember was in fact not a series at all, but a film from 1933 starring James Cagney called (unfathomably) Lady Killer. I even saw the whole thing, which kind of ruins the flow of the evening, but I enjoyed it, so who cares? Yesterday the first series of Jeeves and Wooster arrived in my mailbox, so now I have a few evenings covered as far as viewing material that doesn’t require fierce activity of the brain goes. Yippee. Love Wodehouse. A favourite quote: “[Aunt Agatha] is the kind of woman who makes strong men climb trees and pull them up after them.”
We have had the most spectacular lightning storms here over the past few days. Tuesday night two of them passed over my building giving me perfect view, not just of the flashes, but of the actual forks of lightning. And Wednesday night I was in for another treat. This time the actual storm was much closer, standing at the kitchen window (with a delighted smile on my face, I must say) the thunder was much louder than usual and instead of the normal rolling, booming sound the crackling of electricity was the dominating impression (with loud booming, too, though). Shortly afterwards I had to close the window as the following rain was hard enough to wet the floor several feet into the room. Unfortunately,”the show” which seemed to have been put on for my enjoyment, caused quite a lot of damage – several thousand people with no electricity due to power-thingymajigs knocked out by lightning and houses in various areas northwards from Oslo evacuated due to floods. I am very happy to be living in a five-storey building on top of a hill… I wonder whether it is wrong of me to enjoy lightning so much considering how much damage it causes? At least there’s nothing I could do to prevent it happening even if I wanted to. Unlike fireworks, which I can no longer enjoy wholeheartedly (I keep thinking “What a waste of resources!” and “What if a house catches fire from one of those?” and “What if something goes wrong and anything goes into the crowd?”and so on). Lightning being beyond human control, I figure there is no point in not getting the maximum amount of enjoyment out of it while it lasts. (Though possibly I should draw the line at wishing for them?)
I guess most of you have come across one or other of the various somthing name generators on the web? One of the mailing lists I am on have been playing with two of these lately. What is my pirate name? yielded me the excellent pseudonym Mad Ethel Read, as good a name as any, though why “Ethel”? The other is the Wu Name generator, and provided Happy Dreamer. Not bad, considering. An alternative Wu name generator gave me World-Class Programmah… Better and better. Now I just need someone to tell me what on earth a Wu is…!? Incidentally, I ran some other people’s names through the former of the two, and my former boss came out as Smiling Samurai, which struck me as so appropriate that I nearly sent him an e-mail about it (and then I realised the reason I found it appropriate was not entirely flattering and so I desisted).
It is pouring (no, POURING) down outside. I almost didn’t bring an umbrella today, as the forecast was for reasonably friendly weather. Luckily I remembered that I could just pop the compact one in my bag, and that there was no need to carry the one with Gromit (which, though nice, is rather a nuisance when not in use, as I am not used to carrying a walking stick. Though maybe I ought to practice, I’ve always wanted one of those walking sticks with a hidden blade. Very useful for fencing with villains and probably also for cutting through jungles, though a machete might be more functional for the latter. Sorry, it’s Friday).
Music in my head: Rock DJ (Robbie Williams)