High Ideals

The songs that flit through my head as I write these little titbits have become a running theme and, because of that, I have started to look far more closely at the lyrics, small snatches of which have rounded off every post so far this year. As a long-time fan of David Bowie I have always been a disciple of the beautifully crafted phrase. (My first Bowie LP – Man of Words, Man of Music – came when I was no’but a child and simply because I had some birthday money left and I loved Space Oddity. I will not pretend that, at that time, I understood what the words were really all about, but I liked the way that they sounded – and I still do.) I would like to put in a word of my own here for the wonderful Guy Garvey of Elbow who writes lyrics that read like the very best of poetry: simple yet affecting. Take almost any Elbow song and read the lyric sheet and you will see. Try Puncture Repair, Magnificent, Weightless, Starlings or even the ubiquitous One Day Like This and you will understand. I digress…

The God-like Alan Coren turned out buffed-up idioms like there was no tomorrow and the young Woody Allen used words in a way that rendered me speechless. I love the simplicity of Orwell’s prose, but I cannot replicate it: somehow I always drift off towards the flowery end of the page. Back in the day I was – I think – the same as all other teenage boys: I knew that I was going to be a professional footballer (I was ok but, if I’m honest, seldom the very best in any team I was a part of) or a rock star (despite the fact that I could not play an instrument more complicated than the G# chime bar and had a post-adolescent voice that was reminiscent of the whine of a recently neutered cat). Punk came along for me at the perfect time, but I turned my back on it because by then I had decided that I wanted to be funny (or, as my then best friend suggested ‘weird’). That I failed on all counts is no surprise. Never mind, I play football with the kids, I sing (very badly) all the time and I scour the twilight zone between my ears most days to write this. Who needs the fame I craved back then?

Of course my vision of fame then was slightly different to today’s. Then it just meant getting girlfriends – which is everything to a pimply youth. It was the only motivation. I must admit that I’ve always been a bit bored by money. I realise that I am exceedingly fortunate in that I have always had just enough to live how I would wish, but I have never had – nor desired – plenty. The thought of all the husbandry that is required to care for stacks of lucre is not at all appealing. Nor, for me, is the thought of spending shed-loads: I hate changing my car and the thought of voluntarily diving into the luxury housing market leaves me breathless (and not in a good way). The thought of fussing over piles of dosh, ensuring that they always grow, is less appealing than an evening with Gemma Collins. And you can’t even give the bloody stuff away: you don’t want to pass the problem onto your kids, but you cannot bypass them for charity as a) everyone will presume that you are the head of a disastrously dysfunctional dynasty, or b) that you are incredibly vain and prepared to part with huge wads of currency in order to buy admiration. High ideals, it seems to me, are incompatible with riches. Fortunately, I don’t have to make the decision…

there’s a laddered tear in my high ideals
like I took a chair on the battle field… High Ideals – Elbow

Acquiesce

My wife thinks that I should swim more – it would be good for me – and whilst it is difficult to argue that the exercise would, indeed, be beneficial, there are as always other unassailable truths that must be taken into account: a) I hate swimming and b) I hate public swimming baths even more. I argued that any physical benefit I might accrue would be more than cancelled out by the mental anguish I would suffer. “My personal discomfort in such circumstances would,” I ventured “impact negatively on your own enjoyment of the experience…” or words to that effect. She was not persuaded and thus, it goes without saying, I acquiesced…

The swimming pool changing room is a very particular place of torture. You undress in a booth in which there is insufficient space to bend down and remove your own socks. (And there is certainly no room for somebody else to do it.) The floor is a puddle through which everything below waist level is dragged. All hooks, pegs and rails appear to have been removed from the walls just in case, I presume, someone should decide to take the easy way out. Anyway…

Eventually costumed – albeit with numerous vertebrae completely disassociated from their customary positions – I emerged from the cubicle balancing a teetering pile of shoes, bag, coat and towel, and headed towards the lockers where I discovered that I had left the £1 coin for the locker on the cubicle bench. I retrieved it and, after a mere dozen attempts, found a working locker in which to ram my belongings. I thanked the kind lady who passed me the now sodden pants I dropped on the way through (although I could not help but think that the rubber gloves were a little unnecessary) and somehow rammed the door shut on a space seemingly designed to hold nothing more than a single shoe and a tube of veruca ointment.

Pausing only to retrieve the goggles I forgot – swimming in contact lenses is not recommended without them. Swimming without the contact lenses however, is not possible as it involves wandering fuzzily through the ladies toilet, the café and a startled zumba class before hitting the water. You must submerge yourself quickly in public swimming pools. Do it slowly and you are doomed. The human body reacts badly to freezing: you cannot give it the opportunity to complain.

I am a very poor swimmer. My preferred stroke is ‘the flounder’. I am grateful that the water in my ears prevents me hearing the ‘tutting’ of octogenarians as they overtake me on both sides. I put in what seemed to me to be a reasonable number of lengths – one – and climbed out happy that my health had been fully restored. In my absence somebody had turned the changing room into a freezer. I stood for some little time under the shower, plotting the quickest way to the locker and cubicle without suffering from hypothermia, before making a dash for it.

In the event it took me barely fifteen minutes to open the locker and retrieve my possessions, and I was ankle deep in the cubicle watching my clothes as they bobbed on the floor within seconds. Look, I know what people do in swimming pool changing cubicles – I hope – but I have absolutely no idea of how the floor gets so wet. I wrestled my way out of wet swimming costume and into even wetter clothes, rammed everything I could into my rucksack, before exiting the tiny melamined cell and finding myself in the sun-brushed uplands of brown porcelain tile and stainless steel wastebin. Not even my appearance in the mirror – a very old man wearing a ginger fright-wig – could persuade me to re-open the bag in search of a hair brush. The man at the coffee shop would just have to tolerate me. (Although not, as it turned out, for long because – his card machine having died – he was only taking cash and as I only had a twenty and he only change for five I left without a cup of over-diluted own-brand instant beverage. Not even my by now shattered nervous system would allow me to consider paying fifteen pounds for a coffee.)

Still, my wife was right, I really did feel better for it… until she explained that I was expected to do it all again next week.

There are many things
That I would like to know
And there are many places
That I wish to go
But everything’s depending
On the way the wind may blow… Acquiesce – Oasis (Noel Gallagher)

Help!

I am become pin-cushion. In the last few weeks I have had blood drawn from me three times and various viruses (dead, alive and partial) pumped into me half a dozen more. This week the nurse plans to deplete my ichor by a further 30ml whilst enhancing my vigour by injecting me with something that will stiffen my resolve in the face of pneumonia and shingles. I am 65 years of age and the NHS is making me superhuman. At the rate I am being pumped full of beneficial fluids, I will, should I make it to 100, be inured to all known ailments.

Now please don’t think, even for a second, that I am in anyway ungrateful for these recent ministrations. I most definitely am not. Above all else I wish to be as well as I can be for as long as I might live, and I am quite happy to be pierced in order to get me there. It all comes along at once, which is fine – viruses don’t form an orderly queue, do they? They are bullies: they gang up on you. They are like hyenas and estate agents, constantly looking for an area of weakness to exploit. I’m very happy to accept aching arms if that’s what it takes to keep them at bay. The little red, hot and itchy patches are my spider bites. They are my River Styx.

Unfortunately, like my more revered fellow Styx-dipper, I do have an area of particular vulnerability. My own Achilles Heel is that I am me: a walking bad decision. If there is a wrong choice to make, I will make it. If there is a worst time to do it, I will be counting down the seconds. My capacity for unintentional self-harm is unrivalled in the modern world. If there is something to walk into, I will do so. If there is something to trip over, I will do that also. If there is someone very big and very angry who is just waiting to be offended, I will find him. I am an Exocet missile with ‘Home’ programmed into its GPS.

One good thing about slowing down as you get older is that you don’t hit things quite so hard. I’m at a loss to think of any others. Falling over is a particular problem associated with ageing and it is of particular concern to me as it is something at which I am particularly adept. I can find a patch of something slippery with my eyes closed. I am notoriously unstable on snow or ice and I can perform the kind of gymnastics usually associated with pre-pubescent Romanians with just a few wet leaves to assist me. Dick Fosbury had a flop named after him after leaping over a six foot barrier, I can achieve the same landing position with nothing more than a kerb to go at.

I am looking at science to come up with a vaccination against dyspraxic tendencies and I would be perfectly happy if it came combined with something to counter being a total liability. Protection against giggling at inappropriate moments would also be appreciated… although I think that sixty-five might be a little too late for me.

When I was younger
So much younger than today
I never needed anybody’s help in any way
But now those days are gone
I’m not so self-assured
Now I find I’ve changed my mind
And opened up the door… Help! – The Beatles (Lennon/McCartney)

Frankie & Benny #4 – The Birthday

“It’s your birthday Frankie my friend, so you choose. What should we do today?”
“Well now Benjamin, that’s a tricky one. I mean the world is so full of opportunities, isn’t it? We could take a cruise on our private yacht. We could have lunch in our favourite restaurant in Paris, dip our toes in the water at St Tropez, perhaps fine wines and an evening with Barry Manilow in Las Vegas… or we could perhaps walk a slow circuit of the park…”
“…Like we always do…”
“…drop in at the pub for a pie and a pint…
“…as ever…”
“…home for an afternoon snooze…”
“…the same as always…”
“…and then a film on the TV at yours or mine with a couple of cans of beer and a microwave chicken curry…”
“…just the same as every Saturday.”
“ Ay… we like it though, don’t we.”
“We do, but don’t you think that we should do something just a little bit different as it’s your birthday?
“Like what?”
“I don’t know, it’s your birthday, you choose.”
“Well ok. We could… I can’t think of anything.”
“Oh come on. Use your imagination. We could go to the pictures.”
“The pictures, yes, that’s a grand idea. The pictures. We haven’t been to the pictures in years. What’s on?”
“Erm, let’s see. There’s ‘Nope’.”
“Nope?”
“Yes.”
“Is that the name of it? Of the film? What’s it about?”
“UFO’s I think.”
“Oh no. I can’t be doing with all that pie-in-the-sky mularkey. There are quite enough little green men in the pub of a Saturday night. Isn’t there a Western on or something?”
“There’s ‘Where the Crawdads Sing.’”
“What’s a crawdad?”
“No idea?”
“Oh. Well, who’s in it?”
“Erm, let me see here. It says Daisy Edgar-Jones, Taylor John Smith, Harris Dickinson and Garret Dillahunt…”
“How many people is that?”
“No idea.”
“Have you heard of any of them?”
“No.”
“There must be something else.”
“Well, there’s the new Top Gun.”
“Ah, I saw the first one of those.”
“And did you like it?”
“No.”
“Oh, we used to love the cinema though, didn’t we? Back in the day. You and me, two young ladies, a tanner each in the back row, a newsreel, a cartoon, a ‘B’ film and a main feature – a proper cowboy or cops and robbers…”
“A choc-ice at half time and ten minutes necking if you were lucky before the usherette turned her torch on you.”
“Necking?”
“Ay, canoodling, you know.”
“I remember the choc ices. The chocolate always fell off in the dark. You always came out of the pictures looking like you’d shit yourself.”
“I never could be trusted with chocolate, Benny. I think that’s why they invented the Milky Bar, so it didn’t show up so much on my beige loons.”
“Oh, you loved those loons.”
“And my brown suede Hush Puppy boots.”
“It used to be great, didn’t it, to get dressed up for a night out I mean?”
“Part of the fun, my friend: the matching shirt and tie, the drape coat…”
“…the tank tops and the cork-heeled shoes.”
“Perhaps that’s what we could do today, for my birthday: we could get dressed up, hit the town. Maybe we could have a more sophisticated lunch…”
“A ploughman’s, perhaps.”
“King prawns in our curry and perhaps hire a DVD instead of watching whatever old tosh is on the telly.”
“Do you have anything to play a DVD on?”
“No.”
“No, me neither. It’s all Netflix isn’t it now.”
“Have you got that?”
“No. I’ve got channel 4.”
“OK. That’ll do. We’ll watch ‘Bake Off’.”
“No, come on, let’s do it. Let’s get dressed up and head out for town. We might meet some ladies.”
“Oh, I’m not sure about that Benny. I’m out of practice at all that. I wouldn’t know what to say.”
“Let’s not worry about that for now. Let’s just get our glad rags on and promenade.”
“Glad rags?”
“Sunday togs. Let’s do it.”
“I’m not sure. I think my best cardigan might be in the wash.”
“Come on, let’s just make the effort. Trousers without an elasticated waist, shoes without a tartan Velcro strap, you could take your vest off for a start.”
“I always wear a vest.”
“Over your shirt?”
“Oh, I must have got a little out of synch this morning. I woke up needing to… you know. I had to rush into my clothes. It’s freezing in that bathroom. I’ll move my vest under my shirt, change my trousers, put some shoes on, will that suit you?”
“Maybe gel your hair a little bit. So you don’t look quite so much like you’ve just got out of bed.”
“Gel? I don’t think I’ve got any gel. I’ve got some Vaseline from when I had that rash.”
“That’ll do. Instead of walking round the park and back to the pub, we’ll go straight through, maybe to that wine bar on the other side, and we can feed the ducks on the way.”
“Do they do pies?”
“The ducks?”
“The wine bar. Do they do pies?”
“Oh no. Sophisticated dining there, Francis my friend, couscous I shouldn’t wonder.”
“Couscous? What the hell is couscous?”
“No idea, but I’m sure they’ll do it with chips.”
“And beer?”
“Lager. Fancy lager. In bottles…”
“Ah what the hell. It’s my birthday. Let’s give it a go. I’ll go and get ready.”
“You’ll need a coat, mind.”
“Really?”
“It bucketing it down.”
“Oh, I’m not sure about my best shoes in that park when it’s raining: it’s a quagmire at the best of times. Full of dog shit as well if you’ve not got your wits about you.”
“Yes, you’re right. Maybe not your best shoes.”
“And trousers?”
“Elasticated ankles might be wise.”
“Perhaps we could just go straight to the pub.”
“It’s much nearer.”
“I’m not really over keen on ducks, truth be told.”
“No. Quacking little bastards.”
“Our age, it’s much more sensible to get out of the rain as quick as we can. We could catch our deaths.”
“We’ll do that then, and after that we’ll come back here for a cup of tea – I’ve got a pack of those Breakaway biscuits…”
“…and maybe a bit of a nap by the fire…”
“…chicken curry for tea and a couple of cans with the film on the telly.”
“Sounds great… I can’t think of a better way to spend my birthday, old friend.”
“It’s always good to ring the changes. Cup of tea and a Kit-Kat before we go?”
“Great. Put the kettle on, I’ll go and change my vest and find a clean cardigan…”

First Published 16.09.22

Seemed Like A Good Idea at the Time

The world is full of many great inventions that carry the potential to change our lives – although not always in the ways we expected…

AI Toaster: is just as capable of burning a whole range of baked goods as any other toaster but opens up a whole new feel-good morning vibe to you if you take the time (and have the money) to buy a fully British product which will make the whole smoky, smelly process of trying to get a simple slice of non-incinerated wholegrain for your breakfast so much more tolerable when it coughs through the flames, “I’m dreadfully sorry, I seem to have rather over-done that slice. Would you like me to try again?” Shout at it all you like, it won’t care. Could possibly be programmed to dial the fire brigade through your iPhone each time you turn it on – although equally it may WhatsApp offensive messages to the Kremlin or order seven gross of maggot breeder’s starter kits from Amazon instead…

AI Fridge: Can remind you when you haven’t ordered or have over-ordered products, when they are going out of date, when you have over-eaten, when you really shouldn’t have had that last pudding, when you really ought to step on the bathroom scales from time to time… and also how precious it is to be in control of the ‘Off’ switch…

C.G.I.: gives you something to talk about at the cinema whilst the rest of the audience is watching the, frankly, quite absurd live action sequences…

‘Hazy’ Craft Beer: to be honest, it is the concept – that what was once considered bad is now super-desirable – that is the invention here, rather than the product itself which, nevertheless, does provide the perfect conversation starter: ‘Do you think it’s meant to taste like that?’ ‘It would be quite nice if it was fizzy.’ ‘It reminds me of my old dad’s homebrew. Should I call environmental health?’

iPhone: the knowledge of the entire human race at your fingertips (providing you are not wearing gloves). With one of these little beauties you will no longer need change for the phone box when you’re out and about; a bulky camera; an address book; a Filofax or Psion organizer; a calculator; an English to any language at all phrase book, a slide rule nor, if you forget to close everything down, something to keep your trouser pocket warm. The phone will super-heat your thigh – although not for very long. It has an iPhone battery don’t forget…

Kindle: the world’s library at your command in any size of font you might ever need, suitable to read in bright sunlight or complete darkness and the best thing of all is that it remembers where you got to. The bookmark made redundant…

Music Streaming: means that anybody – even the blatantly talentless – can get their music out there whilst leaving the talented to wonder if it is really worth all the bother. Sooner or later, when CD’s come back into fashion (as they will because anyone with children, pets, the habit of playing music when drunk will have once again realised what a pain in the arse vinyl can be and how a much a single little ‘click’ can put you off a whole album forever) artists will return to making a proper, coherent product and everything will stop sounding the same. Then is the time to go up in the attic to reclaim your Sony Discman…

Radio Controlled Clocks: accurate to a few millisecs per millennia and definitely unable to excuse the fact that the bus is not on time. Will never tell the same time as any other clock in the house. Primary use in the modern home is to let you know that the internet has gone down again…

Sat-Nav: is in-built into most cars today and is able to reliably navigate the way from A-B without ever missing a single inaccessible three feet-wide bridle path, nine-feet deep ford or suicidal right-turn junction. Certain to promote the long-lost art of ‘winding down the window and asking the way’… eventually. Particularly useful in electric vehicles when the simple act of ‘turning it off’ may add several miles to each battery charge interval…

The Internet: has placed the entire world within the grasp of the whole human race – for as long as it works. It unites us all, young and old, rich and poor, by giving us something in common at which we can impotently scream…

Well it seemed like such a good idea at the time
Such a very, very good idea at the time… Seemed Like a Good Idea at the Time – The Darkness (Hawkins/Hawkins/Poullain)

Listen to What the Man Said

My wife is a huge fan of opening the windows. I, whilst being a great fan of the great outdoors would, on the whole, prefer to keep it out there. In the winter, open windows just let in the cold, in the summer they let in the flies: neither of them in my estimation are particularly welcome inside. In an attempt to maximise the efficiency of the central heating, we have double-glazed windows, cavity wall insulation and a loft crammed with more wadding than my head on the morning after. In an attempt to make it all pointless, we have my wife. It is doubly ironic because she hates draughts: a raging gale coming through an open sash is easily tolerated, but the faintest whisper through a slightly off-kilter lock-plate will drive her to the electric blanket quicker than an off-the-lead dog to fox shit. (We DO NOT have an off-kilter lock-plate, believe me, and if we did, I would deal with it. I don’t mind draughts as much as I mind hearing about them.)

Obviously, as in all things, we have reached an understanding: she does what she wants and I complain about it. It is how things work. If I’m honest, in general I do not so much live life as allow myself to get towed along by it. I am a Pooh Stick. I used to be paid for making decisions, I don’t see why I should make them for free. I am always happy to give my opinion if I am asked for it; if I am not, I am equally content to keep it to myself. Generally when people say ‘all suggestions are welcome,’ they have not heard mine.

It is very rare for people to actually hear what you have to say anyway, and the least likely to want to hear it are those who have actually asked for it. Approbation is what is usually required. It is so much easier to get your voice heard if you agree.

I don’t think that I’m unusual in really not liking the sound of my own voice. Inside my own head it sounds ok, but once it is released I have the tendency to sound like Kenneth Williams after one gin too many. (I have no idea whether or not Kenneth Williams actually drank gin & tonic, but I would like to think that he did.) There’s an element of drawl in there – not in a good, cowboy kind of way, but more in a ‘is he having a stroke’ way – and I sound more camp than the chicory essence my grandma used to pass off as coffee. I can mould my voice quite effectively, which is why, quite often, I am not quite myself. I think I should have been a politician. I would certainly soon get bored of listening to me – and that can only be a good thing.

Anyway, the point is (oh yes, I do have one) that when I feel as if I have something I really want to say, this is how I do it; through a keyboard rather than a microphone. In your own heads you all know exactly what I sound like… and hopefully it is nothing like I really do. I feel as though there is so much I could bang on about: the world and all of its inhabitants are ripe for sorting out and, Lord knows, sooner or later someone has to do it. I would tell you what I really think, but the window is open and it’s bloody freezing up here…

Oh-yes indeed we know
That people will find a way to go
no matter what the man said… Listen to What the Man Said – Wings (McCartney)

I Can’t Get It Out of My Head

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In preparation for a planned holiday I have been writing at least two extra posts per week for the last few weeks, hopefully without letting the standards slide. (To where, you might wonder?) Generally I would like to hope that my absence on this platform is noted due to my nonappearance in the comments boards rather than any lack of quality in my output. If it all trundles along the bottom in much the same way as it always has, I will be happy enough.

I have, coincidentally, been unwell for a few days so, with not much else to do, I have written sufficient posts for about three weeks. As I write about little other than… well, me if I’m honest, and as I’m not getting out much, it has occurred to me that I am probably giving the impression that I am always ill. I’m not, it’s just that this is how I choose to fill the dark and empty hours and short of publishing all of these extra posts in one big sulphurous splodge – and you’ve done nothing to deserve that – you might have to accept that my short-term incarceration has become, in the life of this blog, one long-term illness: think three months on a desert island with nothing but Ulysses for company.

Of course, it could be that I am actually just a little less filtered than usual. Could even be that things become slightly more varied. Time – while shifting – will tell. Anyway, I am not sleeping much, which is why I have just seen a late-night TV trailer for a documentary about cosmetic surgery which I did not manage to turn off quite quickly enough to miss the ‘doctor’ (well, a man in a white coat with a comic-book Scandinavian accent) saying, “…So I will be inserting the needle straight into the clitoris…” And aarrrggghhhh no, NO and once again NOOOO!!!!!

Now, it will come as no surprise to most of you to learn that I do not have a clitoris – I’ve searched thoroughly and I’m almost certain I would have found it by now – but if I did, I’m pretty damn bloody certain that I wouldn’t be letting anyone with a needle ANYWHERE NEAR IT! And anyway, why? Just why? What exactly is the doctor going to do with a needle to that particular little knot of nerve endings that is, in any way, going to make anything better? And furthermore, one part of this perverse equation is a knot of nerve endings and the other is a needle! These two things are never compatible. We’re talking Brad and Angelina…

So, now I have to think about something else or I will never sleep again… Have you ever tried deliberately thinking about something else? All you do is think about why you’re trying to think about something else and then you have to think about something else all over again. Your brain takes to the High Trapeze. If you’re not careful you end up watching Family Guy – and then you have to try and forget that too…

I will forget it all of course, in time… for a time… and sleep will come and with it a brief pause in mental gymnastics until Morpheus descends upon me and the full circus comes to town. Of course, I know what will fill my dreams now, although God knows what they will be doing – running away from needles if they’ve got any sense – and I can only hope that I’m feeling well enough to settle back to writing just the posts I need quite soon. I’m sure we’ll all feel better for that…

Oh, I can’t get it out of my head
No, I can’t get it out of my head
Now my old world is gone for dead
‘Cause I can’t get it out of my head, no, no, no, no… I Can’t Get It Out of My Head – E.L.O. (J. Lynne)

N.B. I feel that I should make it clear that this post is about useless and unnecessary cosmetic procedures and not about the vile and indefensible practice of FGM which is nobody’s laughing matter.

Frankie & Benny #3 – The Night Before

“You, my friend, were drunk.”
“I was not drunk, Frankie. I have not been drunk in many years.”
“You were slurring your words. Were you having a stroke?”
“No.”
“Then you were drunk.”
“Nobody else said that I was slurring my words.”
“Well, they wouldn’t would they? They wouldn’t want to upset you, in case you were having a stroke.”
“I was as sober as a Methodist christening. I was not slurring my words. I was not drunk.”
“You were most definitely not sober. I walked the several miles home with you.”
“Several miles? We were only across the road. Eight hundred yards at the most”
“As the crow flies, Benny, I’ll give you that. Eight hundred yards in a straight line, but you were not walking in a straight line. You, Benny my friend, walked as far backwards as you did forwards, and twice as far to the side. You were bouncing off parked cars and garden fences like a pinball. You were singing to the lamp-posts.”
“You’re exaggerating again. I know what you’re doing. Alright, I had drunk a little – as had you – but I was not drunk.”
“Ah well, ok, have it your own way. Have you checked your coat pocket, by the way?”
“My coat pocket? What for?”
“Why don’t you go and check?”
“…A mushroom vol-au-vent. What does that prove? Everybody sneaks food away from a buffet. It’s expected.”
“We weren’t at a buffet, Benny. You went through the baker’s bin on the way home. Check your other pocket.”
“…What the?…”
“Chicken Chow Mien, I believe.”
“I don’t even like Chicken Chow Mien.”
“I know. You kept bothering a young couple at the bus stop, telling them your life story and eventually they offered you some of their food to go away. You said that you didn’t actually like the fore-mentioned concoction – I seem to remember you showed them how the noodles get under your dentures – but that you’d take some home for the dog.”
“I don’t have a dog.”
“Indeed you do not. Nor do you have a parrot, but you also took their prawn crackers.”
“Oh dear. I must admit, I do have a bit of a fuzzy head this morning, but I don’t remember any of this. Are you sure you’re not winding me up here?”
“No. No, not at all… Well ok, maybe just a little bit. The landlord brought out the vol-au-vents after the quiz, that’s where you got that from.”
“And the Chow Mien?”
“That was from the couple at the bus stop.”
“Oh God… What were we even doing at a quiz, we’re both thick aren’t we?”
“I believe that is indeed what our teachers told us Frankie. A verdict I have never felt equipped to contradict.”
“So why were we doing a quiz?”
“There was a prize.”
“What?”
“A bottle of whisky.”
“And did we win it?”
“No, but we did drink one.”
“I think I’ll put the kettle on. Do you want a tea?”
“I wouldn’t say no. If I’m honest I feel a little out of sorts myself.”
“Do you want a biscuit?”
“Yes, and a couple of aspirin if you’ve got them.”
“…Why do we do it?”
“What?”
“Drink too much. At our age, why do we do it?”
“Well, I think that if we were sober, Benjamin my friend, we would not do it, but as soon as we get drunk, then we start to drink too much.”
“So you’re saying that if we didn’t start to drink at all, then we wouldn’t drink too much?”
“Precisely.”
“Well, that’s cleared that up for me then. Here, have a biscuit. I’ve only got Rich Tea I’m afraid.”
“Rich Tea? What happened to the Hobnobs?”
“I don’t have any.”
“You do, I was with you when you bought them yesterday.”
“I ate them.”
“When?”
“Last night when we got back from the pub. I also appear to have eaten several slices of toast and fried my last two eggs.”
“You ate your last two eggs?”
“You should listen to what I say Francis, perhaps clear some of that wax from your ears. I did not say that I ate my last two eggs, I said that I fried them.”
“So what did you do with them then?”
“Well, one of them I appear to have put in the fridge with a beer mat and a half-eaten spring roll.”
“And the other?”
“I have just found in my slipper…”
“So are you not going to wash your foot then?”
“I think I’ll just sit a minute first. Drink my tea… I might need to take a minute or two before… The yoke, you know… So how many of us did this quiz thing then? I mean, how many were in our team?”
“Just you and me old chum. Just you and me.”
“So we came last then?”
“Oh yes we did indeed. Very. But we did win a prize.”
“Really, what?”
“This.”
“A tiny cup. Very nice. I’ll keep it in my trophy cabinet with all the others. What does it say on it?”
“‘Wankers.’”
“Oh classy. Charming that. Quite a wag, that landlord, isn’t he?”
“He did apologize. He said that if he’d known we were going to take part, he would have had our names engraved on the loser’s trophy in advance.”
“Oh well, fair enough.”
“Yes, fair do’s, he could have insisted that the losers at least scored some points.”
“Did we not score any?”
“We never answered any, Benny. We spent the whole night arguing over our team name. I wanted to call us ‘Frankie and Benny’ – everyone knows who we are anyway – but you said it should be something clever and witty.”
“And?…”
“We couldn’t think of anything… How’s your head now?”
“Not so bad. I’m starving mind, how about you?”
“I could certainly go a fry-up.”
“Come on, I’ll just get this yolk off my sock and we’ll go and get one.”
“Ok. I fancy the whole works: fried bread, black pudding, mushrooms… That’ll sort me out.”
“Mind you, we did spend quite a lot at the pub last night. If you want, I could warm us something up here instead.”
“Oh yes, and what have you got?”
“How do you fancy Chicken Chow Mien?”

First Published 24.06.22

Weathercock

A Blackbird Speaks…

…’Course, I blame it all on the government: “Cut your food waste,” they said. “Eat your leftovers. Blah, blah, blah…” Was the day when I’d look forward to yesterday’s roast veg, a little bit of smoked salmon, a dog-eard quiche, a bit of stale cake… now what do I get? Seeds. Seeds is what I get. Balls of fat. Dried meal worms. Meal worms! Giant maggots is what they are. Dried. Who dries a maggot? At least when they’re alive they pose a bit of a challenge. Wriggle for England those little buggers. Taste like shit mind: dried shit, that’s what they’re putting on the table for me these days. And seeds. I can find seeds anywhere, thank you very much. Weeds in this garden are full of them. And don’t even get me started on breadsticks! “Crunch ‘em up and put them on the bird table”, right? Wrong. An outside breadstick becomes naturally moist and therefore… bread. Am I wrong? No ‘stick’ about it. Grissini in the rain is nothing more than a soggy baguette and we’re not in the EU anymore you know…

And I need my energy this time of year: early mornings, buds bursting, sap rising and all that malarkey. Proper physical exertion is nest-building, not to mention the birds and the bees – although what the bees have got to do with it I have no idea. One day a year as I understand it. Slap and tickle, snap your dick off and wave goodbye to the world – not the best of adverts I’d say. Hardly encouraging to your average ornithological lothario is it? Perhaps it should just be called the birds and the birds, narmean? Anyway, not exactly high on the agenda when your diet consists of dehydrated maggot is it: soggy bread and lard. Hardly wossname… oysters is it? Not exactly bacon rinds. Not designed to get you up and at it of a cold February morning…

…Well, except for starlings maybe. Eat anything those buggers and always up for a bit of how’s your father on the shed roof. There are days when you can barely hop along a branch for fornicating sturnidae. Murmuration – that’s what they’re calling it now. Bloody aerial orgy if you ask me. No wonder the Peewits have gone elsewhere. Don’t get a look-in at the flippin’ dried maggots when the starlings are in town. They’ll eat anything if they’re not… you know… and mostly they are!

This is not what I expected when I voted for Brexit – well, not voted exactly. I would have complained to the electoral committee – have you any idea how many birds actually make it to their eighteenth birthday – but no-one up the Home Office speaks tweet. Any day now, mark my words, our beaches will be full of boobies, trees full of pipits and buntings I shouldn’t wonder. They’ll not be happy with desiccated larvae, mark my word. You’ll not catch them eating soggy croissant of a Sunday morning. The government will change its tune then, you’ll see. No more cutting food waste when your good-old-fashioned, home-grown avifauna is being swamped by continental bug-eaters and seed-lovers; they’ll be begging us to eat their leftovers then. “Here little birdie, try this pate de fois, it only went out of date yesterday: it’s still got the jelly on top. Would you like a slice of the wife’s lemon drizzle or the last slab of lasagne?” They’ll be quick enough to feed us when their gardens are full of oiseaux and vogels. Not so bloody tight with their stale profiteroles when the bird bath is full of uccello, you’ll see.

No pizza mind, we’re not pigeons…

Good morning Weathercock:
How did you fare last night?
Did the cold wind bite you,
Did you face up to the fright… Weathercock – Jethro Tull (Anderson)

Getting Better

Photo by Eva Elijas on Pexels.com Because they cheer everyone up.

I am happy to admit that at the time of writing my last little missive I was nearer the half empty section of life’s glass than the half full, but I am by nature cork-like: if I am not held down, I pop back up. (Also like a cork, I can effortlessly retain a whole bottle of wine.) Today both my body and my mind are (like the economy according to all governments in power) recovering.

My ears, so recently deaf to frequencies attributable to all but male Blue Whales in mating season, have shown dramatic improvement and at least one of them will be working at anything up to 25% capacity very soon. I expect to be able to partially follow conversations in no time and believe it will be only a matter of time before I almost fully understand what my wife is trying to tell me.

At the same time my nose has begun to clear with similar speed – at times bordering on explosive – and I expect to be able to use it for breathing any day now.

The raging pain behind my eyes has become no more than a dull, insistent ache, like a tooth that’s just been filled or a shin that has been kicked. I could tackle it with Paracetemol, but I feel that my liver probably has quite enough to cope with so, by and large, I grin (or grimace) and bear it (eg emit a constant low-decibel whine – like a mosquito in the ear). The fog in my brain has started to lift and the sun is poking through. It will be raining again in no time but, you know what, it’s refreshing isn’t it? I feel as if any time now I will be able to make a rational decision – something my wife has been waiting over forty years for.

My limbs, legs in particular, have thrown off what feels like lead shackles. I can walk from coffee machine to chocolate bar without having to pause for breath at the fruit bowl because the gunk that has oozed from my lungs (Where has it gone?) has left space for air. I can breathe without sounding like an antique pair of bellows full of gravel. There is oxygen to spare for my muscles – the poor, benighted little tangles of myofibrils have started to flex their… er, flex their… well, flex. I feel as though my legs can just about support my full weight – going above and beyond in all respects – and on occasions shift it from one place to another. A body in tune with my brain – bless it; it knows not what it does.

It is inevitable that when oxygen intake is depleted the brain is the first organ to suffer. It is, after all, the main consumer. It swallows up bubbles of the stuff and turns them into thoughts, dreams, aspirations and fluff. When it is fully fuelled, fluff is what my head does best. Bereft it does stodge. Mind you, it can do stodge at the best of times…

Today at any rate, my glass is half full. I suppose that it’s typically British that a half full glass is the height of our ambition. Anywhere else they’d crave a full glass, wouldn’t they? In the case of human happiness, where else would the highest aspiration be half capacity? Surely you would just buy a smaller glass…

I think that is where my life is going from now: a smaller glass, but closer to capacity. It makes sense to me: I know I have the brain of a single tot…

I’ve got to admit it’s getting better (Better)
A little better all the time (It can’t get no worse)
I have to admit it’s getting better (Better)
It’s getting better since you’ve been mine – Getting Better – The Beatles (Lennon/McCartney)