Odds and Sods

It's been a while since I checked in, I'm afraid. Here's some random stuff that occurs to me at the moment.

• For nineteen years, since I left San Francisco for the United Kingdom, I've done without The New Yorker. Every time I saw a news item about it, or read an online article from it, or saw a cartoon, I would be transported magically to Seventh Avenue and 42nd St. One learns to do without it, but it's not fun. Now that I'm a pensioner with a good enough income, I can afford to resubscribe. And thus it was that this morning I received my first issue of a two-year subscription to The New Yorker. I am over the moon. It's much different than it was in William Shawn's heyday, of course, and even more than in Harold Ross's time, but it's still distinctive, and I am revelling in it.



• My foot troubles still persist. I have an ulcer on my right sole and it looked like a little bug had gotten into it. So I went on the antibiotics again (amoxicillin and flucloxicillin). The odd thing is that my blood sugar, which had been tending high in the past few weeks, immediately went back to normal and has stayed there. This happened after I started taking the antibiotics again. I shall talk to the quack about it when I see her next month.



• My new iPhone 5 is working fairly splendidly. I have finally figured out how to get Gmail to register in the iPhone mailbox as well as sync my calendars. I'm terrified that I'll miss an appointment because my calendars weren't talking to one another. I've passed the iPhone 4 to HWMBO, who is very happy with it. I now have an iPhone 3 to take with me to the Antipodes. I must make sure that it's unlocked beforehand.



• My iPad3 is also doing well. I do find that it eats battery life quite quickly, but everything else seems to be working fine and I am looking forward to travelling with it.



• Speaking of which, in December I have to get serious about planning my trip more closely. I have to plan getting my medications to Singapore so that I don't have to carry seven weeks' worth of medications with me when I leave London. The only medications I will need to carry with me are enough to use on the flight and my insulin, for which I have a cold pack that works wonderfully well. In New Zealand, I will be going to Auckland, and then travelling by train to Wellington. Then flying to Sydney for a week, flying on to Melbourne for nine days, then Adelaide for four days. Then, back to Singapore where I may just take a resort trip to relax before returning to London. I'll never do this again, so I have to cram as much as I can handle into each day. Will crack the guidebooks next week.



• The political and media classes here in the UK have been anticipating the release of the Levison report on regulating the media—it was released this lunchtime. The Tories are scared witless that their masters from News International (read: Rupert Murdoch) will be displeased if they follow Levison's recommendation that an independent regulator take over, with an underpinning in law. But if they do nothing, or leave the system basically as it is, they will be accused of being subservient to the media and also gutless. So David Cameron will be signing his texts to the media "LOL" (for "Lots of Love") for quite a while yet. Meanwhile no public figure (or even private figure) is safe from the depredations of the media. Watch this space.



• The vote in General Synod against consecration of woman bishops has troubled not only myself but lots of other Anglicans. I always suspected that the lay members of Synod would have a very close vote, while it would sail through the Bishops and the clergy. The Church of England is now in a pickle. Parliamentarians, most of whom have little use for religion of any kind, have all gotten up on their hind legs and bleated about sexism in the Church. If they get exercised enough, they can legislate on their own to either remove the Church's exemption from equality legislation, or simply to permit woman bishops, as Parliament is sovereign in matters to do with legislation to do with the Church of England. Archbishop Rowan Williams now retires with not a major accomplishment to his name—he has failed to get women consecrated bishops, he has failed to bring the Anglican Covenant through the process in the Church of England, and he has failed to make the Americans, the Canadians, and the Scots (among others) toe the party line on homosexuality. In the process he has disrespected one of his best mates, Jeffrey John, twice ensuring that he was not made a bishop and fobbing him off with the consolation prize of the Deanship of St. Albans. The Archbishop has written lots of books and some poetry, though, on our dime. No wonder he didn't do much in ten years: instead of working for the Church he was writing books. Let's see if his successor does any better.



• I was very sad that a young man whom I knew in Singapore passed away last week. He was djyoshiki and I have some of his mixsets in my iTunes and iPod. Timmy, may you rest in peace and rise in glory.