Thursday, April 28, 2016




For more than ten years I have worn the same pair of eye glasses.   There were changes in my prescription but they were minor and I was happy with the quality of my vision.  This year the doctor felt I really should update so in February I got new glasses.


It's more than two months now and I'm still very unhappy with them.  The distance part of the progressive lens works fine but I cannot clearly see the items on the grocery shelf or the computer screen with any part of the lenses.   I never wear my glasses for reading anyway so I don't know why I bother with the (expensive) progressive lenses.   The result is that I wear the new glasses when I'm leaving home but around the apartment I wear my old glasses.


The other issue I have is with the transitional lenses.   They told me they no longer make clip on sunglasses to match the frames so I agreed to the transitional lenses since I did not want to have an entirely separate pair of prescription sun glasses.   They're OK for outside but when I go inside they take a very long time to go clear again and I find that so very annoying.  Aside from seeing clearly I think people look stupid wearing dark glasses when they're inside.


So many hundreds of dollars later I have new glasses that I don't like.


This seems to happen to me a lot lately.  I buy something new and I'm disappointed in it and it is less functional than what I bought it to replace.


Or maybe I'm just old.



Monday, April 25, 2016




Sometimes, when I was still willing to sit in an audience, before the playing started at the symphony I would sit and contemplate what it had required for that to happen.

Music was created/refined.
Instruments were created/refined.
Music notation was devised.
Architecture and acoustic science and building techniques and materials were developed to be able to build the concert hall.

Composers studied and learned and were creative enough to write the music I was going to hear.

Each and every musician in the orchestra and learned and studied and practiced (and continued to do so) for hour and hours for years and years to become good enough to get a position in the orchestra.

People somewhere in the world were working to provide the power for lighting and air control.

All this massive amount of human time and effort to come to this point where I could sit for a few hours and enjoy beautiful music.



Sunday, April 24, 2016




At the grocery store this morning the musack was a disco-ized version of the famous aria from Madame Butterfly.

As a classical music lover this sort of thing annoys me no end.

I find myself thinking, "Be original, write your own music, don't borrow."

But then I recall that this is an issue in popular music between contemporary musicians - what is "borrowing" and what is "stealing" ?

I don't pay attention to popular music so I suppose what I'm feeling is that I don't care what they do to each other, I just want them to leave classical music alone.

I also often find it grating when someone arranges a piece of classical music for a different instrument than it was written for.  Or orchestrates music that was not written for an orchestra.  To me it almost never works.



Friday, April 22, 2016




As I age I find I have less and less tolerance for "experimental" writing.
 
Yes, I am saying that I can no longer be bothered with novels and stories that require me to think deeply and make obscure connections.

I like a good story.  I like interesting characters.

I have never been a fan of long descriptions of setting so my tendency to skim over such passages is nothing new.

Like many seniors mysteries have become my favourite reading material.





Friday, April 8, 2016




What is this strange thing with petty thefts at weddings?

I once had my thank you gift from the bride and groom for being a groomsman pilfered.

At another wedding I had the gift that was at each place setting snitched by the end of the evening.

At one a friend won the floral centre piece at her table in a contest but when she was ready to leave it was gone.

At a recent wedding the maid of honour's bouquet was stolen from the head table.

I am told by friends this sort of thing is quite common at weddings.

What goes on in people's head that they somehow convince themselves that it's OK to steal at a wedding?