Now Cracks a Noble Heart

Head still spinning from last evening, and stomach churning. Arrived home last night without keys, only to discover them this noon-time on my desk after struggling in to the office. Perhaps this enormous hearing settled so timely so as to ensure my celebrations of Mr. Burns' day would be so raptuous. A shame I let the ball drop in quoting some of his verse on site in the normal course, but small's the pity. The new verses for this year include the classic Epitaph for James Smith, and this magnificent excerpt from Scotch Drink:

Fortune! if thou'll but gie me still
Hale breeks, a scone, an' whisky gill,
An' rowth o' rhyme to rave at will,
Tak a' the rest,
An' deal't about as thy blind skill
Directs thee best.

Perfect. Off shortly to comfort family amidst the funeral services tomorrow. I am determined to view the day in "celebratory fashion" (as in, what a life this man had led) but it remains a sad passage nonetheless.

"Good night sweet prince: And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!"

Light Be the Sand that lies on...

"No man ever died more regretted by his personal friends than John A. Quitman. He was in every relation of life a true man, chivalrously brave, nobly generous, and sternly faithful to all that enobles human nature. Had his brain been equal to his soul, he had been the world's wonder." - The Memories of Fifty Years, William Henry Sparks.

My grandfather, the greater of the (once) living James Andersons, has regretfully gone away. Missed tremendously and yet time must come for us all, and he was ready. Lives like his are to be celebrated not mourned (as the Irish know), and so while his passing involves tears, they will be wiped from smiling cheeks. The truest gentleman, the more remarkable the love and caring that filled his immense heart.

I walked through Westminster Cathedral in February 2002, on one of the first days of what would prove to be perhaps my favorite week on record. And looking on the grave stones and the remarkable English tributes, I could not help but write many down. One struck me in particular, and not because I could understand it, because I confess I still do not. But because it rang somehow true in its perplexity in making me think then of my immaculate grandfather, in one of those (dis)associative things. I must seek it out again next month. For apparently there was a man, Peter Mason, aged 82, who died in Sept. 1738, about which they (also) said:

"He was in every relation
A juft and good man,
and what you, in your laft moments,
may with great comfort rejoice to be."

A strangely predictory sort of epitaph, I guess. On my best days, I can only hope so. Oh, granddad. I love you so very, very much.

Dreadful Note of Preparation

Henry V, ACT IV, PROLOGUE:

Enter Chorus

Chorus
Now entertain conjecture of a time
When creeping murmur and the poring dark
Fills the wide vessel of the universe.
From camp to camp through the foul womb of night
The hum of either army stilly sounds,
That the fixed sentinels almost receive
The secret whispers of each other's watch:
Fire answers fire, and through their paly flames
Each battle sees the other's umber'd face;
Steed threatens steed, in high and boastful neighs
Piercing the night's dull ear, and from the tents
The armourers, accomplishing the knights,
With busy hammers closing rivets up,
Give dreadful note of preparation:
The country cocks do crow, the clocks do toll,
And the third hour of drowsy morning name.
Proud of their numbers and secure in soul,
The confident and over-lusty French
Do the low-rated English play at dice;
And chide the cripple tardy-gaited night
Who, like a foul and ugly witch, doth limp
So tediously away. The poor condemned English,
Like sacrifices, by their watchful fires
Sit patiently and inly ruminate
The morning's danger, and their gesture sad
Investing lank-lean; cheeks and war-worn coats
Presenteth them unto the gazing moon
So many horrid ghosts. O now, who will behold
The royal captain of this ruin'd band
Walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent,
Let him cry 'Praise and glory on his head!
'For forth he goes and visits all his host.
Bids them good morrow with a modest smile
And calls them brothers, friends and countrymen.
Upon his royal face there is no note
How dread an army hath enrounded him;
Nor doth he dedicate one jot of colour
Unto the weary and all-watched night,
But freshly looks and over-bears attaint
With cheerful semblance and sweet majesty;
That every wretch, pining and pale before,
Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks:
A largess universal like the sun
His liberal eye doth give to every one,
Thawing cold fear, that mean and gentle all,
Behold, as may unworthiness define,
A little touch of Harry in the night.
And so our scene must to the battle fly;
Where--O for pity!--we shall much disgrace
With four or five most vile and ragged foils,
Right ill-disposed in brawl ridiculous,
The name of Agincourt. Yet sit and see,
Minding true things by what their mockeries be.

Exit

The Vigil

Baltimore — A mystery man made his 58th straight visit to Edgar Allan Poe's grave Friday morning and was watched by the largest group of onlookers ever, the event's most faithful viewer said...

As he has done previously to mark Poe's birthday, the visitor arrived to place his half-empty bottle of cognac and three red roses at the grave, Jerome said...

Starting in 1949, a frail figure made the visit to Poe's grave. In 1993, the original visitor left a cryptic note saying, “The torch will be passed.” A later note said the man, who apparently died in 1998, had handed the tradition on to his sons.

Awesome is most definitely correct. And today I learn that the marvelous Zekya has a ticket that will put her at Waterloo station at 855 on March 2nd. Oh frabjous day! I have to get my damn passport application in.

By interception which they dream not of

Enter EXETER, BEDFORD, and WESTMORELAND

BEDFORD
'Fore God, his grace is bold,
to trust these traitors.

EXETER
They shall be apprehended by and by.

WESTMORELAND
How smooth and even they do bear themselves!
As if allegiance in their bosoms sat,
Crowned with faith and constant loyalty.

BEDFORD
The king hath note of all that they intend,
By interception which they dream not of.

EXETER
Nay, but the man that was his bedfellow,
Whom he hath dull'd and cloy'd with gracious favours,
That he should, for a foreign purse, so sell
His sovereign's life to death and treachery.

Trumpets sound.

A late Friday afternoon at the office. Nice to get the billable hours over with in the first part of the year, although it would be nice to get to the draw one of these days... Walking home from the recruitment session for the new kids last night, I stopped into the Old Triangle for one Guinness and had four, as the clock in the corner ticked down from 65 days to 64. Time flies so quickly and then it is gone. There were some old women and a guy from Aberdeen that was so hilariously Scottish it made me feel just great.

Star-gazers: "Ladies of the pavement who walk by night, not so much, however, to study the heavenly bodies as to dispose of their own." -Albert Barrere and Charles Leland, from my 2007 daily "Forgotten English" calender. Nicely done.

The Stories of Strangers

Here's one inscribed in the notebook back in Ottawa, October last year, whilst we were playing at Hungoose and Hamama. A beautiful entry from another anonymous muse:

"When I was in Panama I was tenting in a dudes yard. Every fucking morning this chicken with a fucked up voice would wake me up for a month. I chased it with a hammock to catch it... followed by a kick, didn't work, .. attached a dart to an umbrella... tossed it, missed it, whipped big rocks, missed. So one day I decided to put an end to my life of being a vegetarian of 13 years. Paid my friend to come over at 4:00 am. He killed the fucking chicken. I carried it down to a restaurant, told them to keep everything. I ate the legs that ran away from me for a month. It was some tasty fucking chicken.

Wassail Eve

Perhaps it would have been more appropriate to quote below from Twelfth Night... Celebrations, it turns out, are a January 5th tradition. And why not? Though there shall be more wassailling to come in the days of 2007 ahead, we can be sure.

Wais Hail. Drinc Hail.

The Particular Accidents Gone By

And so, following late night revels, the first of 2007 saw a veritable parade of moments: Oysters and Costumes and Songs and Schnapps and Haggis and Kelvin and Dancing and Moose Milk and Shakespearean beginnings and Resolutions among Resolutes and the lost dignity and blackberry in Purcells Cove (one of which took/takes longer to recover than another.

I have photographic evidence of the occasion and will endeavour to assort it into a top ten list of travels in the "entourage" of the Deputy Mayor this weekend. Forgive me as I complete my recovery from the revels and leave you with more words of the Bard near the conclusion of the Tempest. Since I must miss his Antony by scant days, I may to seek out Stewart's Prospero instead...

ALONSO
Is not this Stephano, my drunken butler?

SEBASTIAN
He is drunk now: where had he wine?

ALONSO
And Trinculo is reeling ripe: where should they
Find this grand liquor that hath gilded 'em?
How camest thou in this pickle?

TRINCULO
I have been in such a pickle since I
saw you last that, I fear me, will never out of
my bones: I shall not fear fly-blowing.

SEBASTIAN
Why, how now, Stephano!

STEPHANO
O, touch me not; I am not Stephano, but a cramp.

PROSPERO
You'ld be king o' the isle, sirrah?

STEPHANO
I should have been a sore one then.