TILTING AT WINDMILLS: OH VANITY!

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

OH VANITY!

In the summer of 1992 I attended a dinner held on the large outdoor patio of a restaurant in Mijas. Photographs were taken, one from the terrace above, which looked down on the table where I had been sat. I was rather puzzled as the gentleman sitting in my place had, how should I put this, thinning hair in the centre of his head.

Wind forward to last week and I attended a seminar on the safety systems at the CEPSA refinery in San Roque organised by the Asociación Prensa del Campo de Gibraltar.

As we listened to the engineers and environmental experts two photographs were taken. One above shows us all in wrapt attention. The other taken from behind me shows a gentleman with a bald spot in the centre of his head. This photograph I have destroyed.

Now dear reader you can help me here for I am at a loss as to how this spectre appears in my place – every 19 years! The next sighting should be in 2030. Any suggestions?

2 comments:

TONY MURPHY said...: A HAT?; February 9, 2011 at 6:17 PM
Anonymous said...: Much amused by your ‘vanity’ blog, the subject of which is nothing compared to the receding hairline and bald patch my budding actor son has to cope with at the age of 26. Fortunately he has the most optimistic and cheerful nature imaginable and shrugs it off, so just do the same. My second son gave me similar advice a couple of weeks ago when I moaned about aging features, saying I was lovely and should just age gracefully and enjoy myself rather than worry about it.

That’s this reader’s advice!; February 10, 2011 at 7:05 PM

Post a Comment

TILTING AT WINDMILLS

Sancho Panza is much less learned but a good deal saner than his master.

"At this point they came in sight of thirty or forty windmills that are on that plain.

"Fortune," said Don Quixote to his squire, as soon as he had seen them, "is arranging matters for us better than we could have hoped. Look there, friend Sancho Panza, where thirty or more monstrous giants rise up, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes. For this is righteous warfare, and it is God's good service to sweep so evil a breed from off the face of the earth."

"What giants?" said Sancho Panza.

"Those you see there," answered his master, "with the long arms, and some have them nearly two leagues long."

"Look, your worship,'' said Sancho. "What we see there are not giants but windmills, and what seem to be their arms are the vanes that turned by the wind make the millstone go."

"It is easy to see," replied Don Quixote, "that you are not used to this business of adventures. Those are giants, and if you are afraid, away with you out of here and betake yourself to prayer, while I engage them in fierce and unequal combat."”