'Of the 36 ways of avoiding disaster, running away is the best'

I've recently been reading a compendium of obituaries from the Daily Telegraph with the punning title Thinker, Failure, Soldier, Jailer, which contains an impressive cross-section of mainly British subjects of a particular nature most appealing to readers of that conservative and eccentric newspaper. World War 2 heroes are out in force, as are the usual mix of senior political figures, world leaders and august celebrities. And a peculiar mix of golfers, horse racing aficionados, ribald debutantes and society cat-burglars. But it is the oddities that make the book appealing, illustrating as they do the British love of the outre sort who flit around the edges of society. The House of Lords provides fertile ground for such characters, including this fellow:

The 3rd Lord Moynihan (1936-1991) 

The 3rd Lord Moynihan, who has died in Manila aged fifty-five, provided, through his character and career, ample ammunition for critics of the hereditary principle. His chief occupations were bongo-drummer, confidence trickster, brothel-keeper, drug-smuggler and police informer, but 'Tony' Moynihan also claimed other areas of expertise - as 'professional negotiator', 'international diplomatic courier', 'currency manipulator', and 'authority on rock and roll'. If there was a guiding principle to Moynihan's life, it was to be found on the wall of his office in Manila, where a brass plaque bore the legend, 'Of the 36 ways of avoiding disaster, running away is the best'.
- Thinker, Failure, Soldier, Jailer, Harry de Quetteville (ed.), London, 2012, p.522.

Notorious drug smuggler Howard Marks, who was imprisoned after Moynihan wore a wire to incriminate his friend, described Moynihan as 'a first-class bastard'.

Katherine Ryan on Beyonce

An excerpt from Canadian-born and UK-residing comedian Katherine Ryan, performing on the BBC's Live At The Apollo in January 2014, displaying skilful comic timing, clearly well-practiced dance moves and an impressive devotion to the life and works of Beyonce. Sample quotes:

'All I've ever wanted to be my entire life is a strong, powerful, beautiful black woman'. 

'She had the kind of thighs you need to be friends with Beyonce - the kind of thighs that could squash a man's head like a grape'. 

'Twerking is a victim's dance'.

Arras Tunnel opening ceremony

Yesterday morning a ceremony at the War Memorial and a speech by Hon Chris Finlayson opened the new tunnel from the Basin Reserve to Taranaki Street and commemorated the historic relationship between New Zealand and the French town of Arras, which the new tunnel is named after. New Zealand engineers lived and worked in and under Arras during World War 1, tunnelling out huge secret barracks for an enormous allied force to be used in the offensive from April to May 1917 involving 14 assault divisions and nine reserve divisions. Many of the sappers from the New Zealand Tunnelling Company were from the Hauraki goldfields, and the NZTA brochure for the opening ceremony noted their often fiery disposition:

While mustering at Avondale Racecourse in Auckland for training prior to embarkation, they quickly earned the nickname of "The Red Feds" because of the high number of union activists among their ranks. It was reported that 'such men did not take kindly to drill and were later famed throughout the Expeditionary Force as being the toughest and roughest company'.

Walking through the tunnel before and after the official speech, visitors were asked to carry laminated certificates bearing the details of sappers who lost their life as a result of the war. The one I carried was 4/1340 Sapper Sylvester Dargan, a married gold-miner of Waihi who was born in South Australia on 9 October 1877, and had formerly served in the South Australian Infantry Regiment. Dargan shipped out with the initial company deployment. Gassed on 13 November 1917, Dargan was hospitalised, discharged from the army and shipped back to New Zealand as an invalid, where he was treated at the Pukeroa Sanatorium in Hawkes Bay. He died of his wounds on 13 July 1920, leaving behind his wife and four children.

The Carillon

Mayor of Wellington, Celia Wade-Brown & Army guard

In honour of the French contingent

The Arras Tunnel opens for traffic on Monday

Walk-through, admiring the commemorative poppies

Step out into the world and love someone

The second track from American singer-songwriter Josh Rouse's fourth studio album 1972, Love Vibration is a simple but perfectly crafted pop nugget boasting an infectious beat, an optimistic lyric and a deft sax solo on the outro. Released in 2003, the office party karaoke video is an additional selling point.
 

See also:
Music: Bo Diddley - Elephant Man, 15 August 2014
Music: Lush & Jarvis Cocker - Ciao!, 11 July 2014
Music: Eg - Stay Home, 14 February 2014

My favourite scene from 'Sunset Boulevard'

Sunset Boulevard is Billy Wilder's 1950 film noir featuring a remarkable and remarkably courageous performance by former silent movie star Gloria Swanson, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award. She plays close to home as the increasingly delusional former silent movie star Norma Desmond, whose relationship with a much younger screenwriter Joe Gillis (William Holden) starts out as one between an employer and employee but swiftly elides into a relationship between the grandiose older woman and the down-on-his-luck writer. Swanson's performance is historic in its impact, and several of her lines from the film are still quoted - "I'm ready for my closeup, Mr DeMille' and 'I am big, it's the pictures that got small!' The film was nominated for an impressive 11 Oscars, but only won three, most prominently for the screenplay. There are even treasured cameos from the golden age of film: DeMille himself, the legendary Buster Keaton, famed director and actor Erich von Stroheim, and doyenne Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper.

But my favourite scene from the movie is a tiny snippet involving Holden and the talented young would-be screenwriter Betty Schaefer (Nancy Olson). At this point in the film, Joe and Betty are foils - Betty is Joe's best friend's fiance, and had previously nixed one of Joe's studio spec scripts with an honest but honest review in her day job as a script reader. It's New Year's Eve and Joe has sneaked out of Norma Desmond's mansion for some company closer to his own age. In the bathroom of a noisy party, Holden and Olson stage this lovely scene, which is the first inkling the characters actually do fancy each other. Facetiously assuming the roles of melodramatic screen stars in a saccharine romance, they satirise the genre while at the same time sparking a new romantic dynamic that, as you might imagine, rather complicates Joe's relationship with his batty middle-aged patron. Just soak up the lovely jink in Olson's '...furthermore you can have the phone now' and Holden's mock-aristocratic 'Suddenly I find myself terribly afraid of losing you'. Not bad for a scene under a minute long! Olson and Holden would be paired in three further studio films in quick succession after Sunset Boulevard, but none was as successful as this classic offering.
 

Top gardening story of the day, and probably the year

Yes, a woman did ask the BBC to help her identify a marijuana plant

When pensioner Patricia Hewitson contacted BBC Radio Devon to help identify a “weed” in her garden, we doubt she was expecting it to be exactly that.

Ms Hewitson, of Exmouth, asked for help from BBC Radio Devon’s show The Potting Shed - who told her she had unwittingly grown a 1.5m cannabis plant.

“I sent a picture in via email and I got a couple of interesting emails back, including one from the police. They said they wouldn’t prosecute me as I’d done it in good faith”, she said.

A spokesperson for the BBC told i100: “It is a genuine story. The expert advised the caller to contact the police.”

A spokesperson for Devon and Cornwall Police told the BBC: “The lady has committed an offence although there are mitigating circumstances so we would not look to take it further although we would take it away.”

- The Independent, 22 September 2014