cast iron at the V&A ... the worshipful company of salters

a relic of the salters' guild ... i think their motto translates as "salt flavours everything"

http://www.heraldicmedia.com/site/info/livery/livcomps/salters.html

after another visit to the v&a ... the re-write of pride and prejudice can wait no longer ...

the original plot seems a little lacking in proper drama ... maybe i can re-introduce the menage a trois scene, deleted by austen's publishers in a moment of editorial pusillanimity, where lord nelson and lady hamilton, having been thrown out of beckford's fonthill on christmas eve, make their way north through blizzards to gargle brandy with mister d'arcy and his cousin mister rochester on new year's eve

a slow read

I’m slowly finding my way towards the end of a book of essays by Susan Sontag, which I bought more than two years ago. The title is “Where the Stress Falls” and I’m inclined to think it is a very poor title because her work has very little to do with what we call Stress, and much more to do with Emphasis. Each page offers a cornucopia of ideas, felicities, and fresh perspectives, yet somehow, whilst enjoying her sweet-natured conversational style, I never stuck with it for more than a few pages at a time. When we go out in to the world each day, I think we often look at what we encounter as if “through our friends’ eyes”. Why we don’t have the confidence of our own perceptions is hard to explain. Maybe we value the insights that others provide more than our own, as though they were lifeboats on a sea of confusion, more likely it is just our way of sustaining a dialogue with absent friends.

legal tender

= 0.99 US dollars at today's exchange rate,

or one old Bank Of England ten-bob note down Memory Lane