by I Skyped my parents this morning from the café next to the market and by the river. It was a bit noisy there so I moved to a bench by the river bank. It was already hotting up; a shirtless man on the other side of the river hauled in a fish. On Friday I sent Dad a depressing article about the beautiful River Wye being polluted – killed – by chicken factories along the river. He spent much of his childhood around the Wye, which was then teeming with salmon.
Dad mentioned that a new autism clinic had opened in Wellington and it was a shame I wasn’t still there and able to help out in some capacity. Helping people with autism was near the top of my list of career options when I left my insurance job in 2009, but that never eventuated.
The lady whose birthday was last weekend lent me two small English textbooks entitled Eckersley’s Essential English – triple E – dating from the fifties or so. They aren’t without value today, even if the language is outdated. The illustrations are delightful; they remind me of the John Thompson’s elementary piano books that I learnt from when I was little. Here are a few pages:
Interestingly in the second picture she’s circled the pronunciation of “always” with a schwa, as if she didn’t quite believe it. It does seem extremely old-fashioned; I’m not even sure the Queen says it that way. Or Jacob Rees-Mogg. In the eighth picture the author seemed to think that marquesses were something a student needed to know about.
It’s that time of year again that everything smells in Timișoara. The ripe fruit, the lime trees, the general scent of summer heat. That’s nice, but on Friday there was also the distinct whiff of pollution when cycling along the busy roads. Unfortunately that is a problem here.
The weather put paid to tennis once again yesterday, but it should go ahead later today.
