It's Friday. Now, you might think that information rather obvious. Normally it is, but if you've been hanging around the left leaning blogs you might be forgiven for wondering what day of the week it is, if up means down and if wrong means right. Even history seems to have changed before our very eyes.
"Ah, those were the days" they sigh, with some sort of wistful tremor in their voice. Doonegate. Benson-Pope's form in tennis. Dover Samuels lack of form in the hotel hallways. Tamihere being plied with half a glass of red wine to reveal the inner workings of Helengrad. Cullen's train set purchases and wonderful wit: "Eat that, we won, you lost...", the Prime Minister immune to the G-forces and thrills of high speed racing, half a billion dollars on Te Wananga courses, the famed impartiality of speaker Wilson, Labour's noble motivations in pushing the Electoral Finance Bill through under urgency. The list goes on. And on.
Taito Philip-Field and the Clark administration's careful management of the issue leading up to the election.
Ah, those were the days. Remember them well folks, they may not be there in quite the same way this time next week.
So sit back, pour yourself a drink, have a nibble and reflect on the glory days of Labour and the times ahead for National. Their history shapes our future. Might be worth remembering that.
"Ah, those were the days" they sigh, with some sort of wistful tremor in their voice. Doonegate. Benson-Pope's form in tennis. Dover Samuels lack of form in the hotel hallways. Tamihere being plied with half a glass of red wine to reveal the inner workings of Helengrad. Cullen's train set purchases and wonderful wit: "Eat that, we won, you lost...", the Prime Minister immune to the G-forces and thrills of high speed racing, half a billion dollars on Te Wananga courses, the famed impartiality of speaker Wilson, Labour's noble motivations in pushing the Electoral Finance Bill through under urgency. The list goes on. And on.
Taito Philip-Field and the Clark administration's careful management of the issue leading up to the election.
Ah, those were the days. Remember them well folks, they may not be there in quite the same way this time next week.
So sit back, pour yourself a drink, have a nibble and reflect on the glory days of Labour and the times ahead for National. Their history shapes our future. Might be worth remembering that.
Nooooo!
ReplyDeleteJust trying to walk the line right now, without looking left or right.
I've just decided I need to teach myself Latin at a rate faster than I'm teaching the kids.
The weird thing is, I received a pretty normal NZ education and have never known what 1st person, 2nd person and 3rd person was up until now! Pretty necessary for Latin, though.
The school boy's lament
ReplyDelete“Latin’s a dead language
As dead as dead can be
It killed off all the Romans
And now it’s killing me!”
Should still be taught in schools if you ask me - So should Greek,
But Kids are almost taught to despise Western culture these days so they are taught from kindergarten a pseudo stone age language instead
I know a family where both parents spoke dutch, and the kids didn't.
ReplyDeleteHowever, one of the children was able to work out from his Latin knowledge something (a one word reply to a question) one of the parents said to each other!
Me too. My parents sometimes spoke another language to each other, but from all my language training I worked out that they were keen to take my sister and I out for a nice walk in the forest, but from what I could gather it would be easy to get lost, and that would be a tragedy.
ReplyDeleteHow right they proved to be! If I ever find them, I'll be sure to tell them they were spot on!
Sure...
ReplyDeleteAhem. Anyone got theme suggestions for tomorrow's video humour post?
Chris Carter Airways.Spread the word.
ReplyDeleteDon't think there'd be many videos for that.
ReplyDeleteHow about the theme around puppets.
ReplyDeleteThere was Achmed the terrorist, the Jeff Dunhman guy, harry potter...
I spoke fluent German when I was 3 (and lived in Germany) however when we came home apparently, stupid 3 year old me refused to speak German to anyone I knew could speak English so sadly my knowledge of the language faded.
ReplyDeleteSo annoying.
Err, maybe his other stuff with peanut...he was a bit more "family friendly" back then.
ReplyDeleteMatt needs picking up.
ReplyDeleteI hate operating with only one car... stupid blown up cars... stupid public transport...
BRB
stupid 3 year old me refused to speak German to anyone I knew could speak English so sadly my knowledge of the language faded
ReplyDeleteYou weren't stupid Madeleine, when you are three you are oblivious to what language you are actually speaking at any given time. It just comes out appropriate to the people around you - that's probably true for multilingual adults come to think of it unless they consciously choose which language to use.
Zen a word of advice - if you come across any gingerbread houses on your wanders don't go picking bits off of them to eat, no matter how appetizing they may look or how hungry you may be.
Andrei: Ah, you know that place? We must be from the same neck of the woods.
ReplyDeleteNo in our neck of the woods those sort of residences have chicken legs so they can move themselves and occupant if necessary and fences made of human bones topped with the skulls.
ReplyDeleteThe occupier does have the same anti social habits with regard to lost children though.
Indeed Zen, 'Those were the days of our lives,the bad things in life were so few,those days are all gone now ...'
ReplyDeleteA lovely clip.
Gingerbread houses are fine for the forest dwelling evil magic set, but maintenance is a killer.
ReplyDeleteWhat's the legal status of those kid's antics these days? I guess they'd be under the age of criminal culpability, but they'd claim self defense. Who tells the witches' story? Maybe it was all some sort of misunderstanding?
LOL at the schoolboy's rhyme, Andrei!
ReplyDeleteOver the last couple of days I have been reading Memoria Press's articles on teaching and learning Latin. Somewhere it mentioned that the recent learning of Latin was crammed into 2 years in highschool - not the optimal way of learning it or enjoying it.
Apparently grammar schools were originally where children were sent to learn Latin from age 8, after they'd been taught to read and write their own language at home by their parents.
Then there's this wonderful quote by Chesterton: "A language must die to be immortal." Not that Christian Latin is dead - it's been in use for 2000 years.
It would be cool to do Greek as well, but ... time ...
Madeleine,
ReplyDeleteWe only have one car. Most of the time, it's ok, but sometimes I really want that second car. But then we'd need a garage for it, and then it all gets very complicated!
But then, you live in Auckland, so the second car must be just about mandatory.
Once upon a time to be considered educated you had to know both Latin and Greek.
ReplyDeleteFor a short period it was proficiency in mathematics that marked the educated.
Nowadays of course the key to being considered one of the wise is to be able to construct long winded ambiguous sentences full of words words like "sustainability" or phrases like "gender neutrality".
If you are really smart you might even know what Heteronormativity means.
Actually, sugar windows are quite common in the film industry - they're the ones they push people through.
ReplyDeleteActually, I think "educationed" these days is defined as "can type words into google".
Seriously.
Hi all..
ReplyDeleteMy Dad speaks Dutch, but no one else in the family speaks another language.
ps, has anyone else heard about the new Earworms language series? I've seen them in various bookstores. It's supposed to put the language to music to 'bore it deep into your brain', hence the 'worm' part of the name.
ReplyDeleteI've heard the French one, but I'm not sure how effective it would be.
There is music in the background, but the words are still spoken (reminded me of the Electric Company TV show a bit for some reason).
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ReplyDeletedid anyone here about the once in a lifetime event today at
ReplyDelete12:34:56 on 07/08/09;
A boy in my class told me it will never happen again. I had to stop my PE lesson while the kids looked at the clock!!!
did anyone here about the once in a lifetime event today at
ReplyDelete12:34:56 on 07/08/09;
That's the second time this year that has happened, today in Godzone and last month in the USA.
Yeh, the midday newsreader mentioned it was going to happen. I wasn't sure it meant anything to me though.
ReplyDeleteInteresting though :)
Ozy,
ReplyDeleteOh no! My kids would have loved that! And we missed it. I'll have to tell them about it tomorrow.
Fletch,
No, I haven't heard of Ear Worm. Sounds interesting. I'm going to be getting this product, however, for French. It links pictures up with the words, and doesn't introduce the written language until later. It'll be perfect for my 8 year old.
Scrubone,
ReplyDeleteI had no idea the movies used sugar for windows that people fall out of! How cool.