Whither blog?

And before you can say Sivasubramaniam Chandrasegarampillai, another week has elapsed. To paraphrase Inspector Sydney Wang from Murder By Death, "Confucius say, 'Maintaining this blog, like train without wheels. Soon get nowhere.'" Be that as it may, one forges on. The list for this week:

• Visited Navadarshanam. Not quite Timbaktu, but worth a gander. Many experiments in alterative lifestyles have been tried at Navadarshanam, the website says it all. Interestingly, Navadarshanam is located near Gummalapuram, and apparently the two hills are mentioned in The Spotted Devil Of Gummalapur, from "Nine Maneaters And One Rogue" by Kenneth Anderson.
• More money spent on books. In this instance, two volumes by Murakami, Prey - which apparently has something to do with a previous post, and James Clavell's Shogun - for old times' sake
• Finished the empire book. Turns out that most of the book is devoted to describing how the empire grew and expanded, in a very non-judgemental way (if anything Ferguson is critical of various imperial policies). In the final couple of chapters, there is a sudden jump from, "OK, so the British Empire was bad, as we've seen. But your alternatives were the French, German or Japanese empires, and we all know that the Brits were saints compared to those foreign johnnies, ergo the British Empire was a good thing in that it prevented said johnnies from taking over the world." Somehow leaves one with an unfinished taste...
• Am now proud owner of my first Apple gadget. The heavens be thanked for mildly insane kid sisters.
• Got some more music. Getz, Cale, and Hey Baby Hey Baby Yeah.