Walking the dog in this dimension or a myriad of others

Walking the dog and particle physics - mmm! Unusual subject to muse upon on a clear sunny Saturday morning (virtual) stroll. Virtual because I am actually sitting at my netbook with Four-legged-friend sprawled at my feet, coffee on the hob, toast ... burning! You get the picture.

Anyway, and in advance of what follows, I apologise to any particle physicists for my ignorance of their subject and tardiness at keeping up with the headlines in particle-physics-world. Until now, that is! As if the news that particles have been discovered that appear to travel faster than the speed of light -I thinks that means they get to their destination before they left their point of departure - is not enough to addle the average brain, a physicist, on what I had always assumed was a reputable TV programme, Newsnight, last night offered as explanation that the neutrinos in question may have travelled through a worm hole from another dimension.

Now, I know it was late and I was tired, but I am positive that was what he said. The worlds of Philip Pullman and Inception are upon us. Maybe, I'm walking the dog in a parallel universe. Maybe, the other me is fitter, healthier, less procrastinating. Maybe, I exist in thousands of other dimensions. Mind boggling!

To make it worse, he went on to suggest that in order to explain certain aspects of physics, scientists had hypothesized about the existence of extra dimensions for some years now! Isn't that news worthy of the non-physicist press? Is no-one else interested in this?And he casually added, if the neutrinos were from another dimension, it was simply an interesting anomaly -not devastatingly amazing! - because they don't carry any information, so can't tell us anything.

Wow! Need to rest my brain now. Fresh air, apples, brambles, crumble making and six-year-old friend's first ever birthday party (hospitalised for all previous ones) - these kind of put this world back into perspective. At least for now ... whatever the concept of now is.

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Colour, Delacroix, flochetage and why don't we all have a go at inventing words

Yes - it is a real word. Flochetage. Well, a real-ish word. One invented by the painter Delacroix, when he found the dictionary cupboard bare and required a word to describe his technique of layering different coloured paints, using lightly pulled brush strokes to create texture and pattern and thereby enhance his base-layer colours (... lost? - stick around, read on and all will become clear. Or perhaps muddier ...). Flochetage implies both stringiness and threadiness. Apparently. And it sounds good - in a filling-the-mouth-with-sound sort of a way. Try it ... flochetaaaage. Not that I speak French. So I am probably mis-pronouncing it. Nor am I an artist. So what do I know about painting techniques - except that I think this one works. What I do like is the concept - you invent a new technique in whatever it is you do, hunt around for the vocabulary to describe it, find the dictionary is lacking, so make up a word of your own and announce to the world what it means. Delacroix isn&#

Confetti for the brain. A little bit of history regarding a use for holes and a couple of quotes.

Confetti - noun: small pieces of coloured paper thrown over a bride and groom following their marriage ceremony. Also the bane of church yards and wedding venues - who wants to exit church after their favourite spinster aunt's funeral and slip on the papier mâché mush of last weekend's weddings, or step, in your wedding gown, onto a pink spattered step when your colour theme is lilac? Confetti - derived from the Latin confectum, meaning something prepared. Which suggests that there is something missing from the traditional wedding rhyme 'something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue ... something prepared.' How about something shared ... declared ... or ensnared?? Nature's confetti is all over the ground at this time of year - The garden, footpaths, and pavements are covered in blossom snow. And, when he falls asleep beneath the apple tree, it speckles Four-legged-friend's black coat. The confetti we know today - bits of b

My beloved boy, how lucky I have been

It's an odd thing that when we are waiting for someone to die ... and I say someone here even though the one in question was a dog - but to us he had character and a place forever in our hearts and was more of a familiar someone than some of the people in our lives. So, I'll start again - it's an odd thing that when we are waiting for someone to die, our senses go into overdrive. We notice things that normally would be part of the background of our every day. We breathe more - or rather, we don't but what we do is notice our breathing more, as we watch his. We pause. We think. We listen to ourselves and our inner voices speak. Memories flood our dreams ... though sleep is fitful. Why am I telling you this? ... ... we lost this beautiful boy today And in the hours before he went, I saw perfect spheres of dew on blades of grass - little orbs holding micro-images of our world; a bumble bee drunk on nectar, yellow-dusted with pollen, resting in a crocus; ten - yes, ten!

Walking The Dog

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