Fortunately for us erstwhile Snowbirds our transition from summer and autumn to winter has not been precipitous. We’ve had some time and occasional moments to adjust. Or, as I will recount, to get ready. Agreeably over the past month the weather has fluctuated from passably cool to cold then back again. Equally pleasant and tolerable is the forecast for the upcoming week including a high of 7°C on Wednesday with rain; and for several days afterwards remaining above or just around 0°C.
It is likely settled admission that in the pursuit of one’s open identity (that is, one’s career or other publicized endeavour) most of us will never achieve anything more than what is objectively classified as mediocrity. The signature may be softened by calling it ordinariness or being commonplace. Though in some instances the inescapable stratification is inferiority. The least abrasive view of mediocrity is that it is adequate. It’s a label we attribute not only to people (perhaps even to oneself) but also to any of the other popular human undertakings or creations, whether gastronomy, the fine arts, professional sport, literature, engineering, architecture, furnishings, apparel fashion, jewellery, broadcasting or technological devices. It is not unusual to tranquillize the distinction by differentiating between high-end and low-end; namely, mediocre.
Alex, the Service Advisor at the car dealership in Arnprior, told me last week when we made the appointment to be there promptly at 8:00 am today (or possibly a minute or so later but nothing more) because the chap whom they commission to correct these mysterious electronic problems can arrive anywhere between eight o’clock in the morning and four-thirty in the afternoon; and, if my car is not there directly upon his arrival the tech guru will simply move on to the next dealership in the area where he conducts similar services. The dealership itself has been unable on three previous occasions to correct (or, more exactly, to sustain the correction of) the tiny but annoying defect (absent sound system for the turn signals). Initially it was a defect which affected the radio sound as well so I am uncertain how broadly the problem may pervade the vehicle. The continued recurrence of the absent signal sounds has been central to my disturbance; the sina qua non so to speak.
Lawyers, let’s face it, are plagiarists. Apart from such inventive intellects as Lord Thompson Denning, Master of the Rolls who for example advanced the novel thesis that “a bastard is a child” most lawyers prefer to derive credibility from more traditionally accepted propositions such as “you cannot give what you do not have” which naturally sounds even more persuasive in Latin as Nemo dat quod non habet. And while even the most trite averment is subject to interpretation, I am today (December 20, 2023) comforted to know two indisputable facts; namely, 1) it is Camille’s 24th birthday; and, 2) the following recipe (or what I mischievously call a “compôte” although it isn’t cooked) is nonpareil.
Christmas Eve is five days hence. I was replenished with a festive air as I drove into the City today throughout the length of the snowy white fields adjacent the Appleton Side Road and then along the undulating ribbon of highway bordering open farmlands to my mark. As I drove the breeziness was complemented by the sudden appearance of blue sky behind the vapours of cloud which serenely parted across the horizon.
In the Bleak Midwinter
by Christina Rossetti
In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter, long ago.
Taiwan (its capital Taipei shown in the featured image above with one of the tallest buildings in the world) is an island in the East China Sea, north of New Zealand, Australia, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and the Philippines. It’s south of Korea and Japan in the southern part of the North Pacific Ocean. It is east of Viet Nam, Thailand and China. Russia hovers above it all. India, Africa, South America and North America are continents away to the west.
A young man who spent several years working at one of Taiwan’s largest electronics companies agrees: “I think Taiwan’s companies are bad at making big breakthroughs in technology. But they are very good at taking someone else’s idea and making it better. This can be done by trial and error, continuously tweaking small things.”
I was born in the month of December. Serendipitously I know of six other people (family and friends) who were born in the month of December. I am especially empathetic to these people though for reasons I could not reasonably or logically assert. There may be others within my proximate sphere who were also born in December but these six are people to whom I ritually send a birthday greeting or to whom I have lately taken to do so. The majority of them were born precipitously close to Christmas Day. That detail, as you might imagine, works against the celebration of their birth. I find the social conventions surrounding Christmas start early in the month of December; and accordingly collide as an interruption of one’s natal anniversary. It is a tangent especially toxic to gift giving (if anyone is counting).
It would be a distortion to say that I am busy throughout the day; nonetheless I regularly find myself asking, “Where does the time go?” It’s now late afternoon. The sun has already set in league with the approaching hibernal solstice on December 22 at 0:3:28 (when either of earth’s poles reaches its maximum tilt away from the sun depending whether in the Northern or Southern hemisphere).
My sister telephoned today. It was before noon. That speaks to the intensity of the season! Sh-h-h! She is a late riser (if the truth be told). But today is the 14th of December and the Christmas season is upon us with its pitiless flood and urgency. She accordingly wasted no time addressing the purpose of her call other than first to inquire i) if I were at home or in the car, and ii) whether I were having lunch. I replied I was at my desk absorbing the dynamic view upriver. In fact I had only just finished my breakfast. So much for the slur about early risers. With those formalities conveniently and speedily disposed of, we then entertained the tenor of her call; namely, to invite us to their home in the Glebe for luncheon on Christmas Day, December 25th @ 12:30 pm.