Jean Paul Sartre opened La Nausée with the observation that 3 o'clock in the afternoon is too late or too early for anything that you want to do. I've not got a problem with 3pm. And I totally disagree that you can't do anything at 3pm. I can think of lots of things to do in Norwich at 3pm, and Norwich isn't exactly Paris.
Maybe Sartre's mates all had proper jobs and weren't available to head down to the Left Bank for a quick café noir and a natter about existentialism in the middle of the afternoon? But surely he could just pop to the library and find an autodidact to sneer at?
Now consider 4.30am, that is a time that is definitely either too late or too early for anything that you might want to do. Let me tell you. And I have become recently well-acquainted with that hour due to the clocks being regulated by some kind of governmental diktat and my younger son's body clock being regulated by his desire to spoon in a bowl of Weetabix drowned in blue top as soon as his tummy rumbles.
The collective insanity that causes us all to reverse the minute-hands of our clocks a full rotation at the end of October has always bothered me. I have an early memory of asking my Nana to explain how the Sun knew to rise at a different time.
Baked a lovely Cornish pasty, my Nana, and was also ready to explain the basics of celestial mechanics when called upon. It's hard work being a Nana.
Carers of young children will already be aware that before CBeebies proper starts it's colourful assault on the senses, you get half an hour or so of Little Daydreams - lots of slow motion bubble blowing and jumping in puddles - all narrated by 2019 Best Actress Oscar winner Olivia Colman. But even the makers of Little Daydreams know that 4:30am is too early for a little auditory tactile synaesthesia - so they schedule that to start at 5:30am.
If he's allowed to choose what to watch while I aimlessly scroll through Twitter to see which government ministers are likely to resign in the coming parliamentary session, Ginger will inevitably opt for something from the 'blocks' Universe. These are 5 minute cartoons about personifications of abstract concepts that sing and dance.
So far the BBC has adapted the following philosophical concepts for the small screen:
- phonemes ("alphablocks")
- integers ("numberblocks")
- qualia ("colourblocks")
I know what you're thinking - there's a clear gap in the market there for generative syntax ("grammarblocks"?)! But don't worry, I have written to the commissioning editor of CBeebies to suggest this for the next series. I've even written some suggested lyrics for the theme song:
Grammarblocks! Grammarblocks!
Combine syntactically!
Grammarblocks! Grammarblocks!
They make syntactic trees!
'S' is comprised (minimally)
Of one 'NP' and one 'VP'.
Modifiers, Adverbials
And don't forget Recursive Rules
For linguistic infinity!
Grammarblocks! Grammarblocks! (et cetera)
I've yet to hear back. Anyhow it's time for a nap before the 3pm school run - Did I mention that I've been awake since 4:30?
Young Finnginn with Nana photo credit: my mum?
