Birthdays, plagium etc.

Guess what- Lenin, he of the Tomb shares my birthday, although a young whippersnapper. That's not surprising, as statisticians know. Viz, probability of sharing a birthday with another in a room of other people reaches 50% at n=23. We share our day with Salk (polio vaccine), Julia Roberts and Erasmus.

Anyway, I done good on presents. There's two bouquets lined up on the kitchen counter from R and my dear one, and a peace lily plant from mum. Dear one's internet bouquet was probably very expensive and much appreciated, but consisted of rather nasty chrysanths and carnations in a peach coloured bundle. Sorry, dear one- and it's the thought that counts, for sure. R's arrangement came from the local posh florist- a delightful basket of oriental lilies (with heady scent), statice, freesias (more scent) and glossy laurel foliage embedded in oasis, that'll last about 2 weeks. Mum's peace lily, with a black-glazed ceramic pot, was given with the innocent assurance that she'd picked it because it was especially hard to kill, and thrived on neglect (smiley- thanks mum). She knows me well.

On books, I gave the Mao biography and two of the three new Canongate mythology publications- Atwood's 'Penelopiad' and the Karen Armstrong text. The worst kind of Indian giver, these were all (if I'm honest) given with the hope of having a loan of them later. But my karma must be running even, because N gave me the Bob Dylan memoirs I'd almost bought for dad, or myself. I like the references to Folkway records, Lomax and blues roots artists. But I think he dictated into a dictaphone, and didn't write it textually. His fawning comments on Bono nearly had me boaking, unfortunately.

Also on books, the Norman Cantor's 'In the Wake of the Black Plague' was in many ways rather piss-poor, resorting to old-fogey lecture-room jokes on medieval sexual licentiousness and STDs to entertain the reader. I know he's old, but I'd shut up rather than push out that off-the-cuff pablum. This may make me also an old-fogey.

What's kidnapping episode reported at BBC news Scotland? WTF is the crime of plagium, with which a woman has been charged, and what does this classical Roman legalese mean? And how did this transmute etymologically into plagiarism? Clearly, there's much to learn.