0-0 was good enough for Liverpool to frustrate Chelsea, again, and finish ahead of the London club. I think Liverpool really have got the measure of Chelsea, and are perhaps the only team in England capable of reducing Chelsea to pot-shots and scraps. Even Lampard looked ordinary.

Over 13 hours since LFC conceded a goal, and 5 clean sheets in European competition, a record.

If you scrutinise the four games Liverpool and Chelsea have played in the ECL, in the past two seasons, it works out at Liverpool 1, Chelsea 0, but I would like to point out how few shots on goal Chelsea managed in those four matches, a credit to Benitez superior tactics, against a team of superior talent.

However...Essien.
What are you doing on a football field??? The tackles that man produces should be shown on police survelience or medical training programmes. Tonight he was responsible for two bad tackles, the second of which on Hamann, was a potential leg breaker, indeed, on Radio 5 Live, Jim Beglin, (a player who knows exactly how bad that feels), feared the worst, we all did, and it was a testimony to fate that Didi got up again. Essien, in the corner, you should be ashamed of yourself. It does you and Chelsea no credit. Chelsea have developed a nasty side, which must be guiding them to Premiership first place. But such tactics must not be allowed to proliferate, as I for one will turn away in disgust in seeing £50,000+ a week players attempting to cripple the opposition.

The game itself was entertaining, without being exciting, and Benitez being the happier of the two managers. Though Abramovich looked a happy chappy too!!

As a Liverpool fan I'm delighted that LFC qualify as group winners, and with a still-fit Dietmar Hamann. Chelsea, until tonight I've refrained from critcising you at all, but the tactics of some of your players leaves a lot to be desired. No offence, but it's plain for all to see, and you're not alone in that, I know.
Though you still have a great team, great talent, and are the best club in the land, Liverpool are catching you.

My happy rant over!

A careless word may kindle strife.
A cruel word may wreck a life.
A timely word may level stress.
A loving word may heal and bless.

vers le haut là dedans des cieux qui ont appelé
ces rêves trompés et fêlés,
appeler encore avec le soleil d'affaiblissement
force d'aujourd'hui une fois sous votre pouce
une telle magie dans le rétablissement puissant
conduite loin - d'une vieille découverte,
la monte ondule dans votre prise
inoubliable jusqu'au durez
périodes mémorables se tenant toujours
au delà de la santé et de la perte de volonté,
endommagé là n'est aucun doute
cependant regret rarement environ
désir du déploiement transe-like,
bruit de tabla, lune et feu de la terre
belle mémoire brûlante
la musique de plaid a réussi par grigori
témoignage à de tels fortis d'esprit
l'âme de la vie recherchant des iugis
l'éclat rayonne la croyance
adouci, soulagement marqué

up there in the skies that called
those dreams deceived and flawed,
calling again with the weakening sun
today's strength once under your thumb

such magic within mighty recovery
driving afar - an old discovery,
riding waves within your grasp
unforgettable till the last

memorable times standing still
beyond health and loss of will,
a little damaged there's no doubt
though regret's seldom about

unfolding trance-like desire,
tabla sound, earth moon and fire
beautiful burning memory
plaid music succeeded by grigori

testimony to such spirit fortis
life's soul searching iugis
brightness radiates belief
a sweetened, scarred relief

lauren6

The Glass Man

By Martin Sorrell

When a young man learns that he was adopted, his life falls apart and he develops what was formerly known as the Glass Delusion, a state of profound anxiety now associated with severe depression.

With Cark Prekopp, Saskia Reeves, Barbara Flynn, Stephen Perring. Interviews with Andrew Solomon and Mark and Patricia Tranter.

Music by Neil Sorrell; producer/director Sara Davies.

I've just listened to this play, and became inticed by some of the details within.

A fascinating play, thoroughly enjoyed it!

Musician breaks new ground with glass composition. For musician Neil Sorrell, it was one of his most unusual assignments – to create 15 minutes of music, using only the sounds of glass.

Dr Sorrell, a senior lecturer in the University of York's Department of Music, was asked to create the music for a radio play his brother, Martin, had written about an unusual medical condition that caused sufferers to believe they were turning to glass.

The 'glass delusion' - a state of profound anxiety now associated with severe depression - was relatively common in the Middle Ages. King Charles VI of France was a sufferer and had iron ribs sewn into his clothing to protect himself in case of a fall while in 1610, Cervantes wrote a novella The Glass Graduate about the condition.

Martin Sorrell, who is Professor of French at Exeter University, has set his play The Glass Man, chronicling a young man's affliction with the condition, in the present day. He approached his brother to write the music and Neil Sorrell took up the challenge, though with a limited budget and a tight deadline, he decided on a novel approach.

Dr Sorrell said: "I didn't want to use normal instruments. I decided that using the sounds that could be created by glass would give the music an other-worldy quality. If it had been done on normal instruments, it would have sounded banal and naïve."

After sketching out his musical ideas, Dr Sorrell set about gathering his 'instruments' including wine glasses, large vessels from the University's Department of Chemistry and even the inside of a vacuum flask. He enlisted the help of second-year postgraduate student in the Department of Music, Chilean Felipe Otondo, to act as recording engineer.

"I started producing sounds using the glass and recorded them with Felipe which gave me a scale of notes to work with. It was very satisfying and very creative but a bit of white-knuckle ride towards the end when the deadline was fast approaching!"

It took 24 hours of studio time to produce 15 minutes of music.

Morning all.
What does Tuesday, December 6th mean for you?

For me, it is the day I must get my flu jab, the time of which has, perhaps, sensibly been witheld. I must just 'turn-up and wait for a slot'. Hmm, that's helpful, is the cure better than the course? Maybe, maybe not, because all those around me have streaming colds, and more worryingly, their doctor's told them, "Oh, I've never seen a cold like this before"!! Well, I hope I never see a doctor like that. Is it honesty, or acquiescence on behalf of the doctor's?

Fortunately, my doctor is not like that, he is indeed brilliant, informative with regards my condition, and open about timescales, in stark contrast to my local hospital who refuse to let-on that it's even open to the public. My doctor, Polish by birth, always seems considerate, and genuinly pleased when something improves, and offers assurance to the patient, his time seemingly given professionally and assuredly. He's the only doctor I wish to see.

One note to add though, because this year I've been such a regular, seated there in the surgery's newly fitted feng-shui-influenced waiting room, the adjoining (pharmacy) Vietnamese pharmacist, who speaks French, saw my mother last week, and asked her, "How's your son, I haven't seen him for a while, is he OK?" ('is he still alive?' I think he meant), to which my mother chuckled, and answered, simply, "yes, he's OK". It's indeed ironic that my abscence from daily morning surgery is a cause of concerted worry! It was heart-warming actually!!

My dream last night, involved my mother and I gathering-up stray chickens, in my childhood home. (We really did keep chickens and geese, 52 at the peak, until foxes took two cockerels away, the rest massacred in the most heinous, bloody way imaginable), and it centered on our cantankerous neighbour who, in real life, would wonder our garden by night, setting up eel nets all over our river frontage, and act with such violent unpredictability, it scared even the cats. One time, my father and I were sawing down a small ash tree, that was disfigured by the 1987 hurricane, and also just one foot from a perfectly healthy large ash tree, when said neighbour came lurching down his garden with an air rifle, and just like The Simpsons, my father sent me up the tree to saw, to face the music, as he remained safely out of view. (The tree was, incidently, on OUR side of the boundary, and opened by the hurricane rather like a half-eaten banana). Neighbour set out his casus belli and ordered me to stop, with the footnote, "...or else I'll cut you up like custard", a sentence I'll never forget. My father then interceeded and a slanging-match ensued, which is exactly where my dream was staged. However, in the dream, I was planting many trees, and also revisiting the dozens I had planted in real life, beside 'custard's' boundary. I of course encountered custard, who was fishing and still irritated by my presence. What's a dream when it's already happened??

Last night's Indian takeaway, by the way, was Chicken Bhuna, Eastern Bangladeshi style, and very delicious. It was actually the first time I tried this particular restaurant, and is one I'll try again soon.

My picnic friend sent me mail today, she told me, "I never said this before, but you have beautiful eyes"...oh. August was a while ago, but now she tells me. She told me also, that Shizuoka's temperature fell to 1 degree this morning, after Japan had enjoyed a mild autumn...I remember the same last year, when I was there, it seemed like summer in early November, (the mid twenties celsius), and suddenly plummeted to frosty mornings a couple of weeks later.

Outside, in Norwich, it is a familiar shade of fog-grey.
How's your day my friends?

~~~

Congreve and Delaval have at last prevailed on Sir Godfrey Kneller to intreat me to let him draw my picture for nothing; but I know not yet when I shall sit.- It is such monstrous rainy weather, that there is no doing with it.
-Swift, December 6th, 1710

~~~

Music: Dust: Creatures (Agent K remix)