We live our lives forever taking leave - Rilke

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Friday, 20 January 2012

Thursday, January 19/2012

Going to meet Margaret for coffee at George's and run into Jane having coffee on her own She's in for blood tests. So George, who doesn't have to be asked, arrives with a pot of tea and I drink the first half with Jane and the second at Margaret's very busy table. I've brought her a jar of lemon curd, made this morning, and, with the enthusiasm that must have been much the same seventy years ago, she's busy sampling it and giving a little taste to the man sitting next to her.

Much media analysis of the character of the captain of the Costa Concordia, the Italian cruise ship that ran aground. So that one psychologist talks of the panic fuelled personality disintegration of an alpha male who finds that everything has gone wrong and feels compelled to deny that there is a problem. Another commentator adds that he is not afraid of the Captain Schettinos in the world - only of the Captain Schettino inside himself.