Light Night

Well, what a bunch we are, eh?! Seems that many who follow me here feel affinity with the 2.5% of the population who have face-blindness. Either it's much more prevalent than the researchers think or I have a rather special following. Next question: do the photos taken by people with prosopagnosia have something identifiable about them?

I went out rather warily this evening to see my local version of post-Covid, post-Brexit Oxford Light Night. It used to involve grand displays, sometimes with fire and sometimes by French circus groups, in Broad Street. The cash-strapped council has taken a decision - sad for me, but it's the decision I would have taken if I'd been a councillor - to abandon large city-centre displays accessible only to those without child-care responsibilities, and devolve the activities to local areas around Oxford. The children still make lanterns but the processions are several and smaller. Rather than breathtaking, large-scale light displays there are now coloured lights around trees in local parks which are heaving with buggies and excited toddlers. It's much better socially, politically and economically and nothing like so good aesthetically.

(In other, 'I've-Never-Seen-Star-Wars' news, I made poached eggs for the first time in my life this evening. I'm 68. I won't dwell on the childhood trauma behind this but am glad to have overcome it. They were delicious.)