This Is How Recessions Start You Know

[liadnan]

Some of the finest and rarest Russian wines ever to go on sale failed to sell well when they went under the hammer at auction house Sotheby's on Friday.

Well, if they're from Tsar Nicholas II and Joseph Stalin's cellars one doubts whether much of them will be any good by now. And I bet they're corked.

But I was reading recently, I forget where (TLS or LRB possibly) about luxury markets in a recession. In the case of rare books the market took a while to fall after Black Tuesday in 1929 but once it went it stayed down longer. Moral: those signed first impression JKR's may not be such a sound investment after all.

Currently reading Robert Irwin's The Arabian Nights: a companion. Brilliant.

Therefore [ie because of the stylistic differences between Arabic and European languages] only a half-wit or a liar would claim that it was possible to produce a complete and faithful word-for-word translation of the Nights, simply changing the Arabic letters into European ones; but, as we shall see below, Mardrus made this claim for his [French] translation.

Nothing to do with that, but read Keiran Drum on Crooked Timber on the admissability in US military tribunals of evidence gained under torture. Also Ogged on Unfogged. Read it and weep.

Edited to add: to cheer you up Former TV chat show host and European MP Robert Kilroy-Silk has had a bucket of farm slurry thrown over him in Manchester..

Yes, I am drinking at home on my own. Why do you ask?

Comments

[nicnac.livejournal.com]

Yes, I am drinking at home on my own

Me too. Good innit?

I'm also trying to work out how to embed photos in an LJ entry (e.g. sorcha's penultimate post). I've managed to navigate my way through buying a paid account (something I've kept meaning to do) and have found the gizmo for creating galleries, but have entirely failed in the embedding dept. Pah.

[liadnan]

You don't want lj-specific info for that. Try... um http://www.w3schools.com/tags/tag_img.asp which might make sense. There's a tutorial somewhere on the article. LJ picture hosting just allows you to put the image on lj servers, but it doesn't have to be.

[nicnac.livejournal.com]

Aha! Riiight. So the photo will have to be hosted on the net somewhere for me to embed it on the page, rather than it being possible to upload it straight onto the page from my laptop.

All becomes clear (or as clear as it can get on wine..). Ta muchly.

[liadnan]

So far as livejournal is concerned, yes.
I tend to just give a link to the image, for various reasons.

[nikandra.livejournal.com]

Yes, I am drinking at home on my own.

I envy you so much right now.

[liadnan]

Well, I'm only drinking at home because I was too pissed off and tired to go out.

Are you still coming to town on Tuesday? Have chambers christmas party to go to in the evening but should have time for coffee in the late afternoon. Email me Monday.

[nikandra.livejournal.com]

still, you have something to drink at home. I only have a small bottle of sake and the knowledge that I'll regret it tomorrow in the library if I finish it.

Yes, I am, but I'll email you anyway.

[ex-ajhalluk585.livejournal.com]

Apropos of the Kilroy Silk story (and I think farm slurry and Kilroy Silk is a match made in heaven, and I applaud the genius who thoughtof bringing them together) what's Manchester Grammar School For Girls? I'd only come across Manchester High School for Girls before. Has MGS spawned a sex-change clone?

[liadnan]

I wondered about that, I suspect sloppiness on the wire editors on a Friday night, but I may be being unfair.

I Heart Military Tribunals

[ninebelow.livejournal.com]

You might like this. (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2004_12/005246.php) For values of "like" equal to "want to stab your own cock out".