Dear Reader, this has been my last week of…
*No, Clicky… /rolls eyes… of unemployment…*
…And to celebrate, I have spent it doing… */thinks* … erm, fuck all really…
*Ah, I always appreciate your encouragement, Clicky… /pats snout…*
Yesterday, I took time out to watch three old movies from the 80s – one I’d never heard of before called ‘Back to the Beach‘…
*Completely mad, Clicky… that Song featured in Cade’s last missive…*
…and two old favourites. The first, a detective love story…
*”Be careful among them English” …Ah Witness… I love that film…*
*Yeah, yeah I saw ‘Wallace’ in the wiki entry too, Clicky… /sigh… Look, it’s not exactly ‘freedom’ if your significant other has to work extra hours ‘cos you’re not paying your way…*
*Er, Thoughtful Man is not a prostitute! And his ‘for hire’ sign is not red, it’s orange… /slaps forehead… Oh yeah, Clicky, the other film…*
… And the second movie, a romantic comedy, starring Steve Martin…
In 1963, when I assigned the name “quark” to the fundamental constituents of the nucleon, I had the sound first, without the spelling, which could have been “kwork”. Then, in one of my occasional perusals of Finnegans Wake, by James Joyce, I came across the word “quark” in the phrase “Three quarks for Muster Mark”. Since “quark” (meaning, for one thing, the cry of the gull) was clearly intended to rhyme with “Mark”, as well as “bark” and other such words, I had to find an excuse to pronounce it as “kwork”. But the book represents the dream of a publican named Humphrey Chimpden Earwicker. Words in the text are typically drawn from several sources at once, like the “portmanteau” words in Through the Looking-Glass. From time to time, phrases occur in the book that are partially determined by calls for drinks at the bar. I argued, therefore, that perhaps one of the multiple sources of the cry “Three quarks for Muster Mark” might be “Three quarts for Mister Mark”, in which case the pronunciation “kwork” would not be totally unjustified. In any case, the number three fitted perfectly the way quarks occur in nature.
*Well, quite… But chuck in a white coat…*
*About time for a final Song eh, Clicky? …/squints… And don’t even think of giving us Alanis Morisette… not a single line in that Song is ironic…*
Library of Libraries 
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