Icefields

            On Wednesday morning I translated the fifth and part of the sixth verse of “Barcelone" by Boris Vian. It's basically a love song to someone but only the city is described.

            I finished posting my translation of “Joujou à la casse" (Dolly to the Trash) by Serge Gainsbourg and then started listening to his "Baby Lou". It appears there are two versions of the lyrics and so I had to find the one in second person singular to memorize.

            Around midday I washed the outside of my credenza in the kitchen. I had to rip some of the veneer from the bottom drawer because it was splintering and I didn’t want to get any pieces in my hand. I still have to clean the inside before I can put my comic books back in. After that I won’t work on any more home improvement projects until December because school is starting and I won't have time.

            For lunch I had a cheddar, tomato and cucumber sandwich on a toasted pretzel bun.

            In the afternoon I did my exercises while listening to Amos and Andy. In this story Sapphire gives Kingfish $50 to pay the rent but on the way to do so he sees a woman’s pocketbook on the street. A man steps out and says that he saw it first. There’s a lot of money inside but the man says they should call the owner and she might give them a reward. He goes to a phone booth and returns to say that she is coming to get the purse and she will give them $100, which they can split. He suggests that she might be even more generous but that he has to leave to meet his lawyer. The Kingfish suggests that he give him his half now and so the man gets $50 and leaves. The Kingfish waits for the woman with the pocketbook but she doesn’t come. He looks in the purse and sees that all the money is gone and that he has been scammed out of his $50. Now he doesn’t have the rent and there is a padlock on his door and so he decides to try the same scam with someone else. He pawns several items to make $100 and puts it in a purse on the sidewalk. When a man comes along Kingfish says he saw it first but the man says, “Saw what first?” Kingfish has to coax him all along and agrees to split the reward. Then Kingfish gives the man $50 and tells him he will wait for the woman and so the man leaves with his $50. That was the dumbest thing Kingfish ever did. Kingfish tries it one more time but this time the other man is a cop and he is arrested.

            I didn’t take a bike ride because I wanted to get caught up on things before school starts.

            I synchronized the two audio sources for the video of my July 1 performance of my song “Calendar Girl" and trimmed the beginning to where I want it to start. I still have to trim the end and then publish and upload the video to YouTube. After that I won’t work on this video project until the fall school term is over.

            I read the first twenty five pages of Icefields by Thomas Wharton. In 1898 a British botanist named Byrne joins an expedition in the Rocky Mountains of Alberta. He falls down a crevasse in a glacier but his pack catches on rock or ice and he hangs upside down until he is rescued. While hanging there he thinks he sees frozen in the ice wall the image of a human figure with wings.

            For dinner I had my last egg. The egg had been slightly cracked in a plastic bag and some of the white had drained out, so it looked like a smaller egg when it was fried. I had it with a warmed up naan and a beer while watching two episodes of The Count of Monte Cristo.

            In the first story the count learns that his shipping line in Le Havre is grounded by a criminal organization. Masked thugs are keeping all ships grounded by arresting and imprisoning any sailor that signs up to work for any but the Marat line. One of the men arrested is Victor Gaulte because he’d tried to sign onto the Monte Cristo line. Jacques Bergere, the manager of the line comes to the count for help accompanied by Victor’s sister Jeanine. The count goes to Le Havre and to attract the thugs he offers 100 francs a day to anyone that signs on to his ship The Pelican. Three of those who sign are attacked and two abducted. When the count is helping the fallen sailor he is knocked out. He wakes up in a cell with Jeanine and they are taken to the masked gang leader who hints that he is someone the count knows. He tells the count that if he is paid 10,000 francs a day he will allow all the count’s ships to come and go. The leader keeps the count’s purse then the count and Jeanine are forced to drink a sleeping potion and returned to their homes. At a meeting with the Le Havre Society of Ship Owners the count receives a receipt from the leader for 50,000 francs and a note giving his ships permission to sail. The count declares that this is an attempt to discredit him since his purse was taken but he made no payment. Pierre Duval accuses the count of lying and the count slaps him. Duval takes it as a challenge to a duel. The count says he wishes he could take back the blow but accepts that they will duel at dawn. The count, Jacopo and Rico go to a tavern and Marat comes to see him. He confesses that he has been paying protection money so his ships van sail. He is about to give more details when he is shot in the back. The count decides to try to get to the leader by posing as a sailor signing up for a crew. When he is attacked by the thugs his right arm is wounded before he is carried away, with Jacopo and Rico following. But the leader’s men are on to the count's trap and they grab Jeanine. When the count is brought before the masked leader he reveals that he knows he is Duval. Duval reminds the count that they are to duel and because the count’s sword arm is wounded, Duval chooses swords. But suddenly the count rubs his ring to signal his men to attack. The count seems to duel quite well with his left arm. Duval and his men are defeated and the prisoners, including Victor are freed.

            In the second story a young scientist named Pierre Fresnay has submitted the results of his studies of the use of oxygen to cure lung fever to the Academy of Science . But suddenly Pierre is arrested for treason because Maurice Resson, the director of the Academy is being manipulated by the Countess of Dijon to claim Fresnay's treatise as his own. Fresnay’s wife Suzanne goes to the count for help. The count attends Fresnay's trial where Resson argues that Fresnay had developed a poison gas weapon of mass destruction. He demonstrates by administering a gas to a glass cage of white mice and killing them. Fresnay is sentenced to die by the guillotine in one day. Suzanne and the count try to recreate Pierre’s experiment to prove his innocence. Soldiers are sent to destroy their equipment and so they move the lab to the count’s chateau. But something is missing and they need Pierre’s notes. The count and Jacopo sneak into Resson’s office to look for them. They find them in a secret hiding place in the wall and escape just as the soldiers break in. But when Resson discovers this he sneaks into the count’s chateau and puts poison in the water in the glass retort. Later when the count and Suzanne heat the retort they begin choking but they are saved by breathing from one of Pierre's bottles of oxygen. But Resson had carelessly left behind the bottle of poison. Later Rico and Jacopo abduct Resson and the countess, forcing them into the court of Judge Marne who has been brought there upon the request of the count. The count pours liquid from Resson’s bottle into a retort and also produces a bottle of oxygen. The retort is heated and Resson is held over it while the count also stands over it breathing the oxygen. Resson confesses and then the count reveals that he had only put coloured water into the retort. Since Resson thought he was being poisoned it is taken as a confession and he and the countess are sentenced to the guillotine.

            Pierre was played by Conrad Philips who was the star of “The Adventures of William Tell".

            Suzanne was played by Australian actor Diana Fairfax, who performed in several British TV series.

            The countess was played by Hariette Johns, who was in “An Ideal Husband”, "Pride and Prejudice" and “A Night to Remember”.