The Tunguska Event

MIB

2012-02-27T21:02:00.001Z

Her whiskers twitched and she frowned with frustration. There would have been a glint of anger in her green eyes but she was too controlled for that. A mouse was going to die horribly later.

"You cannot be serious! You think that came from where?" she pointed a ginger paw over to an object standing a good jump above the grass in the gloom of a spring night.

"It's alien. Most definitely alien. It came from the same place as the implant in the back of my neck," said her companion. His tabby fur and fine features were hardened by the take away curry tin he had moulded to his head.

"Listen Scully, there is more out there than you can imagine. When I got my implant I was taken in a box made of some material I couldn't dent with my teeth or scratch with my claws. Then they shone a bright light at me, inserted a probe - made my eyes water it did, and then I felt this pain in the back of my neck."

"I know how you must feel. I have a pain in my neck."

"Let me feel. You might have been abducted by aliens too."

"Raise a paw near my neck and I'll give you anal probing you'll not forget. "

Memory Bubbles

2012-02-16T10:25:00.001Z

Just thought I share my “memory bubble” theory with the readers of my blog. Both of you.

Ever gone upstairs to get something and by the time you get there you've forgotten what you were there for? Then you go back downstairs and remember.

Well I have a theory.

Our memories exist around us in a huge invisible bubbles. For example, when you are downstairs and you think of something, the memory swims around in this bubble. You attempt to go upstairs, and the bubble jams against the end of the banister rail and the wall. You continue walking and pop, you come out of your memory bubble. You get upstairs and you have no idea of why you are there – because that is in the bubble at the bottom of the stairs. You go back downstairs, slip back into your bubble and are reunited with your memory.

It follows that you may have also left a memory bubble at the top of the stairs, when trying to go through the loft hatch or going through the wardrobe into Narnia.

Also bubbles must be exclusive to individuals. I mean you wouldn't want to walk downstairs into your partners bubble would you? That'd be just rude.

I'm off for a lie down.

Houston, we have a Poblem

2012-02-14T22:54:00.000Z

Five minutes had passed since the events told in Evey Action has Equal and Opposite Eaction

As the thee of us sat dinking ou coffee, I pulled a business cad out of my pocket. I've no idea how it got thee.

"Oth," I said. "What is that stange symbol in font of you name?"

"What symbol? It's pobably punctuation - I've ead you blog and you nomally spit on it."

"The one that looks like this:"

"Oh cap! I think duing ou last time tavel we must have messed something up. Did you tap some eldely scibe on the shoulde at a monastey duing a moment of thought?"

Indigo Oth gabbed the time tavel device fom my hands. "I'll dive," he said, "Last time you dove I lost 1/4 of my last name."

Eolist pulled two things like handles with suckes on each side. "These ae fo us," she said.

"What ae they?" I asked.

"Panic handles. I emembe the last time Oth dove."

"Was that when he became ou ganny?"

Evey Action has an Equal And Opposite Eaction

2012-02-08T23:17:00.000Z

It was London. It was 2007. We wee pehaps unsupisingly in a coffee shop. By 'we' I mean of couse, the usual suspects. We had been on a little time tavel adventue and had stopped off in 2007 fo a quick cup of easonably nice coffee befoe going home.

Time tavel has consequences. Almost evey time something happens that needs fixing. You come back and then find out you no longe exist because you paents didn't meet. Then you go back and fix that and something else goes wong.

"Do you emembe the time we got back, picked up the family photos and discoveed I had become you ganny?" asked Eolist.

"Then we went back to ty to fix that, thought we'd got things staight and when we etuned, I was you ganny," said Indigo Oth, though a laye of milk foam on his uppe lip.

"I ty to check eveything I can think of out when I get back. Is the cappuccino light bown?" I said.

"Does the gaden gate squeak?" said Eolist.

"Is it indeed the geen geen gass of home?" said Oth.

"Beas, badges and lions wandeing aound and chatting to us like old fiends?"

"Hold on, I think that may be nomal."

"Yep, I just found a note to myself explaining that one."

"Thank goodness this time eveything seems pefectly nomal."

We aised ou cups, clinked them togethe and toasted ou successful tip.

Would You Like Sprinkles On That?

2012-02-03T21:09:00.000Z

It had been a long hard day. I needed to relax, put my feet up and generally chill out. I was walking through the town centre of Slobbering-under-the-Bed when I came across a newly set up coffee house.

I was unsure but I needed a good cup of something warm.So I entered said establishment. In the corner was a huge pipe organ and the man at it was playing Toccata and Fugue In D Minor by J.S.Bach.

It must be good, or the queue wouldn't have been quite as long. Either that or the barista was no where to be seen. Hmm - it seemed to be the latter. I looked up at the extensive menu above the bar which was subtitled The Freshest Coffee Brewed From North Sea Coffee Beans. I'd never thought of the North Sea as a great place to grow coffee beans. I remembered reading once that five minutes after falling in the North Sea you'd be dead from hypothermia. English seaside resorts beat the hell out of Amity Island with all that waiting around for a shark when here the water will get you way sooner.

The barista appeared out of nowhere carrying a large wet fish and a bucket of moist seaweed. He sprinkled seaweed over everyone and proceeded to hit us with the fish. We started to protest.

"Captain's orders. How can you appreciate the ambience unless you've been hit by a large cod and covered in seaweed?"

The woman behind me let out a yelp, "I've been bitten by a small crab!" she exclaimed.

"That'll be extra. Let the man behind the bar know and we'll add it to your tab."

Damp and smelly, we continued to queue. The music got louder as the man at the organ really got into the swing of things.

The chap in front of me got his coffee - it looked unexpectedly good.

"Would you like sprinkles on that sir?" The barista asked.

"Are they chocolate or cinnamon?"

"Fish scales."

It's at moments like this when you understand why tea is still a popular drink in England.

Gone Fishing

2012-01-29T22:01:00.001Z

I sat by the river watching the rain drops expand in little circles on the surface. It was peaceful here. I like places like this. The rain didn't bother me because, although it was now quite heavy, my coat was more than a match - it had survived Welsh hillsides.

I had picked this spot on the bank as it was nicely away from everyone. There are times to be sociable and times when even two is a crowd. I was thusly a little annoyed when an old chap, wearing full fisherman's clothes came and sat beside me.

He stuck up conversation. It wasn't what I wanted, but I'm not a rude man. I just hoped he'd get bored and move on.

"So what bait are you using?"

"None at all."

"And are you being successful?"

"Indeed." It was true. Before coming here I was quite tense. Now I was relaxed and quite at peace.

He looked at my fishing rod and then back at me. "That must be quite some technique you have there."

I couldn't think of anything to say, and as I wasn't trying very hard, I said nothing.

"That's very thin line you must be using. I don't think I can see it."

"Line?"

"Yes, fishing line. Some of the brand new Dyneema stuff?"

"Oh no, there's no line there at all. Can't stand fish."

Clock Watching

2012-01-23T23:50:00.001Z

"Remind me why we've climbed all the way up here?" I said as the wind whistled past my ears.

"It's a fantastic view, isn't it?"

"Roth, you just answered a question with a question. That's supposed to be rude."

"Look down there. Eolist is doing a great job holding off the security people." he paused. "Oooh, that's gonna hurt in the morning!"

Below I could see a small woman, coffee cup outstretched in one hand to prevent spillage facing a burly security guard. It looked a truly unfair match. That said two other security guards were sitting on the ground, back to back rubbing their heads. The uneven opponents were circling each other. In a lightning move Eolist lurched forward and tweaked his knee. He went rigid and fell.

"First time I've seen that - the Eolist Knee Pinch. Like the Vulcan Nerve Pinch but so much lower down."

"I'm done. Time to climb down, if you'll excuse the pun."

We reached ground floor. Eolist was just finishing coffee. "Did you get it done?"

Roth answered, "We've got five minutes to get away from here. We should go."

We dashed through the backstreets and finally stopped by a little cafe. Then it happened. The noise was deafening.

CUCKOOOOO! BOING.

Out of Context

2012-01-17T13:51:00.000Z

It was completely black. Up was black, left and right were black. The sofa we were sitting on was black. Down was black. I'm sure that if I checked, behind us would be black too. Occasionally there would be a shimmer in the distance and then the black would re-assert itself.

"Where are my legs?" asked Roth.

"We are both a little out of context here. Actually, quite a long way out of context," I replied. "It's probably normal."

"How am I going to eat a pizza off my lap? I don't seem to have one."

"Don't worry, there won't be a pizza delivery for at least 13.75 billion years."

Roth became the only white thing I could see and passed out.

Time passed, I looked at my watch and nudged Roth awake. I pointed him to a tiny pinpoint of light an indeterminate distance in front of us.

"Is that what I think it is?"

"Possibly."

"It's fabulous."

"It might be. It has the potential to be. I've seen this a few times before and it doesn't always make it."

The tiny pinpoint expanded to a blindingly bright patch like the sun, only blue-white. Like the sun after it had been given a really good wash on a soap powder commercial. Then the patch forged outwards and overwhelmed us. The shimmer turned into ripples as the light hit us.

This time it had made it. The brightness calmed down and things shot past us, buffeting the shimmer. It was impossible to identify the things. They just weren't things we'd recognise.

"So that dot of light is the universe, and we were outside it watching it expand? The Big Bang."

"Yes, except we're not outside it, because there is no outside to be out in?"

"Then where are we?"

"Does the sofa seem familiar?"

"Yes. Are we still in my living room?"

"Does the Big Bang happen often in your living room?"

"I didn't think so, although admittedly now I'm not so sure."

"This whole construct is generated from the power of our minds. The mind can travel where physically we couldn't be."

"How do we get back?"

"It's very similar to the Wizard Of Oz. A sort of there's no place like home. To make it easy I have put the suggestion in our minds that we'll return when the stop button of the remote control is pressed."

"Where is the remote control?"

"Oh, bugger!"

Several minutes go by whilst we hunt for the remote control down the back of the sofa. It isn't helped by the black sofa, black remote control and generally black surroundings.

Roth succeeded. "Found it. Shall I push the stop button?"

"Yes, but make sure your mind is clear when you do. Remember this place is a construct of our minds."

There was a blinding flash. We were back in Roth's living room.

"Roth?"

"Yes."

"You didn't clear your mind, did you?"

"I did so."

"Then why is there a zebra sitting on my lap with a swirl of cream on it's head topped with a cherry?"

"Oh!"

I am not iDifficult

2012-01-15T22:05:00.002Z

"I am not iDifficult" to paraphrase the title of Leonard Nimoy's autobiography "I am not Spock" (Although it should be noted the second volume of his autobiography is entitled "I am Spock").

I have changed the name of my unwholesome blog and my even more disreputable twitter account. I just got fed up with iDifficult. It started as weak joke and then developed life of its own. It was like using a placeholder name in a novel, and then discovering after publication that it was still there. Thankfully, I hadn't picked John Thomas. So for a while now I have looked for a new Non de Plume, or I guess since this is all typed, a Nom Du Clavier.

I thought about why I needed a pen name. Some of my friends write under their own names, so why shouldn't I? Mostly because the contents of this blog are works of fiction. It's not about my life, but about the lives of make believe characters doing odd and hopefully fun things. It doesn't feel right writing fiction using my own name. I also don't want comments made by my fictional character to be attributed to me just by googling my name. I'm proud of what I write (mostly), but I don't want words from my first person character(s) being taken of as my own personal viewpoint.

So after nearly ten minutes of really hard thinking, I have come up with a Non de Plume of Dr Maximilian Tunguska. I have renamed this blog to The Tunguska Event, as that is nicely fitting.

My blog's old URL http://www.idifficult.org or http://iDifficult.org will be around until the end of March after which it will no longer work. http://iDifficult.blogspot.com has already gone the way of the pink finned dodo. The new URL is http://TheTunguskaEvent.blogspot.com .

Likewise I have changed my twitter account from @iDifficult to @Dr_Tunguska. I'm applying the same rules - try to sell me something and I block you. Instantly.

I'm sure the character formerly known as iDifficult shall appear in a blog near you with Indigo Roth and Eolist Petite wearing a large friendly badge saying "Hi, I'm Dr Max" soon.

Memories of Unreal Things

2012-01-07T23:05:00.000Z

I don't dream often. Or rather I dream as much as everyone else, but I seldom remember them. Occasionally I wake during the night, catch the edge of a dream and think, "gosh, that was interesting, I must remember it." Come morning, I've forgotten the dream, but annoyingly not the feeling of how fantastic the dream was, or of my desire to hold onto it.

So last night was a bit special. I had a most splendid dream and I can tell you about it now.

In my dream I went to see a film and it was a film I was really looking forward to seeing. I'd been to the concession stall and bought a bucket of coca-cola, some salty popcorn and something with melted cheese and nachos.

As I sat down and watched, the story unfolded. Now here's the weird bit - all the characters in this film were friends. Freud would have been taking notes furiously. The victorian doctors would have prepared me for a lobotomy.

The movie was fantastic. As I left, I turned an looked at the poster:

Never Rush

2011-12-29T01:35:00.000Z

Honestly, please don't. I did and I fell over one of these:

So nice of them to warn me, I thought.

The Man From The Ministry

2011-11-26T14:42:00.001Z

Night falls quickly this time of year. I was sitting looking out of the open window drinking a cup of tea. In the garden beyond something moved. I couldn't make out what it was in the gloom. A cat screeched and scrambled over the fence. But still something moved.

I heard wood splinter and could just about see one of my sheds leaning at an odd angle. There was more shattering of wood, a creak and the shed disappeared from view.

I shut the window and bolted the back door. As I sat back down, a dark shape cut across the window. A metal dustbin lid fell to the floor.

Since October things had been going missing at dusk. Everything from garden chairs, a particularly promising Stilton to a neighbour's Pomeranian. Equally strange was the complete absence of Roth. Could the events be connected? Was, even now, Roth sitting with his feet up eating cheese with a small dog bouncing around his feet?

There was a knock on the door of the cupboard under the stairs. Given the strange goings on in the garden, I found myself in need of a change of underwear. I picked up a heavy metal torch and walked over to the door. I had no idea what to expect. I mean, who lives in the cupboard under the stairs?

Slowly I opened the door and a man walked out, stretching up to his full height.

"What were you doing in there? Waiting for the Hogwarts Express?"

"I was in your basement."

"I don't have a basement."

"You do now - I dug one. I needed a base of operations to overlook the strange goings on in your garden."

I hadn't noticed until now that he was dressed in full Victorian hunting gear and carrying a blunderbuss. The look in his eyes gave the impression he hadn't slept for some days.

He held out his hand and said, "I'm Jenkins from the Ministry of Dangerous Vegetables."

"There's a Ministry for that?"

"Indeed sir, your tax money is hard at work."

"I have reason to believe that you have an infestation of Crepuscular Rhubarb in your garden."

"Crepuscular Rhubarb?"

"Very nasty sir. Hunts in packs at dusk and dawn, very dangerous. Although this lot doesn't do much at dawn, as it is a late variety."

We sat down and I made the man from the Ministry a cup of tea, for which, like most Englishmen he was disproportionately grateful. I spoke of the strange goings on in the garden. My shed, garden chair and cheese. My neighbour's dog-napping.

"We've not heard of a case like this well, erm, ever. It's very serious."

"Are there many cases of dangerous vegetables The Ministry investigates?"

"You're the first."

"How long has this ministry been going?"

"Since the Great War."

"This is the first case since it was set up? Why?"

"Mostly I suspect we weren't looking in the right places."

"No, I meant why have a ministry set up for a problem we don't have?"

"Not read much about British Politics have you?"

"I guess not. Do you think you'll be long?"

"Could be another few months before I've cleared the your garden of this menace. In the meantime, you can feel safe the government is on your side and feels your pain. Also lock all your doors and windows after dusk." With this he disappeared back into the cupboard under the stairs and locked the door after him.

Shortly afterwards there was a tap on the backdoor. I walked over threw it open and Roth stepped in. He was wearing a suit and had his pockets stuffed with huge leafed vegetables. He had one extra large leaf on this head. From a distance he looked like a market garden.

"Brandy?"

"Oh, yes please. Goodness this is hard work. Gave the Pom back yesterday - his continuous yapping was driving me potty. Oh and sorry about your shed."

Shed Event Horizon

2011-10-05T19:59:00.000+01:00

She had the kind of smouldering good looks that could burn right through a man's soul.

"iDifficult, my old mate!"

"I'm sorry, I must have had my glasses on up the wrong way," I paused to regain my composure. "What's up Roth?"

"My shed is missing."

"Which one?"

"I only have one."

"Well, that's true. At the moment. Are we talking about the one with your tools in, that so happens to lurk in the middle of Culloden moor, because we put it there in 1746?"

"The same."

"How do you know it's missing? Did you feel a disturbance in The Fence*?"

* The Fence is the mystical force that runs through all things including sheds. My friend Roth is particularly sensitive to The Fence. There are rumours that long ago, he went by another name and fought with a laser brush, the sacred weapon of the Creosote Knights.

"These are not the tools you are looking for."

"I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"Force of habit. I just know its not there. We need to go and look. I know it's a long way back in time but I won't rest until I know it's safe."

"Are you absolutely sure?"

"I find your lack of faith disturbing."

"You and that shed were pretty close once."

Somehow, once a blog entry, we seem to end up going back in time, crossing into a parallel universe or missing some important punctuation. I accept this now.

We rotated the dimensions. What we lost in centuries and years, we gained in yards, feet and inches above the ground. The air whistled around us and we pulled our rip cords. In a flutter of silk we descended to the ground. I would still like to know where Roth got his union jack parachute.

At ground level, it was clear that Roth's feelings were correct. The shed was missing with only a square grassless depression to show where it once had been.

I made up a plausible explanation, "It must have passed across the Shed Event Horizon," I intoned with authority. "It happens to items pushed through time."

"Won't it happen to us? We've been through time on, like, oodles of occasions."

"No, it only applies to sheds. That's why it's called the Shed Event Horizon, not the Roth Event Horizon."

"Or it could be demonic shed abduction," I added.

"Are you making this stuff up?"

"Scouts honour?"

"You were never in the scouts, were you?"

"I was. 23rd Slobbering-Under-The-Bed Scout Group. For one day."

"Is that the Scout Group that needed a helicopter rescue from a mountain in Norfolk?"

"As I said, for one day."

In the distance there was a glow of a camp fire, and sitting around it was a figure dressed in tartan. We walked towards the solitary figure and the welcoming warmth of the camp fire.

"Hello, do you know what happened to the hut over yonder?"

"Good firewood. Makes fine coffee."

"EOLIST?!", we both exclaimed.

It was our friend from the caffeine exchange program.

"What are you doing on Culloden Moor in 1746?"

"In 1985 they're going to build a coffee shop here. I wanted to get in before it got busy."

Additional Storage

2011-08-05T22:57:00.000+01:00

"I need to store some tools," said Roth.

"Where?", I asked.

"Scotland."

"Scotland," I repeated, trying not to sound surprised. "Where in Scotland?"

"Culloden Moor, somewhere near the middle," he replied.

As was common with our conversations the next question was critical, and not to be confused with a normal conversation where it would mean something quite mundane.

"May I ask when?"

When in a regular conversation would be request as to how soon, in ours it often meant which century.

"15th April 1746 probably in the afternoon."

"What were you planning to put said tools in? Some kind of box?"

"I was thinking maybe a shed."

"Where from?"

"The DIY shop just down the road."

"May I ask when?"

"Yesterday, 2am."

"Good choice, that'll avoid the annoying people who expect to be paid."

"That's what I thought."

"Why Culloden Moor in 1746?"

"It's nicely out of the way. I hate clutter."

"Have you considered a parallel universe as well as displacing the tools in time and space?"

"There are parallel universes?"

"Lots."

"Which one is the furthest away?"

"That's the problem, the further away we get the less like this one it becomes. It could get dangerous. If we go too far away we'd be two pizzas talking and thinking about ordering a takeaway Indigo Roth and iDifficult this evening."

Roth checked his limbs, and suggested, "Maybe we stay in this universe."

We acquired the shed without incident, adding some burn marks to the floor and spreading some sulphur about to give the impression it was a demonic shed possession.

A four hour tea ceremony later (you can't rush a good cuppa) and we were ready to go.

Time travel requires an exchange of dimensions. There are three dimensions of space and another of time. Given the right technology, a skilful flick of the wrist and travel into the future or past is possible.

Soon the wind was rushing past us. We were in 1746. "Pull the rip-cord!" I shouted. "No, do the shed's first!"

Three parachutes opened and we drifted to the ground, Roth, I and the shed. We'd exchanged quite some vertical height for some years into the past. Note to self: Need a mineshaft or a cliff for travel into the future...

We hit the ground, cleared away our 'chutes. Roth opened the door of the shed and threw the tools inside.

"Where on Earth were you keeping that scythe?"

"Top right pocket."

"Err. OK."

Before Roth had the chance to close the door a Scottish clansman blowing bagpipes loudly and expertly came walking over the hill and straight into the shed. Thinking quickly he slammed the door and threw the tiny little toggle lock. The piper continued to blow inside the shed, whilst hundreds of his comrades followed him over the hill.

"Have you brought the invisibility deodorant?" asked Roth.

"Yes, indeed," as I handed over the aerosol can. It was one of my least successful inventions. It didn't really deodorise or act as an antiperspirant, but by being invisible no one could see who smelled so bad.

"What date did we arrive on?"

"16th April 1746. Ohhh. I see. You said 15th didn't you? Bugger."

We hid behind the shed, invisible for some hours whilst the battle raged on around us. The piper trapped in the shed blew his pipes more and more frantically, until eventually, late in the afternoon, he ran out of breath.

Darkness fell. The battle was over. Everything was quiet. We opened the door to the shed. The piper staggered out, exclaiming, "Och, scmells of socks in there." And with that wandered back over the hill he arrived from.

Roth looked at the socks lying all over the floor of the shed, carefully wrote a note and threw it into the shed.

A few moments later we were back.

"Does it feel tidier now the tools have a proper home?"

"Indeed it does. Very much so. Shall we order pizza?"

Somewhere else, very far away, a tall well-dressed pizza picked up the phone and ordered a take away human on a two for one offer.

Tales from the Sock Drawer

2011-07-08T22:50:00.000+01:00

Infinity is a hard concept to understand. The neverendingness of it all. To be able to go on and on and on without end.

It is especially hard thing to grasp if it is your sock drawer that is infinite.

My sock drawer is in a cheap, originally flat-packed, chest-of-drawers. Not the sort of place you'd expect something metaphysical, I think you'd agree. Infinite sock drawers should only occur in antique furniture of unknown origin, especially those from the far east or Egypt. Not something that arrived in a cardboard box from Argos and was put together with a screwdriver, some glue and a lot of bad language. It was totally normal. There were even bits left over.

Sometimes I forget the nature of the drawer. Months go by and I place socks in it, take socks out and nothing unusual happens. Then I'll get a sock out and it'll be covered in snow. Like it'd been to Narnia. The Lion, the Witch and the flat-packed wardrobe. Or I'd reach in and I'd have a pair of socks where one would be normal Marks & Spencer and the other a rough Scottish tartan. The piper playing in the distance only adding to my unease.

Most nights I feel safer if I tie my dressing gown cord around the handles to keep the draw shut, or prop a chair up against it to jam it closed. I wouldn't want my bedroom to be overrun by the cast of Braveheart whilst I sleep.

I've looked in the drawer with a torch. The light just disappears into the distance. Sometimes I can hear things. Wolves howling, wind blowing and storms raging. Once something crossed the beam of my torch. I wasn't sure what it was, but it had teeth. They glinted in the light. I'm sure it wasn't the cast of a mid-day soap, smiling inanely.

Last week I opened the drawer, and sitting there was a huge pair of wickedly sharp shears. Handy for home defence if you happened to be Michael Myers. I pushed them as far back into the drawer as possible and shut it quickly. I may have lost some socks with them.

Two days later, I got dressed, plucked up courage and went for the sock drawer. Laying the full length of the drawer on top of the socks was an set of edging scissors. The sort with big red handles so you can edge whilst half-standing to feel like a cripple and want to ring bells at Notre Dame within half an hour. Again I pushed them as far back into the drawer as possible. I'm sure I heard a voice say ouch.

Tuesday, I bought a pair of socks. I couldn't bring myself to open the draw.

Wednesday I wore the same pair of socks from Tuesday.

Thursday, I held my breath, opened the draw and fumbled for some socks. I nearly sliced my hand on the business end of a full sized scythe. The sort Death would feel very happy about. I picked up my wooden back scratcher and pushed the scythe back where it came from, grabbed some socks and shut the drawer.

Friday, this morning, I opened the drawer. There was nothing odd there at all. I pulled out a pair of socks, both black. There was no piper droning away in the distance. The socks were nicely tucked together as a pair. As I pulled them apart a small piece of paper fell to the floor. I picked it up, unfolded it and read the note. It said, "Please stop pushing socks into my gardening shed. Kindest Regards, Roth."

Don't Cross the Line

2011-06-29T22:44:00.000+01:00

"Don't cross the line," I warned.

"What line?" replied Roth.

"That one, there!" I nodded my head in the direction of an empty area of wooden floor. It was quite dusty, as though the building had been abandoned for years.

"There isn't a line there. I'm puzzled. Should there be?"

"We're early. It's not there yet..."

We weren't, as it happens, all that early. As we watched a chalk line appeared and slowly sketched out an intricate shape on the floor.

"It's lovely to see an artist at work, don't you think?" I asked.

"I agree," agreed Roth, "Hey, it's the outline of a body! Like at a crime scene!"

"Ex-police artist."

"Why can't we see him?"

"Ex. He's dead. The police don't often employ ghosts. I think they are prejudiced."

We watched for a while.

"Do you think the body really did have two heads and three arms?" enquired Roth.

"I think he drew the way he felt."

Rambling Uphill

2011-04-02T15:46:00.001+01:00

As I watched Roth pulled a small tube from a pocket on his snow jacket and deftly, despite the gloves, pushed a small button. Out of one end came a point and shaft, out of the other came a flag which unfurled in the harsh cold wind. He turned it up the right way and spiked it into the ground.

He stood back and saluted, "For King and Country," he bellowed against the wind.

"We have a Queen now," I bellowed back.

"Does no one tell me anything, anymore?" came the reply.

We sat down by a nearby snow covered rock, which gave some shelter from the blizzard that had enveloped us.

"You know," I said, "I'd always expected the top of a mountain to be kinda, well,... "

"Pointy?" Roth completed.

"Yes, exactly. Pointy. This is quite flat. Because of the blizzard we've had to walk around quite a bit to make sure it doesn't go up more than this. When I drew mountains as a child, they always had a point on the top and a completely obvious place to put a flag. We bumbled around for ages before we found what you called The Right Spot."

"Shall we explore?"

"Yes, OK. The snow and wind seems to have abated a little."

We set off towards the middle of the summit and were surprised to find a petite woman sitting in a slightly snow encrusted padded armchair. It was our friend Eolist.

"I wondered when you two would turn up. Did you stop off for a curry on the way?"

"Where would we find a curry house half way up a mountain?" exclaimed Roth.

"Well, there was this doorway in the rock face that opened directly into...Owwww!" Roth dropped his rucksack on my foot.

"What are you doing up here?" I asked, knowing that if the question were returned I couldn't begin to answer.

"Getting away from it all, seeking a bit of peace and quiet," she reflected for a moment, "although the blizzard was somewhat loud and annoying."

Answering the question that hadn't been asked, Roth said, "I'd invited iDifficult here over to help me with something at the bottom of my garden. Last Tuesday."

"I thought I was perfectly safe, seeing as he lives in a third floor apartment. I thought I'd go there, he'd realise he didn't have a garden and we'd go and eat pizza."

"Yes, my apartment comes with a share of a large communal garden."

"In bloody Nepal..."

Resolving to be Less Rubbish

2010-12-31T23:33:00.001Z

Lets face it most new year resolutions are not kept. I've been to the future and, trust me, I've broken all of the ones I've made so far. There is just no point in getting hung up about this, what I need are not more stupid, hard to keep, challenging resolutions, but a better class of resolution.

So here is my list:

Eat more curry.
Put on at least 5lbs before the end of January.
Wash my car one less time than I did in 2010. Simple arithmetic yields the answer of zero times.
Avoid walking past a gym.
Never bathe the cat in jam.
Don't wear wellington boots on my hands at work.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE

The Slacker's Art

2010-12-30T23:02:00.000Z

Roth and I have been on a mission to return dignity to the art of loafing.

In addition to loafing, I am a black-belt in lurking and Roth has achieved similar status in looming. He has the height on his side, although I wouldn't wish to detract from his obvious skill.

Whilst neither of us are entirely work shy, we do blush quite a bit and run away most of the time.

In his earlier work (I use the word carefully, but mostly because it only contains four letters and is hence less effort to type) In Line With My Worldview, Roth explains that he is a fractal slacker and at any level, whichever way you choose to view things, he is a raving success at doing absolutely nothing.

Having the technology at my disposal, I have become the world's first* Temporal Slacker. Throughout time, at major points in history, if you look carefully in the background I am there, doing absolutely nothing.

When the Berlin wall fell, there I was at the bottom resting up against it with my head on a pillow. Asleep.

When Stephenson's Rocket first shot down a railway track, I was there. In first class, reading the daily paper.

When the apes were waving sticks around at the base of a huge black obelisk, I was on the other side, leaning against it, sipping a beer and pondering why navel fluff is always purple.

You can think of me as an alternative Doctor Who, but without the heroism, the TARDIS, the assistant, the enemies or the charisma.

There are, without doubts, moments of frenetic activity in my life. Just the other day I lost the remote control down the back of the sofa. They are rare.

* Designations like world's first in time travel are rather hard to substantiate. So I haven't bothered, I've just claimed the unprovable.

iDifficult will return in the Chronicles of Nana, a tale of yellow fruit, flatpack bedroom furniture, a lion and snow, in the new year.

Balls

2010-11-15T23:12:00.001Z

As recounted by Indigo Roth in a wonderful Lemsip fueled haze called Making a break for Venezuela, we shared an interesting few years at the same school.

The school was typical for it's era and location. Wood panelled, ancient, dimly lit, and with masters that looked like they had fought in both World Wars. On the wrong side.

At the end of each year there was a test. Unlike today where this involves individual desks, a piece of paper and a sharpie, tests in our school had a more practical nature. This has been so since the year a master gave Roth a pencil and turned his back.

Roth, myself and Bernard Drentwistle, the principle boy, were chosen for this particular test. We were taken from our normal classes and ushered down the wood panelled corridors to an area of the school I believe none of us had seen before. The floor was dusty and we left fresh footprints. Ultimately we arrived at a corridor with three white doors cut into the wood panelling.

The masters moved as, none too gently I seem to remember, in front of a door each. This close I could see the door was absolutely perfect. Not a blemish. Nor a handle.

The doors hissed open in front of us and we each were ushered into the room beyond. And what a room it was. It was perfectly cubic. The walls, ceiling and floor were brilliant white. It was hard to work out where the light was coming from but it was bright, almost painfully bright.

"You have one hour," said the master, in tones that would have made Death give up his job as a voice over artist. The door shut behind me. Perfectly. So perfectly there was no line around the edge of the door that could be seen. If I rubbed my nail across where the join should be I could just perceive a faint click.

The room was empty, so very empty. Except for two 12 inch diameter stainless steel spheres. I walked over and attempted to pick one up. It was absolutely solid and heavy as lead. This could be an interesting hour I thought.

Some weeks past, during which time Roth and I amused ourselves in biochemistry lessons by making the lunchtime custard sentient. In physics we were successful in electrostatically levitating our physics master up to the lab ceiling, until he had this misfortune of touching the metalwork of one of the light fittings. Brightest flash I've ever seen.

And we managed to restore the library building to it's former position although the selection of pre-historic predators in the reading room was not truly appreciated as the educational aids we had intended. As Roth said, "You try to help some people."

It was a November assembly when we got the results of the test. The headmaster was walking from his office to the lectern whilst the music master played "The Death March" on his piano.

The headmaster cleared his throat and projected, "I'd like to read out the results of our end of year tests." He proceeded to describe the test we had undergone, "Three identical clean, cubic rooms, three pupils, six solid steel balls, two in each room. No communication and one hour to work."

"In first place, Bernard Drentwistle, did extraordinarily well. When we returned to the room he had got one ball balanced on top of the other. Clever chap indeed."

"In second place, by a huge margin, is Indigo Roth. When we returned to the room he had his head on one ball, his feet on the other and was fast asleep. There was a pizza box next to him. We aren't sure how he managed to order a take-away."

"In last place, and banned from ever taking the test again, is Mr Difficult. When we returned to his room, he'd lost one and broken the other."

"Would everyone please clap and show their approval for our excellent pupils." Under his breath he was heard to say, "and restrain Mr Difficult NOW!"

Lacklustre Weapon

2010-09-17T22:53:00.000+01:00

"We have quite a few things to question you about," said the younger man in the suit.

"Yes, we do, Mr." the older man looked down at his notebook, and squinted, "Mr. I.Difficult."

"Who are you?" asked I.

He held up a badge, "I'm DCI Fred Ender, and this," pointing to the younger man, "is DS Dave Smith."

"Oh!" There wasn't much to say to that.

"Would you like to do this here, or down the station?" asked DS Smith.

"Can I decide when you tell me what it is about?" I asked.

"I have a list here in my notebook," DCI Ender turned the book around to reveal a carefully numbered list in small well proportioned handwriting. Each page had roman numerals at the bottom.

I looked at the list:

Disappearance of the Eiffel Tower. Later found. In Basingstoke.
Nuclear submarine in the Slobbering-under-the-Bed Town Centre ornamental pond. Scared ducks.
Street lighting broken in the Town Centre.
Parking a genetically modified animal in the wrong timezone.

"Oh dear," I muttered. Hopefully they couldn't read anything into my expression.

I needed an alibi. Quickly. I thought hard. "I was watching TV, " I said.

"For all of these? And we didn't say when they happened?" DS Smith looked unsure.

DCI Ender helped him out, "What did you watch?"

"Oh, I hadn't turned it on. I was just watching it. And eating a curry." Quick think. Think. Must make this sound plausible. "Actually the cat had eaten the curry and was wearing the tin on it's head." Sorted. Very convincing.

Maybe a change of subject would work here, "Have you two been working together long?"

"Two weeks," replied DCI Fred, "They like to pair together odd couples like in the movies. You see I'm the straight-laced and by-the-book family man," he paused for dramatic effect, and possibly breath, "and DS Dangerous Dave here is the devil-may-care maverick whatever-it-takes-to-get-the-job-done shoot-to-kill hard-drinking hard-living womaniser with a death wish."

"Bugger, I thought you were the maverick with the death wish?!" exclaimed the somewhat surprised and newly nicknamed Dangerous Dave.

The two besuited detectives looked at one another with a look that surpassed surprise. I felt somewhat left out. "I don't know anything about these things, but I know a man who almost certainly does. Well, not know, more sort of acquaintance. We've done a little business. Have you got your notepad?"

"Yes," they both said in unison.

I spelled out the name, "I-N-D-I-G-O R-O-T-H. He'll be able to help. Hell, he may even be responsible for these crimes."

"That's odd," said DS Dave, raising an eyebrow.

"It is indeed."

"That's the name of the chap who gave us your name..."

Balloon

2010-09-08T14:41:00.001+01:00

There we were in the basket of a hot air balloon. Indigo Roth, Eolist Petite and I. Roth was looming up from the basket with his head awfully close to the flames of the burner. Ms Petite didn't have that particular problem as she could barely see over the edge of the basket. I had my hand wrapped around a rope.

I looked down and Ms Petite was busy screwing a holy shit handle to the rim of the basket. This is always a good idea when transport and Indigo were in close proximity.

On the far side of the basket Indigo was steering the balloon with a steering wheel. He felt happier when he was driving. The steering wheel wasn't attached to anything, which made Eolist and I feel happier.

"Where do you think we are?" Eolist asked.

"I've no idea. Slobbering-under-the-Bed kinda disappeared after we went straight through that glowing fog bank," I replied.

"I did try to guide us around it, but it's like this steering wheel isn't attached to anything." Ms Petite and I looked at each other. "It doesn't look like there is much down there."

"Odd, isn't it. We should be over England where there are fifteen pubs and twenty-four curry houses per square mile. I can't see a single one."

It was peaceful floating along in the balloon with the gentle rush of air and creaking of the basket. The peace was occasionally interrupted by the firing of the burner. What was below looked like desert with rolling dunes and the occasional patches of scrubby grass.

Roth was the first to spot something a little odd. "Look!" he said.

"I can't see!" replied Ms Petite, bouncing up and down.

"It's probably just a mirage," said I.

"Nope, definitely not a mirage. Look there's a sign over the door, but I can't make it out from here. Mirages never have signs over the door." He seemed very sure of this.

At this point I felt a pull on the rope I held in my hand. I followed the rope and looked over the side of the basket. On the end of the rope was a very well dressed chap of asian appearance.

"Hello?" I asked.

"Would sir mind pulling me up?"

"Excuse me, but what are you doing there?"

"Hanging on a piece of rope, 40 feet above the ground." He seemed anxious, "Would sir mind pulling me up?" he repeated.

We started pulling the man on the rope up towards the basket. Eventually he was lifted over the rim and into the basket. He paused. Dusted himself off and laid a white napkin over his right arm.

"Who are you?" I asked.

"I would have that would have been evident, sir. I am your waiter for the evening." He handed us a menu each. The menus were each bound in fine brown Italian leather, with the gold lettering spelling out the name of the establishment and the word menu.

"What were you doing on the rope?"

"A good waiter anticipates his customers every wish. I am here to take your orders and show you where to land."

At this point the couldn't-be-a-mirage-with-a-sign-over-the-door came into closer view. All three of us whispered the words, The Euthanasia Curry House.

"What is the big circle with a B in it for? The one next to the big circle with a H in it."

"The B circle is for balloons to land. H is for helicopters."

"What is the barrier with bales of hay and old tires for?"

"In case Indigo drove you here." replied the waiter.

The tale continues at Eolist Petite's Blog with Balloon too and/or while i waited...

Darkness and Solitude

2010-08-30T22:37:00.000+01:00

I was alone, sitting in a folding chair. I've known this place for years. Granite lumps rolled under my feet. The sky was the dark blue of an August evening. I could see the English countryside laid out below me in all directions past the nearby heather. A single tree stood siluetted against the growing dusk.

How many times have I been here? Honestly I don't know.

It grew darker and one at a time the stars came out. This was a good place to see the stars.

A voice spoke. "I knew I'd find you here," it said.

I looked around and there was no one to be seen.

"It's a glorious night, isn't it?"

I decided to ignore the apparent absence of my companion. "Yes, yes it is."

"The old tree is still standing."

"Indeed it is. Survived the storms at the end of the 80's I remember."

"Yes, me too," the voice sounded surprised and distant at the same time.

Nothing more was said for quite some time. I thought perhaps my companion had left. I certainly didn't hear him arrive.

Then it spoke again, "There are places and moments that stick in the soul. This is one, I think."

Curiosity overcame me, "Who are you and why can't I see you? Are you in my mind?"

"It's quite complicated."

"You aren't in my mind?"

"That would be an easy answer. It isn't true, so I'm not going to leave you believing that."

"Who?" I asked. I didn't expect an answer. Whoever it was just came to share the moment, and didn't feel the need to explain himself.

Just at that moment, in front of me, two eyes appeared. Nothing more. No face, just two eyes. I looked into them. They looked familiar and most terribly tired. For an instant I thought I understood. Then the instant passed and the eyes faded.

A young lady pulled up in an almost silent electric sports car, "You ready to go, Dad?"

I nodded and threw the chair in the boot.

"Mum's got us a takeaway back at base. Wouldn't want it to get cold."

As we pulled away, a voice behind me whispered, "Don't eat the left-overs from the foil containers tomorrow morning."

Bloodysillyism

2010-07-15T22:02:00.002+01:00

There I was walking down Tottenham Court Road in London and behold there was a place offering IQ and personality tests. My first thought was that if you went in there then your IQ was likely 10 points below average and your personality test would reveal extreme gullibility.

Even if you don't know Tottenham Court Road, I'm sure you must have come across other places like this shop/church. The teachings are based on the writings of a certain Science Fiction author and are much loved by some film stars.

If a fairly rubbish Science Fiction author can do it, then so can I. Below is the new iDifficult religion Bloodysillyism.

Creation Myth

All major religions have a creation myth. Bloodysillyism believers consider the universe and everything shot out of the bottom of a giant cat. In my house anything coming out of the bottom of our cat causes us to yell God and then crawl on our hands and knees seeking pockets of fresh air.

Forbidden Foods

Lobster and Radishes. They're just frankly gross and no one should have to eat them.

Recommended Style of Prayer

Prayer should be done in pairs. One lays out the Twister mat and adopts meditation postures based upon the spinner twirled by the other prayer.

Bloodysillyism Drive-thru-Temple

Churches are slow and outdated. A major advantage of Bloodysillyism is the new Drive-thru-Temple. All very simple and straightforward. Drive up and swipe your credit card at the first booth. Drive to the second booth to get absolution from your sins, deodorant or, if you forgot what you were doing, a Happy Meal. The third booth presents the receipt. This could be quite a shock and brings us smartly to the Afterlife.

Afterlife

Heaven and Hell to be precise. Well Bloodysillyism was created on a budget, so they are going to be the same place. The Bloodysillyism afterlife will be a somewhat choppy bath full of custard. It allows much more flexibility than heaven and hell. The good are upright, the bad are headfirst and the ugly will also be headfirst (because quite frankly do you want to spend eternity staring at some ugly person?)

Sacred Animal

That arboreal cephalopod the Squiddrel. Under no circumstances should these be shot. Partly because the only one that exists we lost around about 1984, but mostly because it makes them really grumpy. Also don't milk unicorns especially if they have one teat.

Essential Behaviour for a Devout Bloodysillyist

All washing must be pegged up with the matching coloured pegs. Believers must not step on the cracks in pavements. I know this sounds like OCD, but the scriptures are very clear on it.

Scriptures

Will be written when I have the time. Hopefully I can claim they are a science fiction novel and get enough money to write a second set of scriptures.

Conversion

Please leave a message below containing your bank details and as soon as the first financial transaction has gone through you can consider yourself converted. Amen.

Time is the Simplest Thing

2010-06-30T23:51:00.000+01:00

I was explaining, with plenty of hand gestures and unnecessary arm waving.

"There are three dimensions of space, and one of time. It's a bit odd, 'cos the time one keeps on marching onwards. If it were left and right, it'd be like us all continuously moving a bit to the left all the time."

"So you worked out how to travel through time?"

"Oh, everybody can do that! One second at a time into the future. Just staying still is hard. Master that and you've got the rest cracked."

"So how does this work then?" He pointed to the polished brass, glass and dark wooden contraption, glinting in the sunlight of a new day.

"It doesn't. I made that because that is how a time machine is supposed to look. There's no swirling vortex, lightening or a howling gale. Always liked the Time Tunnel or Terminator idea. You even get to travel clothed."

"That's not what you told me when we travelled to Ancient Egypt!"

"Hmm, sorry about that. I was trying to compute your gullibility quotient. It's amazingly high. I digress. The trouble is, you don't see or feel anything," I paused, "Actually, that's not quite true. Everyone feels a little sick going backwards."

"So where is the time machine?"

"Third draw down in the wooden dashboard."

"Third draw?"

"Third. Cheese and fruit cake in the top drawer. Coffee machine in the second. Got to get your priorities right."

"So anyway, you were saying, three dimensions of space, and one of time."

"Yes, thank you," I hadn't waved my arms unnecessarily for several minutes, "Do you remember my favourite technique for playing a really strong chess computer? Play as well as you can, but when it gets a really good lead over and the game is all but lost, swap sides with it."

I carried on, "What if we swapped time for left and right, or time for up and down, or even with back and forwards?"

"And that does it?"

"Yes, although the first experiment didn't go well, and I swapped left and right for up and down. When it swapped back I had my left elbow in my right ear."

"Then you got it right."

"Indeed but only after I got fed up with getting ear-wax on my elbows. I swapped and found by walking sharply backwards and then putting time back where it belongs I had gone back to last week."

"So that's how it works. I did wonder."

"Left it on last night. It'd swapped up and down with time. When I woke I was 15 feet above the top of the house but hadn't aged a second," I thought about this for a moment, "until I woke up."

"What shall we do now?"

"Did you fancy having that curry from last week again?"

"Won't we be there?"

"Yes, but if we wait until we order and then appear one bay closer to the kitchen they'll serve us the food and won't notice our past selves sitting in the next bay down."

"You know, I don't remember last weeks curry being any good. Ordered, waited for ages, didn't get any food and then they presented a huge bill."

"Hey, the plan worked!"

"Yeah, must have done, let's go..."

The report of my death was an exaggeration

2010-06-28T14:17:00.002+01:00

"I'm not dead, I've just been resting."

"You do look a bit pale though. Are you sure you're not dead?"

"Sometimes you've got a take a bit of a rest, even from things you enjoy."

"Like breathing?"

"What?"

"You're not breathing."

"I am. It's very shallow. I told you I was resting."

"Also, what's that smell?"

"What smell?"

"That smell!"

"My new aftershave. It was a present. Do you like it?"

"No, no. Not really."

"Cold Corpse, it's called. I'm told it's very popular."

"Who amougst?"

"Mortuary workers, Undertakers, Grave diggers and some forensic scientists. However only those forensic scientists not cool and good looking enough to appear in Silent Witness or Bones."

"OK, I'll catch you around."

"Good plan. We must have a curry. Anyway before you go, could you do something for me?"

"Sure."

"Could you close the lid? Ta. I need a lie-in."

Fade to Black

2010-06-14T21:15:00.001+01:00

"Have you been out this far before?", my friend asks.

"No, although I did go right to the other end. It looks surprisingly similar."

"Really?"

"Very much so."

"Black, very very black. But yet with a single point of light in the distance."

"The same."

"It's quite beautiful, isn't it?"

I nodded agreement and we both heaved that admiring nature sigh. He sipped his Vesper, and I my Advocaat, Coke and Drambuie cocktail. My eyes watered slightly. I was sure the olives weren't doing it any favours.

"Tell me, is there any air?"

"No, none."

"What are we breathing?"

"Third oxygen, two-thirds nitrogen, bit of CO2 and few other gasses. And I'm fairly sure I just swallowed a fly."

"That's air! I thought you said there wasn't any?"

"None, generally. There is inside this bubble. Don't know quite why. I suspect we brought it with us, along with the two comfy chairs and the cocktails."

"So what's the bubble made of?", he said poking it with an outstretched finger. It vibrated. He poked it again. It had that seductiveness of bubble wrap.

"I think it's curdled time," I scratched my chin and thought about it, "You know it takes huge amount of power to do that?"

"Where did the power come from?"

"Well, next week when your electricity bill drops through your letter box."

"Yes..."

"Don't even think about opening it."

Poking Time with a Stick

2010-06-05T23:14:00.002+01:00

It was a pleasant afternoon sitting in the shade leaning against the wall of an old dusty building. It was a very long time ago, in a land that has had many names, and supported many civilisations with as many languages. You'd probably recognise it best as Iraq.

I was writing in a clay tablet with a stylus. It was careful and painstaking work. I was really missing the spelling checker, but less so the grammar checker and automatic humour inserter, but anyhow these wouldn't have been invented until some 50 centuries later.

Once I'd finished writing, my old friend Indigo Roth would pop the tablet into an oven and give it a good baking. I'd just finished one, he'd put it into the oven and, in return, got a freshly baked one out and laid it gently into the sand where he read it. When he'd finished, he smacked a corner off the tablet with a rock and proceeded to pound the bit he'd broken off into the dust.

"If you don't like what I'm writing, you could just tell me," I said, with my spare stylus in my mouth. It made grinning difficult.

"Nothing wrong with it at all. It's just it started to make sense. It's much better with the corner removed."

"Yes, yes, you're right. If it makes sense we'll loose the whole point of the day."

The day had started ordinarily enough. Roth had banged on the door of my shed. Then the other one. Then finally the shed I was actually in. Feet resting on piles of books, laying back in battered old armchairs we sat and chewed the cud and some of Roth's most excellent coffee. He'd been boiling this batch since last Monday week.

Roth was annoyed. "I'm annoyed," he said.

"Are you?"

He nodded, "Very."

"Oh."

"I wrote a blog entry."

"It happens."

"And I got a comment."

"Nope, never happened to me."

"From a pedant. Of the worst kind. He said I had broken a grammar rule in my entry."

He went on to explain the rule of past participle post wrangling. He did much gesticulating. I chewed coffee.

Then we got serious. The time machine crackled into life. Fortunately it does allow some travel in space as well as time, or it'd be one hell of a long walk at the other end. Or we'd have to get the time machine onto a plane as hand luggage, and you know how fussy they are about things with wires and particle accelerators. Any excuse and they'd think we were terrorists.

The deal was he'd write for the morning and I'd bake the tablets and proof read. In the afternoon we'd swap. Time went quickly and soon the afternoon was over.

Clutching the clay tablets under our arms we went into the local library and carefully arranged the tablets on the recently returned tablets shelf. The Sumerian lending library service was fantastic and the fines were very reasonable for late returns.

"So do you think that'll do it?"

"You know how it is. Cause and effect. Ancient Sumerian feeds other languages, then so on through time. Cause and effect."

"That'll teach the pedant. No more past participle post wrangling," said Roth, grinning widely, "and the Squiddrel will be in ancient mythology."

"Do you think your coffee will have set completely, or can we have a cup when we get back?"

Breaking News

2010-06-02T22:27:00.000+01:00

New UK Government redesigns the houses of parliament.

A spokesman for the new coalition was reported as saying that "they wanted a symbol to represent the new age of austerity and, indeed, fear we should all feel unless we happened to have inherited large amounts of money and have been to the 'right' schools."

Ghost of Birthdays Future

2010-05-17T22:40:00.000+01:00

I'm half awake. It is the morning of my birthday. The room is quite unusually cold. I check the window by my bed and there is a thick layer of frost on the inside. My wife is wrapped up warm and still snoozing gently besides me.

There at the bottom of the bed is a glowing figure. He introduces himself, "I am the ghost of birthdays future." His voice is thin and ethereal. He rattles some chains for effect. As he speaks I can see subtitles floating in the air about midway down.

"Great," I say, watching my breath cloud in front of me, "I'm exactly one year older and I've lost my last marble!"

"I am the ghost of birthdays future," he says again. Well I assume it's a he. Maybe it's an it. Or a he in drag. Cross-dressing ghosts, now that'll be a first. The subtitles mis-spell ghost as gots.

"You're repeating yourself, I got that bit." I really don't like being woken up, especially not by glowing apparitions of central heating past. This is the first time I've seen a ghost and I'd expected to be scared. Instead I'm annoyed to be woken up and freezing cold. "What is it with the subtitles?"

"A couple of previous clients were saying they couldn't hear me over the chains, so I got them added by a local TV company. The spelling's atrocious though."

Remembering the tiny bit of Dickens I didn't sleep through at school, I asked my first sensible question of the new day, "Are you like the Ghost of Christmas Future from A Christmas Carol?"

"He's my brother. He always gets the good jobs, lucky bastard!"

"Am I a really mean person who needs to mend his ways?"

"No, not really. I found your name in the phone book using a pin. I was curious. Do you come from a long line of iDifficults?"

"No, my mother is aTypical though. Anyway, aren't you supposed to find a bad person, scare them senseless and make them good?"

"Yes, I'm supposed to, but I really can't be bothered and I find the phone book technique much better than years of research, careful watching and finally intervention." He pauses reflectively for a few moments, "Do you suppose that's why my brother gets the good gigs?"

"You mean because he does the job properly? No, no I can't imagine that would be why..." Somewhere about now, we should be doing something. I'm sure of it. "Aren't you going to take me and show me some birthdays in my future, so I can finally understand something deep and significant about myself?"

"I should do. Did you fancy a pizza instead? I can pop us forward to the special offer Pizza Hut are going to run next March on lunchtime buffets. Oh, I'm not supposed to tell you that! Never mind. I'm starving."

"You are an appalling slacker. Let's go."

Virtual Tag

2010-05-11T13:45:00.000+01:00

Indigo Roth has tagged me over at IndigoWrath.

I have to name seven historical/fictional people I'd like to meet, and then pass this on with a new question, presumably involving the number seven, to some other bloggers.

My list of seven historical or fictional people:

Patrick Star from SpongeBob Squarepants. I'd love to have someone on my level to talk to.
Douglas Adams. Sadly historical. I always admired his attitude to deadlines. He said, "I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by."
Penelope Pitstop. I'd just like her to know that Sylvester Sneekly is the Hooded Claw.
Edmund Halley. Of the comet fame. It was said he "now talks, swears and drinks brandy like a sea captain" - John Flamsteed. Strangely true, as he is the only civilian Englishman who has even been allowed to captain a ship of the realm. He became a drinking companion of Peter the Great and spent some time being carried around in a wheelbarrow whilst throwing rocks at the windows of his country house.
HAL 9000 from 2001. I want to know if you pull his memory blocks in a different order, whether he was taught some really dirty limericks, or some different endings to 'Daisy, Daisy'.
Albert Einstein. Fantastic character. Loved the story of a young student who came to work with him. Weeks passed and then a theory they were working on proved to be wrong. The student was devastated. Weeks of work up in smoke, so to speak. Einstein came in the following day and said, "I've a new idea..."
Miss Marple. I want to know if she felt any guilt over the further deaths that were caused by her procrastination getting to the final dining room scene?

Anyway now the passing on bit of the tag game.

Name seven fictional cars or other vehicles you'd have liked to have driven and why.

Over to Eolist Petite and Cat Lady Larew, because I know you're going to do something special with this. I wish I had.

Attacking From Both Sides

2010-05-03T18:00:00.001+01:00

Every year at the beginning of summer, the Morris dancers and Marching bands meet at the seaside town of Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe to have a running battle. They have been bitter rivals for years. There is often violence and, always, fairly iffy music.

Once I got caught in the middle of it all, whist I was waiting under the pier for the tide to come in. I was lucky to escape with my musical taste intact. I guess the moral of the story is don't get caught sleeping under a good book. Or a bad book for that matter. Look, it really doesn't matter what sort of book, just don't get caught sleeping under it.

It's important to remember that Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe is not your classic seaside town. Being more than 30 miles from the sea really does put paid to that. The tide is not just out, it has never come in. None of this has prevented the local government from building a pier, complete with hotdog stands, ice cream parlours and putting up miles of fancy railings and calling it a seafront promenade. Most believe they should have spent their time and effort on a really good lunatic asylum.

The beach is a grassy field. The Morris men approached from the Marina end. The Marching bands from the site of the planned west pier.

The troops of Morris men were a fine sight. Sticks a-bashing, beer a-slopping, handkerchiefs a-waving, dancing in lines and bells tinkling. The marching bands were equally impressive. Marching at a cracking pace since they had put wheels on the grand piano and the pianists stool. They only stopped occasionally for two hefty blokes in tails to pick up the double base player and move her along a few feet.

A lump came up in my throat. There was no way I could get out from between them. I was at the meeting point. The epicentre. I couldn't hide either, there was simply nothing taller than a cow-pat in this field.

It was then I heard a cry of "We'll save you young lady, never fear!"

There in front of me was Slobbering-under-the-Bed's very own superhero Off-his-Head-Man. There were few problems that couldn't be made a lot worse with his intervention.

"You have your mask on backwards."

"Oh, I thought it was getting dark early."

"Where's your trusty sidekick Blotto-Boy?"

"Don't worry, he's stopped off to have a pee."

The Marching bands and Morris Men got ever closer. The sound of banging sticks, bells and various instruments was extraordinary. You'd have thought they'd have decided what to play before starting out. The Morris men were playing something authentically rustic, but the marching bands, well, whoops boys! The Birdie Song and Stairway to Heaven just don't go.

Blotto-Boy arrived and fell over. "Hi, you're very pretty," he said.

"Look," I said, nodding in the direction of the waring factions, "We're trapped. They'll be here in minutes. Help."

"Don't worry young lady," said Off-his-Head-Man.

"I'm a man. Look, six days of designer stubble!!" I pointed at my face.

"Doesn't mean a thing, so had my first wife!"

"By the way, what are you doing over in Paralytic, you're normally fighting crime boozing in Slobbering?"

"Pub crawl went wrong. Neither the lad or I can use the sat-nav," he paused for a moment, bent down, wobbled and fell over sideways. He had taken his golden boot off and was pointing to a hole in his sock. "Hey, we could escape through this?"

I slapped my head with my hand, "Look that might have worked on The Goons, but this is real life! For goodness sake what have you been drinking? Shoe polish?"

Blotto-Boy piped up, "I really like dark tan. With an olive."

At this very moment I spied something very familiar poking out of the very turf just a few feet away. It rotated and a single lens locked onto me. I hoped the torpedo auto-fire was switched off or this could be a short reunion. I bid a quick wave to my superhero friends and ran towards the lens. When I arrived the ground bulged upwards and a hatch opened. Indigo Roth looked upwards. "Hope you don't mind, I borrowed your submarine," he said cheerfully.

"Did you know you're 30 miles inland?"

"Bloody sat-nav's buggered again! Told me I was going past a speed camera at 40 knots just now."

"Thanks for the rescue mate, but you can pay the speeding fine!" I followed Roth and climbed carefully through the hatch and slammed it behind me.

Twisted

2010-04-25T23:18:00.001+01:00

I just managed to lift the hatch to the storm cellar, when the whole house shuddered and lurched. Through the hatch I could see the ground slip away into a maelstrom of flying debris. Then the floor tipped and I slid violently hitting my head on the stone fireplace.

When I awoke the house was still in the air and clearly encountering a spot of turbulence. The radio on the sideboard switched on. An announcer spoke in a voice somewhat reminiscent of the late David Niven. "Would you please return to your seat and return the standard lamp to the upright position. We are in a holding pattern and, in accordance to protocol, seeking a witch to land upon."

I did as I was asked with the standard lamp and sat down heavily in the armchair. I felt my head and fingered a large tender area on my temple. At least I wasn't bleeding.

The house plummeted and with a deafening crash hit the ground. A female voice came over the radio, "Captain Kangaroo would like to let you know that he has landed your house successfully and when everything stops bouncing up and down, you may disembark through the front door. Please be careful when collecting your luggage from the cupboard-under-the-stairs as the contents may have shifted during the flight, could fall and knock you the f*ck out," Charming, I thought.

I grabbed my coat, and stepped out of the front door. Outside was bright and sunny. All the people were somewhat short and were singing cheery songs as they went quickly about their business.

"What have you done to my sister?"

"Pardon me?"

She pointed to the legs protruding out from under the house, "Her legs. Over there."

"Oh my goodness, I'm really sorry. I had no idea."

She cut me off mid-apology, "Did you dress her in those hideous striped leggings? Bet she was wearing a leotard too."

"No, but it's my house."

"Oh, don't worry about that. We never really got on. She was allergic to my flying monkeys you know. I thought her fitness drive was silly. Especially leggings and a leotard. Black pointy hat, green face and long black cape - it's traditional."

"Would you like a cup of tea?" It seemed the polite thing to do, since my house had inadvertently squashed her sibling flat.

"No, but thank you. Must be flying. Left my broom with the engine running tied to a lamppost. Got to look after the environment you know." With that she went.

I looked my house up and down. There was no way I could leave it here. The local authorities would get a bit bent out of shape and demand planning permission or something worse. "Excuse me," I spoke to one of the diminutive men singing his cheery song, "Do you know someone who could help me get this back to where it came from?"

"No, sorry mate. You can use my phone if you want," He passed me a small brown cell phone.

I tried for a few moments to dial a number before realising the sad truth. "It's made of chocolate."

"Well, what do you expect? We're Oompa-Loompas. We do chocolate. Everything here is made of chocolate. That's why we're hyperactive and the phones don't work."

"Great. Just great. Do you know anyone who can help me?"

"You need a great wizard to help you. We think he's in Cupertino. We'd give you a map, but to be honest it'll melt in the sun and make a mess of your pocket."

"How am I going to get to the wizard of Cupertino?"

"There is a way. You need to follow the yellow brick road."

"Where?"

"That one."

"Oh, that one!" I step smartly forward, twist my ankle and fall.

"Mind the potholes. Rough winter here last year. Also don't stop, it's marked as an urban clearway. Oh yes, also, keep out of the bus lane."

I set off, muttering to myself, "Follow the yellow brick road. There's a song in that somewhere, I'm sure of it."

I have a feeling this is going to be a long journey. As I walk, the town falls away, the cloying smell of chocolate reduces and finally I am out in open refreshing countryside. Fields and woods as far as the eye can see. It sure doesn't look like Slobbering-under-the-Bed.

I find myself walking beside a huge corn field. In the middle of the field stands a man-sized scarecrow. Surprisingly he hops off his wooden stand and walks towards me in a somewhat wobbly manner. The scarecrow, upon reaching the edge of the field, speaks to me in a Lancashire accent, "It's turned out nice again!" He looks me up and down, "Hang on, you're not Do..."

I didn't hear the rest of what he was saying because at that moment there was a cry of "TIMBER!", then "Ohhhhh shiiiittt!" and finally, "ouch!"

A short man, with quite a flat head and a nearly non-existent neck steps out from behind a nearby tree. He staggers over to where the scarecrow and I am standing. The scarecrow says only what I was thinking, "Are they all dwarfs where you come from?"

The short man hits the scarecrow with a well constructed right hook and lays him out flat.

Scarecrow bounces back up to his feet and timidly says, "Never touched me!"

Hoping to prevent this escalating into something worse, I introduce myself. "Hi, I'm iDifficult," and then for some general interest add, "and I'm off to see the wizard."

The scarecrow speaks first and holds out a hand ready to be shaken. I grasp it and he says, "Call me George. By the way, don't you think you should hold off on second helpings occasionally?" I blink.

The short man speaks, "Hi, Call me Edward. I'm a tree surgeon." He thinks over what I was saying in his mind and then adds, "Did you mention a wizard? It's just I have this problem with trees."

"Allergic?" I ask helpfully.

"Nope, they keep falling on me. I used to be 6'5". I suspect I'm a little less than that now."

"I've got a problem too. He pats his chest. No tact. When the farmer made me he left out the tact. Do you think the wizard could give me some tact?"

"I'm expect in the end he will, but it'll be a rough journey. We'll probably have to throw a ring into Mount Doom. Anyway first things first, do either of you two know if there is a pub down this road? I could murder a pint of beer."

"Sod the road mate. I've got sat-nav."

Ghostwriter

2010-04-18T09:14:00.001+01:00

Writing a blog is hard work. Sometimes I don't feel in the mood. Often there isn't enough silly in my blood to write something humorous.

So I've decided I'm going to employ a ghostwriter. Ideally someone with wit, charm and a depth of writing I could only aspire to. To be a proper ghost writer, being dead is essential.

I've started interviewing the candidates:

Casper. Friendly. Kept hiding behind computer and shouting boo.

Eolistpetite's ghost. Sat smoking a cigarette in the corner. Didn't write a bloody word.

Slimer from Ghostbusters. Wrote 'sfhsdfhsdhjdf hdsfh xxndjjsd'. Keyboard absolutely running with ectoplasm - probably never be able to use it again.

The Flying Dutchman from Spongebob. Wrote about putting a sock on his ghostly tail. Most promising candidate so far. Tended to use a lot of pirate lingo.

Pepper's ghost. Discovered he was a fake. If I wanted a piece of glass mounted at an angle and an actor, I'd have advertised for one.

Ghost of Christmas Present. Kept wrapping mouse in gaudy paper and giving it to me. Very annoying. More a talker than a writer. Dickensian English becomes tiresome after a while.

After this lot, I've given up on recruitment and decided to write the blog myself.

I want to believe

2010-04-13T13:02:00.002+01:00

"Mulder, You've been sitting on that fence for hours. What's going on? You got a furball again?"

"I tell you there is something out there, Scully."

She stopped walking down the fence and balanced carefully on a fencepost. It was then she noticed something strange about her friend. "I must say you look bloody silly with that take-away curry tin on your noggin."

"It keeps their thoughts out of my head."

"Why would they want to get into your head?"

"They want my dreams. The other night I was curled up sleeping in my basket. The bright light came and I was put in a cage I couldn't bite or claw through. It was made of a material unknown to cat-kind. Then they took me to a bright room and stuck a probe in the back of my neck."

"OK, you've got me. I'll bite. So what happened next?"

"They were poking about for that little metal thing they stuck in me last time." He stopped speaking for a moment, and when he started again, it was in a whisper. "Trust no one."

"Call me skeptical, but I just don't believe. There is nothing out there. Come on, where's your proof?"

"That dry stuff in the bowl next to my water? It's not of this world. Have you tasted it? It's weird!"

"Don't like it. Prefer fresh mouse. Sparrow is very nice too - quite crunchy."

"How about the wet stuff with gravy and carrots? It's meat but it doesn't taste like mouse or sparrow. It doesn't taste of anything. When I'm eating it I hear the word 'chic'-something."

"Chicken?"

"So, you've heard it too."

"Doesn't your food speak to you? Last mouse I cornered distinctly said 'bugger'."

"Come on, mice don't speak. That'd be unbelievable."

Walking down the red carpet

2010-04-12T14:07:00.002+01:00

I have been presented The Sunshine Award by the CatLadyWithoutCats. Me, a ray of sunshine! I'm quite shocked. Normally at home I am referred to as "that miserable git".

Like most award ceremonies I shall accept the award graciously, but slightly clumsily as I have been drinking champagne non-stop for seven days since I discovered I had been nominated. Obviously I was simply too drunk to write an acceptance speech, so being a man of words and learning I shall wing it.

Before I forget to show you all, here is the award:

Anyway, I'd like to thank the CatLadyWithoutCats for bringing the award. If the roles were reversed, I'd have probably accidentally forgotton it and left it at home in the 'fridge.

I'd like to thank my mother for giving birth to me. I have quite a big head and it must have stung a bit.

I'd like to thank my father for teaching me how to put up shelves and the like with such a level of cronic over-engineering they'll outlast the sphinx. Should judgement day ever come, we shall be able to hide from the Terminators behind shelves I've made.

Extra special thanks go to my wife, who has often put up with the very slurred line "I love you verrryyy veryyyy much. I written you a poem. Would you like a bit of my kebab?" before collapsing and snoring. Loudly.

My daughter has needed to put up with a father who is sillier than she is. Although, I am proud to say, I have taught her how to fart and blame it on the cat convincingly.

I'd like to thanks all my friends, but most especially Indigo Roth as he is the only one with a cool pseudonym. Between us we have taken on the world of curry and pizza and come out smiling.

I'd also like to apologise to my cat, Tinker, for getting sprayed with water for farting when she hadn't.

Pizza will prevail

Introspection

2010-04-11T22:54:00.004+01:00

Every so often I question my motivation behind writing a blog. Self-analysis is not the easiest thing. There's an expression: "He/she knows his/her own mind." I'm not at all sure I ever will - it's a slippery resourceful bugger that is always at least one step ahead of me.

Lots of things I do are devoid of one over-arching reason, but have lots of little part-reasons all pushing the same way. Sometimes there is a smattering of self-delusion but some things I do know.

I really like creating things. The style, presentation and content of my blog represent effort to put together something unique.

It's lovely to have readers, followers and, especially, comments. If I'm going to write something it's great when people enjoy it.

I have a huge love of comedy. The thought that sometimes, just sometimes, I can emulate my comedy heroes and make someone laugh is a delight. Often I try a bit too hard and miss the mark, but occasionally it flows. I hope those moments are enough.

Somewhere in me is, I suspect, a damn good book. I started writing it ten years ago. How many of my early scribblings will be retained who could possibly say? Likely as not, even the title will be re-imagined. Writing a blog forms ideas, builds up practice and hopefully irons out the wrinkles.

Anyhow, this has been a bit of a ramble with no funnies. I'd just like to say thanks very much to my friends who have taken the time to read this blog over the last few months. I'm sure more daftness will be along shortly.

All the best,
Keith aka iDifficult

Barking up the Wrong Tree

2010-04-08T22:49:00.001+01:00

I met one once. Huge with long canine teeth, fetid breath, and a tendency to wee up lampposts. I am of course talking about werewolves, not Indigo Roth, who for the record does not have fetid breath.

This is the iDifficult guide to werewolves. It will not help with vampires, zombies, banshees, ghosts, poltergeists or bankers. To be honest, it will be sod-all help with werewolves, as I doubt you'll have time to sit down with your laptop and have a quick read should one be around.

When there is a full moon, werewolves run around remote Scottish moors biting and eating people. The people who get bitten become werewolves at the next full moon. Then they run around biting and eating people. Some of the time they spend attempting to blow down the houses of werepiggys. Werepiggys with straw houses tend to be especially vulnerable to this behaviour. Wood fares little better. Brick is definitely werewolf proof.

Killing the first in a line of werewolves, removes the curse from the bitten and their bitten and so on down. It also stops the eaten from being cursed restless ghosts and being annoying.

Beheading kills werewolves. It also works on vampires, zombies and bankers. Should you be a little myopic opt for the beheading approach. Try not to be too obvious whilst carrying around a huge broadsword.

Silver bullets are great. They do kill werewolves. Please check the hallmark as silver plated bullets will not do. You will also need a gun of some kind (although this does not need to be silver) as bullets, no matter of what they are made, will have little effect if you just throw them. Gold bullets do not work, as Scaramanga found out to his cost in the little known James Bond book The Man with the Golden Gun and a Huge Chunk Taken Out of His Arse.

Under no circumstances make use of regular dog training techniques. Werewolves do not fetch, roll over, play dead or beg. Without a huge broadsword or silver bullets you stand only a slim chance of survival. You will need a spot of luck to make use of the following techniques:

If you are near a beach, werewolves love sand. There is a good chance the hairy fanged beastie may bury you and forget where.
A werecat wanders by. Werewolves have to chase these up trees. It's in their blood. Run away from the trees.
The moon goes behind a cloud. Run.

As always, here at the iDifficult blog, we bid you good night, don't have nightmares and be lucky, especially around the undead.

Ghostbusters

2010-04-01T22:53:00.005+01:00

This is a blog that isn't afraid to discuss anything. All aspects of life, curry, the undead, Ford Edsel's and old London Routemaster buses are to be found on these pages. In this post we'll deal with the dead. Not your regular stuck in a box and buried six-feet under, or stuck in a box, burned to a frazzle and put in a jar over granny's mantlepiece type dead. We're talking the restless dead, ghosts.

Should you meet a ghost, be sympathetic. Ghosts have quite a lot to put up with. Like dying and, usually some unfinished earthly business. This can make them stressed and incoherent. What's worse is they can't take Prozac or Valium because the little tablets go straight through them and fall on the floor.

Imagine a ghost, or a little group of ghosts, in some dark and foreboding house. Nice night in. Chance to put their feet or ghostly tails up. Lounge in an old rocking chair, leave a person shaped imprint on the bedcovers, smoke a cigarette or two, laugh at the SMOKING KILLS label on the packet. Then there is a crash. The door opens and in comes a TV crew. They set up night vision cameras everywhere, put motion sensors on the rocking chair, and invite members of a studio audience to sit in the dark and scream. Yes, they've been visited by the Most Haunted team.

Ghosts find this most frustrating. The presenters are saying things like "Oh, over there an orb, or light anomaly as we like to call them. I mean, did you see that?"

Meanwhile our ghost is saying "I'm not over there, I'm behind you. And try cleaning your camera lens occasionally, it's filthy!"

Or, "Let's get out the Ouija board and try to communicate. Is there anyone there?"

"Give over, I was a peasant farmer, born in 1563. I can't even write, let alone spell!"

"OK everyone, put a finger on the glass, or planchette, as we experts say. Call on the ghost to spell out his name."

"Oh, I suppose I can try. Learned a little from the newer ghosts.
S-O-D O-F-F."

The evening usually continues in much the same vein. Table tipping is tried, with squeals of delight. "Look the spirits are lifting the table up. Quick film under there, see the legs are nearly off the ground. Squee!"

"No, I'm over here. In the rocking chair, having a quick smoke. Might have a lie down in a bit."

No team is complete without a medium, who occasionally becomes possessed by an evil spirit or talks about subterraneans living in the London tube network. He'll pipe up and say things like "I sense an evil, angry spirit seeking revenge over his murder. I can see his face just in front of me."

"No, I'm still rocking and having a smoke. Besides I'm not angry. Horse backed up and pushed me down a well. Didn't have time to be angry. Bloody stupid animal."

"Does anyone else think it is getting cold in here?"

"Of course it's getting cold, you've left the front door open to get all the TV cables in, you complete pudding!"

I'm sure you can understand why a ghost might find this frustrating, and possibly just a little bit annoying.

If you want to be nice to a ghost, do some pottery. They love pottery. Something soothing about pottery. It's not as if they have any real use for the mugs or cups you make. A nice cup of tea goes the same way as the Prozac, straight onto the floor.

Goodnight, and don't be spooked. They're as shocked to see you as we are to see them. Traumatised ghosts often wander around saying things like "I see live people."

Taxi

2010-03-30T23:20:00.003+01:00

For various reasons, chronicled here, I avoid the buses in Slobbering-under-the-Bed. Instead I prefer, when unable to drive myself, to make use of Slobbering's only licensed taxi driver, Narcoleptic Norman.

It was a dark night, travelling back from the Euthanasia where Indigo Roth and I had mercilessly murdered a curry, that something quite weird happened. I hope you can picture the scene - we're all in Norman's cab. The man himself, Narcoleptic Norman, was driving. Roth was in the front passenger seat with his knees up close to his chest and holding onto the handle over the passenger door like a drowning man might grip a penguin. I was on the back seat behind Norman talking to myself (I always use a bluetooth earpiece so I can have a good conversation undisturbed by psychiatric workers). Next to me and very much cramped behind Roth was one of the waiters from the Euthanasia. I suspect we'd paid the bill with currency from the wrong century again. I still have a pocket full of Corinthian Staters. The banks hate them, but you can use them in most gym lockers.

We drove to Roth's home town of Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe first. Whilst it would have been easier to drop me off first, I think we had discussed this and decided that Norman wasn't entirely safe without a passenger to keep him awake. The man and his cab have been found in various places - fast asleep in the middle of roundabouts, in the central reservation of fast roads, and once on the steps to the town hall.

Every time our driver nodded off, Roth would yell "Left". Norman would wake with a start and take the next left. Allowing Roth to give directions was pretty much always a disaster. Quite often a passport was necessary. In extreme cases jabs for tropical diseases. On this particular trip, we had been through the same McDonald's drive-thru no less than sixteen times. I was bloody sick of Happy Meals, although the waiter was collecting the toys with glee.

Suddenly we were on the open road. Norman would slump every few minutes. As Roth yelled "Left", I countered with "Straight on". Norm would wake up, explain that he was only resting his eyes and shove the gas pedal violently. The old car would shudder and almost take off. There weren't many like it. It was a 1958 Ford Edsel.

The origin of the car was a complete mystery to us. Norman had never explained, although he wasn't being tight lipped about it, he just seldom stayed awake that long. It was a mystery second only to Henry Ford naming his son Edsel.

Anyway, back to the clear, dark, long, open road. We were travelling at quite a lick when besides us appeared an old style London bus. It came alongside without effort or seemingly much engine noise.

A girl with an impossibly short neck and a flat topped head yelled at me from the open platform. "Make sure you've put your seatbelt on, the conductor is getting quite excited about having you back aboard again."

Bit weird, but I thought I'd strike up a conversation. It wasn't as if we were complete strangers. I even knew the girl. She'd committed suicide by jumping off the Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe pier. The tide was out. I'd first met her after she was dead and, strangely, on the self same bus. "How are you doing?" I asked.

"Quite well, apart from being dead. Mustn't grumble."

"Journey seems to be taking a long time. Is the driver lost?"

"No, apparently there are roadworks and we have to take an alternative route to the afterlife. Anyway, that's what the conductor says. Personally, I think he likes the company."

"Where is he, by the way?" It wasn't as though I was in a hurry to meet him again. I doubted if he liked the company, he hadn't seemed very sociable to me.

"Up top, reading the company rulebook. I think he is trying to find a way of not honouring your return ticket."

"Bugger that!", I turned to our driver, "Norman, floor it! Give it some welly! Put the hammer to the metal! Roth, let go of that penguin!"

"I was just resting my eyes," groaned the soporific voice of our driver.

"Just do it! Now!"

Norman hit the gas. Hard. The Edsel shot forward, and for a few moments was pulling nicely away from the big red bus. I was briefly relieved, until the bus slid back alongside us. On the platform was the conductor. I recognised the very deep-set eyes. He spoke to me in a hollow, far away voice, which despite the straining of the Edsel's engine was crisp, cold and clear to me.

"I've checked the company rulebook most throughly sir. It does seem that your return ticket was valid on this service. But should sir wish to come aboard he can have the left front seat. It's very nice."

"To be honest, if you don't mind, I'd..." The bus vanished, Norman nodded off again and Roth yelled "Left." Norman woke with a start, turned left and we crashed through the hedgerow and spent the night in a farmer's field.

iDifficult.dis-org

2010-03-29T21:57:00.003+01:00

Well, I've done it now. I've registered a domain for my bloggy thingy. It's been lurking around the internet for some months now and it deserved a proper home.

So I've got www.idifficult.org or just idifficult.org for short.

It was simple and hassle free. Except when I had done it, all your comments on my blog entries had vanished. I was mortified. I love the comments, sometimes more than the piece of writing that motivated them. It's nice to hear from people kind enough to read what I have written. In turn it inspires me to write the best I possibly can for them. Fortunately, somewhere between lunchtime and getting home, all your comments came back.

When I first tried to register, I went for idifficult.com, but someone had snaffled it. Besides I'm not commercial, my writing is for fun and to try to stop my brain turning to mush (too late there then!) idifficult.net would be completely wrong too. So I went for idifficult.org because .org is for non-commercial organisations. Although those who know me or have seen the wake of chaos behind me would perhaps believe that .dis-org would be the better domain.

Blogger, thankfully, ensure that idifficult.blogspot.com still works too, so people who have been kind enough to link to me aren't going to get horrible broken links.

Interview with a Vampire

2010-03-23T13:23:00.001Z

"Well, Mr, sorry, Count. May I call you Count? Can I ask you who had the greatest influence on your childhood?"

"Hmm, Let me see. Hey, are you needing all that blood?"

"Aggghhhhhhhhh!"

Guide to Vampires

2010-03-21T23:02:00.001Z

In the second of a series the doctor advised me against, I shall discuss vampires and methods of surviving an attack of vampires.

Please note this blog entry is called Guide to Vampires, not as in an earlier misprint Guiding for Vampires which was a club for vampire self-development started by Robert Baden-Powell.

This guide does not deal with zombies, werewolves, banshees, ghosts, poltergeists or bankers. It may discuss cheese and pickle sandwiches at some point.

Take care whilst attempting to identify vampires as sticking a pointy bit of wood through a neighbour's goth son or daughter is viewed with disdain by most local police forces. Check for slicked black hair, pasty complexion, very prominent eye teeth and a Transylvanian accent. Especially look out for a poor shave (male vampires only) or smarting eyes due to ill-positioned contact lenses. Vampires cannot see their own reflections in a mirror and hence have trouble with some personal tasks. Some attempt to hide their smarting eyes by the use of stupid little sun-glasses (see below).

As well as goths, it is sometimes hard to distinguish a vampire from a banker. Often this can only be done after an attack has taken place. Should you wake up with little memory of where you were or what you did and have two bites very close to one another, then you have been attacked by a vampire or a banker. If the bites are in your neck, you feel lightheaded and your heart is thumping as if it has nothing to pump around your body you've been attacked by a vampire. If, on the other hand, the bites are in your wallet, it is completely empty of cash and there is a small note saying that they have charged you more because you've run out of money, then you've been attacked by a banker.

When ordering pizza, ensure that you also order plenty of garlic bread. Hanging garlic bread on a string around your neck will keep vampires away. To be honest it'll pretty much keep everyone else away too.

Vampires cannot enter your home without being invited, but once invited they are nearly impossible to get rid of. In this respect they have much in common with double glazing salesmen. This guide firmly recommends asking for a business card before deciding to allow entry. If the name on the card begins with Count, or his or her job title is Exsanguination Specialist it's time to get that pizza order in.

Killing a vampire can be achieved with a stake of wood, thrust through it's undead heart. Please be environmentally sound and ensure that you use wood from renewable resources. Polished mahogany is not big and it's not clever.

Regardless of statements to the contrary, vampires do not like going out in the sun and seldom, if ever, sunbathe. It's all about image. How scary can you be if you look like David Dickinson (see below)?

There are a number of places to avoid. Graveyards (well, doh!), blood banks, big impressive but dark houses on hills into which coffins were taken the day before and, finally, snooker halls. The danger of snooker halls has been immortalised by Lawnmower Deth's Spook Perv Happenings in the Snooker Hall (Lyrics). Should you find yourself in one of these places, you'll probably be a member of the undead shortly. Prepare by having a decent shave and putting your contact lenses in as these tasks will be so much harder in the near future.

My final tip is to check the names of your companions. Should one be called Blade or Buffy you're doing pretty well and survival is pretty much assured. If you know a Van Helsing, it's time to order a pizza.

Educational

2010-03-14T01:19:00.001Z

I have received comments that this blog is not educational enough. Indeed one complainant went as far as to inform me that he believed that some of the things written in previous posts had been made up. Lies and untruths he said. It has been said that this blog is just tales of Indigo Roth and I going for curries and then having chilli induced hallucinations.

Anyway to address one of these issues, I'd like to introduce this my first iDifficult self help guide. The chilli induced hallucinations will require further investigation.

The iDifficult Guide To Zombies

Summary

This is a guide to surviving an attack from zombies.

Purpose

To educate in survival techniques for dealing with one or more zombies in urban environments.

Scope

To provide information on surviving a zombie attack. It does not deal with vampires, werewolves, banshees, ghosts, poltergeists or bankers.

Intended Readership

The living. Should you feel undead or even slightly unwell please don't read this document. We really don't want you to know what we are planning to do next. That would be unfair.

Zombies are easily recognised by pale faces, staggering walk with arms outstretched horizontally in front, possibly with gaping wounds, and blood and gunk around their mouths. Their conversation is limited to a few moaning grunts. Please consider all of these factors together holistically. Do not batter granny to death because she has a pale face and a staggering walk. Similarly be careful not to mis-identify local youth coming out of a kebab shop at 11:30 - they stagger, have gunk around their mouths and issue moaning grunts.

Use fresh meat to distract zombies. Frozen meat is even better as they have to wait around for 6 hours for it to defrost, or 12 if they leave it in a refrigerator. If you are vegetarian please do not use quorn or soya products as they really don't have any interest in them whatsoever. Also they are terribly expensive.

Do not use silver bullets. These are intended for werewolves and just annoy zombies. Especially if they are waiting for the frozen meat to defrost. Irrespective of the effectiveness of silver bullets, if living in England you must already have obtained a firearms licence from the local police force. The police will only issue firearms licences to those considered too flaky by psychiatrists to appear on a reality TV show. I suggest taking silver bullets to your nearest jewellery store to exchange for cash. Remember if the person serving you has blood around their mouth, gaping wounds and a tendency to stagger slowly with their arms raised horizontally in front then they are a zombie. Walk quickly away.

Do not attempt to use a steak through the heart. It's a waste of a good cut of meat. Throw it between nearby zombies.

Zombies move quite slowly with a staggering gait. Walk smartly away from them. Do not run, because if you run they'll appear in front of you from behind the nearest tree or tombstone (see unsuitable places below). On flat ground a Segway is an excellent means of escaping zombies.

Do not walk smartly into wooded areas where it is most likely you'll trip whilst looking over your shoulder at a following zombie. Similarly do not go into graveyards, unless you happen to be Buffy. If you are Buffy, would you mind writing an endorsement on this posting, it'll improve my readership splendidly.

Should you find yourself in a wooded area or a graveyard just sit down and rest. You're pretty much doomed anyway. Use your cellphone to text friends and loved ones to let the know just what you thought of them before you became a flesh eating member of the undead. Do not leave a video camera on the ground, switched on and pointing at you. The footage will be most unpleasant for relatives and is unlikely to make them any money selling it to Bloopers and Takeout TV.

Nordic Walking is not a good means of escaping from zombies. It inspires the same confidence as running with the same pitfalls. Although fortunately you will have two metal poles with you to fight them off.

Going up stairs helps as it is well known that zombies cannot go up stairs. They have to congregate at the bottom and yell "Exterminate" in strange metallic voices. Sorry, scrub that. Apparently that's Daleks.

Wooden bats work very well against zombies. Do not use Fruit Bats as they are a protected species.

Next week, The iDifficult Guide to Vampires.

Ten Years from Now

2010-03-10T23:02:00.003Z

My friend Paula, Cat Lady Larew otherwise known as the creative mind behind How to Become a Cat Lady Without the Cats tagged me for this little meme.

Being me, and being a little iffy with the English language generally, I decided to look up meme:

A meme (pronounced /ˈmiːm/, rhyming with "cream") is a postulated unit of cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena.

I understand a little more than I did. Apparently it was one of Dicky Dawkins ideas. Which possibly may make it a meme in it's own right.

Anyhow, the idea behind this one is you're supposed to tell what you hope life will hold for you ten years from now, tag ten more people to do the same, then dance naked around your computer whilst swinging a frozen chicken over your head*

I am hoping for my future self to perfect a time machine and return and fill in my second hope for the future, because I cannot think of more than one for I am that feeble today.
Sorry I'm late. Bloody temporal computer failed between here and ten years in your future. Had to re-boot it. I wish it didn't run on Windows Vista 10th Anniversary Edition. Note for past self: Buy a Mac. Hope for the future: that I did buy a Mac.
Bye bye future self - like the extra ear - very fetching. OK back to the task at hand - I hope for an everlasting bottle of Glenfiddish.
I hope for another everlasting bottle of Glenfiddish.
I hope I don't become senile and start writing rubbish in a blog where everyone can read it. OK. I hope I don't become any more senile. Let's face it this blog is a fairly safe place, as no one actually reads it.
I'd like my wife to be happy and content.
I'd like my daughter to be pursuing her dreams. That doesn't mean lazing in bed until 3pm.
I hope I shall still be in contact with my current friends.
I hope to have met in person some of the wonderful people I've met through blogworld.
I hope Twitter, You Tube and Facebook have combined into a single timewasting site called 'YouTwitFace'.

Now I have to pass this onto ten quite unsuspecting people.

Oh, bugger it! Cat Lady has got nearly all the people I'd pass it on to. There are but a few left:

Kato at Pandorah's Box
Robbie at The Thought Bubbles of Robbie Munn
Bianca at Stream of Consciousness

Well, I've done a meme. Super. What's next on my list?

* It is possible I embellished this a little from the original, but I liked the 'gestures and rituals' bit of the definition of meme so much.

The Basingstoke Project

2010-03-05T00:39:00.006Z

"He's been droning on for hours," said the man I bumped into.

"Who?" asked I.

"Professor Fflaffington-Smyth."

"Why?"

"Press conference. Some new discovery or other. I'm not really sure anymore."

"Where?"

"High-Tedium Research Facility," he looked at his watch. Then at the sky, "what day is it?"

"Thursday."

"It started Tuesday!" he became agitated, "I wrote down everything interesting he said in my notebook." He flipped it open at a page marked by the clip of his pen. There was one word. And then the signs of a mind becoming more and more distracted - little doodles, drawings, a carefully shaded picture, then a poem and finally what must have been the outline for a novel.

"I should introduce myself. I'm iDifficult," I said.

There was a flicker of recognition in his eyes, "I thought you'd be taller." he said at last. "Sorry, I'm Oliver Toenail. I'm a reporter with the local paper - The Slobbering Investigator." He produced a press-pass. It had science correspondent in small print under his name. "I have a big problem," he started once more, "I have a deadline tomorrow morning and I have only one word about the discovery. They're going to fire me. Again."

My politeness gland failed. "Oliver Toenail? Did your parents hate you?"

He seemed unfazed by my reaction. "Actually they named me Onychomycosis Toenail. They were both Chiropodists and mad keen on the profession. I adopted Oliver as it saves time and spelling."

Feeling a little shame, I took pity, "I'll help you out. Did some work with Neddy a few years back. We need to catch up. Besides, he owes me a fiver."

"Neddy?"

"Professor Fflaffington-Smyth. Of course, he liked to be known as Major Reverend Dr Fflafington-Smith then and had one less F but same chap."

We marched up to the doors of the High-Tedium Research Facility. I unscrewed the intercom panel as Mr Toenail watched.

"Aren't you going to ring the doorbell?"

"Where's the fun in that?" I picked out a few wires, scraped off the insulation and twisted them together. "Besides, if I tell them who I am, there's no way they'll let us in." I shoved the panel back. The door clicked open. The lifting barrier across the main entrance behind us started opening and closing rhythmically. We walked into the hallway. The lights were flickering.

I spotted my target, "Neddy!"

"iDifficult!", he exclaimed, "My old chap. I heard you were dead."

"I thought you were in the press conference?"

"Same difference. I was. Popped out briefly Wednesday, couldn't be arsed to go back. I didn't think I'd be missed."

Mr Toenail chipped in, "You called the press conference! You made the discovery!"

"Did anyone notice I'd gone? Anyway, who are you?"

"My fault, I'm afraid. I found him outside. He came to your press conference after a good story. I told him I knew you and would help him," I explained.

Neddy looked at me concerned, "He came here for a good story? We only do really boring research here."

"Then why did you call a press conference?" our science correspondent interjected.

"I'm a scientist, and scientists do that sort of thing. We're expected to. Read it in a book somewhere."

"So have you discovered anything?"

"Might have," he said enigmatically. "Have you heard of the Manhatten Project?"

Onychomycosis Toenail came alive in a way I can't imagine he had since his Christening, "Why yes, yes I have. My goodness this is awesome! And here in Slobbering too."

"Follow me. We call this the Basingstoke Project."

He lead us into a huge room. It was full of machinery. It was all painted battleship grey. There were some panels of flashing lights. Well they would have been flashing but most of the bulbs had long since blown. There were several scientists looking at screens full of numbers. Some were even awake.

"What is it?"

"It's a time machine, come over and have a look. We're about to do another test run." He held a finger up to his mouth, "Shhh! They're about to start."

A scientist leant over a panel and pushed a button. Nothing much happened, but the machine let forth a low and depressed sigh.

"Ohhhhhwwwwww," it went.

Some of the numbers on the screens changed. After a few minutes of examining the numbers the button pushing scientist spoke, "Professor, it's done it again."

"What are the results this time?" Professor Fflaffington-Smyth asked.

"7, 14, 17, 42, 44, 45 and 47."

Mr Toenail spoke, "What does that mean? It sounds like an order at the Euthanasia Curry House. Is it really a time machine?"

"Yes, it is indeed a time machine."

"Wow. I mean wow! This is soo big. I didn't think we'd be covering a story so large here." Then he paused, "Why aren't you overjoyed? This is world fame, Nobel prizes, chat shows for the rest of your life, maybe even a record deal from Simon Cowell."

"Because it will only, not matter which knobs we twiddle or untwiddle, or which buttons we press, go back in time to the previous Saturday and even then it only returns a few numbers. Just numbers. Just from last Saturday."

"What are the numbers?"

"Last Saturday's UK National Lottery winning ticket numbers."

"So all this machine does is get last Saturday's National Lottery ticket numbers?" He waved his arms around the room, gesturing at the machinery.

"Yes - the winning ones."

"Couldn't you just look them up on the internet?"

"Yes."

"I'm going to get fired aren't I?"

Neddy and I looked at him with sympathy. "Probably," we said in unison.

Abducted

2010-02-25T21:57:00.002Z

"So, where have you been these last few days?"

"Abducted by aliens."

"You're kidding?"

"Nope, Check it out. Look at the fur on my left side. All shaved off. See the scar?"

"No shit, Sherlock! How did that happen?"

"Sleeping away, eyes shut, bright light, then one of those hairless pink aliens pushed me in a cage. Took me off in their spaceship to a probing centre. More poking by pink aliens, then I smelled something a bit odd, next thing I know I got the scar."

"Are you feeling ok?"

"Bit sore around the scar. And the back of my neck. I think they put a tracking device in me. Look, try feeling the back of my neck with a paw. There, like a small metal rod, just below the skin."

"I know where there is a half-eaten box of KFC"

"Now you're talking. Lead on. This fence was getting a bit tough on my paws anyhow. Do you know where there's an empty takeaway curry tin?"

"What do you want with one of those?"

"Gonna mould it over my head to keep the alien thoughts out."

"Mulder, you're a strange one, no mistake. Still up for the KFC?"

Can you be too healthy?

2010-02-24T22:40:00.001Z

I got fed up being a couch potato and decided to get in shape with the new banana diet I found on the internet.

Well, after a week, I think the results are beginning to tell:

The Right Moment

2010-02-15T23:33:00.002Z

"Would sirs like poppadoms and the pickles?"

I was startled. Taken aback. Somewhat surprised. I was sitting in our favourite booth at the Euthanasia Curry House. Roth was sitting opposite me. This in itself is not unusual, but I had no memory of having got there, or prior to that, making the original arrangements or even, somewhere in the middle, walking through the door. That is unusual.

Roth looked up. He was fiddling with something with copious quantities of red and black wires. It looked complicated and I assumed it was part of his atomic bomb dismantling refresher course. People in his line of work are tested on this sort of thing all the time. Failure, or drinking the wrong cocktail whilst defusing is viewed most seriously. Roth stopped periodically to sip a vesper.

My mind spun. The last thing I remembered for sure was laying in bed and turning my pillow over to the cold side and snuggling back into it. Was the Euthanasia Curry House on the cold side of my pillow? I understand it's possible to find strange things at the back of a wardrobe, but a curry house on the cold side of the pillow was exceptional. Could I get a pillow with a pizzeria on the cold side?

"I've taken off the black wire and it's not buzzing anymore," said Roth.

"Are you asking?" I asked.

"No, no, I'm fairly sure I'm right. Anyhow we'll find out in 30 seconds time. On the down side we won't get the poppadoms or pickles. On the up side nor will we get the bill."

"Do you know why I am dressed in my pyjamas?"

"I hadn't noticed, but that does seem to be the case. Have you spoken with your tailor?" he paused, "Anyway, I'd sort out what you're ordering - I've been here a while."

"Good point." I looked down at the menu and noticed that along with a vast array of starters and main courses there appeared some more atypical items.

The poppadoms and pickles arrived and within a couple of minutes and so did our regular waiter. "Would sirs like to order?"

"Oh yes please! Can I have a no. 15 sheek kebab, no. 24 keema nan, no. 32 lamb rogan and no. 40 mushroom rice? Oh, and no. 57 a black t-shirt that has seen better days, no. 60 a black leather coat with slight tear near the right sleeve, no. 75 a pair of black trousers with a hole in the left pocket and no. 80a some black underpants. Thank you."

"Certainly sir. An excellent choice," he turned slightly, "Mr Roth?"

Indigo ordered. The waiter disappeared briefly and apologetically. He came back with a second pad and a further supply of pencils. "Sir has made a good choice. Extensive. But good."

"Excuse me, how did I get here?" This little issue was beginning to bother me. The thought of a fantastic curry and the relief that more than 30 seconds had passed and I wasn't sailing past the pearly gates followed by a billowing mushroom cloud had done little to dampen my disquiet.

"We try to be there whenever our customers need us. I shall check. Sirs clothing order will be hanging over the heated towel rail in the men's rest room in just a few moments." He looked disapprovingly at the egg yolk stain decorating the front of my pyjama top.

I slipped away to the rest room to get changed. My clothes were hanging over the towel rail just as the waiter had described. When I returned there were two military types looming over the seated Roth. One was poking around in the complicating wiring. The other dipped his finger in Roth's drink and then licked it. The first one nodded his approval. The second spoke, "Not enough Kina Lillet in this Roth." He winced and coughed.

"That's the lime pickle, P", Roth remarked dryly. "Try this," he pushed the vesper forward. P downed the remainder of the glass in one grateful gulp. He too then nodded his approval. Both men seemed to melt into the general hubbub of the Euthanasia.

Roth turned his glass over in his hand, "He's drunk the bloody lot!"

Our orders arrived and the table was covered in things that steamed, bubbled, sizzled and gave up amazing aromas. We finished the lot. We both broke our personal bests, and some of the crockery.

When we had finished and silence had descended, the waiter came back and spoke to me. "You understand a little physics don't you?"

"Yes," I said, "A little."

"Do you understand the principle of The Right Moment?"

"Yes. There are things that must happen at certain points in the flow of time," I answered with more confidence than I felt about the subject.

"The Euthanasia is tethered close to the Right Moment for a Curry."

Roth, who had been quiet up until this point cut in, "Is that why it isn't on any maps?"

"Yes, quite. Although if you get the right sort of map..." his voice trailed off, as though he were about to impart some information we shouldn't be given.

I caught on. I suspect the fumes from Roth's late drink were slowing my mind. "So that explains why I am here, now?"

"No." said the Waiter.

"Oh. So why are you telling me this?"

"To be honest, I had nothing much to do between orders. I have a degree in temporal physics and feel the urge to show off occasionally."

"I hope your urge is satisfied," I lied, "I was laying in bed. I had just turned my pillow over to the cold side and suddenly I'm ordering a curry!"

"Did sir not enjoy his food?"

"No, it was very good indeed. Compliments to the chef. YOU'RE CHANGING THE SUBJECT!"

"OK. My best guess is you thought of this place and the principle of the Right Moment brought you here."

The Euthanasia swirled around me and vanished. I felt the cool of the duvet and sheets against my skin. Then I remembered, whilst I was turning the pillow over, I reached for my Ultra Heavy Duty Indigestion tablets. I would be surprised if the Euthanasia hadn't slipped into my mind at that point.

Kerr-pow

2010-02-02T23:16:00.016Z

Slobbering-under-the-Bed is not entirely the law abiding place full of happy people you may have surmised from my previous chronicles. There is a dark underbelly. We have karaoke, we have insurance brokers, we have crime.

I was to experience this naughtiness first hand one evening. I had just left the Euthanasia Curry House. Roth had rushed off as he needed to fill in a 20 foot deep hole in the garden. Apparently it was in the middle of the path to the front door and people kept falling in it. Anyway, I took a shortcut down an unlit alley. It was there I bumped into two ne'er-do-wells. Footpads. Muggers. Thieves. Well, two of them.

One was quite short and scrawny, the other was larger, fatter and had a head that looked like a potato. The short scrawny one pulled a knife. "Give me your cash," he snarled.

I blustered. My yellow streak must have been clearly visible. Hesitantly, whilst looking at the knife, I started, "Look, I don't have any money I just spent it, but I can go and get some." I was hoping to show them a clean pair of heals.

Short and scrawny and potato head looked at one another, and before they could say another word, there was a crash and a voice could be heard from the other end of the alley. It said, "Take your hands off this fine, upstanding citizen, and..." at this point the owner of the voice fell over, "...return the world to the upright position you evil fiends."

A second person appeared at the far end of the alley, staggered and fell over the first. "Bugger," he muttered.

I was quite shocked. First little and large with a knife and now I get to meet Slobbering's very own superheroes. Lying not five yards from me were the prostrate forms of Off-his-head-man and his ever faithful sidekick Blotto-boy. Forgetting the knife, it's owner and his spud-head friend I rummaged in my pocket for my autograph book. This would be such an honour.

My would-be rescuers pulled themselves to their feet and stumbled over to little and large. Off-his-head-man snatched something from his utility belt and confronted short and scrawny with it, brandishing it unsteadily in front of him.

"That's a frozen chicken!" short and scrawny exclaimed, "and your underpants are on backwards!"

"Everyone's a bloody critic," muttered Off-his-head-man and poked short and scrawny hard in the eye with the pointy end of the chicken. The knife clattered to the floor.

Blotto-boy lay his hand on the potato headed mugger's shoulder. He briefly looked like he was holding himself up. He spoke quietly, "I love you. I've written a poem," he slurred.

Short and scrawny looked at potato head with watering eyes, "Sod this. I'm off!" With that they both scarpered out of the alley. I never saw them again. I didn't want to.

Off-his-head-man picked up the knife, gave it to me with the chicken and explained I needed to defrost it completely before cooking. He then linked arms with Blotto-boy and they staggered out of the alley singing:

A long time ago, way back in history
When all there was to drink was nothing but cups of tea
Along came a man by the name of Charlie Mops
And he invented a wonderful drink and he made it out of hops

   (Chorus)
   oh he ought to be an admiral, a sultan, or a king
   And to his praises we shall always sing
   Look what he has done for us, he's filled us up with cheer
   god bless Charlie Mops,
   The man who invented beer

The Jury's Bar, the Clancy's Pub, the Hole in the Wall as well
One thing you can be sure of, it's Charlie's beer they sell
So come on all me lucky lads at eleven O'clock ye stop
For five short seconds, remember Charlie Mops
One, two, three, four, five

   Chorus

A barrel of malt, A bushel of hops, you stir it around with a stick,
The kind of lubrication to make your engine tick.
Forty pints of wallop a day will keep away the quacks.
It's only eight pence ha'penny and one and six in tax
One, two, three, four, five

   Chorus

The lord bless Charlie Mops!

[link on the last 'Charlie Mops' to find out where this song comes from, it isn't mine]

More Than You Want To Know

2010-02-01T21:23:00.006Z

The awesome writer who is Indigo Roth has inflicted upon bestowed and honoured me with a Best Follower Award:

This award comes with a scary number of questions. Fortunately it doesn't come with Anne Robinson. That would be just cruel and unusual.

1. What is your current obsession?
Food. 43 years I've been obsessed by what I poke in the hole in the front of my face.

2. What are you wearing today?
Amongst other things, two shoes of the same type and colour. This is exceptional.

3. What’s for dinner?
Now, I think it will be something healthy like jacket potato and salad. By this afternoon it'll be takeaway pizza or chips. By the time I get home it'll be a takeaway curry.

4. What’s the last thing you bought?
A neoprene ankle support.

5. What are you listening to right now?
The Wishing Tree - Nightwater

6. What do you think about the person who tagged you?
Deeply talented, great writer and great friend. Harmful to pizzakind everywhere.

7. If you could have a house totally paid for, fully furnished anywhere in the world, where would you like it to be?
Right where I am would be nice. Fluffy daughter would miss her school mates if we moved.

BANK

8. What are your must-have pieces for summer?
I'd like an iPad please. And one of those docking thingies for an iPad. And an iPad keyboard.

9. If you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go?
Home.

10. Which language do you want to learn?
English. Quite frankly my grammer sucks. My spelling sucks too, but the computers hide that.

11. What’s your favourite quote?
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education" - Albert Einstein.

12. Who do you want to meet right now?
Granny Smith. She makes bloody marvellous apples.

13. What is your favourite colour?
Black.

14. Give us 3 styling tips that work for you.
Always stand under a broken light. Wear black. Leave before anyone looks.

BANK

15. What is your dream job?
Pig pilot.

16. What’s your favorite magazine?
"Megalomaniacs Weekly". Ernst Stavro Blofeld centerfold this week.

17. If you had $100 now, what would you spend it on?
Oooh. Current exchange rate makes that £62.79. That's a good pizza. Where's Roth?

18. What do you consider a fashion faux pas?
Pizza without chilli.

19. Who according to you is the most over-rated style icon?
Mary Poppins. Umbrellas are so 1960s.

20. What kind of haircut do you prefer?
Short. Very.

21. What are you going to do after this?
Talk to myself for a while. I shall clamp a phone to my ear so no one realises, but I shall talk to myself.

22. What are your favourite movies?
Sherlock Homes, Dark Knight recently, then The Crow.

23. What inspires you?
Apathy.

BANK

24. What do your friends call you most commonly?
Mandy, but only at weekends. The rest of the time it's Bishop Snodgrass.

25. Would you prefer coffee or tea?
Coffee until I start twitching. Then tea until I start peeing.

26. What do you do when you are feeling low or terribly depressed?
Eat. I also eat when I'm happy.

27. What makes you go wild?
Lycanthropy.

28. Which other blogs do you love visiting?
Have a look at the right hand column on my blog. They're all there. All have the wit, charm and writing skills I aspire to.

29. Favorite Dessert/Sweet?
Profiteroles

30. How many tabs are turned on in your browser right now?
17 in Chrome, 5 in IE, 3 in Firefox and 2 in Safari.

31. Favorite Season?
Winter, Spring, Summer or Fall.....

32. If I come to your house now, what would you cook for me?
I'd be out.

33. What is the right way to avoid people who purposefully hurt you?
Never visit their graves.

34. What are you afraid of the most?
The big bad wolf. Small bad wolves don't bother me. Big nice wolves are ok too. The big bad ones give me the willies.

BANK

35. When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thing you thought?
Euthanasia. And not the curry house.

36. What brings a smile on your face instantly?
Fluoxetine.

37. A word that you say a lot?
F*ck. I know I shouldn't but I do. A lot.

38. What would you do if you were made President for one day?
Assassinate myself. That'd be one for the history books.

39. What is that one thing that keeps you going?
See 36.

40. What's word drives you crazy when you hear it?
Two: Binge drinking. For goodness sake, who didn't drink too much when they were young?

41. What's your least favourite character trait?
Depression. It really gets me down. Oh. That's the point isn't it? Bugger.

I'll pass this onto only a few followers that Indigo didn't get first! Click the names to visit their blog.

Robbie. A regular commenter, a great blogger and a JC lookalike. And I don't mean John Cleese.
QuirkyLoon. Comments on much of what I have written and writes stuff that makes me laugh.

Oh, yes, I'm supposed to add a question of my own. Here it is:

42. What do you get if you multiply six by nine?

Thank you Indigo. No really.

Kato over at Pandorah's Box has been kind enough to send me the Kick Ass Bloggers award. Thank you very much indeed. It looks a lot like this below:

Apparently I have to give this award to eight kick ass bloggers. Eight is a big number and I'm functionally innumerate. So here we go:

Paula at How To Become a Cat-lady Without the Cats
Sondra Stinglash at Callithump Thunderblog
Annie at Eolist Petite

Thank you Kato.

Lost Temple

2010-01-28T23:38:00.003Z

Getting lost is a specialist art. It takes training, dedication and a unusual aptitude. Like much we take for granted in the western world, this skill was refined during the Ming Dynasty in China.

Monks were trained at the Lost Temple in the ancient art of Whereami. Not just anyone could be trained, there was a rigorous trial of entry. Those who sought the Lost Temple were turned away. Those who had just popped out of Beijing for a daily paper, some tea bags and a pint of milk ten days earlier and stumbled upon the temple were welcomed with open arms.

Training was harsh with few comforts and there were many disciplines to grasp before graduating as a Black Belt Master of Whereami. The nature of many of these disciplines were lost in time but a few are known from some scraps of paper found outside a newsagents near Beijing:

Whataroad: getting hopelessly lost whilst holding the map upside down in your hands.
Nootherleft: taking the wrong turning whilst being told which way to go by your partner.
Minesalargeone: being too blotto to get home and ending up in another pub.
Goneagain: actually finding the right place by accident and then convincing yourself it isn't and going off again.

The continuing liberalisation of China and the increased understanding of the need to get lost, the original Lost Temple has again become accessible to westerners.

Early in 1981 I went out of my house in Slobbering-under-the-Bed to buy some cat food. After six weeks of walking and hitching I arrived at the Lost Temple. I knocked on the huge wooden door.

"Hi, anyone in?" I yelled, "Do you sell cat food?"

"Are you lost?" came a reply.

"I don't know, that depends."

"Upon what?"

"Well, if you sell cat food, I'm not lost you see, and I can be on my way back home."

"So, if we didn't you'd admit you were lost?"

"No, I'd go and look somewhere else." I said, looking uneasily around at the empty fields. Empty apart from this one impressive building. Somewhere else didn't look much of an option.

Another, older voice spoke, "Train this one. I sense great promise in him. Or maybe it's my lunch."

The doors swung open. A tall young monk and a shorter, much older monk stood in front of me.

The older monk spoke to the tall young monk, "You may go about your duties," he said. The young monk turned, opened a door and stepped smartly through it. There was a crash. A pile of buckets, brooms, mops and at least one tall young monk fell across the floor.

Seeming not to register what he had seen, the older monk then turned to me, "Follow me," he said, without much conviction in his voice. He opened a door and we stepped into a lavatory. "I have a very nice office," he said, "at least I'm told it's very nice. I've got no idea where it is - I do have a map. Never mind, this'll do."

So began my training.

After many years I graduated a Black Belt Master of Whereami.

The picture below is of the class of '85 just before graduation standing in front of the Lost Temple:

I never did get the cat food.

The 'I' of the Beholder

2010-01-22T20:02:00.008Z

"So what does the I in iDifficult stand for? I understand the Difficult bit well enough."

"It's a bit like Inspector Morse. Enigmatic," said I.

"So it's short for Inspector?"

"No."

"Or is it a play on iPhone or iMac?"

"No and No."

"Is it short for Intelligent?"

"Oh please! Guess again, if you must," gritted teeth.

"How about Indigo, as in Indigo Roth? You are his evil twin after all."

"Indigo Difficult? Has your head come unscrewed? Besides twins usually share a surname. And before you start, it isn't Indiana either - I wasn't named after the family dog."

"Or like I in I, Claudius?"

"If it were then I'd write it I, Difficult. But I'm not a bloody Roman emperor, am I?"

"You could be in disguise."

"Do I look like I'm in disguise? No, don't answer that!"

"Is it Ian? Are you Ian Difficult? I went to school with an Ian."

At this point I shot him.

I'm on the phone

2010-01-19T13:22:00.004Z

Well I would be, if I could get decent reception. I checked on a map today and discovered why it is so hard for me to get my cell phone to text, make phone calls or, damn me for trying, use the internet on the move. I have highlighted certain features to aid understanding.

I don't know about you but I'd never noticed the big, red painted, mile high lead wall between the only mobile phone transmitter mast in the whole country and where I live Slobbering-under-the-Bed and where I work in The Big Smoke.

I'm sure it wasn't there when I did geography.

Mind, found missing

2010-01-18T13:05:00.003Z

A couple of times a week Mrs Long-Suffering goes to work early and I take Fluffy Daughter to Breakfast Club. It is always a bit of a rush and I miss things. Last week I forgot Fluffy Daughter's glasses and it took her half an hour to get out of the classroom at going home time 'cos she couldn't see the door.

So this morning I was determined not to get anything wrong.

Fluffy Daughter dressed in school uniform. Check.

Packed lunch and drinks done. Check.

Guinea Pigs fed. Check.

Cat in kitchen. Check.

Me washed and dressed. Check.

Fluffy Daughter has glasses. Check.

Go outside and lock front door. Check.

Drive to school and park. Check.

Make sure Fluffy Daughter is happily having breakfast of her choice. Check.

Kiss Fluffy Daughter goodbye. Check.

Drive to station in correct car. Check.

Park car. Check.

Train arriving shortly at platform 2. Check.

Stand on platform 2. Check. Look down.

Non-matching footware fitted. Check. No hang on! Bugger!

A Funny Thing Happened to me on the Way to the Curry House

2010-01-15T21:29:00.003Z

There are risks associated with every area of human endeavour. I've tried throughout my life to keep these risks as low as possible. Tree climbing. No, not for me. Shrub climbing is much safer. Sky diving is exciting but much too dangerous. Instead I joined the Slobbering-under-the-Bed Ground-diving club.

We get together wearing ski-suits and old rucksacks on our backs, stuffed with a sheet and a piece of stout string attached. We find a field and lie down in one of a number of classic formations. It's like free-fall but without the falling. The picture below is our recent triumph. Never before have we managed a 13 person formation.

I digress from the tale I was planning to tell you. There I was standing in Slobbering-under-the-Bed's high street. I was wearing my flame-retardant underpants. Safety first I say. Who knows when you might have a quite amazingly hot curry?

Out of the darkness (there are still no working streetlamps), came a old style red London bus. This, I thought, is somewhat odd. Slobbering isn't anywhere near London, and, even there, this type of bus was retired five or more years ago.

Also, like most things about my home town, it's own native buses run routes no one would want. Well, no one who didn't need quite a lot of help in the noggin department would want. There are so many pointless routes, of which these are my favourites:

SW1 - Open topped tourist bus that does a complete circuit of Slobbering's fine sewage works.
SB1N - School night service. Runs from midnight to six in the morning. The SB1 daytime service was cancelled because picking up and setting down all those schoolchildren was making the service run late.
TC2 - A circular route with only one stop. The other was closed because the local residents complained about the noise of the bus. You can board at the town centre and after a journey of nearly an hour, disembark at the town centre. It's very popular amongst folk who believe they are going to be re-incarnated as goldfish.

I digress again. The bus had a conductor. I got on and the bus started moving. Mr Conductor had one of those wonderful metal ticket machines with dials and a handle. He turned the handle and cranked out a small paper ticket.

"One and a ha'penny sir"

I rummaged in my pocket for some pre-decimalisation currency. Pounds, shillings and pence. Love it. Bound to have something prior to 1971 in my pocket. Whilst I was searching, I made idle conversation, "Aren't you a little out of your way here?"

"No, sir, not at all. We've always run this route. Same route since 1959. All weathers."

"I've never seen this bus before," I said, sense of curiosity somewhat a tingling.

"You've probably not been ready. Not quite in the right frame of mind. Now where would sir like to go?"

I found the money and handed it over. "I'm not sure. Can I ask where this bus goes?"

"Surely you should have done so before you got on and bought a ticket? Sir is now committed to his journey."

I looked off of the open back of the bus, but there was nothing but grey. I sat down next to one of the other passengers. "Can I come along for the ride and decide later where I am going?" I asked the conductor.

"If sir wishes, then you may." There was a hollow, far away tone to his voice.

I spoke to the chap I sat next to. "Hi, how are you doing? I'm iDifficult. Where does this bus go?"

"Are you one of Henry's men too?", he said.

I recognised the voice. "Haven't we met before?"

"Yes, I think we did. In your wooden hut. I was on my mower. Went back through the tunnel and a Frenchman got me with his fiendish weapon," he opened his coat to reveal a French loaf protruding from a seeping hole in his chest. "We routed them Frenchies though." he added proudly, "Made 'em sit upstairs too we did."

This it has to be said, was something of a conversation stopper. I didn't much fancy looking at the unnatural hole in the mans chest, so I turned the other way. The girl on the other side didn't have much of a neck and the top of her head was unusually flat. "Suicide," said the man with the bread. "Jumped off something, stupid thing to do if you ask me."

"Nobody did ask you. Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe's Pier," she said sadly by way of an explanation, "the tide was out."

The penny dropped and I yelled, "Excuse me. Mr Conductor. I need to get off this bus. I'm not dead!"

"If you take up extreme sports, sir can expect to die occasionally," said the conductor calmly. He had very deep-set eyes and somewhat hollow cheeks. He looked like he could really do with a visit to the Euthanasia.

"I'm not dead. Anyhow you said extreme sports?"

"Sky diving. As I said, sir can expect to die occasionally."

"I do Ground-diving. I was never more than six inches off the ground. No one has ever died doing Ground-diving. Although, admittedly, Alfred had a pretty close miss with a combine harvester last Tuesday."

The conductor looked me up and down. Then down and up for good measure. He took my wrist and felt it with his cold boney hand. He looked crestfallen. "Bugger," he said under his breath. "Can I see your ticket please?"

"You only just sold it to me."

"TICKET INSPECTION!" he shouted.

Reluctantly I held out the ticket. "Well, that's a first," and then more slowly, "I seem to have sold sir a return."

Living like Roth

2010-01-12T21:57:00.002Z

Those of you who have read Indigo Roth's blog must wonder what a day in the life of the man is like. Or indeed a morning. Being intensely private (apart from writing everything he does in a blog), I can only imagine what his routine is like.

Roth's Diary - Tuesday

7:30: Woke to the sound of Bear having a shower. Hope he doesn't use all the water. Or the shaving foam.

7:45: Order an extra large deep pan meat feast with green chilli and lashings of extra sauce. There's nothing like a good breakfast to set one up for the day.

7:47: Check blog visitor stats.

7:50: Make triple espresso. Shaken, not stirred.

8:00: Pizza arrives.

8:01: Finish pizza and recycle box.

8:05: Shower and morning ablutions.

10:35: Dress in Savile Row suit and choose a matching tie.

10:40: Pick out coat. Accidentally fumble a button and watch coat turn into Christmas Pudding and catch fire.

10:45: Pat out remains of previous coat and put in bin. Consider written complaint to Q.

10:50: Put on second coat, but much more carefully.

10:55: Go downstairs and read mail. There is a short note from the neighbours complaining about the half-eaten wildebeest on the back lawn and King rummaging through their freezers when they were out.

11:00: Leave house and get in Aston Martin. Adjust door mirrors. Looking good. Set car for semi-invisible. What's the point of looking this good if no one can see you?

11:05: Spot periscope poking through drain grill at the end of the drive. Text iDifficult and ask him how he is.

11:06: Periscope vanishes and a text reply appears - "Should I turn left for the North Sea or right? Navigating a nuclear submarine through the sewers of Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe is not easy you know."

11:07: Text back - "Left, then straight on"

11:08: Drive to Mayfair in London to meet my contact.

12:35: Park Aston Martin. Set invisibility full on. Less parking tickets that way.

12:40: Speak to contact with secret code phrase: "My grandmother feeds her kippers with mashed potato." The man replies: "This is a greengrocer. Secret service is next door." "Oh."

Due to the official secrets act and state security we shall leave Roth's day there. I'm fairly sure there must have been a further pizza. Possibly a curry and several more espressos.

Extra Special

2010-01-11T21:54:00.003Z

It was a dark night in Slobbering-under-the-Bed's unique high street. This was partly because it was the middle of winter, but mostly because the street lights were still broken from my last visit. In any other town they'd have pulled their fingers out and got some replacement bulbs. Not Slobbering's Council, oh no. Not them.

Slobbering-under-the-Bed has a particularly active and adventurous town twinning policy. The town is twinned with the Bermuda Triangle and Atlantis. The whole town council has been missing on twinning duties for nearly nine months. I am eager to see the Atlantean delegation on the return visit. The Bermuda Triangle delegation had arrived on a large sailing vessel, but when townsfolk went on board, there was no-one there, although the table had been set for dinner.

I was planning to meet up with Roth. I could see him looming down the street. I continued to lurk near a streetlight. It's a division of labour thing. Demarcation - he does the looming and I do the lurking. He did try to teach me how to loom, but I just don't have the talent for it.

Roth arrived. I opened my mouth to greet him, but was interruped by a small dapper waiter, dressed in a fine flame-retardant evening suit. He seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.

"Would sirs like to order?" he explained further, "It'll save time. I can run ahead and the chef can be cooking before you even get there..."

"Why the rush?" I asked. I didn't ask how he knew we were going there, or where he'd appeared from. That was old ground and it was most unlikely I would get a better explanation than I had before.

"Sir wouldn't want to be late, would sir?"

"Late for what?" we said in unison.

"You'll see. No time to loose. I'd recommend the Extra Special." He hands us a menu each.

I glance at the menu and spot the Extra Special, "Oh. That looks nice. Minimum 2 people, needs to be ordered 48 hours in advance... Hang on, we can't have that, can we?"

"I said I'd run on ahead, sir"

Roth looked at me with the quizzical, one eyebrow raised look he learned off of Roger Moore. He'd nearly perfected it. When we looked back for the waiter, he'd gone. There was pudding to order, dammit.

We set off down the street for the Euthanasia Curry House. We arrived and the waiter took our coats. Mine growled at him, leapt out of his hand onto a nearby hook and continued a low level snarling. The waiter was left holding Roth's coat. He obviously fumbled a button by mistake, because it transformed into a Christmas Pudding and caught fire.

"Q said that'd be useful." muttered Roth, "I still can't see how."

"Does it contain nuts?" I suggested helpfully, "Useful against megalomaniacs with peanut allergies. Or maybe you could just throw it at them?"

"You're just in time," the waiter said with slight disapproval in his voice. Although he didn't say it, he clearly thought we could have made more effort, time wise. Or maybe he just didn't like our coats. "Would sirs like your usual booth, we've just finished re-building it after your last visit."

We sat down. The waiter lit the spring loaded candle. It shot flaming into the ceiling as soon as he turned his back.

With barely a delay the Extra Special arrived. It looked and smelled magnificent. Bits of it were bubbling. The occasional chilli broke the surface. I felt a strong relationship to this dish, like I imagine Captain Ahab might have had to the Whale.

Being on a single dish of the finest weapons grade stainless steel, Roth and I split the dish neatly in two and created a small no-man's-land between the halves. A period of silence with only the flash of fork, knife and spoon began. Errol Flynn would have been proud.

A waiter greeted a guest at the door. "How's the filming of Captain Blood going?"

"Very well. Loads of sword fights. Love it." The guest looked over at our silent but animated eating. "Damn, I'd be proud of that!"

We finished the main course, and after a short but polite pause a waiter cleared the debris that was left of the Extra Special. "We have but one pudding on this evening," he said once he had finished, "But it is a one off, worth all the hurrying. Crème brûlée. I'd strongly recommend to sirs. The chef hates being turned down, it ruffles his fur terribly."

Presently two huge furry paws placed two giant, but crisp and golden Crème brûlées between us. Roth looked up and smiled broadly. On seeing the teeth I fumbled in my pocket for a crucifix.

"Bear!" yelled, greeted and enthused Roth.

"Bare what?"

"Behind you!"

I turned. Roth's friend Bear was the guest chef. "Singed my paw fur playing the blowtorch on those I did, so enjoy", I distinctly heard him say, although his mouth didn't seem to move.

Gratitude and Thanks

2010-01-11T18:21:00.003Z

This blog you are so very kindly reading has received not one but two awards in this last week. This constitutes a cracking start to 2010.

The first award is from my best mate, fellow blogger and nut-house fodder, Indigo Roth. He has sent me the wonderful Feels like Home award:

One of the conditions is that I need to pass this onto five other bloggers who make me feel welcome in their strange worlds:

The inimitable Nonamedufus
The feline free Cat Lady Larew
The gloriously funny Chrissy
The laugh out loud Sondra Stinglash
The delightful parody that is Shalampax Speaks

The second award is from the Cat Lady herself - the I'm a BadAss award:

I shall do my very very best to live up to the accolade.

2012 Olympics

2010-01-06T13:20:00.004Z

The London 2012 Olympics are being held at a number of venues outside of London in addition to inside the big smoke. All over the country in fact. I am very relieved to hear that Slobbering-under-the-Bed has, after a short battle with neighbouring towns, won the right to host the Apathy events.

Apathy is a small range of events introduced especially for the 2012 games. The Apathy Events are:

Synchronised Apathy where a small team can't be bothered to do anything or think about it. Together. In formation.
Triple-Apathy where one athlete can't be fussed about three different things in quick succession. This is also known as the Hop, Skip and Bluuuuh.
Ap-Cycle. Sitting dead-still on a bicycle, without putting legs down and falling over sideways.

The mayor of Slobbering, Sir Percy Snodburger, gave an interview to the local paper, when they could be bothered to turn up, praising local Synchronised Apathy team members, Mavis, Joe and Edna. He is reported as saying "We have a world class team here. Edna's recent death has only improved her performance, and we are hoping that Mavis and Joe may pop their clogs before 2012. We're going for gold, silver, perhaps bronze. Well, we'll turn up. Probably."

Diversification

2010-01-04T22:10:00.004Z

My greengrocer has a wonderful selection of fruit and vegetables. He sells celeriac, can spell it and knows how to hurl it at a shoplifter and get him squarely on the hoodie. He has a few under-the-counter items too. Often a customer would come away sheepishly with a small brown bag. I witnessed the following dialogue:

"Umm, errr", muttered customer, blushing slightly.

"Something for the weekend, sir?", says greengrocer in a sotto voice, pointing at the counter.

"Umm, errr, yes. Please", scarlet customer says.

"The ladies love 'em", he adds with a knowing grin, "About 3 lb fine with you?"

Scarlet customer nods, and retracts head further into coat.

Greengrocer hands him a small brown bag in exchange for some notes and coins of the realm and the customer hurries away.

Afterwards, he looked over to me. "Confession is good for the soul", he said and adjusted his cassock.

"You told me a while ago you weren't in that business?"

"Diversification my boy, diversification", he grinned broadly. I thought about posting letters. "You've seen corner shops containing small Post Offices, I suppose? Well, I had a word with the Vatican and they said they'd consider my idea".

"What idea?", I asked, puzzled.

"Opening a small church inside my greengrocers shop", he said, still smiling. "I've got the new name going up later this afternoon. St Tuppence-a-Pound. Good egh?"

Quick change of subject needed, I thought.

"What did that man want?", I said, referring to the puce gentlemen with no neck buying a paper bag from under the counter.

"Him. Oh, that's Mr Smith - I'm sure that's not his real name - buying sprouts for a roast dinner this weekend. I've convinced him they're banned since we adopted the European Charter of Human Rights.", he grinned again, but much more broadly still. I wrote out next year's Christmas cards. "I charge him £1.50 per sprout, fantastic!"

"Should you be doing that, I mean especially since you're a man of the cloth, so to speak?" I tried to keep the disapproval out of my voice.

"Yeah, apparently I can stand in my own confessional for half-an-hour and I'm all straight. I used to agonise for days when I overpriced or sold rotten fruit and veg. Last week when I sold you seventeen red snooker balls and told you they were really hard, really fresh tomatoes and needed plenty of cooking I could bearly look myself in the eye", he caught my stare, "Bugger! I shouldn't have said that should I?"

"Oh that's why! Explains almost everything. I fed them to my tortoise".

"I'm sorry."

"No you're not. I came out half-an-hour later and he'd painted one white, one black and was well on his way to a break of 147"

Shedgate

2009-12-27T22:18:00.006Z

I have two sheds. The one is not enough. The first shed is empty with a trapdoor in the floor leading down to the Large Sweetcorn Collider as has been exaggerated appallingly by Roth. The second is just odd.

From the outside it is a lapped wood panel shed about 6' x 4'. I keep a workbench, a comfy chair, a little coffee table and a few books. The workbench looks out through the tiny window onto the garden. There is a fluorescent lamp running down the inside ridge of the roof. Very simple. Very ordinary.

Now push open the door and enter. It is totally as I described. I can stand at the workbench and look out the window. The chair, coffee table and books are behind my bench standing position and also facing the window. The light buzzes above. Everything faces the window.

Everything faces the window because to look the other way is a little disturbing. The far wall is missing. In its place is a tunnel. It has wooden lapped walls, the fluorescent lamp continues along the ridge of the roof. It looks like it goes miles and disappears at a tiny point of light. It draws the eye awfully, in the way that something totally impossible in a shed often does.

Sometimes I look into the distance, turn, go out and walk around my shed. There is nothing unusual outside. Not that unusual anyway. A couple of tulips fighting a neighbouring cat. Genetics is so fiddly. One false gene and you've got plants that hate cats and can express their feelings.

Maybe when inside I should face the tunnel entrance, because things come out of the distance. Alternatively, I could just buy another shed.

I'm also fairly sure the other end sort of 'flaps around' a bit. I've distinctly smelt sea air and fish and chips. I've had a small amount of desert sand blow around my feet.

I was sitting in my comfy chair when a strangely dressed man on small green ride-on motor mower shot past my chair and came to rest against the leg of the bench. He cut the engine, jumped off yelling "Where are the French?". He noticed me for the first time.

"No French here", I said, a little surprised. This doesn't happen often to me. Even in this shed.

"Are you sure?", he said.

I patted my pockets, and looked around. "I'm positive".

"You speak strangely for an Englishman. Are you sure you're not French?"

"Yes, I'm sure". I had a small piece of brie in the fridge. Better not mention that.

He thought on this for a moment and seemed a little more relaxed, relatively speaking. More relaxed, like one sugar less in a whole bucket of espresso. He'd decided I was friendly or at the very least neutral.

"Would you be kind enough to point me in the direction of Henry's line?"

"Henry?"

"Henry. The King. His Majesty. King Henry V."

Why do I have to get a nutter on a motor mower in my shed? It's not fair. I wanted a coffee, a nip of nice malt whiskey and to sit down. I decided to humour him until I could escape or hit him on the noggin with a large mallet.

"How did you get here?", I asked.

"I was caught in a French charge. d'Albret's men were wielding two day old french sticks and cutting through the lines of English lawn-mower men.", he paused, "There is nothing as hard or nasty as two day old french loaves. In the right hands one of those will cleave through the blades of an English mower like a burning arrow through hot lard."

I was a little surprised, and tried hard to remember my history. "I thought the English used longbows against the French?"

"Dear me, no! That would be so 1414!", he gasped. "Ride-on motor mowers. Fantastic". He thought some more. "Well, until the French started using old, stale bread. Not so clever then."

I couldn't find my mallet, and the door was behind him. I also wondered if there was a platoon of deadly bread-wielding Frenchmen closing on our position as I we spoke. With haste I helped him turn his mower around and pulled the starting cord. It chugged into life. They don't make them like that anymore.

"The French will be closing on our position any minute now. Head back down the tunnel, I'm pretty sure they'll be gone when you get to the other end". I was pretty sure I'd be gone as soon as he was out of sight.

He revved up. I was impressed how well tuned it was, it sounded like a Harley-Davidson after a service.

"Good luck", I yelled as he roared off down the tunnel. "Bring me back some Camembert".

Slow News Day

2009-12-20T22:28:00.004Z

All news services suffer from the Slow News Day phenomenon. However investigative or creative they may be, there is nothing to report. Nowt. Diddly-squat vaguely interesting things. On the TV news in England back in the 80's they did lots of film clips with ambulances and fire-engines racing to places before finally admitting that no-one had been injured and, in fact, absolutely nothing was on fire.

It was to cover this problem that the recent culture of celebrity has developed. On days when all the interesting stuff is having a sabbatical, or what is happening requires more brainpower than a hamster on Mogadon to understand, something can be reported. Usually at length.

Anyone who thought news filling was a recent practice would have been brought up short by the recent discovery of a diary by the most famous of Slobbering-under-the-Bed's Town Criers, Mr James Southsea. He was famous because during his tenure in the office of Town Crier so very much happened. There was the Mysterious Cattle Rustling, a terrible stage coach crash and, last but certainly not least, The Great Fire of Slobbering.

The diary starts in September 1835. The first few entries in the diary run like this:

Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Everyone turns and looks. I tell them nothing has happened. Townsfolk look a little cross.

Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. It's traditional you see? Everyone turns and looks. Once more I explain nothing has happened. I mean whose fault is that? If they did something then I could announce it. No use the townsfolk getting annoyed with me.

By November the entries have become like this:

Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Bored. Bored. Bored. Tell everyone that nothing is going on. They stare at me. I stare back. I can keep this up as long as they can!

Rang bloody bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Still absolutely nothing going on. Dammit. It's not my fault people! If you weren't all so very very boring I'd have a fulfilling job.

In December, the Christmas tipple was getting to the man:

Shouted at bell. Bell did not ring itself. Told townsfolk I was going for another ale. Nearest they'll get to exciting news.

By January things had not changed for the better:

Decided that since Slobbering-under-the-Bed is the jewel in the crown of boredom, it needed brightening up. Am now going to make up the news. Started lunchtime. Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Told the townsfolk that the Vicar's wife had just had a baby and would any man claiming to be the father please report to the vicarage. Stunned silence.

February:

Needed more interesting news. Waited until three in the morning and then left cow field gate open and the back door of the mayor's cottage. Once four cows were inside, closed the gates and back door. Went home satisfied and waited for my first announcement of the day. Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Latest news: mayor implicated in cattle rustling scandal. Oyez.

Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Mayor arrested for cattle theft. Man, that caused a bit of buzz in the town. Maybe this is an interesting job after all.

March:

Bored. Nothing going on. Mayor seemed a little offish with me. Seems the vicar wasn't too pleased with him confessing to having an affair with his wife.

April:

Slipped into coaching inn at the dead of night and loosened the wheel bolts on the left side of the stagecoach. The stage would be riding out at midday. Prompt news reporting would be needed.

Two minutes before midday. Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Bringing the news to the townsfolk as it happens, right now. The stagecoach shot past me pulled by four horses. I announced a major stagecoach disaster just outside Slobbering. Aboooouuuuut NOW. There was a crash. A wheel rolled back past me. How's that for prompt news?

May:

Slow news month again. Apparently the mayor was on the stagecoach trying to leave town. He was mightily peeved when the wheels fell off.

June:

Slobbering has just had gas street lighting fitted. One of the new gas light posts was put where I normally make my announcements. Feel a little aggrieved about it. Especially since the gas supply, like that of the rest of the town came from the local sewer. Some of the posher cottages had gas light too. Must really smell bad.

After the third day, I could no longer stand the smell. That night I snuck out with a hammer and flattened the pipe on my gas light. It went out. It no longer smelled. Job well done. As I was walking home, the gas lights down the street over-pressured and flared up one by one. Bang, bang, bang, bang. Oh dear. Finally the mayor's cottage exploded in a big ball of flames.

By my first announcement at six the following morning, most of the town was ablaze. Rang bell. Shouted Oyez Oyez Oyez. Great Fire of Slobbering consumes most of the town, faulty gas supply suspected. The townsfolk did their staring at me thing again.

Nearly at the Seaside

2009-12-18T18:22:00.004Z

As I have mentioned before, I live in the town of Slobbering-under-the-Bed. My best mate lives in the neighbouring town of Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe. He visits me. To my shame I seldom visit him, as the asylum doesn't often allow me out unless they are very sure of my medication.

Today was different. I'd got a day pass and intended to visit Roth. He is the God of Extremely Tall People and an Expert Pizza Worrier.

Our preferred meeting place was the Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe pier. I arrived and noted today the tide was out. In fact the tide was always out. It was out 30 odd miles, and had been for quite some time.

Just after the Second World War, the town council, after a particularly long meeting and one or two strong bevvies had decided that what town could do with was more tourists and holiday makers. What brings in tourists and holiday makers more than being a seaside town, they reasoned. A couple of dissenting councillors mentioned a small matter of geography but they were firstly shouted down, and finally had their glasses topped up.

Construction began immediately on all the facilities a seaside town needed. They built a pier. Then a second pier. Then burnt one down. They created an electric fun railway. There was an amusement arcade. There was even a man employed to rent deck-chairs. The smell of fish-and-chips was pumped into the air day and night. Lights were hung along the fence that was to be the sea front. A local celebrity was to turn them on every November as soon as a suitable wander-lead was found.

When global warming was first recognised in the 50s, the councillors and townsfolk were overjoyed. It was just a matter of time before the tide came in and they had a beach, they felt. A matter of time before binge drinking on the seafront, they thought with glee.

In case of a shark attack, the search went out for a police chief who looked a little like Roy Scheider. Roth's grandfather went for the job, although for reasons he'd never let on, he didn't get it. Too tall I expect. This was a town in love with the romance of the sea.

Anyhow, I ramble. We met at the land end of the East Pier. Actually land end as a location isn't helpful. Both ends are painfully land-lubberish. It's probably the lack of sea that does it. Yes, now I come to think of it, that'll be the case.

I walked over to a fortune tellers booth. She told me "you'll meet a tall dark stranger". "Yes, I know", said I, "he's standing right behind me and you don't get stranger than Roth".

"Flat, Authentic and Boring Pizza?" said Roth.

"I thought you didn't like that place?"

"It's not as good as The Wrong Topping Pizzaria in Slobbering", he admitted.

"Let's go there instead", I suggest

"Can't", he said, and added, "It's being redecorated"

"Oh. Another buffet accident?", I smiled a knowing smile.

The pizza was memorable. It had that kind of three-in-the-morning memorability about it.

Rejected by the Publisher

2009-12-17T22:53:00.001Z

Tonight I set out to write a blog entry. It would have everything. Mystery, humor, time-travel and sheds. I wrote, nay, I crafted for an hour.

I reviewed what I had writ. It sucked mightily. Shame 'cos it made sense (one up on Phillip K Dick there then), but it was dull. There was no point, no payload, no pleasure in the journey.

So press the publish button I did not, and off to watch the snow fall I did.

Dark Is The New Light

2009-12-10T20:53:00.002Z

It was a dark and stormy night. Roth and I were walking down Slobbering's eclectic high-street. As I have previously mentioned, I live in Slobbering-under-the-Bed. Roth lives in the neighbouring town of Paralytic-in-the-Wardrobe and visits regularly. Actually the night wasn't at all stormy, but it certainly was dark and for a reason I shall come to mention.

We were heading towards our latest "discovery", The Euthanasia Curry House. We had been there but once before, and despite having to eat a pot of yoghurt each to restart a stomach culture, we had survived.

Something odd was happening. Every time Roth and I went under a lamppost the light flickered and went out.

"It's very odd that. It keeps happening to me and I'm getting quite a thing about it", muttered Roth.

"What?"

"The streetlights going out"

"Oh that". I pulled a small box out of my pocket, placed it near the failed street-furniture and pressed a button. The light struck and proceeded towards full brightness.

"Why do you think it happens?", asked Roth quizzically.

I thought for a moment. "It could be your height?", I speculated. It is worth mentioning for those who haven't met Roth, he goes up a depth. I thought some more. "Alternatively, it could be I'm pressing the other button just as we walk underneath the light." I gave the idea some more thought, "Yes, that seems more likely", I concede.

Just to test my theory, I pull the box out of my pocket and press the buttons alternatively in quick succession. "I made it in my other shed" I explained. The light extinguished and re-struck in time with my button pushing. Then it fizzed, popped, released a shower of sparks and went out. So did all the other streetlights. "Bugger!", I said.

"Would you like a curry?", asked Roth

"Hell, yes", said I.

"Can I take your order sir?", said a waiter, with a flourish of his notepad.

"That's odd", I said out loud.

"We haven't even got to the restaurant yet", Roth noticed. "How do you even know we're going there?"

"A good waiter anticipates things, sir. And, if you will excuse me for saying, I am a very good waiter", and as if to prove his point, he removed a torch from his pocket and illuminated our way.

Euthanasia

2009-12-07T23:34:00.003Z

Slobbering-under-the-Bed has one Indian-ish restaurant. The Euthanasia Curry House. I say Indian-ish because it serves a range of dishes that no native Indian would recognise but are staples of the British diet.

The restaurant was discovered one night by Roth after he left a particularly unsuccessful buffet at The Wrong-Topping Pizzeria. It was right next to my favourite (partly because it was the only one in town, but mostly because it was cheap) Chinese restaurant, Happiness. Neither of us could remember seeing it before, nor did we have any idea what kind of shop or eatery was there before.

Some days after we ate there the first time, we tried to find it using my Sat-Nav. It couldn't actually find it, but plotted a route via Basingstoke and Luton. This was perfectly normal, it did the same for every location. If it was switched to shortest route mode, it included Edinburgh and Southend in the journey. We tried finding the Euthanasia on council planning maps. It wasn't there, there wasn't even a gap for it. Happiness butted directly up to The Big Blister Walking and Hiking Emporium. We got an arial photograph. It wasn't there. Maybe we need to hire a hot-air balloon.

Maybe this general not existingness was responsible for the ambiance we found on our first visit.

The Euthanasia had a cavernous interior. Little private bays heading back as far as the eye could see. It was quite full of diners. Waiters were bringing out dishes that flamed, sizzled and very occasionally exploded with a small mushroom cloud surrounded by miniature flashes of lightening.

A very sharply dressed waiter greeted us. Combined with Roth's fine suit, I was convinced I'd been doorstepped by a fringe religion. "Table for two sirs", he said. We nodded. I believed.

He showed us to an empty bay, and produced two menus. He removed the glass shade from a table candle holder, released the catch and the candle sprung up. He lit it, and pushed it back into the body of the lamp. It was clearly sprung loaded to keep the flame at the same level. Nice touch. I hoped the heated napkins were as good.

We ordered starters. Roth had a thing on a stick. I ordered pterodactyl burgers. Whilst we were eating other guests were being shown to their tables. One chap had a very pale face, a fine tailed evening suit and slicked black hair. "Vlad", cried the waiter, "How was the snooker match?" "Fine" he muttered as he took his seat. "Can you keep the light down low, please?"

Too intrigued to do otherwise we'd both ordered the special. Actually it was listed as the Very Special. The waiter said the dish was "very delicately spiced by their expert chef and spice master" "from a distance of 37 miles", he added under his breath. The waiter arrived wearing a Hazmat suit and pushing a trolley supporting two large lead containers. Using steel tongs he lifted the lid on the first container. He carefully removed a balti dish and placed it between us. Ever so carefully he removed the other balti dish and placed it down at a safe distance from the first. He turned and ran, shouting "Enjoy" at the top of his lungs.

More regulars arrived. "Mr Lucan", enthused another waiter, "How's your missing person's agency going?". "Oh, so-so", he replied before taking a seat carefully shielded by a huge pot-plant.

Our two dishes then shot a column of flame straight at the ceiling in unison. When the pool of smoke cleared, there were two neatly burned circles on the ceiling tiles. The sprung loaded candle took this moment to spring up and extinguish itself by embedding in the ceiling.

For a restaurant I'd never even seen before this was quite stunningly popular. Regulars were arriving every few minutes. "Mr Kirk, how was your day at the office?" "Bit of a no-win scenario. You know how it is..."

Well, a finer curry I have never tasted. Waiters would come by occasionally to see if were still enjoying our meal, to ensure we were still alive and to replace forks that had dissolved too badly to be used. "Would sir like a CO2 extinguisher with his meal?" "Oh, ta. Thanks."

Roth paid, unfolding four huge white five pound notes.

As we left, we heard a waiter greeting another regular "Mr Methuselah, your usual table sir? Did you know you are our oldest customer?" "Really?"

Restaurant Guide To Slobbering

2009-12-01T23:00:00.002Z

There I was in the best chinese restaurant in my home town of Slobbering. It is also the worst. Actually, there is only one. In my childhood, I thought there were two but it later turned out the second one The Texaco was a garage, not a chinese restaurant after all. Unleaded is not a way of cooking duck. This restaurant is called Happiness. Apparently the originally name The Golden Vomit didn't bring in the punters, so they changed it.

Anyhow, they do the very best finger-bowl in town. I was spooning my way through my third helping, and looking forward to the hot napkins. I tell you, there is nothing to beat the taste of a freshly prepared hot napkin. But my napkin course was due to be politely interrupted. There was a terrible crash and the door flew off it's hinges.

"Roth", I beamed, a piece of escaped lemon clinging to my teeth. My smile faded when I noticed the red gloopy substance dripping from his attire. He could be injured. He still owes me a fiver.

He spotted one of my concerns and waved it away. "I've been stuffed crust diving", he said, flicking a small disk of pepperoni from his collar.

I was much relieved. It explained the gloopy red stuff, the wetsuit, snorkel and mask. Meeting Roth for the first time you'd have never have thought he was such an extreme sports adrenaline junkie, and you'd have been right. He isn't. He spends much of his waking time in The Wrong Topping Pizzeria next door leaping from the edge of deep pizzas into lashings of red sauce. They attempt to discourage Roth from attending buffets. To date they've tried: leaving the doors locked; opening at 2am; and more recently strange toppings.

"Have you eaten?", he asked. "The buffet isn't good. Sprout, seafood and chocolate sprinkles".

I looked around the interior of Happiness. The tables, the empty finger bowls, the wreckage of the door lying on the floor. The napkin warmer was just getting going. One of the waiters had a small piece of pepperoni stuck to his forehead. He looked sad.

"No", I lied, leaving a pile of Yugoslav Dinar for the staff of the Happiness. The waiter still looked sad.

"Good", he said, and removed his wetsuit to reveal a perfect pin-striped suit. He looked ready to sell double glazing, used cars or insurance. "They've opened a new restaurant. Next door I think."

"What's it called?", I ask.

"I think it is the Euthanasia Curry House"

"I like the sound of that".

The Dark Sprout

2009-11-23T23:26:00.002Z

"Forgive me father for I have not blogged since October", I mumble.

"Sorry to hear that my son", he says in a low gravelly voice. He continues, "But I'm afraid there is nothing I can do about it".

"I came here for the Lord's forgiveness and absolution." My voice trembles a little, though that could be the cold.

"I said there was nothing I could do about it. This is a greengrocer. The church is next door."

"Oh." I shuffle my feet slightly.

"And you're standing in my upright freezer talking to me through the ice maker slot".

"Oh", I said again, "I thought your confessional had gone up market, although admittedly the air-conditioning seems a little aggressive."

"Hope you don't mind me asking", he said quizzically, "But didn't you notice the fruit and vegetables on your way in?"

"I thought it was harvest festival." On reflection this seemed a little weak, and I had noticed sprouts which are clearly a vegetable from the third circle of the inferno.

I push the door of the confessional and the light switches on. I step blinking into the daylight, and dust a little ice off of my leather coat. The greengrocer assists me, and I shake him firmly by the hand.

As I leave he adjusts his cassock and shakes a smoking thurible over the sprouts.

Endless loop

2009-10-30T13:20:00.007Z

I got an award. I'm absolutely shocked. I write English as a second language, despite not having a first. I wibble on about things of absolutely no importance. Finding a purpose behind something you've read in my blog is as likely as being able to buy a bale of hay in Central London.

But none the less it happened. Again. My blog is now "multi-award winning". I'd like to thank my parents, my sister and my therapist. I'd also like to thank my primary school music teacher for three whole lessons of listening to me play the Recorder. It was just bad noise.

The award looks like this:

Awards in the blogosphere seem to be like chain letters. The first blog is given an award, its writer passes that award onto people he or she thinks also write pretty cool blogs, and so on ad-infinitum.

On a slightly different tack, my hobbies are listed as:

Causing Chaos
Disrupting things
Naming tortoises after doorknobs.

So, in my usual manner, applying hobbies 1 and 2, I started thinking what would happen if I bestowed this award upon the blogger who bestowed it on me. Would it create a loop? A failure of cause and effect in the blogosphere? A time paradox?

Lets find out:

I would like to pass this award onto my dear friend Indigo Roth, who bestowed it upon me. [Do we hear the blogosphere explode?]
I would also like to bestow the award onto Eolist Petite for the fine piece of writing that is Trading Cards.
Finally onto Mrs Long-suffering who has started her own blog, but hasn't yet put anything into it. Thought it has got to be worth passing a blogging award onto an as yet empty blog! Bumble

The Origin of the Roundabouts

2009-10-26T13:16:00.005Z

Roundabouts or rotaries (or traffic circles to give them their full latin name) are an amazing species. I live in England where they roam freely in great herds. Most especially, I live in Stevenage which is a designated zone of Special Scientific Interest and a Conservation area for the roundabout. Stevenage is to the roundabout what the Galápagos Islands are Galápagos Green Turtle or the Invisible Zebra.

Now if roundabouts were cute and fluffy, we'd be beating the naturalists and their film crews back with sticks. They're not. If they were exciting, aggressive or poisonous books would be written about them. Sillier naturalists would be poking them with sticks. They are slow moving, so slow most say they don't move at all. And neglected. We know so little of the life of a roundabout.

After many years of careful observation I believe the humble roundabout starts as the cute mini-roundabout like this one:

Development must be fast, because you never see a roundabout that is too small for a car to go around (even in Stevenage). A fully formed mini-roundabout must be born and grow in just a single night and move itself into the middle of the road to feed on the fumes and tyre-rubber of passing cars.

A theory that also plays on my mind, but I have all but discounted now, is the priciple of "budding" like yeasts. A single roundabout splits and forms a double roundabout. After a brief period of co-habiting the same road junction and once sufficient bits of car light, broken glass and detached paintwork have accumulated the "budded" one shifts off to it's own road junction.

Clearly there are some issues with competion with traffic lights, and this is an area of separate study. A roundabout is clearly a stronger and more virulent species and will often displace a family unit of traffic lights to take the precious land of the road junction. The traffic lights can briefly be found huddling by road works, before passing on to other lands.

There is a further theory, that roundabouts are not a form of life at all, but rather are the end points of wormholes in space, one clockwise and the other counter-clockwise, that allow the passage of white vans, tractors and invalid carrages to the road directly in front of you. This theory is clearly rubbish and should be discounted from the minds of any right thinking conservationist. It is simply paranoia.

Anyhow, listen out tonight for the squealing noises of wheels, for this is the cleverly disguised call of the roundabout. They speak to each other. They do. Honestly.

Is it just me, or is it getting warm?

2009-10-15T22:56:00.002+01:00

I feel very mixed about climate change, global warming or whatever the media insist on calling it these days.

You see, whatever we do, planet Earth will survive. Yes, you heard me correctly, the Earth will survive. Drive your gas guzzling four wheel drive. Leave the TV on standby all night. Buy big lovely instant-on tungsten filament bulbs - 100w are best. Use them 24/7, even if it is blazing sunlight outside. Leave the air-con on maximum even when you're on holiday. Burn down the rain forests. Burn down all the bloody forests. The Earth will survive.

It's all happened before. There were big lumbering creatures with brains in their heads and bums with fantastic latin names - that's how old they were. They weren't too quick at making decisions, not that it really mattered, there were no decisions they could have made that would have made any difference. The climate changed, they died out and something small and fluffy took their place. The Earth survived.

I wonder whether our activity, however dire, compares with that of mother nature herself. Do we produce enough exhaust out of the back of our cars to equal one decent volcanic eruption? Add onto that the burning of fossil fuels - are we there yet? Plus herds of farting dairy cows - is that enough? Actually it doesn't matter - our car gasses, cow gasses, fossil fuel burning, tree chopping mania only has to push towards the tipping point. Our activity plus a good volcanic eruption and we're overbalanced. The Earth will survive.

Of course, we think much faster than the dinosaurs, but not en-mass. Humans can be really clever - look at the computers, medicine, astronomy, art, literature, music and particle physics. Each of these areas is advanced by people thinking by themselves or in very small groups contributing to the knowledge. It's when we try to think and make decisions together it all goes horribly wrong. Look at any government. Look at the United Nations. Sit on any committee. Participate in a decision making meeting. See what I mean - in groups humans are ponderous and stupid. So are we going to think our way out of this one? I doubt it very much. Never mind, the Earth will survive.

Unfortunately, it is likely the Earth will survive without us. I have a daughter. I don't want her generation to have a bad time. I don't want her children or her children's children to be the last of our kind. So I want to try my best to stop the Earth from reaching the tipping point and tipping us off. Let's do our best to push the ponderous and stupid, whom we seem to have put in charge, to fix things. And while we're doing that, lets do the best we can ourselves.

London by Night

2009-10-12T22:50:00.002+01:00

I recently posted a very poor quality shot taken from the observation gallery on the 32nd floor of Centrepoint Tower in the West End of London. Now for almost any other city in any other country 32 floors would not be considered high. For New York it is positively tiny and you'd expect to get 360 degree views of the walls of the surrounding buildings. London, for some years, had a policy of very low rise and hence Centrepoint Tower affords a quite fantastic view. One day I shall sneak up there with my camera, a tripod and a glass cutter so as I can take some wonderful pictures before I am arrested and incarcerated.

I enjoy taking photographs, and so do a few others I work with. A small, but select, band of us decided to take a walk one evening in January around some of the more picturesque parts of London. When there are a few of you, setting up tripods and taking photographs doesn't feel anything like as self-concious an exercise. There is, as has been said before, strength in numbers.

We decided on the Tower Bridge area of London. It is an iconic symbol of London. It's also really windy.

For my first photo I wanted to get a shot of the traffic streaming through the bridge (clicking on any of these photographs gives a bigger image):

This was close to thirty seconds of car lights. Notice the green traffic lights. This is one of those places in the world where running a red light can result in a very through car wash.

I varied this a tiny bit for a vertical shot:

Tower Bridge is lit up like a Christmas tree. Up to a point this is fantastic for photographers, but you'll notice the star lights and glare all over this image. Incidentally there were people walking up and down the pavement (sidewalk), but because of the long exposure none made even the slightest impact on the shot.

A short walk later and we were over on the South bank of the Thames, looking back across the river towards The City. The City is what we call the financial hub of London, and is to London what Wall Street is to New York. That is, a place of risk taking plonkers who needed some serious bailing out when they discovered that they'd all been selling each other assets that on closer inspection were probably liabilities.

Fortunately this photographic trip was before the credit crunch and they could still afford to keep the lights on at night. Now they are allowed a single tea light per floor, which is lit at dusk and blown out at dawn.

Even I, a jaundiced, cynical, countryside lover has to admit this is very pretty, with all the different coloured lights. Oooh, look at the pwity lights...

This wasn't the coldest of nights, but a gentle and persistent wind wore away at us all. It was beginning to make my nose go all the wrong colour. A blue nose clashes so badly with my green eyes. It's an aesthetic thing.

From this vantage point, I could look back and get a view of the whole of Tower Bridge and a magnificent sight it was too. I hope this image captures that beauty.

From there we strolled back and I went home to attempt to get my circulation working again. I did in everything except my head.

World Mental Health Day

2009-10-09T23:44:00.004+01:00

October 10th, 2009 is World Mental Health Day. The idea of a day was started by World Federation for Mental Health, and a damn fine idea it is too.

Mental health is a subject very close to my heart. I am a sufferer from depression. I've been on anti-depressent tables, I've had counselling on more than one occasion and in fact, I'm still on the tablets.

There are stigma attached to mental health problems. The one depression enjoys is the why don't you snap out of it line of illogic. This is also known as the you don't need counselling/anti-depressents, you just need to make up your mind to be ok conversation. Most often this is from kind, well meaning people, especially of the older generation who just got on with it.

I draw an analogy to mind. If I were unfortunate enough to suffer from heart disease, and it were controllable with tablets, most people would say, poor Keith, he has a bad heart and has to take these tablets for the rest of his life. Now, for various reasons, which I shan't go into in this blog (well not today at least, and probably never), I suffer from depression. It affects my sleep, my memory, makes me bloody hard to live with, lousy at my job, lousy at being a husband and lousy at being a father. Makes me quite an angry person. Oddly enough it never affects my appetite (I want to be buried with a hamburger, just in case I get peckish). Counselling has helped a bit, but without a shadow of a doubt the anti-depressents nail the problem, so why then have I had the snap out of it conversation. I wouldn't snap out of heart disease, why would I snap out of depression!

This attitude has meant many people with depression, or other mental illnesses, have remained shy and reluctant to speak out, despite it affecting many people. People who need help have been frightened to seek it due to the stigma. Still others have just got on with it, and lead miserable lives for themselves and made the lives of those around them miserable too.

Have a look at this website for some scary statistics. Mental health problems are not something that only happens to other people.

I'm very lucky. Good doctors, good counselling, effective medicine and it affects my life very little. Thanks for reading this post.

I'd like to thank my Invisible Zebra

2009-10-08T22:19:00.001+01:00

I just got an award off my old mate Indigo Roth (the big purple one). It is for having a blog that is a tiny bit Over the Top or a little Away with the Fairies.

Here it is:

To qualify for the award I need to answer some questions with one word answers. For me this is amazingly difficult as I am widely known for being long-winded and going on for a bit, even though most people would like me to shut-the-f*ck-up.

Here are my answers:
1. Where is your cell phone? Pocket
2. Your hair? Short
3. Your mother? Sarcastic
4. Your father? Inventive
5. Your favorite food? Curry
6. Your dream last night? Missing
7. Your favorite drink? Large
8. Your dream/goal? Escape
9. What room are you in? Ballroom
10. Your hobby? Disruption
11. Your fear? Alzheimer's
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Free
13. Where were you last night? Bed
14. Something you aren't? Religious
15. Muffins? Prozac
16. Wish list items? Many
17. Where did you grow up? London
18. Last thing you did? Tweeted
19. What are you wearing? Glasses
20. Your TV? House
21. Your pets? Cavies
22. Your friends? Unhinged
23. Your life? Chaos
24. Your mood? Grumpy
25. Missing someone? Myself
26. Vehicle? Unicycle
27. Something you're not wearing? Clingfilm
28. Your favorite store? Apple
29. Your favorite color? Black
30. When was the last time you laughed? Today
31. Last time you cried? Yesterday
32. Your best friend? Karen
33. One place I go over and over? Astrocamp
34. One person who emails me regularly? Indigo
35. Favorite place to eat? Raj

I don't read too many blogs, so like Indigo, I shall pass on to just a few highly deserving people, in the hope that they appreciate the recognition as much as I do:

eolistpetite 's thoughtful and throughly enjoyable blog.

Rebecca at Provocation of Mine (d) who oft makes me laugh.

The thought bubbles of Robbie Munn - the blog that came before and has revived.

A Few Moments of Peace

2009-10-06T01:02:00.001+01:00

I recently had the pleasure of a holiday with my family (Fluffy daughter, Mrs Long-Suffering and I), my sister, her husband and children and my parents. We went to the Spanish Balearic Island of Minorca. There was sunshine, a swimming pool, good food and company.

Whilst I love the relaxed atmosphere, a chance to spend whole days doing nothing, I'm not one for spending much time in the sun. Searing sunlight, wilting heat and factor 97 suncream are not my bag. One good ray of sun and I'm smoke.

Exploring and taking photographs is my thing. Our holiday location, the glorious and quite lovely Vista Picas is only a few miles away from the old capital city of Ciutadella. The city, like the island has a very rich history resplendent in megalithic stone monuments, Roman, Vandals, Byzantine, Turkish, British, French and then Spanish. The capital of the island has moved to Mahon which has a far deeper port suitable for much larger ships. And gin.

The best time for taking photographs, especially in sun drenched bits of the world are the golden hours after dawn and during dusk. I wanted the place to be empty, so I arranged for a taxi to take me to the capital at 5:30 in the morning. This is me on holiday - crazy huh?

Mr Taxi driver arrived. He spoke Spanish. I speak English. His English was as good as my Spanish. I grunted and pointed at a map. He held map and rotated it several times. I pointed again. We reached an understanding. At that moment a young lady from the hotel leapt into the back of the taxi and in a flurry of Spanglish indicates she would like to share the ride and pay half.

I arrived at 6:00 in the morning. The journey was very much like the Knight Bus in Harry Potter, but with fewer shrunken heads and wheeled metal beds crashing about. He missed three road islands, which I'm sure he must have clobbered on the return journey.

From my point of arrival I took a slow walk down the narrow streets. The lights were still on giving an orange glow. I sucked in a few moments of peace before nearly getting run over by a delivery van. They belt up and down these streets like maniacs. Ancient, pretty, narrow they may be, but these are peoples homes and work places. And don't forget it!

The streets had wires across them from an earlier lighting system with what looked like large domestic light bulbs - it would have been very interested to have seen them then. Across the middle of the frontage of each of the buildings was a mass of wires and pipes. This seemed something of a shame when the rest was so very picturesque.

I wandered around fairly aimlessly - I was looking for photographic opportunities rather than landmarks and time was short. There would only be an hour before the sun came up and everything was scorching hot and photographically somewhat flat.

Walking along I saw a man sitting in a doorway in a very Monday sort of way. He looked like he was steeling himself to face the day. I asked his permission and took a photo - this is not something I've ever had the guts to do - just walk up to a stranger and take their picture. But I did just that.

From his attire, dishevelled appearance and eyes staring into the middle-distance, clearly the chap was the local computer programmer.

Having relieved the man of his soul I travelled on my way towards the edge of town where I found this unusual building.

Now it is not every day you see the combination of a nightclub, bar and windmill. They were just tidying up from the night before where the locals had obviously had a couple of flowered buns too many or maybe hit the malt loaf too hard. Binge pastries, such a problem in this part of the world.

My final port of call was, forgive the pun, the port. Rather wonderfully it was in a what must have been a deep cut in the land, so as I could stand on high ground and see the whole area. This is probably my favourite image of the whole shoot, but each to his or her own.

I took a slow walk back into the city centre, found a likely looking bus and arrived back at the hotel before anyone else had even peeked their heads out of their duvets. I fell asleep during the show that evening.

Green or Mean

2009-09-30T23:56:00.006+01:00

Today was the first day of Autumn, or so it felt. I'm sure there is an official first day, but frankly I don't care. It felt chilly. The trees are changing colour. I love this time of year, Halloween, Guy Fawkes night (fireworks, mulled wine, sausages, jacket potatoes, oh yes indeed). A few years back I took some nice firework photos one Guy Fawkes night. He's one I quite like:

Over in the UK we have a postal strike. I hardly ever send anything by post or depend upon it in any way, so it is, for the most part, as relevant to me as a Blue Hippopotamus strike. Then again we are under three months from Christmas, and like most people I send and receive Christmas Cards.

I still cannot figure out why I celebrate Christmas or send cards. I'm an atheist, but I was brought up in a Christian country (well Church of England which is more about tea with the vicar and village cricket than anything else). My parents were devoutly apathetic - we 'did' Christmas, Easter Sunday, ate hot cross buns and ate pancakes on Shrove Tuesday. We only ever went near a church for the occasional christening, wedding or funeral.

Anyhow, when it comes down to it, what's wrong with a day of the year where all the shops really do close, we pretend to be nice to one another and give presents we received from someone else the year before to relatives we won't see again for another year? If we atheists didn't borrow a festival from the incumbent religion in the area we'd have to invent one. Why shouldn't my child get loads of presents on a day other than her birthday?

So why do I send these stupid cards to people I actually do care about? Cards that have pictures of a winter scene that doesn't usually happen where I live until over a month after Christmas. I can't remember the last time it snowed on Christmas Day anywhere near my home. Alternatively I send cards with 'witty' comments like "Have another mince pie this Christmas, you're already fatter than Santa Claus". Almost all contain a trite, hand scrawled message saying "we must meet up in the new year".

What makes the whole fiasco even more silly is that many of my friends are similarly disposed towards religion as I am, a good number are Muslims and a small number are of other world religions. Should I give them a card because I do genuinely wish them peace, happiness and plum pudding, or not because it is not their way?

This year, I'm thinking quite seriously about creating an electronic card, with a personal picture and greeting for all my friends, and saying to the card companies: "don't chop a tree down for me this year".

Would this be considered green and 21st century or mean and Scrooge-like?

Conspiracy Theory

2009-09-27T23:37:00.001+01:00

I love conspiracy theorists. I want to believe they say. Well, Mr Mulder, I am your arch nemesis. Professor Moriarty to your Holmes. The Joker to your Batman. The Roquefort to your Edam.

Indigo Roth (the big purple one) and I had an idea. Like all ideas it was formed over a drink in the pub. "Conspiracy theories are the new religion", I said as I fell off my bar stool. "Quite right", he replied, helping me back onto my stool, deftly adjusting his waistcoat and flicking his tails over the back of his chair in one fluid motion. "So what shall we do about it?", he continued. "Give 'em something to think about?" we both said together.

We sealed our pact with a drink, my yard of ale clicking against his, his, well something-in-a-glass-with-a-brolly-in-it. He never explained what it was, but sometimes it gave out a puff of bluish smoke. Although that may have been the earlier Chicken Phal.

We started small. All good operations start small. We found a front garden of a house in Basingstoke. It had three gnomes. We started moving them around over intervals of several days. Then we added to them. By the time we finished there were over two hundred and fifty-four of them. Our best evening was arranging them under the owner's jacked up car, like they were changing a wheel. Made the local paper. I believe the gnomes are still running a Kwik-Fit Tyres place.

Since then it has grown, taking most of our waking hours procuring materials, travelling, building strange structures and getting back in time for the day job. Some are arduous, some are just fun. Crop circles are always fun. You can do them when you're completely out of your face on beer and whisky. Just need to find a field with a decent crop.

The statues on Easter Island were Indigo's design. I said they should be more 'smily', he disagreed. He wanted moody and enigmatic. Maybe he was right. Either way it was bloody hard to get them in place with a old Vauxhall Viva Estate and a set of crowbars. We didn't put out the one with the porkpie hat, as that may have blown the game.

There has been laughter and tears during our times. I remember doing the Mysterious Nazca Lines in Peru. Middle of the night, there we were pushing our wheelbarrows around, lining them up on features in the horizon - got to keep the lines straight I said. Mine got a puncture and started going along all flop, flop flop. Indigo hit a llama, which lay on it's back in his wheelbarrow with all four legs in the air. When you look at the photos taken from the air you can see where we got in trouble.

Now the Bermuda Triangle is one I really wish we hadn't started. Such a long way to go. My original plan was to have the triangle between Felixstowe, Amsterdam and Gothenburg like the dreadful 1980's British TV series. We settled on Bermuda as one apex mostly because it had much better hotels. The North Sea Triangle would never have been investigated by anyone who didn't want to get freezing cold, wet and miserable. So Bermuda it was.

Getting the crew of the Marie Celeste ashore without anyone noticing was hard. Sailing the ship back out two handed was tiring and once in position we sat down for a really decent fried breakfast and then the radar went bleep. We just got away in our stealth boat on the far side without anyone noticing.

Anyhow, time is getting on and I have a really good mock up of Pandora's Box to finish in my shed. The llama needs feeding too [why my shed Roth? He'd have fitted under your bed perfectly well]. Indigo will be over later with the mysterious metal bits he cast for Roswell next week.

Mystic Place

2009-09-26T12:26:00.004+01:00

I live in a place where ancient lay-lines cross the well trodden route to KFC. That brings some ancient magic to the fore. Strange things happen here.

Fluffy daughter would like a cat. Mrs Long-suffering would like a cat. I would like a cat. They're strange indifferent creatures with their minds permanently at the edge of the jungle.

Mrs Long-suffering and I would like a dog, but they're a load of effort and responsibility.

Anyhow, back to the cat idea. There is a snag. A wee problemette.

When I was in my teens I had asthma. Quite badly. I had allergy test at a swanky London hospital (thanks to the NHS). They confirmed I was allergic to house dust and CATS.

My parents immediately went out and bought a very hairy Persian cat. Does anyone think they were trying to tell me something?

Mrs Long-suffering explained about Daddy not being able to live with cats because his breathing gets bad. Fluffy daughter nodded sagely. She said she'd still like a cat.

Friday morning Fluffy daughter explained that she could get a cat if daddy went away. She said I could go and live with my mum and dad, 'cos I love them. Mrs Long-suffering smiles quietly to herself. Fluffy daughter says "when you have a cat, you must take responsibility. Getting rid of Daddy is responsibility."

So, at some point soon I may be repl meoow meow meow *finds slipper to poo in*

Techno Addiction

2009-09-25T22:26:00.001+01:00

My name is Keith and I am a techno addict. I have been as long as I can remember. I've considered developing some emotional maturity and realise that life is about living rather than having. But then it isn't entirely the having - it's the making it all work together.

I love it. We've got a house full of it. My wife and daughter can't move due to the wiring.

Just this evening I worked out how to make my iPhone play music through my PC using bluetooth. Anyone else would have just found a bit of wire and connected the two together. That'd be too easy for me. Where would be the fun in that? I mean I can take my iPhone up to 10 meters away from my PC and still play music through it's speakers. Hell, I can be in another room so I wouldn't even have to listen to the music I was playing. Stupid thing to get happy about.

Maybe I can move onto other devices. Could I get my toaster to play Judas Priest's "Living after Midnight"? Got to be worth a go, I'd have said. To be honest, I would be satisfied just to get the thing to make bread brown on both sides evenly and quickly. It has a dial on the side marked with numbers. Number 1: Make the bread vaguely warm to the touch; Number 2: Make one side of each slice slightly brown in the middle; Number 3: Put the fire to it. Cremate. Leave no trace of the bread. Send it to the ozone layer post haste. Thankfully it cannot be turned up to 11 - I've always assumed that would have been banned under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Amerdinerjad says Iran has no nuclear weapons, but they've got a toaster and they know how to use it.

I had reason earlier in the day to look up Bermuda Triangle mysteries. Sadly most are terribly easy to explain, but like always it set me thinking. Where exactly did my 500g bar of Dairy Milk go? [For those of you reading from the other side of the Atlantic that is a very big bar of very nice chocolate] One day it was in the 'fridge and the next it wasn't. Obviously I took statements from all present, although the celery was remaining suspiciously quiet. I took the cheese away for interrogation.

My keen mind discounted the obvious immediately. It hadn't been eaten by the dog. Dogs don't like Dairy Milk. 500g would clearly be too much and the poor animal would have a stomach ache. Dog's can't unwrap foil wrapping and that was gone too. The absolute clincher I felt was that we don't own a dog. Well, I don't think we do.

A few days later it reappeared, but had gone past it's best-before-end date. Mysterious chilly white portal to another time and place OR a grocery delivery - you make up your own mind.

This blog is intentionally left blank

2009-09-24T22:58:00.004+01:00