The Eclectic Interweb

Yup… I’ve finally reached the penultimate number in this decade… will I be here to reach the next one? Watch this space… I make *no* promises… but I *do* hope I make it 😀

Actually ‘happy birthday’ has been right so far. Got up this morning as usual and forgot totally… then wife and kids reminded me… though I still had to get their lunches ready first!

So… pressies? Well I had a lovely little roly-poly ceramic pig from daughter number one accompanied by a box of Turkish Delight… which I love. I like making my own as well but it’s too much trouble usually so these will go down well… as will the packet from daughter number two… who also bought me a ‘welcome’ map for the front of the house… really nice 😀

Then the wife gives me a framed copy of Desiderata… and a copy of “Diana – The portrait” by Rosalind Coward. It’s a seriously large book packed with photos and stories about the life and death of Lady Di and well worth the money I reckon. Clearly I’ve not had time to read all of it, but the bits I *have* read were really *very* good.

It’s nice to see this sort of book that paints a “warts and all” picture of someone but still produce on balance a positive reflection on someones life and their effect on their times.

The pictures tell their own story. The ones from the early years were a revelation with nearly all of them showing a sad, troubled and moody child! She grew and changed, but those sad eyes remained the same almost all her life. To be honest, I never thought of her as a particularly beautiful woman, despite the adulation heaped on her after her marriage to Charlie at age 19, but she was clearly well presented 😀

If there is a quibble about the book it’s that there wasn’t sufficient coverage of the size of the crowds who waited in line to pay their last respects as her funeral cortege passed through London. I was amazed at the number of streets where people stood shoulder to shoulder… the string of well wishers stretched all the way to the motorway… and even *along* the motorway in parts!!

I’d forgotten some of the stories about her, e.g. stroking the hands of lepers and aids victims… but they brought back some memories.

I liked Diana… I felt somehow she brought ‘hope’… it’s all a bit intangible… and it’s hard to believe it’s so long since she died. I think I’ll have mixed feelings reading through the book.
And so back to today… I’m here and another year has drifted by… hard to believe they drift by so fast, but it’s true.