5 passages language work —— nuria p.
THU 25 January 43
43. A day at the seaside. (p. 206) - 1. Coming home (p. 15)
TUE 30 January
2. Help
(p. 19) 3. Well, Dr, I was just trying to lie down (p. 23
THU 1 Febr
4.
Take me out to the ball park. 27 - 5. Dumb and dumber. (p. 31) -
TUE 6 February
6. Drug culture
(p. 35) 7. Mail Call. (p. 39) -
00001 coming home
- I HAVE BEEN QUIETLY, EVEN GAMELY, REASSESSING POINT NUMBER THREE.
- AFTER SUCH AN ABSENCE IS A SURPRISINGLY UNSETTLING BUSINESS
- MOVING HOME AFTER MANY YEARS AWAY IS LIKE THAT IN MOST RESPECTS, AN ODD BLEND OF THE COMFORTINGLY FAMILIAR AND ODDLY UNKNOWN.
- REALLY, I COULD HARDLY HAVE FELT MORE FOREIGN IF I HAD STOOK THERE DRESSED IN LEDERHOSEN.
- JUST BRING EXTRA MONEY FOR ROAD MAPS AND REMEMBER TO ASK FOR SPACKLE.
COMING
HOME
It
talks that he read in a book things he could do in life and he chose one of
them: go home.
He
had been doing this lately. A year ago he went from England to States with his family.
After
nearly two decades, he found that everything had changed.
He
had left as a youth and was returning in middle age.
He
felt very strange, specially doing shopping.
In
fact, although he was from America, he was very happy in Britain and he neves
stopped thinking of America as home. He thought he felt more like a native of his own country where
he lived.
soon
he enjoyed reencountering those things he had grown up with, but he had
largely forgotten.
Then
he admitted he had been wrong and he could go home again, just some thing has changed.
0004
take me out to the ball park
- FULL OF DELICIOUSLY SCATTERED MICRO-MOMENTS OF REAL ACTION
- I HAVE NEVER FELT ANYTHING SO STARTLINGLY NOT LIKE I EXPECTED IT TO FEEL
- I WALKED AROUND FOR FOUR HOURS ON WOBBLY LEGS … AND VOWED NEVER AGAIN TO DO ANYTHING SO FOOLISH AND PAINFUL
- YOU DON'T HAVE TO BE A BRAIN SURGEON TO WORK OUT THAT IF…
- IT IS ALL IMMENSELY COMPLICATED BUT ALWAYS IN THE END THEY DOGGEDLY MANAGE TO COME UP SHORT.
- THEY HAVE BEEN DOING THIS, RELIABLE AND EFFICIENTLY, FOR OVER HALF A
- CENTURY.
- THERE IS NO ROOM FOR SENTIMENT IN SOMETHING AS WILDLY LUCRATIVE AS AN AMERICAN SPORT. I HAVEN'T SPACE HERE TO ELUCIDATE ALL THE MISGUIDED THINGS THEY HAVE DONE TO MY BELOVED GAME IN THE PAST.
- GENERALLY THESE WERE DANK AND CREAKY (BALL PARKS), BUT THEY HAD CHARACTER.
- NOW THE OWNERS WANT TO TEAR IT DOWN AND BUILD A NEW STADIUM.
TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALL PARK
Difference between
baseball and cricket.
All are games which
involves balls and bats.
He prefers baseball, because
he played as a boy.
Once, when he was a
boy, after watching football on TV he thought he could do it and he flicked the
ball casually into the net with his head. He had a big red circle and word mitre imprinted on
his forehead. It was painful.
Now the Worls Series
has just started and it is the annual baseball contest between the champion of
the American League and the champion of the National League. So, it only involves two teams.
But they are not the
two best teams in baseball, because each league is
divided into three
divisions of various teams.
But every team (good
or not) has the chance to go to the World Series.
But Chicago Cubs never
manage to qualify even under a system as magnificently accommodatins as
this.
They haven't been in a
World Serier since, he believes, 1938.
But all the great old
stadiums have been replaced with big characterless, multi-purpose arenas.
There are only four of
theses old parks left. One
is in New England, although the owners wanted to build a new one. He thinks he won't go to the new stadium, but it is
impossible because he is hopelessly addicted to the game.
On the other hand,
Chicago Cubs continue to play at Wrigley Field and when it plays there is one
of the great American experiences.
So, for all that he
thinks that nobody deserves to go to the World Series more than the Chicago
Cubs. But they can't go because
that would spoil their tradition of never going.
So he considers not
easy being a baseball fan.
(note that always de
conclusion or fact is written in the last last pharagraph)
000005
—dumb and dumber
- I AM ALWAYS A LITTLE DUBIOUS ABOUT THESE SURVEYS
- STILL, THERE IS A KIND OF EMPTINESS OF THOUGHT AT LARGE THESE DAYS THAT IS HARD TO OVERLOOK.
- … THE EFFECTS HAVEN'T QUITE WORN OFF.
- IT SOMETIMES FEELS AS IF NEARLY THE WHOLE NATION HAS TAKEN NYTOL AND THAT THE EFFECTS HAVEN'T QUITE WORN OFF.
- I DON'T FOR A MOMENT GHINK THAT AMERICANS ARE INHERENTLY MORE STUPID OR
- BRAIN-DEAD THAN ANYONE ELSE.
- AMERICAN LIFE IS FULL OF THESE LITTLE CRUTCHES, SOMETIMES TO A QUITE ASTONISHING DEGREE.
- IT WAS EXCRUCIATING, BUT HARDLY UNUSUAL.
- THE GIRL WITH CLITIS GOES BY THEN CUCHKLINGLY EXPLAINED THAT…
- I MEANT STATE IN THE RATHER BROADER SENSE OF NATION-STATE
DUMB AND DUMBER
- BUT LET US FINISH WITH MY FAVOURITE INANITY OF THE MOMENT
After
some organization tested American high school seniors they realised they didn't
know anything about general culture.
He
is always a little dubious about these surveys. In general there is a kind of emptiness of
thought at large these days that is hard to overlook. This phenomenon is now widely
known
as the Dumbing Down of America.
He
explains that in documentaries the comments are stupid and it happens all the
time.
He
was recently on a flight and he read the airline magazine. There was a "Letter from the
President" explainign how they had just conducted a survey of their
customers to find out
their
needs. In that case they wanted
to arrived on time and with their luggage.
He
found it funny.
Americans
tends to specify the country as well as the city in datelines. For example they use "London,
England".
Even
he refers to a politician (I think) he used a "strange" sentence in
his campaign, although he was right: "It's about the future, because
that's where we're going".
Everything has to be
translated to a simply way / words.
(12 inches = 1 foot)
00006 DRUG CULTURE
- TO COME IN A BLURRY FRAME OF MIND
- …BUT YOU WOULD BE SMILING AGAIN, IF WANLY
- …FINISH THE DAY HAVING THE TIME OF THIS LIFE AT A BOWLING ALLEY
- THE DRIFT OF ALL THIS WAS…
- …WHEREAS AMERICAANS WILL SETTLE FOR NOTHING LESS
- A MAN GRIMACES AFTER A POOR SHOT AND MUTTERS TO HIS PARTNER
- IN THE GLOVEBOX OF HIS CAR
- … THAT LETS YOU GET OUT THERE
- ANOTHER MORE RAKISHLY ASKS,…
- THE IDEA IS THAT YOU READ THE ADVERT, THEN BADGET YOUR DOCTOR…
DRUG
CULTURE
He
lives in US and he miss coming in from the pub about midnight in a blurry frame
of mind and watching Open University on TV.
Now
he would not find the same on TV.
He is not sure, but he would find a guy wearing an old-fashioned clothes
and who is talking about something he had no idea. Except once,
he saw an unexpected diverting documentary. The gist of the programme was that the same product
had to be sold in entirely different ways in the two markets: England
(cold
relief) and US (instantaneous relief).
The
drift of all this was that the British do not expect over-the-counter drugs to
change their lives.
To conclude, he said that Americans
expect to feel more or less perfect all the time.
Americans spends a lot on medicines of
all types, but the really amazing change lately is that now even prescription
drugs are advertised.
The
idea with the adverts is that you read and then ask your doctor to prescribe it
for you.
So
readers are deciding what medications are best for them. So it seems that Americans know a
great deal about drugs.
He
does not agree whether this obsession with health i worth it, but he thinks is
better to achieve harmony drinking six pints of beer and watching Open
University.
000007 MAIL CALL
- …GRAND BUT NOT FLASHY,…
- THE COUNTER STAFF ARE ALWAYS BRISKLY EFFICIENT AND PLEASED TO GIVE…
- THE EMPLOYEES HAD HUNG UP BANNERS, PUT OUT A LONG TABLE WITH A NICE CHECKERED CLOTH…
- … WHO SPED THEIR DAYS MANGLING LETTERS AND WHIMSICALLY SENDING MY ROYALTY CHEQUES TO…
- I WAS WON OVER UTTERLY
- … THAT AS I STROLLED HOME FROM MY ERRAND, WIPING CRUMBS FROM MY FACE, MY THOUGHTS TOWARDS AMERICAN LIFE IN GENERAL...
- …WELL, AMONG ALL THIS CLUTTER AND DETRITUS WAS A FORLORN AND MANGLED LETTER…
- MAT és bústia???
- … THAT SOME PUCKISH SOUL HAD ONCE SENT A LETTER ADDRESSED, WITH PLAYFUL AMBIGUITY, TO…
- … TO SUGGEST A NEED FOR CAUTION WITH REGARD TO THE POSTAL SERVICE AND ITS
- SLEUTHING ABILITIES.
- NOW JUST TO GIVE THIS PLAINTIVE TALE A LITTLE HEARTWARMING PERSPECTIVE, LET ME TELL YOU THAT NOT LONG BEFORE I DEPARTED…
MAIL
CALL
Living in a smal,
old-fashioned New England town you have a small, old-fashioned post office.
American post offices deal
only with postal matters, not pensions, car tax,…
But here there are never
any queues and you go quick.
Once a year every American
post office has a Customer Appreciation Day, when the employees give pastries
freely to customers.
He appreciates this
gesture and he see the postal employees like highly trained individuals.
One day he received a
letter which he had sent to a fiend in California forty-one days ago.
It indicated Insufficient
Address.
He could not believe it
because he had recently read an article in a magazine explaining that postal
authorities in American had worked out that a letter had to be read different
in order to find its receiver; in that case it was a letter with a poor and
careless address written on it.
He point out an example
that before leaving Englanc, the Royal Mail had brought him, within 48 hours of
its posting in London, a letter.
He complains that the service won't help him out when he
cannot remember a street name (that was what was left in his returned letter).
When you move form one
country to anothers you have to accept that there are some things that are
better and some things that are worse.
But he thinks about the
day of the pastries and he feels happy because a part from all what have happened he did get a free
doughnut, so on balance he guesses he is happy.
what have happened he did
get a free doughnut, so on balance he guesses he is happy.
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