Coffee Spoons

….

For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
               So how should I presume?

I know you all recognise that as being from T S Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and are probably wondering why I am blogging about it?

Well, I recently had cause to read Lohar v Dibu (1975) 1 BPR 97,014 (about notices to complete) which is authority for the proposition that once time is essential, it’s not necessarily the case that nothing less than strict performance is acceptable. Alternatively, there is Glass JA’s more eloquent formulation (which made it into the headnote & sparked some literary detective work): “There is no universal rule that conveyancing performance is to be ‘measured out by coffee spoons‘”.

Creative commons acknowledgment for the photograph.