The Commute

I leave the house and start up the hill in the light fog, other, distant figures half-visible in front of me. I turn right to start the long-descent to the valley floor and the Station, pausing at the rate-limiting step of my journey to await a break in traffic. As I continue, I become aware of others, striding with greater purpose, ,perhaps they know something I don't? I speed up, tension building in my shins until I'm afraid they'll crack, shatter like trees in an Arctic frost - they don't.

At the station I look along the platform at my fellow commuters, grey in the gloaming, hunched like armadillos, against what - the cold, the impending Pendolino not stopping at Platform 2, the Damoclean doom of a full working-week?

The train arrives, I find a seat and look around at the sleepers, the readers, the caffeine-hungry and the just-plain hungry. We move off, cocooned in a warm oasis of gloom, the reassuring pressure of cushion on buttock giving us a pre-emptive superiority over those others, the less- fortunate, who will get on later and stand, teetering, into London. Is it worth the extra money, this seat? You betcha!

The taste of ash.

I have recently moved, I bought a property on March the 8th and moved in on December the 11th. Now, you would have thought that in the intervening time I might have done all the necessary work, got the place shipshape, so to speak. However, I elected to build the kitchen myself, British Man pitting himself against the Swedes, uneven walls and floors, and his own ability to draw a straight line. The resulting depression has come like a hammer-blow from the Gods, I cannot draw a straight line, saw a straight line, make anything horizontal or vertical. My latest paramour is full of, "I can't understand why you don't...", "Why didn't you...", "Why haven't you..." and "But...", so much so, that last night I hung up on her, perhaps demoting her from "latest" to "last". Though she did send me multiple pictures of pygmy hedgehogs in the bath (to be honest I'd prefer pictures of her in the bath) to "cheer me up".

Why? Because all these phrases resonate in my echoing pate, mainly because they already exist there, they chime and echo, thrum in harmony with the catgut of my worry, smothered with a blanket of stubbornness, and - to be honest, fear. Fear of, "I don't know how to.", "I've never done this before.", "How do you find a kitchen fitter?". Fear of the unknown (though I do ask directions).

Let me tell you about cack-handedness - fitting the handles - I did what every good fitter, self-help book (of which I shall now need a few, though not relating to DIY), sensible person, does and made a template. I marked and drilled, two of the handles didn't fit, and it was after I drilled that I realised that that particular design is only supposed to be mounted horizontally.

My weekend is to be spent, unpacking bags and boxes, and, ironically, packing the worktops to the horizontal. The good craftsmen of Hemel Homestead can look forward to a new year full of employment.

Gall and bile are bitter fruit.

Oysters Aweigh!

WARNING! Contains scatology and mortal illness! Those of a squeamish nature or a nervous disposition should stop reading now!

It had been Jacks birthday on the Saturday and to help him celebrate I had bought some oysters from Morrison’s (a supermarket chain that had bought up the Safeway franchise when they decamped back to the States). Now I’m not saying it was the oysters but they seem the likely candidate. Monday morning I felt quite bloated, but not having a group of forty-year-old female friends to recommend Activia, I thought not much of it. This afternoon I moved from bloat to ropey, and determined to go home so mounting my bike I pedalled slowly off.

At the top of the first hill I had to have a little sit-down to allow the world to swim back into focus. The last half-mile was fraught, peristaltic waves would creep up on me forcing me to think of lock-gates nudging shut, books closing, oysters shutting at the approach of shadow (ironic huh?) and ducks being throttled. I made it with my clothes inviolate and then lost about two litres of bodily fluids in as many seconds into the appropriate receptacle, not so much Niagara, more Hardraw Force in spate.

My keen brain ran through a calculation of toilet roll versus time and came out ahead on a two day stint. Phew! I then threw myself in the appropriate receptacle – bed, and embarked upon a febrile episode with stomach cramps (ladies reading this will be drawing breath, yes I know, I now sympathise a lot more than before). My bedroom was carefully and tremblingly arranged; clear run to the door, spare washing up bowl in easy grasp (always a conflict, should one assume the worst and take the bowl to the toilet?).

Those of you who get my Friday email will know that my libido has been a bit peculiar of late, and it came upon me to wonder whether a life partner would find this behaviour lust arousing at all, the moues , moans and groans, the writhing and finally, the sheer heat. I decided, “no” and also posited that were I in this position again, said life-partner would have to sleep on the side away from the door.

At this point I must have lost my presence of mind for I considered taking an ibuprofen like my period-pain comrades-in-arms, a part of me did consider that putting in an irritant may be a bad idea. It was. Twenty minutes later and I was at one with the fountains in Trafalgar Square. After that I retreated under the covers until the water, salt and sugar ran out when I would have to go and make another batch – a wobbly adventure.

Every time I turned in the bed (at this point with extra blanket) my gut would fall to the downhill side impelled by gravity and several litres of fluid, precipitating a wave of compression that would flow down the liquid mass before ending at my anus, as I felt the wave, I would squeeze everything shut, eyes scrunched, teeth grinding, hands fisted, even my toes would curl and finally and, most fundamentally, buttocks clenched, buttocks clenched so tight that I lost two inches in height.

I failed to sleep, tormented by waking dreams of bubbles floating on a scummy lake, that had to be flattened by counter-bubbles, as soon as the surface was calm the dream would repeat.

The next day I managed to move to the living room and suffer the indignities of daytime tv. Today fifty percent.

First Night

It had been the usual night with Dean, he amazed at my callowness, me at his sensitivity – lack of, so it was with a weary bleary head that I rose on Saturday. After a revivifying, but guilty, breakfast of bacon, egg, tomatoes, buttered toast and Cousin Julian’s Seville and grapefruit marmalade (it’s OK, I’m on statins), in fact it was so good that I’ve had to resist the temptation to capitalise it. Where was I? After breakfast and a small sit in front of the tv, I loaded the trusty steed, pedalled off to Euston and set off for the new house, for a sleepover to validate the insurance. I arrived and pedalled painfully up the hill (some hope for increasing fitness at least, let’s hope it will exceed my increasing decrepitude) and arrived, as I pulled onto the Astroturf (yes I have a front lawn I have to vacuum) my neighbour, John bounced into view, “Can I help y... Oh it’s you, can you put me in touch with your electrician?” This is the man who put “watch” into neighbourhood watch, all of which is quite gratifying. “You cycle too” a simple statement of fact, I can’t decide if this is indictment or approval but the addition of “too” may be telling (try the phrase out for yourself, there are multiple inflections you can apply to ”too”.”
I entered, counted the dead spiders (two but with a few emaciated brethren clinging to the ceiling, at least I think they’re clinging, I haven’t seen them move yet, perhaps five – I’ll leave the door open for a bit, see if we can attract some volunteer nutrition objects), sorted the postal wheat from chaff (it’s a lean year so far), ran a non-horticultural eye over the garden (the recent rain has done wonders for the grass, moss and dandelions that make up the back lawn – I missed the daffodils – isn’t that willowherb?-I really should grub THAT out, please let it not be ground-elder or that blue thing beginning with “P”......... periwinkle!), then, after a quick unpack of sleeping bags (yes bags – is May out yet? No – has the house been heated for two months? No- bags) remounted and went in search of Giant Tesco.
Which I found on the top of a hill up a particularly busy and nasty stretch of the A414, in fact so busy and nasty that I carried the bike over the footbridge rather than risk the right (and therefore cross-traffic, for those of you in uncivilised countries) turn to get to the carpark. Somewhat fazed by the journey, I attached steed to the trolley corral (bike parking – what that?) and set off away from the door, this left me with the option that, rather than being a twat, I had decided to look at the view of the leisure centre (though the sheer size and number of flumes has set me thinking about days off, outside school holidays). Consequently I turned and slid, oysterlike, into the maw of Tesco, I re-emerged (also potentially oysterlike) about 15 minutes later with a packet of liquorice allsorts (on offer), a bottle of fizzy pink wine (on offer and to celebrate my “arrival”) and a blow-up double mattress (which some of you may well be enjoying the company of – not you Roxy, you’ll be sleeping on top of something much more comfy, unless I lose a heck of a lot of weight).
My journey home was less busy but not much, Hemel Hempstead seems to be some sort of arterial anastamosis, but I arrived, l put the bike in the shed, I put the wine in the sink, I put the Allsorts in me and then I put most of me into blowing up the mattress. It took about an hour, I had to keep having a rest, during which time I started the heating and hot water system. The gas system turns on with the sort of explosion that will both wake the dead and have a lot of them chatting about , “That’s exactly what I heard and then I saw all these lights and some feathery bloke gave me this harp, well I’ve never been musical... and this ambrosia. Ambrosia! It’s like no rice pudding I’ve ever had. Anyway I was talking to Mrs Iscariot the other day and she said....” But at least it turns on.
Back to trusty steed and a run to find something to eat, I aim for a pub in Potten End, and end up in the Plough, the less poncey of the two I suspect, my arrival, with bike, fluorescent jacket, helmet etc provokes the usual banter but there’s no malice, so I settle in with a pint of “Brock” from Tring Brewery, which turns out to be a pint of brown bitter beer, and Pasta Alfredo, which turns out to be fusilli, garlic, chicken and salt, I’m not being disparaging it was pretty good but a bit salty (like me? Comments? Please yourselves!). Then I came back as the weather closed in and seated on my mattress, with my back to a radiator (whose thermostat valve I have to play maestrolike to tread the thin line between cooked and frozen), a toothglass of sparkling pink to my right and a chest full of asthma and plasticisers (the mattress inflation not the Alfredo) I started to write this. But what of tomorrow?

The central heating and water come on, it sounds like a broadcast of concrete manufacture, slightly off-station and beaming in from Ganymede, the radiators tick and bang with badly remembered expansion. It had been a cold night, not my coldest but cold enough, I listened to the gastro-intestinal protests of the plumbing for an hour or so and then immersed myself under running hot water. What the hell was I going to do now? It was the typical camping dilemma induced by no chair, I could lie flat until I got bored or my hands fell off if I wanted to read, sit cross-legged until my knees popped, sit on the floor with my back to the wall until my bum went numb, I tried all three in various combinations until Ten when I hoped a shop might be open for breakfast supplies, though without anything to cook them on (or with) breakfast would probably be cake.
Mercifully (perhaps not), the greasy spoon was open (and busy), so now I’m back, full-to-burstin’, waiting for the wine delivery (priorities, priorities) after which I shall trusty steed to see how far along the bluebells are (they’ll be perfect as I forgot the camera). While I wait, I’ll finish the book and do some desultory gardening, not being sure what is and isn’t weeds, if I had had the camera then I could at least have shown my experts, now I’ll probably have to drag them along by waving a corkscrew at them. I have decided to get some sort of bird-feeder though the lawn appears to be doing adequately for the neighbourhood thrush.
The booze arrived, I parked it, shut up shop and headed off for bluebell country, they were out, once again I regretted the lack of camera and naked girl but at least I didn’t ask for volunteers. A delightful amble through the woods turned into a sour debacle in the last two miles before the station when some young people decided they’d creep up on me and shout and sound the horn, oh it was hilarious (Y377 HEE if anyone knows how to trace them), I decided not to give them a piece of my mind when they pulled into a garage a couple of hundred yards later I didn’t want to get blood on the tarmac – particularly mine. Why is it you’re never carrying a shotgun when you need one? Later they overtook me again, restricting themselves to a single epithet, I was amazed from their demeanour I didn’t think they were capable of speech. Cycling back to the flat from the station, a group of kids strolled out in front of me to criticise my, “Wanky hat” God it’s good to be out on the open road, the sun in your eyes and insects between your teeth. I’m writing this at the new canalside cafe, which from its prices has a lot of overheads, I may have to go out for a pint when I get in.

Lumbared!

Once again I'm in the wars. I had spent a Saturday afternoon looking after my Godson, Stuart, and his two year old brother Laurence, while Mum attended an introduction to the Japanese School in London. To be fair I had been treated to a scrummy sushi lunch. Eventually having been told off for playing with toys in the School hall, we went to investigate outside, and discovered a play area. Stuart was eventually inveigled into football by some "other boys", so Laurence and I took to the swings. After extensive swing pushing, I decided to try something different. I walked round to the front of the swing and pulled it towards me,
"Are you holding on tightly?"
Two year old assent.
I let go of the swing. It became patently clear after the apogee of his flight that he wasn't, as the swing returned to me and Laurence didn't. Consequently, I spent the rest of afternoon carrying him in both his traumatised, and later, comatose states. Laurence is a dense little boy and, in the sleep state, his molecules appear to coalesce down to something resembling one of the heavier metals. Later I handed him over to Father, and went home.

On Monday, cycling in, I stood on the pedal to move out of a T junction, and was rewarded with excruciating lumbar pain, this rather slowed my journey, and has led to the bike having a holiday at work. To add insult to literal injury, I was shouted at by a pedestrian as I was moving across a crossroads on a green light.
"There are people crossing!"
If I had felt that I could get off and give the lady a piece of my mind without more damage I would have, pointing out that while there were indeed, people crossing, they, including her, were crossing on a red light. Instead I made an expansive gesture designed to include the lights, this was wilfully misinterpreted.
"Charming!"
I pedalled painfully on, with both mental and physical anguish.

Consequently I now suffer from "sock terror", this is the conviction that when one puts on one's socks (impossible to do without bending, no, it is, try it), there will be a crux point where, after a ripping sound, the wall opposite your back will be studded with vertebrae, and your unsupported head will be making the acquaintance of whatever lives under the bed (in my case a warren of dust bunnies, the occasional bogeyman and that pair of trainers that disappeared). I shall leave "underpants terror" for a more, less salubrious occasion.

Spice of ...

My Father was mild-mannered Clark Kent, he stayed mild-mannered Clark Kent, and never transformed to Superman, lifts, revolving doors and telephone boxes were never compromised in my Father’s realm, he was the same as everyone else’s father, who only ever transform in the cocoon of the imagination of their adult children, and then only post-mortem.
Drinking: towards the end, he moved from a cream sherry towards a half of lager and lime, oh and gave up sugar in his tea, wine (new-fangled at the time) would be Anjou Rose or Lutomer Reisling, red was far too outré.
Smoking: he moved from the pipe to cigarillos, usually Manikin, surely unmoved by the bouncy chest of the blonde as she loped athletically along a tropical beach before plunging carelessly into the surf.
Food: He took up salading as a hobby, bought books on how to compose salad, and let rip: chicory unmanned with the flick of a knife, a series of circumcisions, and there was the poor vegetable displaying its contours to a melange of tomato and tinned sweetcorn before suffering the indignity of being dressed with a vinaigrette of malt vinegar and vegetable oil, flavoured with a, literal, dusting of dried mixed herbs. Sometimes the then Chinese Gooseberry, the now Kiwi fruit, would be seen lurking behind the audacious walnut. He also liked the adventure of the Vesta curry, a jumble of stuff plus some non-rehydrating beef chunks, with occasional spice. It was the daring of difference that captured him, the daring of difference advertised nationwide on the TV as different and daring.
I had staggered home from an evening with Dean, it had been Graduation Day and a female student had made me blush – with fulsome praise rather than a lewd suggestion ( sadly, I think my days of women making lewd suggestions to me may be over. Any and all detractors please contact me as soon as possible). We had gone to the pub so that Dean could watch the first half of England v Croatia. I was the sightline that he returned to only during the pauses in the match, for the rest of the time I had the unrivalled opportunity to map out the veins on the underside of his eyeballs.
At half-time Dean skedaddled off to the station, and I swayed into the supermarket to check out the “reduced” shelf, Wednesday seemingly being a very poor night. So it was that I returned home and raided the store cupboard turning up a packet of soba noodles and cold soup mix. I decided that the onomatopoeic qualities of the soba noodles sounded attractive, given my state, and so embarked on preparation (or to be more honest, opening the packets). The soup turned out to be redolent with wasabi, offsetting the chill of the noodles with sharp needles of spice. This was the point that sent me drifting down the temporal stream to a visit from Dad to London (where he would be going to an IST meeting to talk about chemistry syllabi). I decided that I would take him to Diwana, a vegetarian restaurant that specialised in Bombay street food, which would certainly be more adventurous than a Vesta.
We had Aloo Papri Chaat (potatoes, chick peas, onion, tamarind and yoghurt and poori pieces) and Sev Poori (semolina vermicelli, onion, tamarind and so on). I think that Dad may have lost his taste for spice that day, or perhaps just lost his taste, the sev poori had a chilli hit that would have cleared the sinuses of large pachyderms in one cathartic spasm. I’m not sure if he enjoyed that meal, or whether it may have tipped him against the sub-continent, at least nutritionwise
Moral: Though it may look like a good idea at the time, it still may destroy your sense of taste and, perhaps, trust.

The Cough

It starts as a tic, a glitch, a slight thickening in the air as it rolls over my tongue and surfs down into my lungs, a moment of liquefaction that subsides momentarily before starting to set the unprotected ends of my nerves all ajangle. I glance nervously round the carriage, the filling in a Crombie sandwich, and, handkerchief unavailable without considerable pocket mining, slip off my fleece hat. Then the tickling starts at the back of the throat, I force saliva and swallow, hoping to drown whatever arthritic-fingered grandparent is tormenting me, the tickle subsides then returns with greater insistence. Pressure builds in my chest, and I bunch the hat, more swallowing, a prayer to St Jude. The train stops, adding to my misery, spectacular convulsions and expectoration I can cope with on a platform but in the confines of the carriage it may startle the horses. More pressure, I now know the inevitable will happen, that I will cough but will it be the single bark and wheeze, or the tubercular rack; explosions coming thick and fast, each inhalation providing fuel for the next bombardment? And which breath will it start with, this one, the next one, the one after that? It's this one; my chest contracts forcing air out in spasm, the hat, hovering below my chin, moves swiftly up to catch the gust and any pulmonary detritus. I breathe in cautiously through my nose, this is the crux point, wake up Grandad Tickler now and I will descend into the tussive equivalent of an avalanche. The train is overheated so that the stifling air does just that, it stifles mercifully.
In the night I have to adopt a different strategy, I sleep, or attempt to sleep, with my nose and mouth submerged under the covers where the air is heated by my body. However, there comes a point where I will have to surface to find some oxygen. Like a whale I rise to sip some air, never knowing if the harpoon of the patrolling unheated-air "scientific whaling" fleet will strike, leaving my neighbours to enjoy the aural Nantucket Sleighride of my paroxysms.
Eventually I will reach for the balm of codeine linctus and glug, then wait for the forty minutes it takes to smother my throat with honey and lullaby my tormentors into the arms of morphine. There is a problem with codeine though, not only does it still the cough, it stills everything else as well so that I rise groggily in the morning, mouth filled with glue, head filled with wool, and stumble into my bathroom, my clothes, some shoes, the street. The street where the cycle will begin again, the imp in my throat cracks his hoary knuckles, reaches out and begins very gently to stroke.

The Editors would like to apologise for the somewhat conflicted nature of the following, the copy only arrived thirty minutes ahead of the printing schedule.


Old Nick's Almanac - a guide to love and fortune for 2010.

Capricorn
December 22 - January 19
New Year resolutions are really hard to keep up, though Capricorns with your stubborn pigheadedness are better at succeeding than others. Gosh I hate Capricorns, always moaning about the right way to do things, not one spark of wit or vitality.

Aquarius
January 20 - February 18
The water bearer, well, that just about sums up my resolution, let the good times roll, my arse. I hate Aquarians, always holier than thou, and we all know what WC Fields said about water....

Pisces
February 19 - March 20
Well how apt, here we are talking about fish and along come a pair. The fact that they're swimming in opposite directions is supposed to symbolise internal conflict. I hate Pisces they haven't got a clue about conflict, try being an astrologer, that's conflict.

Aries
March 21 - April 19
Look, it's a science it's got tables and everything, I have to do maths! And then what do they want, they all follow like sheep and just want you to say, "You'll have a lovely time" . Aries (how I hate you, you woolly-headed addle-pated, weak-willed...it beggars belief) you'll have a lovely time.

Taurus
April 20 - May 20
Then what happens, they go and discover more planets, they dump Pluto, what am I supposed to do? A lot of scientists are Taureans, with their desire for recognition, probably bloody astronomers, I hate astronomers even so I'm sure they'll have a lovely time making my life a misery. It's enough to drive one back to drink.

Gemini
May 21 - June 20
Twins, why is there never a pair of compliant twins when you need them? Well Gemini, you're supposed to be multi-talented, well bully for you, here's me working like a slave to produce, "you'll have a lovely time" and Gemini can turn their hand to anything, lucky, bloody Gemini.

Cancer
June 21 - July 22
Precisely, that's what you are, the lot of you, I hate you.

Leo
July 23 - August 22
The Lion, I mean why aren't you "up" in March, y'know, "in like a lion out like a lamb". Bloody Greeks, why can't they make it simple, I mean, when I started I was told there were only four elements and now there's six, with this bleeding Phlogiston and Aether, what's that all about? Whaddya mean a hundred and nine!

Virgo
August 23 - September 22
The Sun is in Virgo at the moment so I can't see a bloody thing. Look, if anything did happen you wouldn't be a Virgo any more. I give up, sod the resolution, I'm off to the pub.

Libra
September 23 - October 22
Well-balanced? WELL-BALANCED! This gin and tonic is well-balanced, if Libra were well-balanced they wouldn't be reading this tosh would they? I hate well-balanced people. Landlord, LANDLORD!

Scorpio
October 23 - November 21
Who's a Scorpio? C'mon the law of odds says one of you is. You, you, I hate you, I hate all Scorpios, they're all creeps, hiding under rocks and then blindsiding you when you least expect it. Come on then! Come on! Ow!

Sagittarius
November 22 - December 21
I used to like the Archers until it got all modern, yeah you too? You're my best mate you are, you are, you are, I love you.

According to the supermarkets St Valentine's Day is looming up on us again (though not as fast as Easter apparently). Being a (reluctantly) single man there is a lot of pressure to find a significant other, therefore I have recently consulted the Nixco Dating Helpline for some tips. They have given me a set of straplines to use on dating websites, lonely hearts columns and the like, which they say are guaranteed results. I feel it my duty to pass these on in case there are any more like me out there, they include:


ECO WARRIOR SEEKS BAG FOR LIFE
STUDENT AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LIFE SEEKS BIOLOGY TUTOR
ASPERGIC SEEKS NEW HOBBY
TRAVELLER OF LIFE'S HIGHWAY SEEKS LUGGAGE
ADAM SEEKS EVE (POST-APPLE)
CURMUDGEON SEEKS SOUNDING POST


Nixco say that these have all been lovingly crafted by their team of elderly batchelors, and guarantee that the use of these will generate some form of response.
Their address:


Nixco Assisted DAting
a division of NIxco ENTErprises
Zone Industriel Lucerne, Switzerland

I had hoped that having a laptop was going to make my life easier, I had thought that it would enable me to immediately place my shafts of wit and flashes of brilliance into the public domain. I had forgotten that the source of some of those shafts of wit and flashes of brilliance was the disinhibiting effect of alcohol, and that while those SoW’s and FoB’s were fulminating under the carapace, I would have to be able to type, which is difficult when your fingers and eyes are equally disinhibited, which is why I’m transposing this from a barely legible scrawl mainly written in block capitals so that I can translate it.
There comes a moment in an evening’s drinking where one attains a transcendental state resembling Godhood (Dionysus or Bacchus, I suspect), you can do no wrong, every thought is hilarious, you are the epitome of Adonis and Casanova combined. All this can be instantly undone by catching a glimpse of oneself in a suitably reflective surface – the Dorian Grey Moment. It’s also undone, though with a considerable longueur, the following morning when one becomes the epitome of Job and Lazarus combined.
Just before Christmas I had succumbed to an offer in my local supermarket; two bottles of liqueur for twenty five pounds, I had selected Drambuie (sweet whisky) and Cointreau (a confection of oranges). The thing about liqueurs is that they are sweet, and because they are sweet, they can do you no harm, they obviously contain no alcohol.
I had been out for an evening with Dean: Doom, Gloom, Optimism, Serenity, Pragmatism (ascribe as you see fit, they were all covered, apart from Optimism, which kept itself hidden under a rock, and is likely to stay there in the present work climate). Arriving home I decided on a nightcap and stupidly embarked on a trip around my liqueurs, a trip into a dimension several removed from self-denial, but hey, it’s only sugar and fruit it might even be good for you – my arse.