Bagpipe music

Not much happening in my life, but when has that ever stopped a columnist? Interesting lecture today by a shell executive and someone from Amnesty, arguing about corporate responsibility. They both made good points, but, for my money, the shell guy made the better points. After all, a company can only do so much, and can't dictate how revenue is spent, any more than a company can stop its employees spending their wages on kalashnikovs and besieging a local old people's home (for example). Lunch at the Hari Krishna man was unusually sparse, perhaps because he splurged yesterday, with ginger beer and poppadoms. Still, as it is free, one shouldn't complain. Listened to interesting radio programme about Louis Macneice, my favourite poet, whose anniversary it is this year. Odd to hear him reading out his own verse in those clipped Oxford tones, ("We are dying, Egypt, dying"), without a trace of emotion. I don't think poets read their own work well, as a rule. Yeats is just dreadful, like some senile old loon; wonder what kind of actor Shakespeare was.
After 32 years of trying to master small talk, I have decided to give up. Alright, I wasn't really trying the first ten years, but come to think of it, the problems only started once I did start trying. Anyway, it's a waste of time, I can't do it, at least in my native language.