Reading and Living

For reasons of laziness and inertia all the books I have read, bought, borrowed from the library and have been given over the last four weeks are all stacked together.  Casually perusing this stack today made me realise that it represents a very diverse set of reading, but one that illustrates my reading habits perfectly.  So here is the list:  * indicates that I have not yet read this one.
Fiction:
  Crime/Thrillers
    I can see you - Karen Rose.
    Fever of the Bone - Val McDermid
    The Chosen One - Sam Bourne
    Lethal Weapon - Linda Fairstein
    Black Friday - Alex Kava
    True Blue - David Baldacci
    Genesis - Karin Slaughter
    Lock Down - Sean Black
    Bloodline - Mark Billingham
    Blindman's Bluff - Fay Kellerman
    Prepared for Rage - Dana Stabenow
  Science Fiction/Fantasy
    The Nano Flower - Peter E Hamilton
    Unseen Academicals - Terry Prachett
    The Dreaming Void - Peter E Hamilton
    Norstrilia - Cordwainer Smith
    The Rediscovery of Man - Cordwainer Smith
    Anathem - Neal Stephenson
    Hat Full of Sky - Terry Prachett
    Burning Tower - Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle
  Other Fiction
    House of Cards - Michael Dobbs
    Vintage Stuff - Tom Sharpe
    The Lord God Made Them All - James Herriott
    Relentless Pursuit - Alexander Kent
Non-Fiction
    The Greatest Show on Earth - Richard Dawkins
    The Revenge of Gaia - James Lovelock
    The Tantric Tradition - Aehananda Bharati*
    The Great Game - Peter Hopkirk*
    Confession of a Buddhist Atheist - Stephen Batchelor*
    Freakenomics - Steven D Levitt and Stephen J Dubner
    Buddhism Without Beliefs - Stephen Batchelor
    QED The Strange Theory of Light and Matter - Richard P Feynman
    Professor Stewart's Cabinet of Mathematical Curiosities - Ian Stewart


So if anyone knows what this says about me, please let me know.

Dalai Lama's 75th Birthday celebration in London

Yesterday was a day that provided a great deal of emotional variation.  I was moored in Tottenham, and went to the Dalai Lama's 75th birthday celebrations, and then on to Samye Dzong for Chenrezig practice in the evening.  This involved using most forms of public transport in London - walking to Tottenham Hale tube station; catching the tube to Vauxhall; a bus to the park next to the Imperial War Museum - where the birthday event was held; then a bus to Elephant & Castle, and a further one on to Bermondsey.  Then the return by bus to Liverpool Street, and then train to Tottenham Hale, with the attendant walk back to the boat.  In the process both my Oyster card and my bus pass got a good work out.

Overnight, before going off, my boat had suffered the attentions of free runners, at about midnight, and 2am - waking me up both times, and ensuring that I was sleep deprived when I had to get up for the things I was doing on Saturday.

The birthday event was Tibetan culture, representatives of the Tibetan government in exile; monks from one of the monastries refounded in India; stalls selling Tibetan related material, food and drink stalls, and other miscellaneous stalls.

The first thing that struck me forcibly - getting there early and watching people setting up - was the contrast between the Tibetan culture, and the Buddhist sense of peace and compassion in a park setting; next to the Imperial War Museum.  I spent some time trying to get a photo that would bring these two things into visible contrast, but have only partially succeeded - it was impossible to get a photo that would show the sense of contrast and compare that I felt.

I said hello to Isabel who was setting up her books - if you haven't read any of her books go out and buy them!!

Part of the variety of experience during the day was getting very hot and bothered, wandering round watching the entertainments and the people and taking photos in the direct sunlight.  Isobel came up with cooled water and a lavender volatile spray, both of which came as blessed relief after the sun.

As always, the Tibetan people, religion, and culture brought a twist to my heart, but coupled with a degree of sadness.  The last time I saw anything like this was in Ladakh where the Tibetans are a refugee people as they are in this country.  So I was glad to see the celebrations, but sad that Tibetan culture is heading to be a splinter culture, nutured and sustained by enthusiasts otherwhere than Tibet.   During the afternoon I met up with Helen and Mark who were down for the day in London, and also bumped into Lama Zangmo, the director of Samye Dzong in London.  Very pleasant to meet with them and catch up to a degree.

Chenrezig puja in the evening, at the new site for Samye Dzong, which I had not visited before, so I needed to find it and a route to it.  As a result I got there very early, and had time to try out the restaurant on the corner of Spa Road, which was virtually deserted at that time, but was a very pleasant meal.

By the time I got back it was some fourteen hours later than I had started out, and I was physically drained.

Exploring London by boat

Today I travelled from Paddington basin to Limehouse basin.  The route, along the Regent's canal, provides an amazing sampler of very varied areas of London.  The roll call of places visited is itself a litany of the variety of London:- Paddington, Little Venice, Maida Vale, Marylebone, Regent's Park, Primrose Hill, Camden, Kentish Town, St Pancras, King's Cross, Pentonville, Islington, Shoreditch, Haggerston (I had never even hard of this one before), Bethnal Green, South Hackney, Tower Hamlets, Mile End, Stepney, Limehouse.  And at the end it delivers this view, from my kitchen window.

The first part of the run is very attractive - Nash designed houses, a lot of vegetation, well set up gardens and houses, the zoo, and virtually no boat traffic.  Though the footpath is well used, by comparison with the Paddington basin, and the far end of the route there were far fewer people using the footpath.  When I got to Camden, there was a mass of people there, viewing my operating the locks as part of their Sunday morning entertainment, but again there were far fewer than I had anticipated.  After this the use of the towpath was very heavy, all the way down to Limehouse.

The locks are in pretty poor condition and the access for working the boat is quite difficult.  At one of the locks, the approach was blocked by two boats on the waterpoint by the lock, and I had to gain access to the lock over them.  On the way back, I may try to go slowly, and take some photos, but working the boat tends to make it difficult to sensibly use the camera; and vica versa.  Limehouse basin is currently housing a very wide variety of boats, including a "gin palace" that would not feel out of place in Monaco.  

Over the last couple of decades I have been down to Canary Wharf on a couple of occasions for business meetings, but the last time I was in this area, able to look and see what the place is like, it was to visit a friend who then lived in the Isle of Dogs.  This was before any of the Canary Wharf development, and the Isle of Dogs then was the bleakest urban landscape I have ever seen (including the 60's tower block redevelopment of Glasgow).  Now of course, there are expensive apartments, huge office developments, and massive amounts of new developments.  It is an attractive piece of urban landscape, that seems to work, and forms a living and vital  community.

All in all, a good day.

Extremophiles and me

I had thought that extremophiles were confined to bacteria; but as time goes on I am becoming convinced that I am one.   Give me days like this one and the last two - glorious sunshine, high temperatures, no cloud, and no wind - and I revel in it.  The temperature over the last two days at the rear of the boat, where I stand (in direct sunshine), has been between 34 and 37C.  I tend to enjoy this type of weather until I my body gets dehydrated (and I fail to recognise the symptoms until too late).

Put me on the slopes of Everest with daytime temperatures of 20oC and night time temperatures of -20C and again everything is marvellous.  Get stuck in Scotland over Xmas and New Year, with temperatures of -25C, and snowfall of nine inches in one night, and life is fun.

However,  in between days are dire - drear, depressing, dank, damp, and dicey.  I will shelter indoors, unwilling to emerge into the light (or the dusk, dawn, or night) and I sit and vegatate.

So I think I must be an extremophile.

Boathooks and magnets

I had occasion to go up to Milton Keynes today, from Berkhamsted which is where I am moored.  Relying on public transport and shank's pony, I did not get back to Berhamsted until about 19:40 and had been travelling virtually continuously since 10:30.  After walking most of the way back to my boat (about a 30 minute walk) and looking forward to something to eat and a rest, I got to the lock just above my mooring and saw two Wyvern boats (the nearest hire boat company) moored right by the locks.  By the lock side was James Griffin the owner of Wyvern boats, and somebody I have met a number of times.  We chatted briefly, and it became apparent that the rearmost of the two Wyvern boats had managed to drop their rear fender into the lock near the downhill gates.  This was quite an achievement in itself - the fenders that Wyvern use are rope covered metal cylinders stoppered at one end with rubber.  The cylinder is about one foot in diameter, and perhaps 18" in length.  It is normally bolted to the boat, and then additionally secured by a safety chain.  The person running the boat must have caught the fender on the bottom gate or rammed the gate fairly hard going in reverse - or both.  Anyway, James was trying to recover the fender from the full lock using magnets he had brought out, but they were proving insufficiently powerful to lift the fender, though he could locate and attach to the fender with the magnets.  After chatting for a little while I went down to my boat to pick up a boat hook that has a very large, sharp point, but which has a broken shaft.  Returning to the lock, we attached this hook to one of the Wyvern boat's barge poles, put the boat back in the lock, emptied it and went fishing with the resulting boat hook and the magnets.  We could locate the fender but we could not retrieve it.  Whilst this was going on, one of the women on the boat was providing coffee and biscuits.  After trying for a good while to stab it; hook it; lift it; shift it, we opened the lower gate to try and trap it between the gate and the lock wall.  At this point it became obvious that the fender was in such a position that the gate was having to go over the fender to open, and that two times out of three it was stopping the lock operating.  After continued unsuccessful efforts, we eventually called a halt.  I recovered my boat hook and walked back to the boat to finally get something to eat and drink and to sit down to rest and do this blog at about 21:30.  Not what I expected to be doing as I was coming back to the boat.

Summer weather

There is normally a canal festival held in the Wendover arm of the Grand Union canal this weekend.  This has been held for about 21 years, but this year it could not be held because of some problem having access to the field where it is held.  To compensate, the Aylesbury Canal Society decided to hold an informal, semi-impromptu barbecue.  So, as I was intending to head for East London to explore the River Lee area, I set off from Aylesbury canal basin a couple of days ago to stop off in the Wendover arm before going on southwards.


I got here yesterday morning, and was the first boat here.  I moored up, and Ros came out to continue with the painting of a picture on my boat.  Yesterday was a glorious day and very enjoyable.  Today, of course, the day of the BarBQ and when about a dozen boats had arrived, was rain virtually continuously until late afternoon, and fairly heavy showers after that.  Tents were erected, and the coals fired up, and the barbecue held, but it can hardly be described as a particularly notable event - true some interesting conversations and a reasonably nice set of people, but hardly THE event of the summer.  


The forecast for tomorrow, as people will be going away is, naturally, for fine weather.


The joys of an English Summer.


I am going on from here towards London, and then on into Essex. This latter area is a complete novelty for me, and I am looking forward to my investigations there.

Delusion and invention

It is amazing how I can use any circumstance to excuse, to myself, apathy and lack of activity. During the winter, when I was trapped in Scotland, I obviously could not do anything because of the low temperatures, and heavy snowfall, both of which affected transport so extensively that I could not do anything. Now we are having our few days of summer, I can't do anything during the day, because it is far to hot to be at all active. Equally, doing redirection letters and emails is an obvious reason that I don't have time to start in on the repairs to the paintwork on my boat. Equally, because I am doing such letters and emails, I need all my computer related gear to hand - computer, computer used as a TV, printer, scanner, and envelopes and stamps. I can't possibly clear them up while I am doing this job, and I can't do this job while the place is in such a mess. All this invention inspired by a need to delude myself that I am not lazy, or idle, or apathetic; but rather circumstances conspire against me and prevent me doing anything useful.

 I of course know that I am a useful and valuable person who brings light to all who encounter me; and I don't need to actually do anything - people should just be very thankful for my existence and presence - and if I choose to pass comment, whether positive or negative, on anything, then my comments are absolute gifts that people should take on board with suitable humility and gratitude.  And of course my perception of anything is always correct and anybody who fails to share my views is stupid, or is not in full possession of all the facts.

Makes you wonder why Nobel prizes, offers of high office from multiple places, parades in my honour with plenty of dancing girls and elephants, and world wide recognition of my unique gifts do not shower down on me as they so obviously should.   I wonder why?

The Simple Life

I have just moved onto my new moorings in Aylesbury. By contrast to my existing moorings, this one has much greater facilities. It has only taken me a day on the mooring to realise that some of the things taken for granted by people living less basically than I have been for the last eight years, are both wonderful, luxurious, and completely invisible most of the time. Take electricity for instance. I have an electric supply on my boat - stored in batteries, and provided by running either my engine or generator. Now I am on a land line, which means if I want to have more than one light and one electronic item on at a time, I do not have to think about, or check the state of the batteries before doing so. I do not have to think about the next time I am going to run the engine, nor fit the running of the engine in with noise abatement regulations. Equally, I have toilet arrangements on my boat, but they need a pump out at regular intervals, and to get a pump out I need to travel (on my old moorings) 3 miles; (or on my new moorings) 8 miles and 21 locks; so having an accessible toilet 15 yards from my boat rather than 400 yards means that toilet visits don't have to be planned out in advance and in detail.

I am going to try and maintain my new found awareness of the wonder of these, commonplace, gifts.

A picture sometimes isn't worth a thousand words

Coming down the Aylesbury Arm today, there was a moment of pure joy in the view and landscape I was travelling through. Hedges on either side of the canal and towpath making a green cutting; the towpath itself green; the canal stretching straight ahead to a bridge framing a lock; going down hill so the landscape was opening out into the Vale of Aylesbury giving a very large, white cloud dotted sky; and the sun casting local shadows onto the vegatation. Pure heaven. So why no picture? I have not found a way to adequately represent the beauty of such a scene - the photographic process tends to flatten the view in two ways - the perspective of a lens causes the whole scene to be flattened, unless there is something in the foreground to give scale; my only option for something in the foreground is the length of my boat and that shot is interesting only once and I have a lot of such photos; also the landscape being so green gets flattened because all the colours are very similar when reproduced photographically, and there is inadequate differentiation between the different colours, and the planes they are in.

So I am left with description rather than a picture.

Normal journeying

I have spent the last few days travelling up from Paddington by canal. It has taken me eight days from Paddington to the junction of the Grand Union with the Aylesbury Arm. This is fairly normal for me when I am cruising - I tend to travel for two or three days, for about 4-5 hours per day, and then stop in one place for a couple of days. The weather has been very variable and the people encountered en-route have also been very variable. I will be going down the Aylesbury Arm tomorrow - 16 locks, which is more than I have done on any day this year. I am moving to new moorings there.

Anathem - my review

I have just finished reading Anathem by Neal Stephenson. This is a tremendous book - in many senses. It is just under 1000 pages, so functions as a tremendous doorstop; but more seriously it is tremendous is scope, ambition, and evocation. It deeply embeds views about philosophy, mathematics, methods of human thought, and the history of science and thought into a fictional world that is compelling and drew me in irresitably. His prose style is rich, deep, and intricate. In building his fictional world he manages to introduce and integrate many current scientific, mathematical, and philosophic theories into a book that is eminently readable. (I read the book in two sessions.) The feel of the culture he describes, and the feeling of depth of time he conveys reminded me very much of Cordwainer Smith - though these two authors convey such feeling in very different ways. Smith is nearly devoid of technological description or explanation, relying rather on an phrases and words which evoke the depth of cultural history - Stephenson's work is structured by, and explains the theories on which his world is based, and evokes the richness he conveys by extensive narrative explanation.

I found that reading this book brought various strands of thought together and enabled me to clarify some of the ideas I have been investigating (Buddhism and what science writing I still keep up with; ways of understanding; and what life, the universe and everything means to me (and for me the answer is not 42)).

There are two quotes from the book that summarise its attraction, meaning, and significance to me:
"What is given to us, what we observe. In the end, that's all we have to work with."
and
"My brain doesn't have to support this hugely detailed, accurate, configurable quantum-superposition-supporting model of the cosmos anymore! All it need to do is perceive - to reflect - the cosmos that it's really in, as it really is."

Lazy Days

After cruising for five hours this morning/early afternoon, I did not feel like doing very much except lounge around. So this evening has been one of watching Terminator Salvation; listening to Meatloaf at full volume; and browsing the Facebook site "Living on a Narrowboat - and NO it's NOT cold in Winter!!!" and joining in all the discussions there. No work done - boring things like change of address letters, preparing the paint work or housework. Isn't it bliss to do exactly what you want to do and nothing else.

Lazy Days

After cruising for five hours this morning/early afternoon, I did not feel like doing very much except lounge around. So this evening has been one of watching Terminator Salvation; listening to Meatloaf at full volume; and browsing the Facebook site "Living on a Narrowboat - and NO it's NOT cold in Winter!!!" and joining in all the discussions there. No work done - boring things like change of address letters, preparing the paint work or housework. Isn't it bliss to do exactly what you want to do and nothing else.

The National Health Service

Today I had a minor operation on the NHS. The actual operation was completed in about 20 minutes - getting the local anesthetic; being put on the table; having a minor cyst removed; stitched up; removal of surgical materials etc. However, the administration side was a different matter. My appointment was 11:45 and I got there a few minutes early. The paperwork was done quickly - consent form; explanation of the risks; confirmation of identity etc; visit by the surgeon and provision of a hospital gown. All done by shortly after 12:00. Then I waited, and waited, and waited and waited - I finally went down to theatre at 17:05 - FIVE HOURS OF HANGING ABOUT. Admittedly I managed, during this time to do my Tai Ji practice; I had also picked up a very substantial novel (new in paperback) by Neal Stevenson - Anathem. He is an author I rate very highly. This new book is just under 1000 pages long. Thanks to the enforced hanging about I read about a third of the book.

I am a fan of the NHS - for all the criticism and hostility directed towards it, it does a very good job. But the non-medical side of the Health Service is dire. My surgery was done competently and professionally, at a date within my preferences, and all the staff were doing a very good job - but oh dear - the systems they have to work with.

London and my social life

Being in London for a week has led to a busier social life than the couple of months spent on my permanent mooring this year. I have had lunch on two successive days with two attractive, intelligent, smart, interesting, people; and coffee with my brother this morning at 06:45 as he went to his office overlooking my boat in Paddington basin. Admittedly, there are other factors involved than location, - knowing I was going to be down here led to me contacting people I know, and to try to hook up with people I haven't seen for a while. Still, it does reinforce my positive view of this mooring.

This year - an surprising time

I am currently moored in Paddington basin, London, for a week. It is a good mooring - in the centre of all the luxury flats and offices, with security and comparative calm - especially as one of the pathways that would go past my boat is closed off, so not much foot traffic.

I learnt, at New Year, that my plans for this year were not going to work in the way I had anticipated, so have been going with the flow. The trip down to London was a brief idea, and en-route, my plans changed. I am going from here to my new moorings in Aylesbury, and then will be returning this way in order to explore the rivers and canals of East London.