Day 99: I Decide To Make History

I was lying in bed this morning thinking, ooh me knee, ooh me ankle*, and generally thinking about random unassociated things including what kind of hats people wear in Canada in December, how to market internet dating sites, Catherine's mother doing a cat-splat into her French French windows, whether my rather beautiful 50s swing coat with dead fox round the neck has been destroyed by the Moth and what to have for breakfast, when something Sensational came on the Radio 4. (It was on at 8.20am. You'll have to scroll down the page a bit.)

Suddenly, I have a purpose. For History Matters want everyone to write a blog about what they did today, then the British Library will ARCHIVE IT FOR POSTERITY. That Sebastian Faulks was on talking about it, and giving it: yeah, like, the more rubbish the better, you know, like, maybe something INTERESTING will happen to you (no such luck, I thought), but what is Important about this is the minutiae: how you got to work, what you ate for breakfast, that sort of thing, for at some point in the distant future the idea of buying a flight on the line may be Insane as our air travel miles will be so regulated. And because People in the Future will have nothing to eat but cakes made of soya beans and blueberries, they will want to know about the Scrambled Eggs people ate for breakfast in the Olden Days. (I made that bit up but it's probably true.)

Then the other bloke said, Social History is History with the politics taken out, which I thought was good and quite funny. (Then I stopped listening for a bit and thought about doing a history MA because really it was always social history I liked the best: wars and that not that interesting; what kind of pants people wore: interesting).

Then I listened properly again and they were all being very funny, and I thought right then, I'll do that. Maybe you should too. Dunno, up to you really, but I thought I'd tell you about it in case you fancied it. And anyway, I know for a FACT that my descendants will want to know what kind of pants you wear.



* My left knee sometimes feels like it dislocates and I have to flick my leg until it pops. Yuk. My right ankle I fucked up jumping off a 15 foot wall in Bayswater in 1987; the left one I fucked up falling off an espadrille in France a few months ago. It is the left one I keep twisting again, and every time I twist it again I am reminded of someone I fell out with unexpectedly fairly recently, which makes me doubly cross and a bit sad.

SPLENDID GUEST POST: My Mother Tells Stories Of The Naked Grocer

Monkeymother writes with Astonishing Stories about a exhibitionist grocer, heard over a 15-course dinner the other night. With her kind permission, I reproduce them now for your delight.

(The only background you need to know is that they live most of the time in a very small village in very rural France, where they have been for nearly 20 years. They mainly hang out with the Frenchies, smoke Gauloises and get through approx. 1 bottle of Absinthe every three days.)

STORY ONE:

"The scene: 8.30-ish one morning in the epicerie in Louzignac. Jean-Luc's grandmother turns up to buy a packet of butter. Grocer behind counter wearing his apron, as usual. Turns round to get something from shelf behind. Mamie sees he is wearing nothing under his apron, drops her pack of butter on the floor and legs it."

STORY TWO:

"Lucette (Jean-Luc's mother) used to get mussels for the grocer every week. Four weeks running, she delivered them to his door, only to be greeted by him standing there totally nude, so she dumped the mussels on the doorstep and ran. As she hadn't stopped long enough to see where he kept his loose change, he hadn't paid her for them for four weeks so, in the end, Pierrot (J-L's father) made delivery no.5, made no reference at all to the nudity, behaving as if all was normal, and reminded him that he owed for five weeks in total, with no mention of why.

By this stage, we were weeping into our napkins."

STORY THREE:

"Missed the beginning of this one but, essentially, teen-aged Catherine (Jean-Luc's sister, MM?), had gone to grocer's house for some reason, finding him there totally nude. Lucette had seen this through the window of his verandah thing and rushed up the path to rescue her child, not realising the glass door was shut. She hurled herself against it and, apparently, did a comedy, cartoon-like, cat-splat against the glass, slowly collapsing in a heap. When someone asked Catherine how she felt about all this, she told us that she wasn't complaining - then or now - about any of it.

I suspect you had to be there, but we were all on the floor by this stage."

MM ignores my repeated requests that she Starts A Blog of her own. More amusing things happen to her (particularly as she lives with my father), than they do to me and I rather think it would be for the best.

Day 98: I Get A Cake In The Post

I returned to the Scene of Conflict (i.e., my flat) some forty minutes ago to find a package resting on my front doorstep. "What is this?", I asked myself. Only this morning I had taken delivery of a bottle of Single Malt, with a personalised label, sent all the way from the Scotland. On Saturday, I was given Gifts of such extraordinary kindness and imagination it fair took my breath away. Mr Dave Shelton, who took the likeness of me you see above, sent me a representation of myself in a raccoon hat on Saturday, accompanied by a bi-polar Polar Bear and a penguin on a motorcyle. Life couldn't possibly get any better, I thought to myself.

But no. For inside the package, all the way from Manchester, came a birthday cake created by the truly astonishing Clare. ("S" is a private name she likes to call me by. I think it's probably 'Squirrel'; I will therefore have to have Words with her at some point.) Look at it! It came with candles and napkins (she assumes I think I will be sharing it with others, which I will Not, for it is too delicious to share), wrapped in brown paper, then wrapping paper, then cellophane, and a box of Real Silver, and tissue paper, and two foil pie tins, and more foil, and other layers of Magic Protective Stuff.

Thank you, dear Clare. Your cake is delicious, and you are very kind. This blogging lark is demonstrating the Truly Astonishing Kindness of Relative Strangers, and leading to all kinds of other extraordinary adventures. All of this leads me to believe that I must stay non-working for as long as possible, breathlessly awaiting the next blog-related Magic.

(No, but really. A cake. How nice is that.)

Day 97: I Lose My Temper

I don't often lose my temper. I can't be bothered. Usually I just wander off. If I do, I am usually icy and sarcastic. It isn't very nice. And I always apologise afterwards, even if I was Sorely Tested.

But TwatBoy has pushed me to the limits of reason. A Dear Friend and I were eating grilled chicken and roast carrots and salad and drinking wine. Then we were eating oatcakes and pears on the sofa (I am obsessed with food today), watching Jane Eyre. Dear Friend kept asking questions ("Why is he blind?" "Where is she?" "What are they doing?"), not because he is Senile, for he is not yet that old, but because of the CRASHING and BANGING and SCRAPING. ("My God, is that your neighbour?")

And then the Final Straw: Jane is being 'fondled' in a way I do not remember from the Original, and Mr Rochester is whispering into her mouth and she is whispering back, but we cannot hear. ("What are they saying?" "What? What did you say?") A sudden pounding and a slam and I LEAP to my feat, and throw open my front door. There he is, grinning like a loon. There is a Pizza Boy.

"I am taking delivery of a cheeky pizza."

"The banging. It has to stop."

"Are you joking?"

"No, I am not. It has been going on all day. Crashing and banging and loud music. And it has been going on since 8 o'clock this morning. I am very, very tired, and I am very, very fucked off, and I have had ENOUGH."

With which I slam the door loudly, and immediately start feeling guilty.

Still, it is very quiet tonight. I hope he isn't crying. I shall write a Note apologising for shouting, but making the point, yet again, that his floorboards are Technically Illegal, and that anything that happens by the front door may as well be happening in my flat, right next to my head. Then, and only then, will I kill him.

Day 97: I Eat Peas

I have just eaten half a pound of peas. I'm not sure why. I just felt like it. Peas were what I wanted, so ate them.

Otherwise today I have eaten some toast and Marmite, and half a fairy cake that someone made me spit out. (No-one likes fairy cakes, including me, but they looked nice.)

Other foodstuffs I have Almost Uncontrollable Urges For Sometimes include:

1. Penne with anchovies, garlic, chili and broccoli
2. Roast chicken
3. Green beans with garlic
4. Roast salmon
5. Cadbury's Buttons
7. Cold hotel toast (despite being thwarted at every turn, I SHALL eat it again)
8. Hula-Hoops (plain)
9. Miracle Pudding (only my mother has enough Power in her hands to make the Miracle Happen)
10. My friend Anna's mother's salad dressing (untasted since c. 1987)
11. French bread in France with French butter with big salty crystals in and Marmite, just to add to the saltiness.

Come to think of it, I think I may buy a Salt Block and lick it all day like an aged horse in a field. I'd be happy with that, I reckon.

And now I shall kick up my heels, toss my mane, and go and roast some carrots.