Whatever

Tags

Actimel, expressive aphasia, Game of Thrones, heritage lamp post, Hodor, irritable bowel syndrome, Jamie Oliver, Kristian Nairns, Laocoon, Lisa Faulkener, Manuel, Mocha, Pastel-de-nata, penance, Portuguese custard tart, Vicar of Dibley, Year Five

(photo by Luca Masters from Chocowinity, NC, USSA)

John Boothroyd-Smythe was winding up his mother

as usual.

It was the Easter break and he was supposed to be

revising.  However, the state of his bedroom was not

conducive to serious study, his parent felt.

She threatened to dock his allowance if he didn’t put

his dirty clothing into the laundry bin, but he just shrugged

and muttered, Whatever.

Your name isn’t Hodor, by any chance? she remonstrated.

Not a flicker.

You know- that character in Game of Thrones.  The one who

only utters a single word.

John grunted and did not avert his gaze from his computer

screen.

Oh, I give up! Gisela expostulated, depositing his underwear

and sundry soiled garments on the floor.  Some socks entwined

themselves into a tangled series of knots that would have given

Laocoon a tourniquet or two.  Why do you have to be so

monosyllabic?

Wot?

Later, in Costamuchamoulah must-seen cafe, Gisela was sharing

her woes with a vaguely interested acquaintance.

Brassica had twin boys in the same class as John.  She tried to

overlook the painful fact that he had bullied her precious sons-

Castor and Pollux, causing withdrawn behaviour on their part.

Eventually she had involved Mr Milford-Haven, who had been

unable to address the issue.

It was only when he had passed the case on to Mr Augustus

Snodbury, The Senior Master, that the name-calling (‘Bastard

and Bollocks’ or ‘Custard and Pillock’) had stopped.

Maybe it was because Mr Snodbury took to abbreviating

Boothroyd-Smythe’s surname to ‘B-S’ and wrote the bully boy’s

forename initial in Latin form, as a capital ‘I‘, thus rendering the

whole I B-S, which everyone, including all the Masters, knew stood for

Irritable Bowel Syndrome.

Some felt this was a trifle cruel, but Snod said that the child had the

same miserable effect on one and all and that he personally required

a probiotic Actimel from the Staffroom fridge before he could face the

bete noire on a Monday, period one.

So, Mrs Willoughby found the effort of appearing sympathetic

somewhat challenging.  She endeavoured to adjust her facial

expression when Gisela complained:

He basically only utters a single word at any one time.  Sometimes I

worry that he might have Expressive Aphasia.

What’s that?  queried Brassie, suddenly wondering if it was contagious

as her boys exhibited something very similar.

It’s a neurological condition, explained Gisela.  There can be a lesion in

the part of the brain that controls speech.

But John spoke quite fluently until Year Five, didn’t he? commented

Brassie.

Um, yes, but he did receive a blow to the head during a rugby

match recently.  Apparently this condition can be initiated by trauma.

Brassie was worried now.   At the time she and Cosmo had

congratulated Castor for tackling the bully and bringing him down.

She stared into the fern motif in the chocolate powder of her Mocha.

Gisela was in her stride now.  He doesn’t reply when I call his name.

Oh, my two are just the same, but their father calls it Selective Hearing

and he is just as bad.  She unfolded her tablet and Googled Expressive…

What did you call it again?

Aphasia, supplied Gisela.

Oh, I think there is a girl in Tiger-Lily’s class called that.  Hang on…It says

that those who have been diagnosed with it cannot form syntactically

complex sentences.

You see!  interrupted Gisela.  That’s what John is like.

No, soothed Brassie.  I’d say that everyone is on a spectrum.  Hodor

Syndrome would be at one extreme and individuals probably reveal

varying degrees of the tendency.  That gushy woman we had to wait

behind at the Parents’ Evening probably exhibited the other extreme.

We can all communicate telegraphically.  I mean, I bumped my head

badly and nearly concussed myself when I was transfixed by a dress

in the window of ‘A La Mode’.  I walked straight into a Heritage lamp

post.  Cosmo says I’ve never been the same.  But, I wouldn’t think

John is morphing into Kristian Nairns, aka Hodor, just yet.

I did drop him on his head once when he was a baby, confessed

Gisela in a whisper, which was nevertheless overheard and instantly

processed by The Suttonford Grapevine.

Most mothers have done that, absolved Brassie.  I suppose that’s

why most husbands are men of few words.  She felt like The Vicar of

Dibley, only slimmer.  Should she prescribe some penance?

But don’t girls get dropped too? asked Gisela with disarming logic.

They seem to be more robust cranially-speaking, said Brassie.

Maybe it is an evolutionary adaptation to inure them to survival

after being dumped in later life.

The minute she had tactlessly uttered this, she regretted it,

given Gisela’s recent divorce.  Have another Pastel-de-nata, she

distracted.  Go on.  You deserve it.

Pastel-de-nata?

Portuguese custard tart, after Jamie Oliver.

I think it is a Lisa Faulkener recipe, actually, clarified the barista,

removing their used plates.

Tanto faz! Gisela brightened.

Que? said Brassie, attempting a quizzical Manuel impression.

Whatever, Gisela laughed and sank her veneers into one of the

seriously moreish roundels.

Palm Sunday in Salisbury

Tags

Arundells, Babel, Bishop's Stall, Chapter House, Constable, Creme egg, Dom Perignon, Easter, Jobseekers, Julian of Norwich, Living Water, Mammon, Mocha, National Trust, New Sarum, Old Sarum, Palm Sunday, patens, Pontius Pilate, Salisbury, Simnel cake, Ted Heath, University Challenge, Yasser Arafat

A re-blog as it is timely:

I can’t believe that it’s nearly Easter, shivered Carrie.

Quick! let’s go in and bag a table, I said.

Costamuchamoulah cafe was still doing a brisk trade, even on this

grey day.  Amazingly, the smokers were still prepared to sit outside.

We have the routine down to a fine art now: one gets into the queue while

the other nabs a table, much as the disciples snatched a colt.

Yes, Easter’s early this year, I commented, watching a child stuff its face with

a Creme Egg in advance of the Christian calendar.  It’s amazing how such

diminutive creatures can incorporate a whole orb of sickly chocolate fondant

into such a tiny aperture.

I bet they don’t know what Simnel cakes represent, I mused aloud.

What do they stand for? queried Carrie.  Then, seeing my expression, she

added, I’m sure I once knew.

That’s what I say during University Challenge, I replied.

Then I sipped my Mocha, getting a chocolate powder moustache.  You know,

it’s Palm Sunday tomorrow.  Are you going to go to a service? 

Try persuading that lot to get out of bed, she sighed. They used to like to see

the donkey coming into the church, though.  Sometimes they were convinced

that The Dean, giving his dramatised reading, was Pontius Pilate and it scared

them.

Yes, we used to go to Salisbury for the service.  That was when Ted Heath

lived in The Close. In fact..

..you have a poem about it, she smiled.

How did you know?

PALM SUNDAY IN SALISBURY

Polythene wraps New Sarum like an egg.

The sky above The Close is Constable’s.

Cream-robed clergy congregate in cloisters,

bespectacled, brandishing dried gray palms,

under a spire as tall as Babel’s own,

while new choristers mouth All glory, laud

and honour.. without comprehending laud.

The tallest lad hopes that his voice won’t crack.

Girl choristers have not been asked to sing today.

Some miniature Yasser Arafats

in tea-towels and trainers coax an ass

from a spreading cedar into the nave,

where all present pray for its continence.

True blue glass provides a continuo.

Ted Heath’s Jaguar, also blue, is parked

on a reserved space outside Arundells.

What if one should loose its handbrake

and say, The Lord has need of thee this day?

Meanwhile we make intercession for all

unemployed, under and over-employed,

while carefully noting the advertised

champagne breakfast on our service schedule.

Dom Perignon: a foretaste of glory.

The Jobseekers can sip Living Water.

Coffee will be served in the Chapter House

among the exhumed coffin chalices,

patens. The bookshop is doing business

in postcards of Julian of Norwich:

All manner of thing shall be well. Mammon

hasn’t felt stings from His whip of cords-yet.

The head which indicates the Bishop’s stall

has a triple face of circumspection.

The Dean and his ordained wife wear the same

as they stand on repro medieval tiles,

trying not to worry about their lunch.

In the cloisters a chill wind chafes faces.

A chair is overturned, but no tables.

Although we have received the sign of peace,

our palm crosses seem ineffectual.

We stick one on Ted’s windscreen, just in case

his residential permit cuts no ice

with the flaming Being at the Close gate,

who curiously doesn’t wear a badge,

but bears authority from Old Sarum.

He tends to let the backpackers pass through,

like Christians, still bearing their large burdens,

or as camels accessing a needle.

But Tory Faithful have to wait in queues,

backs turned to the Celestial City,

while Peter checks their National Trust cards

and the very stones cry, Glory! Glory!

Extroverts? Introverts?

Tags

Crying baby Contest, Extraversion and introversion, latte artwork, lemon polenta cake, Mocha, Paloma Faith, Susan Cain

Chlamydia had settled herself into a surprisingly sunny corner of

Costamuchamoulah’s courtyard, to read her latest book choice:

Quiet: The Power of Introversion in a World that can’t stop Talking,

by Susan Cain.  She couldn’t help but apply its theories to her own

character and to those she observed in the cafe society all around

her.

She wondered if there would be a global personality-free zone

eventually, as she increasingly heard of silly pronouncements from

schools, such as children being deterred from having best friends

and being allowed weird privileges in examination conditions, such

as being permitted to go to a quiet room to recover if they found that

the colour of the walls in the room clashed with their designer tops.

Of course, they would receive extra time for their sartorial and

aesthetic trauma.

What was the world coming to?

Personally, she would put herself down as an extrovert: but was

that spelled with an a or an o?  Candia would know.  Whatever: she

derived her energy from interaction with others. That much she knew.

As she had walked up High Street, Suttonford, she had regaled and

hailed about ten people, whereas her husband Tristram tended to use

his perambulatory time to mull over ideas.  This had led several people to

think that they had been snubbed and that he was snooty.

She destroyed the chocolate powdered fern design on the Mocha by

stirring it with a spoon and took a sip.  So much for Hayley’s Global

Award-Winning Latte Artwork, 2013. She turned the book over.

S or N?  What was that then?  Ah..sensing, or intuitive?  Weren’t they the

same?

No.  Apparently, sensing meant collecting information through the senses.

She licked the knife blade with which she had cut her Lemon Polenta cake.

She collected some data through her taste buds, so she must be sensing.

T or F?  Surely both.  She was a thinker, but she could be governed by her

feelings.  She felt that she could eat another slice of Polenta cake, but she

governed her impulses by the thought of that little slip of a dress which she

had just purchased in A La Mode.

She had spontaneously bought it.  However, she had seen it as she had

driven past the shop vitrine and had clearly been perceiving it with a view to

its acquisition.  Had she been a good judge of her actions?  Again, Candia

would soon let her know by her facial expression when she wore it for the first

time.  Candia couldn’t hide her true feelings.

But all this polarisation was suspect, she believed.  It was like Nature/ Nurture;

Free Will and Determinism; Law/ Grace.

She read a little further.  It was admitted in a review that people could perform

differently on different days.

Clammie supposed that was why there were so many re-sits in the exam

system.

Also, you could be a combination of the categories.  An ENFJ would make a

good teacher: Extrovert, Intuitive, Feeling and a Judge.  Nothing like that Mr

Snodbury at St Birinus’ Middle then!  Or at least, not from what the twins,

Castor and Pollux said.

She wondered if they had identical personalities?

She was trying to think about this, but was interrupted by a disturbance, or

what could be termed  A Crying Baby Contest. She had read that it was a

well-known feature in Japan.  No doubt the trend was growing universally.

Candia came over.  Her expression certainly revealed her thoughts.

She glanced at the title on the book’s spine.  So, what am I then?  An

extrovert in a world that can’t stop screaming?  She laughed rather bitterly.

Clammie thought of a few pertinent adjectives, but she moderated them and

mentioned a few Candian characteristics, such as boredom with routine;

outspokenness, being critically aware; her ability to spot trends ahead of time

etc.

Actually, she would show her the dress and see what one of her best friends

thought about its acquisition.

It’s very now, said Candia, somewhat disapprovingly.  But will it be tomorrow,

tomorrow?  It would suit Paloma Faith if she was dressing down.  A little bit

clown-like, but as we saw in the local elections, clowns are having the last

laugh at the moment.

Clammie knew that she shouldn’t have asked her.  She would exchange it the

next day.  Clearly she and Candia reacted differently to dopamine.  She needed

more of its hit in the reward centre of her brain, whereas Candia derived a

similar level of pleasure from telling someone that their bum did look big in

their favourite outfit.  Maybe she should expand her bestest friend list?

Here! said Candia, sitting down beside her and moving the tome to one side.

I’ve bought you a slice of that Lemon Polenta cake that you like so much.

Kind, but critical.  Ah well, Clammie knew that she would never get into that

frock anyway.

Better to have a true BFF than yesterday’s fashion item.

 

Two Brains Are Better than One

Tags

amygdala, bliss point, blueberries, fight or flight, frontal cortex cells, frontal lobes, hippocampus, Jeremy Clarkson, Man Flu, Mocha, multi-task, showrooming, Stick Cricket, Superfood, tend and befriend, Tesco, walnut oil, Weetabix

Aaagh! sighed Carrie, dropping her shopping bag on the floor and settling

herself onto the awkward height of a Costamuchamoulah trendy bar stool.

What’s the matter? I asked.

Oh, they’ve just run out of blueberries in Tesco- again.

Not a major tragedy, I think.  This was unspoken.

Well, it’s all the mummies in Tiger-Lily’s class. They bulk buy just before

the exams, as blueberries are supposed to be super foods for the brain.

I know, sympathised Clammie.  Sherry wanted Weetabix and stocks are

running out because of the poor wheat harvest.  Brown cereals are so big

this year.

Quick! Look! nudged Brassie.

What?

It’s that woman whose daughter is in the accelerated set.  She’s

showrooming, breathed Carrie.

What’s that? we enquired, annoyed that we weren’t au fait with the latest

argot.

It means, explained Carrie, that she just zooms around Costamuchamoulah

and suchlike premises, noting what they stock and their prices.  She then

stores the information on her phone and orders, more cheaply, what she

fancies online.

How very enterprising! I ventured to remark.

No! I was contradicted.  How can shops and retail premises survive, if

customers don’t support them?  We like coming in here for over-priced

coffees, but management have to cover their council tax and cost of staff.

That’s why customer service and ambience is so important, reinforced

Brassie.

So where is that Mocha you ordered ages ago? I asked mischievously.

Apparently some stores are going to charge for entry, to combat such

behaviour from people who have no intention of purchasing, Clammie added.

Then, if you buy something, the entry fee would be deducted from the

purchase price.

Well, there she goes.  She’s just noted the price of that

virgin-pressed walnut oil.  What a brass neck!

complained Clammie, monitoring Mata Hari’s

modus operandi.

Some people are just wired differently from you and I,

soothed Carrie.

Yes, I agreed.  And most of them are men.

What do you mean, Candia? 

Oh, I was reading the BBC news online today, and there is research to show

just how differently the brain works in the two genders.

But are there only two genders? Brassie asked, provocatively.

I ignored her.

Oh yeah, interjected Carrie.  I read that a man’s amygdala

triggers a fight or flight response, like whenever I ask Gyles to

do something practical, such as taking out the bin.

Whereas, contributed Brassie, a woman’s response would be

to tend and befriend. That’s why we meet here, isn’t it? 

To support each other. I read the article too.

Yes, and all that talk about men not being able to multi-task is

apparently another male diversionary ploy, I confirmed.

Men multi-task 39 hours a week, but women have to do it for

48 hours per week. (Brassie substantiated my point, showing that

she had, indeed, studied the report in depth.)

That’s why guys have 9 hours more spare time than we do, so they can

play Stick Cricket online, or watch Jeremy Clarkson, I agreed, with

feeling.

Men are supposed to be decisive, owing to their strong frontal lobes,

added Clammie, but I seem to make all the important decisions in our

house.

In the report, I continued, it said that in evolutionary times, women

had to be alert at all times, as they had responsibility for looking

after the children.

So, we are not living in evolutionary times now? queried Brassie.

Well, nothing has significantly moved on, pointed out Clammie.

Oh, come on, girls: men do cook sometimes. Carrie defended her

spouse.

Yes, but do they ever clear up properly? I retorted.

Women can remember things better than men, observed Brassie.

That’s true, we all agreed.

It’s something to do with the hippocampus, she elucidated.

Well, you seem to have forgotten that you ordered a Mocha

some time ago, and so has the waitress, so where does that

leave our theory? I joked.  Everyone ignored me.

Gyles is always amazed that I remember everyone’s phone number and

I send out all the birthday cards- even to members of his family that I

have never met, Carrie elaborated.

Such as? I pressed.

Oh, I forget- his aunt so-and-so and uncle Thingy.

Brassie changed tack: And men always claim to feel pain more

intensely.

Man Flu!  We all laughed.

They’re really just little boys, Brassie pronounced.

Yes, that’s why they bite people on the football pitch when they

get over-excited, stated Carrie.

Yes, agreed Clammie.  But women have been shown to have superior

planning skills and with more frontal cortex cells they govern their

impulses better.

Oooh, look! They’ve got blueberry slices! Carrie couldn’t contain

herself. The waitress had just placed a plateful beside the till.

A Dutch study has shown that women need to eat more to achieve a

feeling of fullness, or satiety.  We crave sugar more than males and store

fat to support babies through gestation, I informed everyone.

I’ll have one now that my Mocha has arrived! enthused Brassie.

What? A baby? I teased.  She ignored me.

See! I told you the waitress hadn’t forgotten. And she selected one of

the biggest cakes on offer.

But, remind me- you are not pregnant, I cautioned.

No, but I recognise my bliss point, she tried to say, while stuffing the goo

down her throat.

Which is? asked Carrie.

Oh, I forget!  Something to do with the balance between food and joy..;

the precise level of sweetness that makes consumption enjoyable.

You mean when you transgress that feeling of guilt? I suggested.

Absolutely, she laughed.

Let’s all have one and another round of coffees, Carrie tempted us.

Sugar lights up the brain, so let’s fuel our grey matter and keep ahead

of our families, Clammie encouraged us.

There’s no harm in that, agreed Carrie.  And, let’s face it: we are only sinking

our teeth into a fruit slice; not into our fellow man.

Mmmm! Certainly more palatable, I agreed, forgetting the calories.

Must check these out online.  They must be cheaper elsewhere.

Palm Sunday in Salisbury

Tags

Arundells, Bruckner, Chapter House, Constable, Creme egg, Dom Perignon, Holy week, Julian of Norwich, Mocha, Old Sarum, Palm Sunday, Pontius Pilate, Salisbury, Simnel cake, Ted Heath, Tower of Babel, University Challenge

I can’t believe that it’s nearly Easter, shivered Carrie.

Quick! let’s go in and bag a table, I said.

Costamuchamoulah cafe was still doing a brisk trade, even on this

grey day.  Amazingly, the smokers were still prepared to sit outside.

We have the routine down to a fine art now: one gets into the queue while

the other nabs a table, much as the disciples snatched a colt.

Yes, Easter’s early this year, I commented, watching a child stuff its face with

a Creme Egg in advance of the Christian calendar.  It’s amazing how such

diminutive creatures can incorporate a whole orb of sickly chocolate fondant

into such a tiny aperture.

I bet they don’t know what Simnel cakes represent, I mused aloud.

What do they stand for? queried Carrie.  Then, seeing my expression, she

added, I’m sure I once knew.

That’s what I say during University Challenge, I replied.

Then I sipped my Mocha, getting a chocolate powder moustache.  You know,

it’s Palm Sunday tomorrow.  Are you going to go to a service? 

Try persuading that lot to get out of bed, she sighed. They used to like to see

the donkey coming into the church, though.  Sometimes they were convinced

that The Dean, giving his dramatised reading, was Pontius Pilate and it scared

them.

Yes, we used to go to Salisbury for the service.  That was when Ted Heath

lived in The Close. In fact..

..you have a poem about it, she smiled.

How did you know?

PALM SUNDAY IN SALISBURY

Polythene wraps New Sarum like an egg.

The sky above The Close is Constable’s.

Cream-robed clergy congregate in cloisters,

bespectacled, brandishing dried gray palms,

under a spire as tall as Babel’s own,

while new choristers mouth All glory, laud

and honour.. without comprehending laud.

The tallest lad hopes that his voice won’t crack.

Girl choristers have not been asked to sing today.

Some miniature Yasser Arafats

in tea-towels and trainers coax an ass

from a spreading cedar into the nave,

where all present pray for its continence.

True blue glass provides a continuo.

Ted Heath’s Jaguar, also blue, is parked

on a reserved space outside Arundells.

What if one should loose its handbrake

and say, The Lord has need of thee this day?

Meanwhile we make intercession for all

unemployed, under and over-employed,

while carefully noting the advertised

champagne breakfast on our service schedule.

Dom Perignon: a foretaste of glory.

The Jobseekers can sip Living Water.

Coffee will be served in the Chapter House

among the exhumed coffin chalices,

patens. The bookshop is doing business

in postcards of Julian of Norwich:

All manner of thing shall be well. Mammon

hasn’t felt stings from His whip of cords-yet.

The head which indicates the Bishop’s stall

has a triple face of circumspection.

The Dean and his ordained wife wear the same

as they stand on repro medieval tiles,

trying not to worry about their lunch.

In the cloisters a chill wind chafes faces.

A chair is overturned, but no tables.

Although we have received the sign of peace,

our palm crosses seem ineffectual.

We stick one on Ted’s windscreen, just in case

his residential permit cuts no ice

with the flaming Being at the Close gate,

who curiously doesn’t wear a badge,

but bears authority from Old Sarum.

He tends to let the backpackers pass through,

like Christians, still bearing their large burdens,

or as camels accessing a needle.

But Tory Faithful have to wait in queues,

backs turned to the Celestial City,

while Peter checks their National Trust cards

and the very stones cry, Glory! Glory!

Citric Acid

Tags

Agrumes, Americano, Arborio, cashed up bogans, chamois, Citric acid, Dorothy Wordsworth, George Formby, Jane Austen, Kirstie Allsopp, Madeleine Morris, Mocha, quantitative easing, scurvy, Tesco Express, urban rednecks, Vitamin C

What on earth will I cook tonight? I thought, rushing up the road to

Tesco Express.  Let’s see, we have had lamb, pork, fish, beef.. Oh, I

know: prawns! A nice risotto with Arborio rice. What ingredients do I

need to buy?  Ah, a lime.  What! Thirty five pence for that tiny green

agrume!

Well, I am not the only one to moan about the price of citrus.

Madeleine Morris, the BBC’s Australia correspondent was griping

that a lime in the Antipodes will set you back the equivalent of £1.50.

No doubt, on paying for it, you would have a face that would look

as if you had sucked its larger yellow relation.

Morris said that Australians didn’t know that they had it so good, as

there has been no recession Down Under and the drives of urban

rednecks, or cashed up bogans are often full of boys’ toys which

demonstrate this particular species’ spending power.

Unfortunately she felt that being able to afford garnishes for their gin

and tonics and Margaritas did not always go hand in hand with a

display of common sense. She considered that the moneyed do not

always have a wealth of education to match.

Note that she said that, not me!

Anyway, with no sunshine here, I have got to stump up, or I will

probably succumb to some kind of deficiency.  However, I once read

that a lemon has about 75% more Vitamin C than a lime, so maybe I

should just buy an unripe lemon, or a plastic one and squirt the liquid

into the risotto when no one is looking.

I was recounting my experience of rising prices with Carrie in

Costamuchamoulah café. We are not cutting back on caffeine yet.

She was moaning about the price of having her windows cleaned.

You could just clean them yourself with newspaper and vinegar, I

suggested.

She looked at me as if I was mad.  Vinegar smells, she said.

Well, use lemon, but don’t clean them in sunlight.

You’ve just told me the price of citrus, so how many would I need?

she asked.

Okay, I see your point. My chap has put up his prices too and when he

said that he couldn’t clean some of the panes at the rear of the

house as it was too slippery to put up the ladder, I deducted a

percentage of the cost.

That was bold of you, she remarked, but what did he say?

He said he wanted a cup of coffee then, with four sugars.

Scurvy knave!

They all are, I agreed. Different if you offer. Then I thought that as

coffee is expensive, I’d charge him £2.50 for every cup that he

wheedles out of me.

Good idea, she said.  That’s quite cheap compared to here.  You could

sprinkle some cocoa powder over it and call it a Mocha and charge

him one pound more. Or, –now she was becoming excited-you could

put a few mini-marshmallows on top and have your windows done

for free.  Unless we have more quantitative easing, we will all be

going back to barter.  Imagine Kirstie Allsopp’s next programme. She

is capable of showcasing herself as a kind of expert on haggling. If I

give you a crotcheted egg warmer, will you replace the tile on my

roof?

There have already been quite a few programmes where so-called

celebrities try to hassle people to give away their goods for next to

nothing, I observed.

Yes, and apparently, when the shop owners and dealers see the

television cameras coming now, they lock their premises, or flee.

Hmm..I replied. I don’t think barter would work somehow. Even

for Kirstie. I think it would alienate my window cleaner.  He told me

he could get £40 per hour elsewhere if I didn’t want him to come any

more. I replied that qualified and experienced invigilators of public

exams with multiple degrees and years of teaching experience earn

less per hour than a Suttonford dog walker. I was trying to get him to

be reasonable.

So did it have an impact?

I don’t know, but I felt better when I only put three spoonfuls of the

old Demerara into his mug.

Do you think that you are becoming bitter? she asked, sipping at her

Americano.

No, I have just reached the age when I could teach my grandmother

to suck eggs and, if I look as if I have sucked a lime, well, it may be

the last opportunity I have had before I eschew the little blighters for

ever!

Well, be careful, Carrie advised.  Remember George Formby.  In his

song he made the point that window cleaners get to see a lot.  They

could blackmail people.  Here, for instance, neighbours would

love to know if you hadn’t made the beds by ten o’clock.

Do you make yours by then? I asked.

Don’t be silly, she said.  My cleaner makes ours.

Don’t you worry that she will gossip about all your business?

Of course not.  We pay her protection money.

So, maybe my coffee bribe is a good idea?

I’d say so.  And, if you want to be kept out of the town limelight, a

Christmas bonus would be a good idea too. Make a tangible

commemoration of the anniversary of his first visit and offer to

carry his buckets and chamois to the van.

Maybe I will just do them myself from now on.  Then I can afford the

odd spurt of acidic.  In fact, I feel a large G and T coming on at the

very thought.

Anyway, if you think about it, it rains so much nowadays, that there’s

little point in doing them at all, mused Carrie.

I’ll drink to that! I said.  After all, Jane Austen and Dorothy

Wordsworth weren’t known for their sparkling windows.

They weren’t known for wasting their time, writing silly blogs either.

Touche.  Sourpuss!