This is another
way of saying that, checking my emails I noted that there was a communication
from the Open University informing me that my latest tutor marked assignment
was marked and available to be checked.
As a favourable result of this assignment was going to be an indication
of the way forward (aka The Way Forward) for the rest of the course it was
important.
The
throat constriction thing was also accompanied by an indrawn breath and a
tightening of the chest. I was
disappointed to discover that I was so hackneyed. It was, therefore, with a certain degree of
trepidation that I went through the unbearably slow process of logging onto the
OU website and waiting for the result to appear.
This
writing is not so confessional that I would have gone on to explain to all and
sundry that the result was not the one that I wanted, so the more perceptive
among you will have worked out that things, as it were, worked out. Not entirely satisfactorily as I was four
percentage points away from my ‘smug’ result, but well within the ‘generally
complacent’ area. This result means that
my vague plans for the future assignments in the course can now be firmed up
and the direction of my writing is now assured.
Or at least as assured as it can be given the hard fact that I haven’t
actually done any of it yet.
I
have one poem on the go and the bones of the thing are there and I should get
at least a first draft of it by the end of the day. The finished article then may or may not form
one part of the extended work for the next assignment. The work is still all to do, but the direction
is relatively clear. And that is all I
need to get on with it.
On an altogether more prosaic, yet more
important front, the central heating system – if our ‘system’ deserves such an
appellation – is leaking big time. Given
the quaint rules of renting in this god-forsaken country, everything in the
house appears to be our responsibility.
No matter how antiquated the stuff in the house is, its working is
firmly the responsibility of the tenants.
I do not know what rights we tenants have, but they are as nothing
compared to the Rolls Royce rights of our British equivalents! Toni will have to phone up and find out if
the blood sucking bastards who own this place are prepared to do anything to
justify the vast sums that we pay them every month. I do not hold out any positive hope. But summer is not yet with us and some form
of heating is essential.
Perhaps
this latest in our stand-offs with the renting agency will be the straw that
breaks etc. as we do have to think about somewhere cheaper and ideally on one
level in the not too distant future.
I
must say that the idea of moving fills me with absolute depression as it has
taken me all this time to get what is left of my books into something like
order. The thought of mixing up the
books again and setting them out is more than I can contemplate with anything
approaching equanimity. But the time
will come when we have to consider the unthinkable and find somewhere else.
My mind turns from such awful realities to
the delights of Sci-Fi. I have been
watching the 4th series of ‘Torchwood’ where ten programmes formed a
high budget drama ‘Miracle Day’ set largely in America. No matter how absurd the story I am always
taken by the ideas in Sci-Fi and the central conceit of this one – that people
stop dying – was an interesting one to say the least. A strong cast produced an enjoyable romp
which also allowed Russell T Davies to indulge the gay aspects of his main
character Captain Jack Harkness to a rather more explicit level than in
previous episodes of this Doctor Who spinoff that I have seen. Some of the action seemed to me to be
gratuitous, but it was Sci-Fi and I am more than forgiving in this genre.
As a bonus at
the end of the series, I discovered a hitherto unwatched episode of David
Tennant in ‘Doctor Who’ on my iPlayer.
Who can ask for more?
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