A Footnote to Faust*

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Perhaps the most vital of assets, one of the key markers in social aspiration, is to be well-read – or at least to be perceived as such. But this is the age of rush. This is the age of little opportunity to pause in the forward thrust of life, let alone time to read – what are they called again? – books. So, here’s my plan. I intend to publish at regular intervals (this will probably turn out to be irregular, bordering on the never again) some easily digestible précis of great works of fiction that will allow you to exude an air of education and erudition during conversation in almost all possible social contexts. (I think it only fair to point out that I almost certainly won’t have had the opportunity to read the originals myself, so don’t be drawn into detail!)

Alice in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll – the pen-name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, who really should have known better.)

A girl, Alice (believed by many to be Alice Liddel, an eleven year-old acquaintance to whom Dodgson proposed marriage, although he denied this, but then he would, wouldn’t he?), for reasons best known to herself, follows a white rabbit down a rabbit hole and, against all advice, drinks a potion given to her by the author that shrinks her, meets a March hare (mad as a box of frogs), a Mad Hatter (plain mad), a dormouse (slightly peeved) and the Queen of Hearts (apoplectic and psychopathic). They have a tea party and then do stuff with Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle Dee and the Cheshire Cat who, now I come to think of it, might just have been in the other book about chess. At some point, judging by Dodgson’s photographs, Alice’s clothes appear to fall off. The book is full of hidden number puzzles (which remain hidden to me), acrostics (which are clear when pointed out) and symbolism (which is just a little too blatant for my liking). After a number of adventures that I can’t quite recall just now, the author sobers up and returns to his position behind the net curtains.

Oliver Twist (Charles Dickens)

A boy is born an orphan and, after nine years in an orphanage, is sent to a workhouse to eat gruel. The workhouse is run by a Welsh man who sings very loudly and sells Oliver to an undertaker, from whom he runs away because – well, because he’s an undertaker. He is befriended by The Artful Dodger who, despite being English, has the worst mockney accent since Dick Van Dyke, and learns to pickpocket. When he is caught, he is given a home by his prospective victim, and he realises that he wouldn’t have had to go through all those years of gruel if only he’d thought about stealing handkerchiefs sooner. He is then recaptured and taken back to Fagin, a reprobate who hides his money behind the wall in the hope of becoming a Labour Party donor. Fagin sends Oliver to burgle his benefactor’s home, but he is caught. It then emerges that there are more cases of mistaken identity at play than in the average Shakespearian comedy, leaving Oliver a rich man and, if I am not wrong, his own second cousin. Fagin is sentenced to death, but blames everything on Bill Sykes who went on to co-write The Goons.

Nineteen Eighty Four (George Orwell)

In a world completely unlike our own, where the three global superpowers are constantly at violent odds, Winston Smith realises that the government is not necessarily telling the truth – an easy conclusion to reach, as he is actually employed by them to tell lies. He keeps a diary, which is illegal, although he constantly forgets to fill it in and, like everyone I have ever known outside of Adrian Mole, gives up completely before the end of March. He meets Julia, who is a member of the junior Anti-Sex League, and they have an affair. I am not sure how. Eventually, Winston is captured by the Thought Police (who I suppose are a bit like the ordinary police, but with ‘O’ levels) and, having had rats strapped to his face, betrays Julia (which is what tends to happen to girlfriends who join the Anti-Sex league) and is released because he now realises that he loves his older sibling.

Treasure Island (Robert Louis Stephenson – who I think invented the steam engine in his spare time)

Jim Ladd (son of Alan) nicks a dead man’s treasure map and sets off to find the treasure, unaware that pretty much everyone on the ship, except for himself and the ship’s captain Smollett, was a member of the original crew of the pirate who buried the treasure, Captain Flint, who is now a parrot. Despite the preponderance of eye-patches, hooks, peg-legs and ‘ooh-aahs, the captain is unaware of the nature of his crew until he is told by Jim, who has heard them plotting from his place in the apple barrel. The chief plotter is Long John Silver, whose son sang Let the Heartaches Begin in the 1960’s. Eventually Jim finds himself on an island with Michael Palin, who has been marooned by the rest of the Pythons. When Silver and his men eventually find the treasure chest, it has already been emptied by Palin, so they nick it from him instead and set off towards Bristol. Silver casts himself adrift with a bag of gold and some nuts for the parrot, whilst Jim sails home in the certain knowledge that crime does pay. Michael Palin spends his share of the loot on a ticket around the world.

Far From the Madding Crowd (Thomas Hardy, before he became Robert and learned to insert his arm up a cow)

Nothing Happens. Often…

*All literature is a footnote to Faust. I have no idea what I mean by that. Woody Allen

A classic is a book that everybody is assumed to have read and often think they have. Alan Bennett

If ever there was a writer who proved that humour is timeless, that writer is probably Stephen Leacock. (I recommend ‘Moonbeams from the Larger Lunacy’, which was first published in 1915, should you wish to give him a try.) Though securely set in its own time, the humour continues to crackle brightly from every page. It is of a date, but definitely not dated. It is to Leacock’s article ‘Our Literary Bureau’ (contained in the abovementioned collection) that this post owes a huge debt of gratitude.

The World of Pyjama Ownership

So, if you were asked to name the one thing that age has brought to your life, what would you say? Peace? Knowledge? Understanding? Pyjamas?

Now, I am not completely new to the world of pyjama ownership. I’ve always had them for visiting and in case of hospitalization, but they only fully entered my life with my children, when attending to the early-hours needs of dependent offspring un-apparelled no longer appeared seemly. I remained, as do all dutiful fathers, firmly buttoned-up, jeaned and shirted through the sleep-over years: the fear of being caught, mid-landing, wearing anything less than full-length towelling lingers to this day. These days we have fairly regular visitors to our house: daughters, grandkids, in-laws etc. and it is quite rightly considered imperative that I am correctly attired for my nocturnal comfort breaks. Nobody wants to see me waddling off for a midnight widdle with my undercarriage down.

I am not a man who rushes home from work in order to step directly from pin-striped suit into candy-striped pyjamas. They do not figure in my day until it has become my night. My wife, however, somewhat less hidebound by sartorial convention, although not, I would argue, shame, is well disposed to diving behind the settee with a shriek of ‘You get that. I’m in my pyjamas!’ should there be a knock on the door at any point from the Six O’clock News onwards. I do not don the night attire until I feel it is the time to be night attired. I remain clothed and ready to answer the door until the nightcap has been drained and the Ten O’clock News has finished. Besides, my twilight flower-pot and hanging basket water trips would, I fear, be even less well regarded by my neighbours if I was wearing jammies. The creaking gate, the mega-watt security light and the sound of me moaning as I spill half a watering can of water down my slippers is already almost too much for them to bear.

Now, whilst I am prone to spending the night with the quilt pulled up to my chin and my entire body firmly enveloped in multiple TOG’s, my wife is currently liable to reach temperatures that are just this side of Vesuvian and, in the night, this generally manifests itself in the quilt being brusquely tossed off both of us with a ‘Tut!’ that is, I imagine, audible on Mars. The price I would have to pay for subsequently seeking some modicum of cover for myself is one I cannot afford, so pyjamas are my only salvation – especially when the windows are also thrown wide open. My night attire serves to cover up most of the available targets for the hundreds of biting invertebrates that buzz their way into the bedroom cafeteria, even in winter – ‘I’m sorry, most of the menu is off: just ears and nose available – and ankle if he’s not wearing bedsocks…’

And there are times, just around the corner, when the nights are too warm even for me, even when windows are opened, the quilt tossed aside and the T-shirt discarded. Now cometh the time of the boxer shorts. Now also, unfortunately, cometh the time of the Olympic standard nocturnal tossing and turning to which no cotton boxers are ever equal. Corkscrewed boxers are never sufficiently accommodating for a restless night. Constant readjustment leads to troubled slumbers and a vow to find a garment that is more suited to a man’s needs. Unfortunately, no such garment exists. Eventually you are left with just two options: a) put up with it or b) remove them and hope that the cat is not about when you get up in the night.

On the whole though, cooling down is not a problem for me and, consequently, long pyjama trousers are my preferred option, even though the legs do tend to end up crumpled about my thighs come the morning. What, in God’s name, urges pyjama legs to head north overnight? A genetic compulsion to head to warmer climes perhaps? A hitherto unsuspected loathing of the ankle? Perhaps it’s something they put in them up the factory: a couple of nights encased within increasingly restrictive trews sending you off to the pyjama shop first thing in the morning in order to bulk buy two dozen pairs in a larger size. Having checked, of course, that they do not have pockets. What is the point of pockets in pyjama trousers? Am I expected to take my keys to bed with me? Perhaps a pocketful of change in case I need to tip a taxi driver. Maybe, at my age, I am expected to pay the Tooth Fairy for the privilege of allowing me to keep such teeth as I have left. In my experience, unused pyjama pockets just flap around uselessly, like wings on a hippopotamus, they serve no practical purpose whatsoever.

I am only just beginning to realise how exercised I have become about my nightwear and I begin to dread what further night-attire related demons I might uncover. Can anyone tell me, for instance, how a correctly worn T-shirt manages to turn itself into a straitjacket over night? How the buttons in a pyjama top can insert themselves up your nose? How one side of a pyjama top can be the right way round whilst the other side is inside out? I can feel the neurosis seeping in. So, I think the time has come for me to let it go. It cannot be healthy for a man of my age to become so disconcerted by nightclothes. Especially as I should be saving myself for the peace, knowledge and understanding that my later years will surely bring…

If your husband has difficulty in getting to sleep, the words, ‘We need to talk about our relationship’ may help. Rita Rudner

Hypochondria – A Slight Return

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I wrote this when I actually wasn’t feeling very well and my wife told me I should go to the doctor’s. I do not go to the doctor’s; I write. Throughout my life I have found it very therapeutic to be cheery on paper – and illness has never stopped me writing. I actually find this one of my jollier early posts, with little or no ‘edge’, despite the neurosis. The ‘envoi’, by the way, is completely true. I love etymology, but when I cannot find an explanation for the origins of a word I want to use, I often have to busk it – all the more difficult when I’ve made the word up in the first place, which I do from time to time (mostly inadvertently I must admit).

Hypochondria was originally published 10th January 2019 and is approximately 1100 words.

Awoke with a soaring temperature, a tightening pain across my chest, a strange ‘panting’ noise in my ears and an itching nose. Struggled for breath and abandoned all attempts to pull myself upright whilst simultaneously taking my pulse and checking for swollen glands. Breathing as laboured as a prospective politician’s joke. Forced open sleep-gummed eyes and prepared to face my end with as much dignity as I could muster whilst still allowing myself the odd whimper, only to find the dog sleeping on me again…

My wife tells me that I am a hypochondriac which I consider to be grossly unfair to someone whose health is as fragile as mine. Especially since I have never taken a single day’s sick leave in my life. I say this, not in a goody-goody, holier-than-thou sort of way, but merely as a bald statement of fact, rather like the fact that over the same period of time I have never had the decorators in: it doesn’t mean that I don’t wish that I had. Forty years of DIY is not the sort of thing that someone as poorly as myself should have been involved in.

Nor do I constantly visit the doctor. The waiting room at our local health centre would make anyone feel ill. I cannot walk through the door without misappropriating at least twenty additional symptoms. And the place is littered with the kind of leaflets which, to a hypochondriac, are akin to the Argos catalogue: nothing in there that you actually want, but a thousand things that you suspect you may already have, although you’ve no idea where you might have left the attachments. And I never self-medicate. You can never be certain that the side-effects of self administered medicines will not be worse than the malady they are intended to treat. I suffer in silence. Well, not silence exactly, more a sort of long, low moan. Never-the-less, the mere mention of illness, any illness, immediately brings me out in hives. The appearance of a hitherto unnoticed mole (probably a gravy stain) invokes the kind of panic usually associated with a cabinet reshuffle. I have yet to be allowed to forget one of my rare visits to the doctor with what seemed to me the certain indicators of incipient brain tumour, only to be told that my hat was too tight.

As I get older, two things give me cause for greatest concern: my weight and my mind. I monitor my diet constantly – I never change it, but I do monitor it. I exercise fitfully (I’m just checking my dictionary here to ensure that ‘fitfully’ does actually mean ‘hardly ever’). I calculated my Body Mass Index with a formula I got from the internet. Apparently 24 is normal, 25 is fat and 30 is obese, so it was of some little concern to find that mine worked out to be 3,731. My wife suggested that I may have got my maths wrong, so I immediately checked for all other obvious signs of dementia. Fortunately, I could find none.

Now, where was I?

Ah yes, my capacity for worry is legendary. I worry about my inability to remember a PIN number without access to a ball-point pen and a rarely exposed body part. My ability to leave my bank card in the machine at the supermarket checkout is matched only by my tendency to leave the custard creams on the conveyor. My long-term memory comprises a bulk supply of Post-it notes and a fridge door. I understand from BBC Breakfast News that drinking three glasses of fruit juice a week will reduce my chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease by something like 60 percent. I do not eat meat, but I do eat prodigious amounts of fruit. Does this count as juice? Do I have, perhaps, to chew it up really, really well to get full benefit? They were very specific about the number of glasses; three per week, but not the size. Would that be three large or three small? Do three small glasses equal one large? What if I overdose – would the symptoms set in at once? Would I ever be able to remember how many glasses I had drunk? Anyway, I don’t know anyone who drinks fruit juice without vodka. I know a Bloody Mary without the vodka is a Virgin Mary, so what is an orange juice: is it a Harvey or a Wallbanger?

Worry is my constant companion: should I be able to remember my mobile phone number; should I be able to touch my toes without sitting on a stool and asking somebody else to lift my foot; do the ever-expanding dimensions of my man-boobs put me at proportionally increased risk of breast cancer? (If there are any doctors reading this, for God’s sake, don’t write in with the answer, particularly if it is ‘Yes’.) And while we are on the subject of doctors, I must give a dishonourable mention here to all those ‘newspaper doctors’, whose columns are responsible for me feeling unwell more often than the common cold virus. I am uniquely susceptible to auto-suggestion: whatever the most obscure symptoms of the rarest, most recently discovered illness, I have got them within fifteen minutes of reading about them (less if I am on a bus).

There is, I’m afraid, a tendency to dismiss the concerns of the hypochondriac as a crank. Grossly unfair I would argue and also wasteful of the G.P.’s time as, having been so dismissed, any hypo’ worth his salt is almost certain to demand to be referred to a psychiatrist in order to receive treatment for depression. My opinion is that the best way for doctors to deal with hypochondria would be for them to recognise it as a bona fide disease. Imagine the rise in self-esteem of the sufferer if, instead of being told ‘There’s nothing wrong with you, you’re a hypochondriac, pull yourself together,’ you were told ‘I’m afraid you’re suffering from hypochondria, it’s seldom terminal, but there is no cure.’ We’d all feel so much better…

Envoi. To better understand the word, hypochondria, I decided to follow my usual procedure: break it down into two pieces and then look-up the Greek (or sometimes Latin) meaning of the constituent pieces. I thus found ‘Hypo’ to mean ‘Under’ and jumped to the obvious conclusion that ‘Chondria’ means ‘The Weather’. I was somewhat disconcerted to discover that it is merely a type of North America Red Algae – there’s no wonder I feel ill.

The Medical Merry-Go-Round

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I wrote this piece by shouting at my phone as I worked around the house. Forgive me if it makes little sense, it is what came out of my mouth and, believe me, what comes out of there is almost always utter nonsense…

I am of an age when my entire life is punctuated by routine medical appointments. Blood is syringed, its pressure measured, its health assessed. I am, myself, measured and weighed. At times, the piss is taken. It seems that when you pass sixty, you become something of a hobby for the medical profession. A case of, ‘Everything is ok at the moment, but let’s just keep an eye on him, because sooner or later, something is bound to go very very wrong indeed.’ I am prodded more often than a pregnant woman’s stomach in an old folk’s home. My blood pressure, faced with the knowledge that it is about to be measured, goes through the roof. One tiny pin-prick at such an inopportune moment could probably spread my entire contents over several miles. I am a pressure cooker, and what I am cooking is doom… Until I am told that everything is ok, and then I am sunshine, with the slight cloud of, ‘see you next year’ and the intermittent showers of, ‘by the way, do you take any form of formal exercise?’

I wear contact lenses, because my (proper) job is very difficult without them – I realise that it may come as something as a surprise to some of you to find that I am not a full-time failure. For eight hours a day, I am quite proficient at what I do, e.g. what I am told. Today was the day of my annual contact lens after-care appointment. Nothing problematic in that you are thinking, and how right you would be, if only I was somebody else, but I am not and so, sadly, it is indeed a big deal.

Let’s start at the beginning. I was early. I am always early. I was invited to take a seat while I waited. I sat and I waited. I’m good at waiting. I do a lot of it. After a while, the ophthalmologist appeared. ‘Mr McQueen?’ he enquired.
‘Yes,’ I replied.
‘Would you like to follow me?’

I stood and turned around to pick up my bag and coat and when I turned back, he was gone. Where? Manically I looked around for some indication, perhaps a giant illuminated arrow that I could follow. In a panic, not quite yet bordering on hysterical, I lurched into a corridor full of doors. Right, well, this had to be the right way, but which door was mine? An open one surely. I stood confused until, eventually an ophthalmic face appeared from a distant doorway. ‘Mr McQueen?’ he said. I followed him into the room. ‘Take a seat,’ he indicated a swivel chair parked back against the far wall. I took a seat. It was very high. ‘Ah yes,’ he said. ‘My last patient was six. I can adjust it easily. Just have a look in the mirror on the other wall. Can you see the chart?’ I could. ‘I think the height is fine then,’ he said. Great, my eye-level is the same as a six year old. Never mind, I could read a long way down the chart without problem, so that was cool. Then came the bit with the numbers on a half red, half green background. ‘Which are the clearest?’ he asked. So, come on, can anybody actually see which is clearer than the other? I muttered something about them both being the same. He dropped a lens in front of one eye. ‘Now?’ he asked. Still the same. ‘Oh,’ he said, sucking his teeth, ‘Right.’ He turned to the computer and began to type something that developed into a novella.

‘Right,’ he turned his chair towards me, ‘Let’s have a look at your eyes.’ Now, you might think me wrong, but as far as I’m concerned, at this stage the ophthalmologist has to get far closer than anybody should ever get unless they are going to kiss you. I am not comfortable with it. I concentrate on not breathing through my mouth. Anyway, we did the usual things: look up, look down, look left, look right, and I did my usual thing – I have absolutely no idea why, under pressure, I do not know my left from my right – but he was very patient, and then we did the dye in the eye bit – I do not have the faintest idea why I can’t keep my eyes open when I need to – forgive me, someone pokes a strip of paper into my eye and the lid slams shut like a buffed-up clam, I can’t stop it. Anyhow, we got there in the end and everything was fine. Eyes healthy, two of them, both where they should be, everything correct. With a sigh that sounded like a punctured bouncy castle I reached for my coat – too soon.

‘So, Mr McQueen, do you wear your lenses in the shower?’
‘No, never.’ (I do. Every day. If I shower first, the mirror is so misted up I can’t see to put them in.)
‘Do you ever swim in them?’
‘No, never.’ (I do. On holiday. If I don’t, I can’t even find the swimming pool.)
‘Excellent, that’s fine. We’ll see you in a year’s time.’
I made some kind of a joke about finding my own way out. He didn’t get it. Never mind, I’ll try again next year.

Something for the Weekend?

In my days of yore, long before there were hairdressers or stylists, and eons before either of them had become ‘unisex’, we had a Gentleman’s Barbers on the estate where I grew up: Mr Friskney, by name. Mr Friskney’s salon had two chairs, but only the eponymous owner ever worked at them. He had two styles: the short-back-and-sides and the crew-cut. Both styles pretty much involved shaving all but the very top of the head, although the crew-cut involved cropping the hair on the top of the head very short as well. Most of the men on the estate sported the former cut; the children, the latter.

Father and son always went together – it was an important bonding ritual – and dad always went to the barber’s chair first, whilst son sat and was quiet. He was very keen on ‘Seen, but not heard,’ was Mr Friskney. When dad’s cut was finished and the Macassar applied, a plank of wood was laid across the arms of the chair and son was helped aboard. This was a time of acute anxiety for the schoolboy. Mr Friskney had the reputation of being able to spot a ‘nit’ at forty paces and, it was said, if such an item was spied, he would abandon his work mid-crop and usher your demi-scalped head out of the shop and into the cold cruel world outside, with no alternative available to finish his work: the horror of the kitchen scissors and mum’s pudding bowl awaited.
Meanwhile, providing no sign of parasitical infestation was detected, conversation continued between father and barber, and son sat quietly having his head butchered whilst reading the ‘menu’ over the mirror in front of him. One word always stood out: ‘Singe’. I never knew what a singe was, nor what it did, but it was obvious that people had already had it done because the whole place constantly smelled of burnt hair and hair oil.

I have what we called a ‘cawflick’ (I think it is a corruption of ‘calf’s lick) – a lock of hair that stands up, as if licked by a calf – which becomes very much more apparent when my hair is short. I hated it, and I hated Mr Friskney for accentuating it. When Mr Friskney had finished his machinations, he always turned to my father for approval. He never addressed the children: I think that he was aware that the response, had they been asked, would probably have been along the lines of, ‘What the hell have you done to me?’

It was at this point that monies were paid and Friskney discretely enquired whether the fee-paying adult required ‘Something for the weekend?’ If the answer was affirmative, the whatever-it-was, was handed over in a brown paper bag and tucked inside the jacket pocket. I had no idea what it was, but I knew it was never to be spoken of.
For those who wished to make a ‘Something for the weekend’ purchase (only we Brits could view that – along with a glass of cream sherry and tinned fruit salad – as something that could be indulged in only at the weekend) without having to go through the entire rigmarole of an unnecessary haircut, he had a small counter to the side of the salon where, at the ring of a bell, Mr Friskney could be summoned away from the chair incumbent, in order to supply a full range of shampoos, combs, scissors and, as far as I could see, brown paper bags. Occasionally an ill-informed newcomer might wander in and ask, hush-voiced, for ‘Dr White’s’ (another mystery product in the ten year old’s world of conundrums) only to be brusquely informed that she needed to be at Herriott’s next door, with the wool and the knitting patterns. Friskney’s was a male only environ.

After Mr Friskney died, presumably without tonsorial heir, his barber’s shop closed and with it, a little piece of the past. I have no desire for that past to return – not even nostalgia can mask the inequity of those times – but I cannot help scouring the barber’s ‘menu’ each time I sit to have my hair cut, hoping that someday I might, once again, see the word ‘Singe’, so that I can ask the hairdresser what on earth it entails – even though my nose tells me that alongside macassar and unmarked brown paper bags, it probably no longer exists…

The Later Cases of Sherlock Holmes: The Mystifying Instance of the Absent Footwear – A Slight Return

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This early post is exactly what I anticipated the blog would become. I’m a big fan of Conan Doyle’s books and I was happy that I had got the ‘feel’ of this about right. It is one of my favourite pieces from my ‘little fiction’ strand, but according to WordPress, it is the only piece I have ever published that attracted no likes and no comments. Maybe it will do so again. Never the less, I hope it might make you smile…

Sherlock Holmes… was first published on the 6th December 2018 and is 1100 words long.

The casebook of Sherlock Holmes had become somewhat less congested as he moved into his later years, but the analytical mind of my companion never ceased to amaze me. He was capable of the most extreme leaps of logic, such as those I have recorded in my own modest records, and his perspicacity remained unrivalled. Only on his idle days was his behaviour at odds with that of his former self. He no longer smoked his beloved black shag as he was unable to break up the large blocks in which it was delivered and his violin had been permanently retired, consequent upon his tendency to poke himself in the eye with the bow. His use of drugs had become limited to those prescribed by the doctor to control the more erratic habits of his prostate. The strong lens which had found its place in so many of the cases on which I have reported, lay constantly at his side, used to scour the newsprint of the many daily newspapers he still had delivered. He was much taken with the crossword puzzle which had recently become a feature of The Times, although I noted a tendency for his answers to contain a different number of letters than that intended by the compiler. It was from such a crossword, pen in hand, tongue curled up over top lip, that his cataractous eyes rose and almost met my gaze.
‘Has Mrs Hudson spilled the tea, Watson?’
‘On the contrary,’ I assured him. ‘At least an hour has passed since she was last in the room, on the occasion that she had to mop up your broth.’
‘Then is it raining outside? The window casement has, I fear, shrunk in relation to its frame.’
‘No, it is quite sunny,’ I said. ‘And the windows are quite secure.’
‘Then the chair that I now occupy has, in the recent past, been occupied by a damp animal of some kind.’ He half-grinned in his triumphant way. I shook my head slowly: he wasn’t good with sudden movement.
‘Aah, a conundrum,’ he said. ‘We must follow my well-established practice, Watson.’
‘Eliminate the impossible and whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth,’ I ventured.
‘Indeed,’ he said, groaning gently as he raised his wiry frame from the chair. ‘If you would be so good as to guide me to the dressing room.’
I held open the door for him and he entered, already preoccupied with the business, lately much more time consuming, of button opening.
‘I would be awfully grateful if you would try not to widdle in my brogues again,’ I said.
Upon his return, Holmes picked up the long clay pipe which he smoked in periods of deepest introspection and attempted to light the wrong end. I returned to my kipper as Holmes threw down the unlighted meerschaum. His temper had deteriorated markedly since Lestrade had confiscated his cocaine. I looked upon his face, so little changed with the passage of years. The thin, aquiline features, still pale and gaunt; the hawk-like nose embellished only with a dew-drop the size of a bulls-eye. The case of the missing slippers was troubling him. He was restless and short, a condition to which I have grown well accustomed over the years.
‘Data, Watson,’ he said at last. ‘I must have data. All is mere hypothesis until I am in possession of the full facts.’
‘But what facts do you seek, Holmes?’ I asked. He looked at me a little strangely I thought.
‘Facts?’ he said.
‘You said you needed facts.’
‘Did I?’
He took up the position that I know so well: finger tips joined, his chin resting on them, eyes hooded, almost closed. I settled down to review my newspaper whilst he cogitated. Some five minutes had elapsed before I saw his chin slump to his chest. A thin trickle of saliva swelled from his mouth. His breathing became heavier and deeper, reverberating around the room and rattling the china. This happened a lot when he fell to thought these days and I had myself descended to slumber when Holmes emerged from his reverie with a coughing fit that was testament to many youthful trips to the opium den. When the paroxysm at last subsided, I discerned that Holmes had in his eye the bright spark that I had come to recognise as a mark of his genius. ‘The slippers, Watson, are in the third drawer of my desk.’
‘But how can you possibly know that?’ I asked.
‘You know well my methods, Watson,’ he said. ‘Let us start with the hard facts. They are not on my feet. They do not fit your feet which are several sizes bigger than my own and Mrs Hudson is, as we know, averse to all types of plaid footwear. We know, also, that I was wearing them yesterday evening, but not this morning. Therefore, to find the solution to this riddle, we must look for the moment when I ceased to be wearing them.’
‘You used the drawer in your desk shortly before retiring yesterday evening?’ I offered.
‘Precisely, Watson, now, open the drawer and reveal…’
‘… A leather truss I’m afraid Holmes.’
‘Ah,’ said my esteemed friend.
We called upon Mrs Hudson, but she confirmed that she had not seen the slippers since they last resided on Holmes’ feet the previous evening. The mystery was troubling Holmes and even the giant intellect of the world’s greatest detective was unable to assemble sufficient facts from which to manufacture a solution. ‘I sense the involvement of Moriarty,’ he said at last.
‘Unlikely Holmes,’ I said, reminding him, as gently as I could, that Moriarty was currently securely confined at the Bide-a-Wee’ care home, where he shared a room with Mycroft Holmes and a selection of spongeable bedroom furniture. Holmes sighed deeply and closed his eyes. Only the nervous ripples that passed spasmodically along the lids betrayed the fact that he had not, once again, fallen to slumber. And then, with the small cry of triumph that he is known to utter when a thousand impossible threads are woven within his cavernous brain into a single cloth, Holmes snapped open his eyes, took up his strongest glass and peered down at his stockinged feet. ‘At last, Watson,’ he said. ‘There is evidence to be had here. You will notice the minute thread of burgundy weave that lies across my sock. An exact match for the weft of my slippers, I vouch.’
‘It’s a rasher of your breakfast bacon, I fear Holmes,’ said I. ‘And anyway, you have changed your stockings since yesterday, have you not?’
‘By Jove,’ he said. ‘You’ve hit the nail right on the head, old boy.’
‘I have?’
‘You have what?’
‘I’m sorry, I…’
‘Don’t worry yourself, Watson. Let us devote ourselves to the matter at hand,’ he said. ‘Now…’ he paused, deep in thought, his furrowed brow almost resting upon his pouting lip, his eyes cast down to his feet. ‘Have you seen my slippers, by the way?’ he said at last…

Incidentally, I have just become aware that ‘Brexit Day’ is upon us. Should you wish to know how it all looked to me in November 2018, just look here…

Sing, like There’s Nobody Else in the Room

boys screaming — Photo by Patrick Case on Pexels.com

You know the feeling. You are alone, in the shower, or cooking in the kitchen, or driving the car, singing along to the radio at the very top of your voice when, suddenly, you become aware that due to the key you have started in, you are not going to be able to make the high notes and, even though, as in space, no-one can hear you scream, you are wracked with embarrassment. What do you do? Do you just stop singing? Do you abruptly change key? Do you just think, ‘Oh bugger it!’ and let rip anyway? Whatever you decide, this is a decision you will only ever have to make when you are alone. Why? Well, in company you would almost certainly have not started singing at the top of your voice in the first place and, if you did, the ‘yelling on’ alternative would be quickly taken off the table. Being out of control in public makes us feel vulnerable; like being the last person on an otherwise full bus with an empty space beside them – even worse if the next person on takes the decision to stand anyway. In company, there are things that you just do not do. Full throttle shrieking of a song that is obviously beyond your capabilities is clearly one of them – unless, of course, you are auditioning for ‘X-Factor’, when it might just get you on the telly.

Being alone widens horizons; increases options. Take, for instance, the common experience of realising – pants down, too late to back out – that there is no toilet paper. Alone, no problem. In a house full of strangers, the kind of panic only otherwise associated with losing your trunks in the swimming pool: to cover up, is to drown.

We make these micro-decisions a thousand times a day, each one of them influenced greatly by company and circumstance. Consider taking your child to the soft play area at a restaurant and realising that your big toe is poking through your sock. Do you brazen it out, remove your socks altogether, or snatch up your screaming child and exit without paying the bill? Consider going to your doctor’s appointment, remembering only once you are settled in the waiting room that the only clean bra you could find that morning was the peep-hole number an ex-boyfriend bought you as a joke. Do you see the doctor, or stay sick? The words ‘OK, just open up your blouse and we’ll have a listen to your chest,’ could well bring on the kind of hyperventilation that results in the nurse calling a hearse.

Not only do we make decisions when we are on our own that we would never make in company, we make decisions when we are alone that we will later regret when we find ourselves squashed into a lift with half a dozen strangers: ‘My, wasn’t that garlic bread a good idea,’ ‘Thank goodness I had those two extra coffees…’ It is so easy to make a decision when you are alone in anticipation of remaining alone, despite the fact that common-sense dictates that you will not do so; that the postman will knock, that the car will break down and you will have to catch a bus, that the tills at the all-night supermarket will not be self-service, that the police officer will not be the forgiving sort…

Now, please don’t get me wrong here, I am certainly not suggesting that you should never take decisions whilst alone – it is the time, after all, of least distraction (unless Countdown is on) – but, perhaps that once made, you should run them past yourself whilst in company before implementing them. Perhaps Superman would have thought twice about wearing his pants outside of his trousers, if he had just run it past Lois first.

Anyway, as for singing at the top of your voice, you should do it whenever and wherever you can. The further you veer off tune, the louder you should become, because if you keep ploughing on, you will pop right back into it sooner or later and, anyway, like the falling tree in the forest, if there’s nobody there to hear you, do you actually make any sound at all?

I always try to cheer myself up by singing when I get sad. Most of the time, it turns out that my voice is worse than my problems. Anon

Notes to Self – How to Become More Interesting

Eddie the Eagle

I have been trying to decide how I can make myself more interesting: how I might gather myself in some kind of coat of intrigue that helps to imprint me upon the memory as someone I would like to know more about. It is not an easy task. Such élan as I once had has dropped down to my ankles. I am the same as everybody else: I think that I am likeable, and that’s ok, except I am the same as everybody else! People don’t shrink back in the shadows and scuttle away when they see me coming (although, to be fair, I wouldn’t know about it if they did, would I?) but nor do they settle at my feet to be beguiled by my tales of derring-do. I am much more derring-didn’t-quite. I have never quite managed to be the centre of attention whilst conscious. I have a body full of scars, but none of them particularly notable. They all stem from accident or operation. They are all, like the body they adorn, mundane: the result of a surgeon’s knife, an inopportune moment of clumsiness or an accidental trip. None of them involve duelling with swords or wrestling with an escaped circus lion. Attached to each is a story, but none of them (even with a generous dollop of embellishment) would make me any more interesting – except, perhaps, to a forensic pathologist. As an aide-de-memoire they are invaluable, as a measure of intrigue, they remain firmly anchored at zero.

I have never been a spy/saved a life/eloped under threat of shotgun. I have descended so far into the ordinary that I would need a street map to get out of it. It would take a sackful of carefully hoarded airmiles for me to reach engrossing. There are times when I can actually sense myself blending in with the wallpaper. Times when I feel the words Eau-de-Nil being embossed on my forehead.

So, who can I turn to for inspiration? How do I become more interesting? The great snooker player, Steve Davis, was so predictably good and so un-used to error or eccentricity; so incredibly even-tempered, that he became known, ironically, as Steve Interesting Davis on the professional circuit. When he retired he searched for something else with which to occupy his mind and, in a bid to become in reality interesting, he became a DJ (known as – you’ve guessed it – Steve Interesting Davis). I believe he was very good, but interesting? Sadly, no. It would appear that, even for wealthy (presumably) ex-sport stars, indulging in hobby and epithet does not guarantee fascination. Who’d have guessed? Completely scuppered my plans to tour the UK as Colin Captivating McQueen, bingeing on red wine and chocolate. I need an alternative strategy.

Perhaps I could audition for Love Island. They must have a vacancy for a short, fat, elderly geek. What about X-Factor? I have all the requisite attributes for that: I have no personality and I cannot sing. Perhaps I am approaching this from the wrong direction; maybe I should start by looking at all the things that I am good at… Well, that didn’t work, did it? I could follow the Eddie the Eagle route and be heroically bad, but stoically determined. All well and good, but at what? I come from a nation of gallant losers. All manner of sportsmen, athletes, explorers have been there before me. Whatever I might choose, you can pretty much guarantee that some other Brit will have gloriously failed ahead of me.

I am certain that even the most magnetic of people would like to be more interesting than they are. I am sure that Neil Armstrong may well have had times when he wished that he had something more exciting to talk about; that Edmund Hillary was always looking for some enticing anecdote with which to make his own story more diverting; that Piers Morgan… oh bugger, I’ve lost my drift now.

The point is, if I was more interesting, then more people would read my blog, even if it, itself, was not interesting. If, from time to time, I did not publish at all, they would think that I was off somewhere interesting, doing interesting things, with interesting people, whereas, what they actually think now is, ‘Stupid old duffer has forgotten again.’ In mind of The Trade’s Description Act I did think of changing my username to Colin Not-Very-Exciting McQueen, in the hope that new readers might, mistakenly, think that I was being ironic, but I fear that I would be all too quickly found out and, possibly, ejected from the platform.

Still, that would be interesting, wouldn’t it?

Well, you know, it’s interesting being 50… You start to reflect on your life. And you look back over the years at everything you’ve ever done. And, with age, middle age, comes wisdom. But I have to say that I’m not sure that 50 for me is the same as 50 in people years – Kermit the Frog

The Evolution of Modern Manners

photo of people using gadgets — Photo by fauxels on Pexels.com

This is not actually a repost – it just feels like it. It is in (as Sean Layton so correctly said of my early posts) a different voice – although, I hope, still identifiably mine. It has been in my drafts forever, but each time I prepare to publish it, something else comes along and it gets put back. I don’t know why. I like it. I’m sure if I was to write this today, it would be slightly different – although that is by no means certainly better. Anyway, I read it through this morning and it made me smile, so I decided it was definitely going to be published today. I hope you enjoy it…

Manners, etiquette and polite conventions are fluid and evolving, dictated by such factors as history, social class and common usage. They develop in response to the changing circumstances of our lives: smoothing the sometimes turbulent waters of social interaction and applying the calming oil of respectful custom onto the waves of conflict and misunderstanding; like a gob of cooling raita on the ebbing sting of a mutton vindaloo. New challenges constantly emerge and the moral dilemmas with which they present us require time and space to allow new social practices to become established and accepted. Arguably it is our use of the mobile telephone that has driven the most wide-ranging changes to our views of what we consider right and wrong when interacting with others, so, as I begin my investigation into 21st century common courtesies, perhaps I should start by describing some of the contemporary mobile phone-related civil practices that I have myself experienced and which, I believe, are considered de rigeur – at least in my neck of the woods:
• When listening to music through your phone, it is considered necessary to remove only one ear-piece before engaging in conversation. It is not necessary to turn off the music or to turn down the volume.
• It is acceptable to break off a face to face conversation in order to answer an incoming call providing you say ‘I must take this’, before ignoring the person with whom you were previously conversing. That person is expected to stand, unmoving whilst you carry on a loud or (perhaps worse) whispered conversation for what could be several hours. It is considered ‘good form’ to mouth “Sorry” to the person waiting for you every couple of minutes during the call.
• It is considered proper behaviour to say “You are on speaker-phone,” immediately after coaxing an indiscrete disclosure from a work colleague and broadcasting it to the whole office.
• Whilst it is wholly unacceptable to loudly discuss your partner/sex life/bowels with a friend when you are together on a train or bus, it is quite acceptable to do so over the phone, especially if they are on holiday in the Seychelles and you have to shout very loudly so that they can hear you.

Which brings us to the location of a morass of modern etiquette dilemmas; public transport. When, for instance, is it polite to catch a fellow passenger’s eye; smile; speak; offer your seat to somebody who is obviously struggling ? The answer to the first three is probably ‘never’, the answer to the fourth is ‘you have to be kidding’: the ‘strugglee’ would have to be incredibly sharp-footed to get into the proffered seat ahead of the 13 other more able standing passengers, who would gladly trample their own grannies in order to get there first. Best just to keep your eyes down and interact with no-one. If you are feeling hot, or you need a bit of space, simply rock back and forth and mumble softly.

Should somebody ‘jump’ the queue ahead of you whilst you are waiting for a bus, it is permissible to say “Excuse me, there is a queue, you know.” If they ignore you or become aggressive, it is customary to examine your finger nails intently before biting off an imaginary ‘snag’. When the queue jumper eventually turns away, you may stare sullenly at the back of their neck.

When meeting a person socially for the first time a handshake is generally considered the correct mode of greeting. On subsequent occasions, a hug is acceptable. The man-on-man hug should always be accompanied by exaggerated back-slapping. A squeeze of the cheek accompanied by “Allo Choochie” is seldom appropriate.

Much modern social intercourse is centred around the public house. When visiting the pub with a group of friends, it is customary to join in ‘the round’: a semi-formal arrangement in which each person in the group pays for a ‘round’ of drinks for everybody else in the group in strict rotation. Being part of a ‘round’ means that it is not generally acceptable to change what you are drinking dependent upon who’s paying for it, even if they’re loaded. If you drink half pints, you cannot pay for just half a round. It is not acceptable to announce that it is your round when everybody else has a full glass and, as nobody at that point is likely to want another drink, offer to buy crisps instead.

Touching-up lipstick is (just) acceptable, as is refreshing other make-up during a meal as long as it is between courses. Plucking hairs from the nose is not. If eating at a friend’s house, it is not considered ‘good form’ to ask your hosts for a tea spoon in order to scrape the dog-shit from your soles, even if it was their dog that did it. The shorts/socks/sandals combination is never acceptable at a dinner party unless you are under ten years of age.

Finally, the course of normal social interaction will, at some time, lead you inexorably into the minefield of small-talk. The formalised awkwardness of such occasions may lure you into saying things out loud that you have not had time to run by your brain first. So, in ending this brief guide, please allow me to offer a short list of phrases that should never be uttered, even in the most mind-numbing of circumstances:
• “Blimey, what have you been eating?”
• “I don’t think it’s infectious…”
• “I wasn’t sure what to do with it, so I just tied the end and dropped it behind their settee…”
• “I’ve still got the scab in a packet somewhere…”

“Say you’re sorry. No-one says you have to mean it.” Jeff Green

“It was a delightful visit; perfect, in being much too short.” Jane Austen

The Haphazardly Poetical – Finding the Perfect Rhyme for Atrocious

Poetry — Photo by Trust “Tru” Katsande on Unsplash

I really don’t think it’s a crime,
But I like all my poems to rhyme.
It’s possibly overly formal –
I prefer that my rhythms stay normal.

And then, if I possibly can,
I prefer every stanza to scan.
You may think I’m being effete,
But I quite like a verse with a beat.

I find that it all feels much neater
When the lines are of requisite metre,
For I really do feel it perverse
When there’s no shape or form to the verse.

So, for those who prefer their verse free,
There is no point in looking at me,
But for people who like their rhymes bad,
Stick around then, ‘cos I am your lad.

For K Morris (Poet) and James (Proclaims) with apologies for taking so long…