Sean Connery | August 25th 1930 - October 31st 2020 | The First OO7 Hangs Up His Walther PPK

It was inevitable. As I read of Sir Sean Connery's ailing health in recent years, I would check BBC.com for news of his passing. But then, I would also think that he'd last another five, maybe even ten years. 

I was in bed reading. It was just past midnight, Sunday November 1st when my wife and I heard two rapid knocks on our bedroom door before my daughter burst in and said; "I just read on social media that Sean Connery died! I didn't want to tell you, but I didn't want you to read it tomorrow and be upset."

Slightly stunned by the news, I sat there thinking about it, letting it sink in. I looked up BBC.com. Nothing yet. I checked Instagram. News was already coming through, with links to comments by Connery's son, Jason.

Sean Connery passed away in his sleep, aged 90, at his house in the Bahamas. Many of his family members were there. It's what I call a million-dollar ending. We should all be so lucky to check out that way. 

While Roger Moore was the Bond that I grew up with, and the one who made me sit up and take notice of this Bond fellow, it was Connery's earlier portrayal of OO7 that turned me into a life-long Bond fan. Reading the Fleming books a few years later, in the early '80s, Connery was the Bond that I pictured coming off the page. The dark hair, cruel good looks, and cold manner when on the job were embodied by Connery in his first Bond flick Dr No (Dir: Terence Young, United Artists, 1962). This was honed a great deal by Terence Young, who taught Connery about fine tailoring, fine dining, and other attributes that made up the literary character of James Bond. 

Certainly, Sean Connery had his Scots accent rather than a British one, but it was a deep voice which gave him a commanding and confident presence on-screen. He moved like a panther, as has often been said, and he had a certain magnetism about him, all of which helped give this first Bond film a promising start to what the Producers hoped would be a franchise. 

I was at the Designing OO7 - Fifty Years of Bond Style exhibition seven years ago and, after seeing various exhibits of props from the Bond movies, I continued on to a room to my right. I parted a beaded curtain which led into a large room that had been done up to look like a casino. As I stepped inside, I saw a roulette table and up above, there were a few large-screen monitors showing scenes from various Bond films and I happened to walk in just as Sylvia Trench (Eunice Gayson, the FIRST Bond Girl) asks her opponent his name while playing against him in a high-stakes game of chemin de fer. 

Connery's introduction in this scene is the stuff of movie legend and his almost world-weary delivery of his name has been much used by other Bond actors, but never bettered. 

Ian Fleming was less than impressed with the casting of Connery. He wanted somebody like David Niven or Rex Harrison for the part. Cary Grant was offered the role and he said he'd do one picture, but would not commit to a series. Much as I love Cary Grant, he was too old for the part, as were Niven and Harrison. Sure, they were terribly English and all that, but literary Bond was a hard man, and the role required a certain level of physicality. And Bond had to look like he could kill a man with his bare hands. Niven couldn't have done it. Casting a younger and virtually unknown actor like Connery was the right move, in my view. 

Fleming had said; I wanted Commander Bond, not some sort of overgrown stuntman.

In the end, Fleming was happy with the choice of Connery in the role. There are photos which show him conversing with Connery on-set and, as the film was shot partly in Jamaica, there are pics of the cast having lunch with Fleming (presumably at his house Goldeneye in Oracabessa). Fleming published his next Bond book, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, in 1963 and in it, he gave readers a little more of Bond's backstory. Bond's father Andrew was a Scot. This was a nod to Connery as, by the time filming of Dr No was half completed, he had grown to be happy with the film-maker's choice of Connery for the role. As the film had a total budget of $1,000,000, the producers had to make the money go as far as it could. 

The film grossed 6.9 million dollars. 

Part of Connery's appeal in the role of Bond was his smart-assery, something which has been sadly lacking in the Daniel Craig Bonds. Connery could deliver a line with just a slight arching of an eyebrow and a purr in his voice. In You Only Live Twice (Dir: Lewis Gilbert, 1967), we find Bond tied to a chair while Helga Brandt (Karin Dor) stands over him holding a scalpel.

"I've got you right where I want you", she says.

"Well enjoy yourself", he replies. 

I recall seeing this film on DVD one night and my wife remarked with a smile; "He's so arrogant."  

In the unofficial Bond film Never Say Never Again (Dir: Irwin Kershner, 1983), there's a stupid scene when Bond goes up against Maximilian Largo (Klaus Maria Brandauer) by playing against him in a video game. A video game!

To make it all seem more adult, they play for money and the game's joysticks give off an electric shock every time a player loses. As the monetary stakes get higher, so do the electric shocks. 

Anyway, Bond wins the game and donates his tens of thousands of winnings to some charity. Largo says to him; "Tell me, Mr Bond, are you as gracious a loser as you are a winner?" 

Connery-Bond replies; "I wouldn't know know, I've never lost." 

 

It's lines like these that are missing from the current Bond films and, even the quips from the Pierce Brosnan-era films seem dated or poorly written. The humour in the Roger Moore Bonds was a product of its time, in the era of bawdy British comedy such as The Benny Hill Show and the Carry-On films, which is a shame because given some smart, witty lines, Moore could have done a lot with them.

Connery did five Bond films in the Sixties before growing tired of the role and fearing that he'd be typecast. He announced his resignation from the role half-way through filming of You Only Live Twice. The Japanese press, whose photographers followed him into a men's room, probably help him make up his mind. He was lured back to the role for 1971's Diamonds Are Forever and donated his 1.2 million dollar salary to set up the Scottish International Education Trust, which was designed to bestow grants to artists in Scotland. Connery's contract also stipulated that United Artists would fund two films of his choice. 

He went on to make The Offence, directed by Sidney Lumet. It was a police procedural about a detective who questions a paedophile about his recent crimes and over the course of the film, Connery's detective begins to lose his grip. Working again for Lumet, Connery went on to make The Anderson Tapes, a caper film where a thief's entire plan for a large-scale robbery has been recorded through wire taps and surveillance cameras. 

A few duds followed in the 1970s, but he did a great film in 1975 called The Man Who Would Be King, co-starring Michael Caine, and directed by John Huston. Based on a Rudyard Kipling short story, it concerns two British ex-soldiers in the 1880s who wind up in Afghanistan and one of them is mistaken for a god. It was one of Connery's better films from that era. Along with Robin And Marian (Dir: Richard Lester, 1976), in which he played an ageing Robin Hood, returned from the Crusades to find the Sheriff of Nottingham (Robert Shaw, cool!) still running the town and Maid Marian (Audrey Hepburn) is now a nun. 

He also did some ensemble parts in films such as Murder On The Orient Express (1974) and A Bridge Too Far (1977).

Aside from being lured back to the role of Bond for Never Say Never Again, the early '80s was a lack-lustre time for Connery until 1986, when he starred as 12th century Franciscan monk William of Baskerville who ventures to an abbey in Northern Italy for a meeting with papal representatives, but is soon lured into investigating a series of odd deaths among the clergy at the abbey. Directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud, this French-Italian co-production didn't do so well in the US, but garnered much of its box office receipts in Europe. Connery delivers a great performance in this film. Another notable standout is Ron Perlman, who would later find success in Sons of Anarchy on the FX network. 

Personally, I think Connery should have gotten an Oscar for this film, but this was not to be. For another year. It was his role as 1930s Chicago beat cop Jimmy Malone in The Untouchables (Brian De Palma, 1987) that Connery would score a Best Supporting Actor statuette. Granted, his short "You wanna get Capone?" monologue is nicely written and beautifully delivered. You get the sense that Malone knows how his town operates and is fully aware of why he's still a uniform cop pounding the streets at his age. Other roles soon followed and while some weren't Oscar-worthy material (The Presidio), they ensured that newer audiences got a glimpse of the persona that made up the first James Bond of the silver screen. Luckily, we got him as Indiana Jones' dad in Spielberg's Indian Jones and The Last Crusade in 1989. And we also had The Hunt For Red October and The Russia House, both in 1990.

 

He later appeared opposite Nicholas Cage in Michael Bay's The Rock (1996), a wasted effort in my book. Here we have the guy who played Bond, and it wasn't utilised to its fullest extent. Mind you, this was probably to be expected in a Michael Bay movie. 

Connery's last film was The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Dir: Stephen Norrington, 2003). By all accounts it wasn't a great film. I can vouch for that. The CGI in some later scenes was awful. This film was a gruelling exercise for Connery and it was enough to convince him to retire from acting. Spielberg tried to lure him out of retirement five years later for Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of The Crystal Skull. No luck. Peter Jackson wanted him to play Gandalf, but Connery wasn't interested in staying in New Zealand for a few years of filming. 

 

Sean Connery came out of retirement (sort of) to provide the voice of James Bond in EA Games' rendition of From Russia With Love in 2005 for the Playstation 2, Game Cube and X Box consoles. It was great to see his younger likeness on screen, albeit in a video game, and while it was his voice that we heard in the game, it was older Connery's voice. Still, it had some bite left in it. He also gave the makers of the game some insight into how Bond should fire a gun in the game, based on the weapons training that he received way back in the early 1960s. 

His last job was another voice-over gig for an animated film called Sir Billi (Dir: Sacha Hartmann, 2012). It wasn't well received. 

 

Still, I choose to remember Sean Connery firstly as the original James Bond on the big screen, and then as an actor in some great films of the Sixties (Marnie, A Fine Madness, The Hill), Seventies and Eighties. He grew up poor, and had his share of stresses - he joined the navy at 16 and was discharged at 19 due to duodenal ulcers. I know what that's like. I had a duodenal ulcer from the age of twenty-three to the age of thirty-six. I think he got to an age where he had made a success of his life and chose to do whatever he wanted. That's one sure-fire way to avoid any stress. 

It was Connery's Bond that made me a Bond fan. In no small way did his portrayal of OO7 ensure the success and longevity of the series. Here we are, 58 years later, and they're still making Bond movies (that we're still waiting to see, thank-you Covid-19). 

 

So, I'm grateful that Sean Connery existed. I'm saddened to hear of his passing, but I'm heartened by the peaceful way he went out. 

I hope he knew of the legacy that he leaves behind. Sure, Bond became a millstone around his neck at times, but whenever the cameras would catch him in the crowd at a Wimbledon Tournament, the crowd would clap and cheer. 

And the smile on his face always seemed genuine. 

Thanks for everything, Mr Connery. Your work has brought me much pleasure. 

RIP, and condolences to those close to you. 

 

 

                                         Fantastic artwork by Dave Seguin

Thanks for reading!

Monday, September 28th, 2020 - Goodbye Mrs Bond, Oh My Dear Dussy, DVD Culling, Happy Birthday Princess! + Recent Wristwatches

This month saw the passing of Dame Diana Rigg, at the age of 82. She starred in the 1960s British TV series The Avengers and in the later seasons of Game of Thrones in the past decade, as well as appearing on stage and screen throughout her career. 

picture taken from https://www.radiotimes.com Wow, I've never seen this photo before. Cool!

But any Bond fan worth his PPK will know that she played the one woman that Bond has ever married (so far) and therefore she occupies a rare spot in OO7 lore. Rigg starred as Contessa Teresa 'Tracy' Di Vicenzo, the troublesome and wayward daughter of Corsican crime boss Marc-Ange Draco and she delivered a performance that was equal parts strong and brittle.

In their attempts to lure Sean Connery back after he quit the role following the release of 1967's You Only Live Twice, EON Productions offered to cast Brigitte Bardot as Tracy which, in my view, would have been sensational. I mean, sure, Bond would quit the Secret Service to marry somebody who looked like Bardot, but I think Rigg's acting chops were definitely sharper and while Bardot would have been cool - assuming she said 'yes' to the role - I think the part required somebody that we the audience could fall in love with too. You had to believe that Bond would drop everything to marry a girl like her. And Diana Rigg made you believe it.

I'm 54 years old and am now at the age where all the formative characters from the early films that helped make me a James Bond fan are getting older and leaving this life. Roger Moore died in 2017 and some of the major Bond Girls also left us in the past couple of years, most notably Honor Blackman and Tania Mallet, who both appeared in the classic Goldfinger, and Claudine Auger, who starred in Thunderball, as well as Nadja Regin (From Russia With Love and Goldfinger) and Molly Peters (Thunderball). 

Speaking of Bond,  the new trailer for No Time To Die was released in the first week of September.

As you may know, this is Daniel Craig's swansong in the role. No news on who'll be the next OO7, but that hasn't stopped the river of speculation. 

Henry Cavill has once again been mentioned, as has Tom Hardy, fuelling further speculation that Batman/Inception/Tenet director Christopher Nolan could be attached to helm the next movie. Watch the first ten minutes of The Dark Knight Rises or the last 20 minutes of Inception to get an idea of how Nolan would handle a Bond movie. Let him write the screenplay too, I'm begging you. 

I think Henry Cavill would be good, but Tom Hardy just strikes me as too close to Daniel Craig in terms of build and screen presence. I would love to see Sam Claflin (below) as Bond, as he has a look that would be closer to Ian Fleming's original template in the novels. 

In Fleming's book's, Bond is fit, but he's not got the kind of build that Daniel Craig has. He has a leaner physique, more like a swimmer than a body-builder. Claflin has a nice look about him and at age 34, he could probably handle three or four Bond movies over a 12 or fifteen year period.

Anyway, casting for the next Bond is so far away at the moment that it's not really worth considering. As is sometimes the case, some new actor may appear on the horizon in 2022, an actor who hasn't yet made a name for himself. I'm sure there's a youngish English actor out there who's just completed a tv series that's yet to air. Let's say this tv series then becomes big, like a Downton Abbey or Sherlock Holmes. Next thing you know, this actor is the talk of the town. He appears in a film or two and he's soon being touted as a potential Bond. It's happened often enough. 

Anyway, Bond fan must wear Bond watch, so I had the Rolex Submariner 5513 on my wrist in recent weeks;

I was standing outside a shopping centre, wearing a mask on a sunny Spring day, when I glanced down at my watch and thought it might make for a decent photo. While I waited for my wife to finish some grocery shopping, I took a few snaps. As an aside, I have to say that we've been doing more incidental trips to the supermarket to stock up on supplies during this Covid-19 lock-down. Certainly spent more on groceries than usual. The upside is that I filled my car's fuel tank on August 5th (approx.) and it's still only half-empty as of today, September 21st.                                                                 Swings and roundabouts, I suppose. 

 

At the time of writing (Sept 20th), Covid-19 cases here in Victoria have shown significant decreases.

Sept 1st - 73

Sept 5th - 71

Sept 10th - 48

Sept 15th - 46

Sept 20th - 13

It has varied a little up and down throughout this month, but the signs are there that numbers are falling, hopefully to the extent that the current lock-down, due to be softened on September 28th, may be lifted further, to allow more people to return to work. 

Anyway, wait and see.

We took the cats to the vet for their routine shots. I mentioned that Dussy, our older cat, was drinking a little more water than normal in recent months. They told me they'd take a blood and urine sample to check for renal dysfunction and diabetes, since this cat of ours is now around thirteen years old (we think?) and they can be susceptible to these types of issues at that age. 

We got a call from the vet a couple of days later. Our feline has the early stages of renal failure. Her kidneys aren't operating as smoothly as they should in removing waste and purifying the blood. Her condition will deteriorate over time, but we can change her diet in the meantime and this should give her anywhere between six to twelve months or as long as two to three years. 

My wife had her mobile phone on speaker as the vet was explaining all of this. I sat there in stunned silence and then I turned around and saw Madame sitting at my feet, looking up at me and my eyes welled up. I had some questions that I wanted to ask the vet, but I knew my voice would break if I spoke.

I spent a few mopey days dealing with other stuff, such as work emails, chores around the house and such, and then wrote down a few questions for the vet. I called her later in the week and had a brief discussion about where to go from here. She stated that Dussy (also known as 'Wispy'...and a thousand other names that she doesn't answer to) would require a prescription diet consisting of protein-rich canned food which would slow down the degeneration of her kidneys thereby extending her life-span. I still felt bad after hanging up the phone. 

Later in the day, I went to a nearby pet store to buy some of this prescribed food. They had a vet there and she ran me through the feeding portions for this new diet. She also told me not to worry so much about this. A change in diet can add more years to the cat's life than my current vet had stated. Madame may last another five years or more. One fellow over on a wristwatch forum that I visit told me that his cat lived another ten years after a diagnosis of renal failure.  He said his cat outlived the vet! 

My family also reassured me that Madam Dussy is still as spry as she ever was. She's definitely more active than our other cat, Bowie. So, we've been introducing this new food to her over the past few days and she's having no problems with it. She currently weighs 3.15 kilos, which is a slight drop since her last visit to the vet. The idea is to get her up to 4kg and then maintain it. 

We'll see how she goes over the next few months. 

I think she suspects something. They're trying to fatten me up! Trying to ruin my svelte, youthful figure.

I wore the Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean at some point;

The Olympia SF was sold (see previous post). I like the look of it, and the fact that Fleming used one at his house in Jamaica, but I've always found Olympia super-slim typewriters a little loud and rough to type on. My Tower Chieftain III (a Smith-Corona Skyriter by any other name) is a smoother machine, and I still have my Olivetti Lettera 32 - my high school weapon of choice, that I bought brand new in 1981 - and the circa 1958 Groma Kolibri. 

Then, I looked at some other typewriters that I thought of moving along. I laid out the circa 1952 Olivetti Studio;

I really like the design of this typewriter. It's screams 'wartime Italy' , since its design stems back to the Studio 42 model from, yep, 1942. I bet Vittorio De Sica hammered out a few screenplays on one of these throughout this career. The ribbon cover lifts up like the bonnet (hood) of a 1960 Alfa Romeo Sprint (hinged at the front of the lid, rather than the back). This is a solidly-built typewriter and, despite the racket, I love how the keys feel when I type on it. But, man, is this typewriter loud! I could get the platen re-covered by J.J. Short in the US, but I have other priorities. And I suspect that if I ever send a platen to get re-rubberised, the smart thing to do would be to send a few of them in one hit.
 

 And the other typer that I hauled out was the circa 1951 Olympia SM2;

I loaded a sheet of paper into both of them and started typing. I love how the Olivetti looks, but it has a hard touch to the keys and the typeslugs are loud as they hit the platen. The Olympia SM2 is wonderful to type with. I also have a SM3 model from 1954 which types just as nicely. 

So far, it feels like a case of brains vs beauty. I think in the end, the Olivetti will go, but I don't think I'm ready to let it go just yet. This is as much an exercise in de-cluttering as it is anything else. As I've said before, if it ain't being used, it's just taking up space. I have fourteen typewriters, and I'm trying to get it down to a respectable dozen.     

Possibly a Baker's Dozen, the way I'm going. I think I'll have to lay them all out and have a bash at the keys on all of them. I already know that my 1936 Smith-Corona Standard types a little rough, but it's charisma is through the roof!

Have to say I'm really enjoying Any Human Heart, by William Boyd. The protagonist, Logan Mountstuart, has gotten out of Oxford and has tried his hand at writing a few books and selling artwork as World War II looms. Told in the first person, the character of Mountstuart comes off the page, with all of his observations, quirks and flaws.

Okay, I have a lot of DVDs. I haven't counted them but there are quite a few that I've accumulated over the last fifteen or twenty years. Movies, TV show box-sets, Japanese animes, foreign films, etc. As I continue to (slowly) de-clutter here and there, I thought it was time to do something about them. I purchased a DVD ripping software app and began loading films onto a 1Tb portable hard drive. These are films that have no Director's commentaries or worthy (in my view) extras. A lot of them are movies from the '80s, such as The Money Pit, The Fabulous Baker Boys, Bull Durham, Midnight Run. This collection of discs filled up a 6.5 foot tall DVD shelf, two drawers of the tv cabinet, and a wooden chest that was in a corner of the lounge room. Something had to be done. 

Aside from the portable hard drive, I bought some plastic sleeves off eBay. These can hold up to three discs, as well as the cover insert from the DVD's jewel case. 

I also bought some small paper envelopes for CDs. These would be used for the extra discs of any double or triple-disc set. I was then going to hunt around for plastic tubs or boxes that could hold a stack of these DVD sleeves. To my surprise, I found that a standard cardboard wine box would hold anywhere from 70 to 85 films, depending on how many extras discs they came with. Perfect. 

We have another tall DVD shelf in the spare room and that's loaded with music CDs. My wife was getting rid of her entire CD collection and I suggested that I could burn her favourite albums into iTunes and then load them onto the 160 Gb iPod that I bought for her about five years ago that she's never used. One-Sixty Gig should hold every CD in the house. I plan on slipping my CDs into plastic sleeves as well, since a lot of my music is made up of hard-to-find movie scores and soundtracks, a lot of Rolling Stones, Bowie, Springsteen and The Beatles. This is all a big job, but when it's all done, the leftover DVD and CD collections should all fit onto the 6.5 foot tall DVD shelf in the spare room, hopefully with room to spare.

The fiddly part of this task is the TV series boxed-set collections. All seven (or is it eight?) seasons of the Kiefer Sutherland series 24 comprise of 55 discs! Add other shows, such as Mad Men, Alias and The Sopranos and you can see that I'll have my work cut out for me. Thank God I never started buying The Simpsons! I've already started loading Magnum PI onto the hard drive. Once that's done, I may try putting all eight seasons on eBay. Got a soft-spot for this show. More than likely, I'll probably end up watching every episode over the next few years and then delete them from the hard drive. 

So, at the moment, I have a lot of empty DVD jewel cases lying around and a bag full of movies to get rid of, with more on the way as I continue to burn onto the hard drive and/or store into sleeves. Then, the plan is to take them to a nearby nursing home and offer it to them free if they have a TV room for their residents. Failing that, they'll all go to a thrift store. 

Now, the only wild card with this whole process is the portable hard drive. From what I've read, these can degrade over time, rendering their contents useless. Well, I guess I'll just take my chances. Maybe transfer the contents onto a new drive in three to five years or so,  

I wore the Omega Seamaster 300 WatchCo edition while working on this momentous act of folly;

And also the Movember Edition Oris Divers SixtyFive, on a black NATO strap;

My daughter turned 18 this month.  The years have flown by. We made her favourite meal for her birthday (lasagna) and I gave her her presents. She's had an eye on my Pelikan M400 fountain pen for some time, but as you may know, fountain pens require a little more care and feeding than a basic ballpoint pen, so I got her the ballpoint equivalent of my 'milk & honey' pen. And I got a leather NATO strap for her to put on her other Oris watch.

 

 

And then, after dinner, I mixed her up a Grasshopper cocktail;

30ml of Green Crème de Menthe          

30ml of Crème de Cacao                

30ml of cream                                   

Put all three ingredients into a cocktail shaker filled with ice and shake for 20 to 30 seconds and then pour into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a sprinkle of grated chocolate. Serve. 

It basically tastes like a mint-flavoured chocolate bar, but it IS a classic cocktail. Probably goes very nicely with an ice cream dessert. So, she had it along with a tartufo.  

Not a bad way to spend your 18th Birthday in lock-down.

I picked up a $40 bracelet off eBay, to try it out on the Tudor Oyster hand-wound watch that I recently had serviced. I opted to try out a 'straight-edged' bracelet because I already have a couple which feature a curved edge and they just don't fit against the watch's case properly.  Straight-edge bracelets were used on watches during the 1950s. Yes, they leave a gap between case and bracelet, just like a leather strap would, but I have no quibbles with this, as the watch dates back to somewhere between 1958 and say, 1963. This bracelet suits the watch perfectly. It does feel a little cheap, as any $40 buck steel bracelet might, so I may purchase something similar, in a higher price bracket if I find that this one gets more wear. 

I currently still have two watches that have been repaired and are awaiting collection from the watchmaker. He had to close due to the lock-down, so with a bit of luck, I should be able to go pick them up in the next few weeks. And then, time to put a few watches on eBay. 

Friday, September 25th

                                      This statewide lock-down is due to be lifted in the next few days, subject to Covid cases staying low. The last seven days have shown;

18th - 48    19th - 24     20th - 13    21st - 14     22nd -30     23rd -31     24th -10    25th -17              

Deaths 

          5                7                  5                 2                   3                    5                    2                    8

Difficult to tell if the numbers will subside to single digits for a consistent period of time, signalling that our state has this virus under some sort of control.  Either way, my employer has applied for worker permits so that we can return to work in a limited capacity. I'll be heading in to the office next Thursday and Friday, along with the watchmaker, to tackle the work that has mounted up since August 4th. The other staff will do two-day shifts on other days. This two-day roster may well continue through the rest of October and possibly into November as well. 

The office will be given a deep clean twice daily. I plan to wipe down surfaces before and after touching them, but I also plan on staying at my desk as much as possible, to minimise the amount of surfaces that I touch. No couriers are permitted to visit our office. All deliveries will be sent to our post office box address. We'll still conduct Zoom meetings every morning at 10:30, to keep us all in the loop. Till we get back to some kind of normal, or the 'new' normal, that's how things will be. 

Can't say that I've moved mountains during this lock-down period. Glad to have gotten the DVD task underway and I started exercising also, though not on as regular basis as I'd like. I'll have to work out a proper routine for it. 

Still, the family have been together throughout this time and nobody has picked up an axe and wiped everybody else out. We've all gotten along fine, with only minor fraying of tempers here and there. Not only that, but I filled the tank of my car on August 5th and I still have half a tank left over. The only driving I've done over the past two months has been to the nearby supermarket, staying within the 5 kilometre radius of my house. 

Yessiree, Bob, I'll be glad when this whole mess is over. 

And a couple more watch photos. I also wore the Citizen Eco-Drive Nighthawk this month;

And the Sinn 103 St Sa Chronograph;
 

I hope you've all been well, and thanks for reading!

Stay safe!

Friday June 22nd, 2018 - New Data Laws, RIP Miss Gayson, The Guy Who Stayed In With The Cold & Recent Wristwatches.

Okay, so it's Friday night, June 22nd and I'm sick again. Here's a quick timeline;

May 21st - I went to see my doctor to have a 'flu shot. 

May 27th - I caught a morning session of Avengers | Infinity War and noticed half-way through the movie that the cinema had cranked up the air con. I felt quite chilly for the rest of the film.

Later that evening, my throat felt raspy, like a had a spikey golf ball jammed in it. 

May 28th - Blocked nose, chesty cough, feverish. I end up feeling ragged for the next two weeks. 

June 10th - Feeling better. Back to my old self.

June 16th - Throat begins hurting again, and my lower back aches. Uh-oh, is this now  a 'flu? 

We had the air conditioning attended to at the office recently and it now feels a little too warm every day. One co-worker likes it cold, another likes it hot. End result is that the ambient temperature is all over the place. I wear layers, in an attempt to combat the situation and it works well. When I'm not sick. This time, though, my body temp is having a hard time regulating.

June 18th - Went in to work, though I probably should've stayed home. Same with the next day. It's busy at the moment and, corny as it sounds, I want to go in and do the work, even if I feel bad. 

June 19th - Spent the night coughing and coughing. By one am, my wife suggested the old honey & cinnamon mix. I stumbled to the kitchen, poured two spoons of honey into a small glass, and threw in a couple of liberal shakes of ground cinnamon powder. Then put it into the microwave for 10 seconds. 

I then mixed the cinnamon thoroughly through the softened honey until I had a golden syrup. Then I ate it. 

Sure enough, the coughing stopped a few minutes after I got back into bed. I slowed down my breathing and tried to relax. Not easy. 

June 20th - Called in sick. Stayed home. Slept in. Tried to nap on the couch later in the afternoon, but got a little too cold in there. Went to bed that night and coughed until one am. Then lay awake until 5:00am, trying not to cough. 

This morning - Sent a text to my boss, saying I wouldn't be in today. He replied, telling me not to come back to work until Monday. 

We'll see how I'm faring by then. 

By now, you're all probably aware of the New Data Laws being rolled out across Europe. I don't know what it all means, but I've had this message up on my Blogger dashboard for a few weeks;

I have underlined the confusing part of this message. I hit the "Learn more" tab and then tried to view my blog using a European .com (.co.uk, .co.fr, etc) at the end of my blog's address, but it keeps reverting back to the Australian '.com.au".

So, I'm wondering, if any of you are reading this blog from somewhere in Europe, are you getting the cookies notice somewhere on my blog? Thanks in advance!

The first Bond film, Dr No, was released in 1962. Bond's creator Ian Fleming died two years later. The director, Terence Young, has been gone for almost 25 years. 

However, it always strikes home for me when one of the actors in the early films dies. 

Eunice Gayson died earlier this month at the age of 90. She has the honour of being the First Bond Girl, Sylvia Trench.

She is first seen at the chemin de fer table at a London casino. She stands out because, amid all the men in dinner jackets, she wears a red off-the-shoulder gown.  

Aside from how she looks, she also comes across as very self-assured. Gambling alone, she engages in light reparteé with the unseen stranger across the table, the only worthy opponent in this game, it seems.

The cinematic introduction of James Bond is the stuff of OO7 lore. And, unrealistic spy movies aside, it is considered one of the greatest intros in film history.

But, don't take my word for it (thanks, YouTube!);

 

The next time we see her, she has managed to get into Bond's flat (probably bribed the doorman) and is attempting to slice golf balls into one of Bond's hats...wearing nothing but a pair of high heels and one of Bond's silk pyjama shirts. Bond arrives at the front door and, hearing sounds coming from inside his digs, draws his pistol and bursts in. To be pleasantly surprised.                        Thinking about her character now, she seems like the right kind of girl for 1960s cinematic Bond. Confident, flirty, and sexy as all get-out. She was intended to be a recurring character in the films, the girl back in England whose plans for intimacy with Bond would always be thwarted by his duty to Queen and Country. She appeared in the next film, From Russia With Love, but was never seen again after that. Shame, really. And so, I raise a glass (of orange juice) to you, Miss Gayson. It was performances by people like you that went a long way towards getting big-screen Bond off the ground.

Wristwatch-wise, these are what I've worn in recent weeks;

The Submariner still gets worn sparingly throughout the week and tends to see a little more daylight on the weekends. I'm careful with this one, given that it offers no water-resistance due to its age, but I'm glad that I've gotten to the point where I don't baby it the way I did when I first got it.                                                                Having wanted one for four decades, I knew there'd be a possibility of my treating it with kid gloves, but that's slowly faded since I got it overhauled last year. 

I ran some film through the Yashica Electro 35 GSN that I got recently;

I took the roll of colour film to my local mall to get it developed at Big W. They're like a Kmart or Target store.  The guy behind the counter told me that it would take around two-and-a-half weeks now because they no longer have the machinery to process film on the premises. Damn! Oh well, what choice did I have?                                The eBay Seller keeps sending me automated messages, asking me to leave feedback. I keep replying that I will do so once I check out the photos that I've taken. Seems fair, don't it? Anyway, he can wait.

I've been home since Wednesday. I've had a few very lousy sleeps. Wore the Oris Diver Sixty-Five Movember Edition for most of the week. I spent this morning paying some bills online before parking myself on the couch with a cup of tea and a couple of books. I have about a hundred pages left of Ernst Jünger's account of his experiences as a younger officer in WWI. The book is called Storm of Steel and it's up there with Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front. Once I finish this book, I can get started on the new Bond book, Forever And A Day. That should tide me over until the next Bond movie, which is still just a glimmer in EON Productions' eye at the moment.I later switched over to the Omega Railmaster, a watch that I haven't worn for some time.                                            It's now about ten past nine pm. I'm gonna have an inhalation made up of boiling water and a teaspoonful of Vicks Vaporub. Hopefully, this'll open up my airways a little. 

Anyway, thanks for reading, and have yourselves a good weekend!

Sunday March 11th, 2018 - Diners, Artwork Flashbacks, Speakeasies (or not) & This Week's Wristwatches

Saturday, March 10th, 1:35pm
                                       

I'm sitting in a groovy little cafe called Dak Daks. Car memorabilia adorns the place, while some '50s rockabilly tune plays in the background. 

I'm feeling a little queasy, so I forego the bargirl's suggestion of a bite to eat. 

Looking through the glass door of the drinks fridge, all the usual suspects are lined up in rows of coloured aluminium and glass. Nothing leaps out at me. Don't feel like Coke or Sprite, and a beer is definitely out of the question, with the way my gut's feeling. Not sure what may have caused this upset. Can't recall eating anything out of the ordinary. 

In the end, I order an iced coffee. Probably not the wisest move, but anyway.

"Take a seat, mate, and somebody'll bring it over", she says.

I park myself over at a little round red laminate-topped table that's bracketed by two black vinyl-padded chairs and take a look around the place. I'd been here before, but that was a few years ago.

This bit of decor should give you a snap-shot of what the place is like. A framed Elvis picture/wall clock, right next to a revisionist artwork of '50s pin-up model Bettie Page.

The walls were peppered with this and car-related signage, the kind of stuff that I used to see in antiques stores in the '80s, going for a song. These days, a tin sign advertising Shell Motor Oil or Peter's Drumsticks (an ice cream) tend to fetch a pretty penny when you see them in Antiques stores next to Chesterfield armchairs or numbered edition water-colours from the 1960s. 

This is the kind of place where the salt and pepper shakers are the actual shaker that you buy from the supermarket. Sugar sticks reside in coffee mugs that I saw in numerous houses of relatives and friends when I was a kid. Other tables have small screw-top jars filled with raw sugar, giving the place a pleasant, make-shift feel. 

I'm here because my son is (finally!) getting his hair cut next door at a barbershop called Kid Gamble. The establishment's logo shows a cartoon bulldog with boxing gloves on.  

The barber/owner is a young guy with a rocker hairstyle. He seemed like a nice guy when we walked in 15 minutes ago. 

"One of us needs a haircut", I said. Since I'm bald, it was easy to guess who was here for a trim. My son is on the verge of winning a Roger Voudouris look-alike competition. 

The iced coffee arrives while Buddy Holly sings about being happy to be livin' in the USA. Linda Ronstadt should sue. It's served in one of those standard '1950s diner' milkshake glasses. A scoop of vanilla floating on top, just a little smaller than the iceberg that sank the Titanic, with a light dusting of chocolate powder to cap it off. 

I take hold of the long-stemmed spoon sticking out of the glass and start stirring. Then I leave it alone for five minutes before mixing it again. The ice cream begins to melt sufficiently by then. I continue stirring it until it mixes with the milk completely, giving the drink a thick consistency. 

As I sit there, I write this post using a vintage Shaeffer fountain pen. The ink leaves a little too much feathering on the page for my linking, so I switch over to the spare pen that I brought along, a Jinhao 159 fountain pen that cost me a staggering one cent on eBay sometime last year. Plus three-fifty for postage, that is. 

This pen, although it's only got a steel nib on it, writes extremely well considering the price I paid for it. 

My son's appointment was over. He approached my table looking clean-cut and a little more mature. There was a neat side part on the left and not a hair out of place. 

"Very nice. Sharp. Now, can you keep it looking like that?", I asked. 

"Yeah, yeah."

"Do you want an iced coffee? Soft drink? Some lunch?"

"Nah, I'll just have some water."

He pours himself a glass and downs it in two gulps. 

We head over to the counter and I pay for my drink. I ask the gal behind the bar: "Is it okay if I take a  couple of snaps?"

"Yeah, go for it", she replies. 

All I have with me is my iPod Touch. It'll do. I've already taken the three shots above, but I just wanted to get a couple of the other wall near the bar. 

Cabinets filled with model cars, all manner of mid-Century furniture, mixed in with some pieces from the 1970s, Pop Culture references throughout, and some industrial fittings here and there. I do like the way it's all done. Although, if it were me, I'd tuck away the wiring a little more. Anyway, I didn't want to dilly-dally too much, since my stomach was still feeling weird. I just wanted to take some pictures. Primarily, I wanted a shot of the painting on the right, since my first glimpse of it when I walked into the place transported me back to circa 1978.

I must've seen this kind of painting in quite a few homes that I visited when I was a kid. These evocative paintings of some Sophia Loren type, wearing not very much, and located in some dusk-lit exotic jungle.
As a pre-teen (read pre-pubescent) in the mid-Seventies, the sexual/sensual nature of these paintings was lost on me. I just liked the idea that there was some well-scrubbed raven-haired beauty reclining on a tree trunk somewhere far, far away. Not exactly a native as seen in the pages of a National Geographic.

I saw variations of these in the houses of various relatives. Uncle Vic had a one up in the lounge room of his Art Deco house in Brunswick. Not sure what his wife Auntie Maria thought of it, but she was strong-willed enough that it would have come down off the wall if she hated it. 

This was the one that he had;

These paintings were done throughout the 1960s by a fellow named J H Lynch, a British artist. Reproductions were sold in the thousands, which would explain why I saw so many of them growing up.

They would have been considered quite racy/sleazy/sensuous (pick one) back then. Nowadays, they have a kitschy value that makes them collectible. Luckily, reproductions can be found all over eBay. I should get one some day, if I ever put a bar in my house. Hefner the place up a little.

I doubt my wife will mind. She got me a couple of framed Vargas reprints some years ago, but I never did get around to putting them up. Especially once the kids came along.

Now, of course, the kids are teenagers. Something like this wouldn't even register on their radars. Hell, this lady's considered over-dressed when compared to what you'll see on somebody's Instagram page nowadays. 

Many thanks to;

Queens of Vintage.com | Mysterious Girl: Tina and The Art of JH Lynch

When I Googled the term "1960s painting of lady in the jungle", I landed on this cool website. 

There's a house on a main highway on the way to work that sold last weekend. This house had been in the same family for six generations, according to the real estate agency blurb.  I've been told that it may have been a speakeasy back in the 1930s. Not sure if this is true or not, but it makes for a nice story. 

I decided I'd go see if I could get a decent picture of the place from across the road. 

Nah, no luck. That fence was higher than it seems when you're driving past the place at eighty kilometres per hour. 

I can't tell you the number of times I've driven past this house on the way to and from work over the years. When I was told that it might have been a 'speak', I had visions of people approaching this front gate and having to give some kind of coded phrase or password to get in. Although, I'm not sure this fence would date back eighty years. 

The house sure does, though. Built in 1874, Roseneath is described as 'an Italianate villa', featuring four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a pantry with cellar and a hothouse, among other things. 

Here's a picture from the last seller's listing;

I daresay the house looks like it has seen better days (just like Norma Desmond's place), but can you imagine how it would look if it were 'sensitively' restored, with a few modern conveniences thrown in? 

Scale back some of the overgrown greenery, restore the roof, a lick of paint, and it would look quite fetching. 

Can't imagine what it would have sold for. Some valuations have listed it at anywhere between 3.8 to 5 million dollars. Information on it's true value is scarce. 

Okay, these are the watches that I wore this week.

The Oris Diver SixtyFive blue/black. Briefly;

I had the Submariner on on Friday night and half-way through Saturday. Spent too long setting up this shot. Chose the Key Line setting on the camera, to cartoonify it.

The 'cigarette' in the ashtray is actually a rolled-up receipt from a 7/Eleven fuel purchase. I cut it down to the appropriate length of an unfiltered smoke and then glued it along one edge.

I then crammed some scrunched-up paper into it and then began filling the end of it with tea leaves, packing them down every so often. This didn't seem to work very well, so I grabbed a stale cigarette from a pack that I used for photo ops and used the tobacco from it, thinking to myself; Man, you're goin' through a lot of hassle for a damn photograph.

The real trick was the three gold bands on the end of the cigarette. If you've read the Fleming novels, you may recall that Bond smoked a blend of Turkish and Balkan tobacco, specially made for him by Morland's Tobacconists of Grosvenor St. The three gold rings represent the three stripes of Bond's rank of Commander in the Royal Naval Reserve. 

I used to have a ballpoint pen which contained gold ink. That would have been swell. I ended up using a Lyra pencil with gold lead. I knew it would come in handy one day!

Not perfect, but good enough. 

Most of this week saw me wearing the Oris Movember Edition Diver SixtyFive. 

I switched out the leather strap for a black NATO. 

This morning's breakfast was a variation on a selection that Bond chooses in From Russia, With Love. 

I've written about this before...

Breakfast, Bond Style

...So I won't go into too much detail. Basically, it was yoghurt with sunflower seeds and almonds, three black figs and some black coffee, in this case an espresso stretched out with boiling water. 

Okay, it's now almost 7:45pm Sunday night. We have a Labour Day public holiday here tomorrow! 

Right now, I'm gonna watch The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou again. I only just watched it last weekend, but I feel like watching it again.

Man's home is his castle, and all that. 

Thanks for reading, and have a great week, all!

Sunday Feb 11th, 2018 - Happy Birthday Bowie (our cat), Typewriter Conundrums, Bond is Back! (soon), Gotta Read More & This Week's Wristwatches.

Where are my manners? Looking back at last week's post and comments, I saw that I didn't reply to comments made by Bill & Ted (yes, that's their real names. Highly respected members of the Typosphere, let me tell ya's).

So anyway, here goes;

Ted 4 February 2018 at 07:41

Heh, I think all of these Tower CIII's have that ding on the left side of the ribbon cover. yours matches mine :D

Feh on you at 52 still wearing 30's. be glad you're not vacillating between 38-42 like me :P

Reply

The Tower's a beauty to use, Reverend. It would be one of the last ones I'd get rid of. Those ribbon cover scratches are a badge of honour, from the previous owner, I'm sure.

As for my thickening waistline, I'm sure I have no right to complain. It just came as a shock to me on that fateful Saturday afternoon a few months ago when I tucked in a t-shirt ('cos I was putting a short-sleeved shirt on over it) and saw the soft curvature of my stomach.

Bill M 4 February 2018 at 15:38

I need to follow your lead and unload some of my typewriters. One will probably be my Splendid also. I just do not like its touch. My one recent find though was a Chieftian Attache. Skywriter in a briefcase.

Reply

Yeah, Bill, I seem to have more typewriters than I can use. Therefore, any of them that don't measure up AND aren't nice to look at will just have to go. My Olivetti Studio 42 is nothing earth-shattering as far as its typing goes, but it's a beautiful machine to look at. So that's staying. 

I've seen pics of Chieftain Attaches. Super-cool. Nice score.

There was a comment from an anonymous reader who commented on the Rolex Sub photo that I posted last week;

  

He (could have been a she, for all I know, but for the sake of laziness, I'm gonna be old-school politically incorrect and just use 'he') asked if the crown was screwed all the way in because he could see some of the threading of the crown tube. 

I recently had this watch overhauled by an ex-Rolex technician who's highly regarded. He did some great work on this watch. 

He mentioned to me that the crown tube was on its last legs and would probably require replacing at its next service - in about three to five years - and he had put a new rubber seal inside the crown. 

Crowns? Crown tubes? What are you talking about, Teeritz? 

Okay, so most dive watches that are rated 200m water-resistant or more will tend to have a winding crown with internal threading and a tube jutting out from the side of the case with threading also. This is so that the crown can be screwed down to ensure water-resistance to the depth stated on the dial. 

Let's look at this diagram, borrowed from www.stsupplyonline.com. 

Figure A shows a standard dive watch crown design. For the purposes of this explanation, disregard Figures B and C.

Figure D and E show a crown tube in which E is the part that is screwed into the watch case and then welded into place on the inside. Figure D is the exposed part of the tube that Figure A would be screwed into. Seated inside the crown is a very tiny rubber 'O' ring (seal or gasket is a term that's also used) that is compressed down when the crown is screwed in all the way, further adding to the water resistance of the watch. 

My watchmaker put a new 'O' ring in the crown and said that it may need some time to 'bed-in'.

When I went to pick up the completed repair, I was a little disheartened to see the crown looking like this. For those of you not up to speed with my Submariner 5513 saga, I had wanted one of these since I was a kid back in the mid-1970s (thank-you for the expensive obsession, Mister Bond!), and I wanted it to be as perfect as I could get it. 

As I drove home with the watch on my wrist, I decided to hunt around for a new crown tube on the web.  That way, I'd have it ready when the time came. I asked the watchmaker as to whether or not he had access to Rolex parts, but he would have to hunt for them the same as I would.  He undoubtedly can get ahold of some parts, but not all of them, pretty much like a lot of independent watchmakers that I've encountered over the years. 

Something was niggling at the back of my mind whenever I looked at the watch, though. When I got home, I fished out the old 1981Rolex catalogue that I had gotten back in yep, 1981 and flicked over to page 20 to find this;

And here's a cropped close-up;

This put my mind a little more at ease, but I thought I'd ask over on a Rolex forum to get the opinions of some experts. One guy replied, saying that the exposed crown tube is not uncommon and the seal needing to bed-in was plausible.

Further searching on the web showed that, while most 5513 models had a crown that screwed in closer to the case, there were a few that showed the crown positioned like mine. 

So that was enough to allay any of my concerns. 

The crown may bed-in slightly, thus closing up the gap a little or it might not. In which case, I went ahead and implemented Plan B.

Rolex are notorious for not distributing parts outside of their Service Network (a very wise policy) and so, it leaves me, and every other person who needs parts, to fend for ourselves on the web. 

As a result, you end up paying more for Rolex parts - especially for the sports models such as this one - when you find them. Some sellers, however, are just downright delusional, or more likely, greedy, and to an obscene degree. 

Thankfully, sort of, I managed to track down a NOS (new old stock - i.e, no longer produced, but never used) crown and tube and I've stashed them away until required. And doubly thankfully, I didn't pay too much for them, considering that some sellers were charging a ridiculous $1,000USD for similar parts. 

Either way, the watch is purring along nicely, and I'll drink to that.

Here's the Lemair-Helvetia;

Today is Sunday where I am and our younger cat Bowie is one year old. When we first got him as a four month-old kitten back in June last year, he spent the first two weeks hiding under our daughter's bed, occasionally snarling at us if we got too close. My daughter soon noticed some pairs of socks had gone missing. It wasn't long before we noticed that he had arranged them under her bed in a half-circle formation, like sand-bags. 
Whenever we'd get close enough to pat him, he would scurry back under the bed to the safety of his sock fort. A few days later, I'd see him run past me with a rolled-up pair of my socks that he'd swiped from the freshly laundered pile that had been brought in off the clothes line. 
As regular readers may be aware, our other cat is nine years old and we had hopes that she would eventually accept this little guy and get along with him. From everything I'd read on the web, it would be a slow process to get an older cat to accept a newcomer, with no guarantee of success. We tried feeding them apart from each other, on either side of a door, so that the older cat could get used to the idea of another cat on her territory. 

That didn't seem to work. Madame was wise to our tricks. She would emit a low growl whenever he was near, hissing sharply if he got too close. It's a little heart-breaking to watch, because we all get the impression that he just wants to be friends with her.
Admittedly, she hisses at him less and less these days, but she still won't let him near her, and she'll still growl if she enters a room where he's just been. I can only imagine that his scent must be all over this house by now. We tried using a diffuser that emits cat pheromones. This is designed to act as a calmant for cats when they are stressed. It didn't work, but I think it was because it was placed in an area that gets a bit of a draught of air and this diminishes the effect of the diffuser.
Next up, scent swapping. This is something that I tried when we first got Bowie the kitten. Problem was that it had to be a constant and regular procedure and the kids ("We should get another cat, we should get another cat.") didn't help with this as much as they should have.
Anyway, it basically involves each cat's scent passed over to the other. Apparently, scent is a major communicator for cats and I've read that their sense of smell is around 14 times sharper than ours.
They have scent glands on the sides of their mouths and also across their temples. The idea is to rub these areas lightly and then stroke the other cat with them, to spread the scent along their fur.
Later, when they're grooming themselves, they are supposed to get a whiff of the other cat's scent intermingled with their own. Bit by bit, this is meant to get them used to each other's scent.

Yesterday, we thought we were witnessing a ground-breaking moment between these two cats. They were in the kitchen, about six feet away from each other. Madam Dussy glanced over at Bowie, who was staring at her intently, and she got up and slowly approached him. He hesitantly edged towards her. They got so close to each other that their noses almost touched. They sniffed each other, paused for a second...and then Madame hissed at the little guy and walked off.
What, does she need glasses? Couldn't she tell it was him? 
So, my aim is to try the scent-swapping process properly over a prolonged period, to see if it will work. Best-case is that they'll become friends. That's what he wants. She's being territorial and/or stubborn. Take your pick.
My wife remarked that "It's like having a friend all your life and then you see them treat somebody really poorly and you realise that they're a bitch."
Yep. 
Cats are creatures of habit. They like routine. Apparently, moving the furniture around can throw them off. So, I can fully understand that Dussy's entire day-to-day lifestyle has been upended to some degree. She doesn't go into the lounge room as much as she used to, she doesn't go out via the cat-flap in the back door, she doesn't use the indoor litter tray anymore. 
As I said, best-case scenario is that they'll become chummy, grooming each other and sleeping huddled together to stay warm. 
Worst-case is that it'll be some uneasy truce between the two of them. 
Wait and see.

In the meantime, Happy 1st Birthday to you, Bowie! You're a mad rascal and we have the scars to prove it.
We'll set you up with a can of tuna with a candle in it later this evening. 
When you wake up.

I've fallen out of the reading habit in recent months. Can't remember the last book I read. I got up to page 226 of an espionage novel called Brandenburg by Henry Porter, which I should point out was a great book, but so far, it has more to do with a defector named Dr. Rudolf Rosenharte than it does about the main character Robert Harland, an MI6 operative who appeared in another of Porter's earlier books. So, I've put that book on the back-burner for the moment.

During our European trip in 2016, we went to Shakespeare & Co, a famous bookstore in Paris. It was there that my son bought a copy of Storm of Steel, a biographical account of World War I as seen through the eyes of a young German soldier, written by Ernst Junger.

Teeritz jr had recently read All Quiet on the Western Front and I think he had a hankering to read more about the war to end all wars. 
He had been badgering me to read the book myself and I kept putting it off. I had started it twice and got fifteen or twenty pages in before stopping. It appears that I'm spending the final part of the evenings winding down by getting on the internet via my iPod Touch rather than curling up with a good book. This is not a good habit to get into. 
I already spend 90% of my day staring at a computer screen at work, so I should probably spend less time reading off glass and more time reading off paper.
So, I started reading this book again about two weeks ago, and again I got fifteen or twenty pages in before stopping. Yesterday, I picked up from where I left off, with a determination to get back in the reading saddle, especially considering that I used to read a lot when I was younger. 
Not only that, but Junger has a beautiful writing style, with some nice turns of phrase. Good writing is something that we can tend to forget about, but there are sharp reminders everywhere these days of bad writing, courtesy of the world wide web. 
I was listening to the news on the radio one day last year and the newsreader was reporting on a murder-suicide that had occurred in the city's outskirts. She uttered the phrase; "Police on the scene are still trying to unpack what went on here."
I was mildly aghast at the use of a slang phrase like that in a news bulletin. Coupled with numerous spelling and grammatical errors that are now found in our daily newspapers, I begin to crave a nicely written sentence. Maybe I'm asking too much.  
There's no shortage of books in my house and I have a bulk of titles that I've bought in recent years, but haven't read. 
My wife always says I'm a slow reader and this is true. Although, compared to her, everybody's a slow reader. 
So, aside from the list of tasks that I'd written for myself to tackle this weekend, I also included "Read for 30 mins", and managed to do so on Saturday afternoon. 
 

Another reason for getting back into reading is that I'd like to re-read the Anthony Horowitz Bond novel Trigger Mortis.
English author John Gardner was commissioned by Glidrose Publications to write an updated Bond novel in 1981. Bond was basically brought into the '80s, literally frozen in time and still in his late 40s, the age that he was in Fleming's last Bond story, The Man With The Golden Gun in 1965. As a teenage Bond fan, I thought Gardner wrote some great stories. Sure, his later ones were a little stale (he wrote sixteen of them) and some of his characterisations and dialogue were a little hammy or corny, but I vastly prefer his output when compared to what followed in the years after his last OO7 story. American author Raymond Benson was tasked with the job sometime in the late 1990s and I can't say his works thrilled me. I have all six of the books that he wrote and have read three of them. Not very memorable. 
After Benson's tenure, not much happened with literary Bond until 2008 when Sebastian Faulks gave us Devil May Care, set in the late 1960s. I thought it was a lacklustre effort in a lot of ways. No tension, no risks for Bond. No thanks. 
I've said this before- there's always a danger in getting a literary author to write crime or thrillers if they haven't done so in the past. I've always gotten the impression that they consider crime writing to be beneath them. Of course, the end result shows just how difficult it is to write a convincing Bond story.
Two-thousand and eleven brought us Jeffrey Deaver's modern re-boot Carte Blanche, which gave us a 21st Century Bond, in his early thirties, being  recruited by some new branch of British Intelligence which operates outside the boundaries. I didn't like this one either. 
Two years later, William Boyd wrote Solo, with Bond back in the late 1960s. Like Faulks' effort, we had a Bond story where nothing seemed at stake.
Finally, in 2015, Anthony Horowitz gave us Trigger Mortis, set in 1959, a few weeks after Bond's Goldfinger mission. Some of Ian Fleming's unfinished work was used in the first chapter and Horowitz wrote the rest. And it is seamless. Horowitz was known for writing numerous episodes of Agatha Christie's Poirot and was the creator and principal writer of Foyle's War for television. Aside from this, he also wrote a popular series of young adult fiction about Alex Rider, a teenager who gets caught up in espionage adventures. 
Horowitz knows how to write a Bond story and he wonderfully captured the feel and flavour of a Fleming Bond. 
There was word early last year that Ian Fleming Publications had commissioned him to write another Bond and that it would be released sometime in 2018.

Okay, so the title, while sounding Bondish enough, may border on pastiche, but if this book is anything like Horowitz's previous one, it'll be the last thing to worry about. Again, this book may contain some of Fleming's unused material, but what I'm looking forward to is the basic premise of this story, since it's set before the events of Fleming's first OO7 book Casino Royale and initially centres on how literary Bond got his licence to kill.
Here's the brief excerpt that's been doing the rounds this week;

M laid down his pipe and stared at it tetchily. “We have no choice. We’re just going to bring forward this other chap you’ve been preparing. But you didn’t tell me his name.”
“It’s Bond, sir,” the Chief of Staff replied.
“James Bond.”

I'm looking forward to this one. But I suppose you already knew that. 

Okay, time to wrap this up. It's gotten longer than I thought it would, and I still want to vacuum and mop the floors.  
What an action-packed life you lead, Teeritz!

Anyway, I wore the Oris Diver Sixty-Five all week;

Thanks for reading, and have a great week, all!