Oyu-Sama

This is the earliest in the bunch of Mizoguchi films I'm working through.  If you can swallow the premise of love at first sight between the dull young hero and the jowelly, giggly, middle-aged heroine, everything else follows like a dream. Mizoguchi himself thought it was a failure- and I suppose any film you can only enjoy by suspending your disbelief has to be classified that way- but there are some wonderful set-pieces- notably a death in childbirth framed by the going up and coming back down the track of a distant steam train. 

A Driftwood Clock, Ikea, Michael Moorcock

We gave Ruth a clock made of driftwood for her birthday. We liked it so much we were half hoping she'd hate it and we could claim it back and buy her something else. In the event she loved it, so we're taking steps to get ourselves something similar. It won't be exactly the same because driftwood clocks don't come off an assembly line.

We went to Ikea today. We needed to replace a ruined seat cushion. It had been ruined by a bag of fermenting peppers which weren't fermenting when we first put them down but were mostly liquid by the time we found them again under the junk that had been piled over them when we had the workmen in. Of course we can't visit Ikea without buying all sorts of cheap, well-designed oddments. On this occasion we bought some tea lights and some rugs and a water bowl for Tosh. The one thing I don't like about Ikea is the floor- which is completely ungiving and buggers up every joint I have from the waist down. We also ate lunch- which cost us £8.50 for two. 

I've just been reading Hari Kunzru's article about the very wonderful Michael Moorcock- author of my favourite fantasy sequence The Dancers at the End of Time.  At his peak Moorcock was capable- according to a legend he doesn't deny- of writing 15,000 words a day. Damn- why can't I do that?