Day 536: I Am Losing Readers!!!

I do not think it is a 'seasonal lull'. That alone cannot account for a near 50% drop in readership in the last three weeks or (to illustrate it in equally tragic, if not numerically different) terms, a 63% drop year-on-year.

I had better write more 'posts', and this time they had better be interesting. I think this is the 'root of the problem', or the 'genesis of the issue'. (I cannot believe that many people have died in the intemperate British winter.)

But I have nothing to write about! I have not had to cut the chewinggum from my ladygarden in recent months; nor have I seen any giant classical cocks. The squirrels are quiet and I have no neighbours to hate, as the nearest one is fifteen miles away.

However, a number of 'topics' spring to mind. Here they are. You can choose which one you would like the most, and then I will write it with my tiny little monkey paws.

1. Who would win in a fight: England or Canada?

2. What I Miss About England

3. What England Seems Like When You Do Not Live There Any More

4. My Favourite Biscuit (and why)

5. What Would I Rather Do: Never Poo Again, Or Never Eat Toast?

I can do all of them if you like, spread out over some time, e.g. up to and including one month. That should do it.

In anticipation of your early reply,

NWM

Day 529: I Review An Old Email

I am in London until tomorrow morning at 9.45am, whereupon I mount an Air Transat aeroplane and return to Montreal, where I now live in conjugal confusion with a French Canadian veterinary research pathologist*.

In England, the people walk the streets gasping about the cold, but in London it is only -1, and in Montreal it is -17. This means English people are wetsies and Canadians are hard and would probably win in a fight (if they could be bothered).

And in London, the clearing out of my plush one-bedroom Brixton penthouse swankpad continues. In the bottom of a previously-stuck drawer, I find an email dated 3rd June 2003, written ten months before I took a very fucking long sabbatical.


From: NWM

To: Random list of ex-colleagues

Date: 3/6/02 7.48pm

Subject: WELCOME TO NISSAN
______________________________________________

So, we're sitting on the train to Rickmansworth on our way to a Nissan meeting, and Roz suddenly says, "Bloody hell, I heard this story at the weekend, you're not going to believe it". Steve and I look at her and say, "What?". She says, "Well, my mate knows this girl who's got these tiny monkeys, the size of a hamster apparently, and she keeps them in a hamster cage."

"Do they eat tiny bananas?", I say, "like the ones you get from Woolies, you know, made of foam?". Then Steve says, "How do you know they weren't hamsters dressed up in tiny little monkey suits?". Roz says, "Well they weren't, there really ARE tiny monkeys in the world, the size of hamsters."

We think about this for a bit then Steve says, "What about hamsters the size of monkeys?". Then Roz says, "What, eating enormous sunflower seeds?".

Good God.



Happy New Year, one and all!



* Recent events involving a hairdresser-cum-standup comedian with a philosophy degree mean he can no longer be accurately described as 'self haircutting', at least until the fin grows out.

Day 525: I Offer My Readers A Seasonal Warning

Yes my friends. It is the season of licking out the inside of a family size tin of Quality Street with your rasping tongue, of being caught gnawing on a joint of ham in the light of a inquisitive torch as you feast in the clammy larder of your incontinent grandmother, and of sucking Bailey's straight from the bottle with a curly straw.

But beware. If you do not stop soon, the same fate could befall you as befell the porky squirrel discussed in this online article, forwarded to me by MonkeyMother under the heading "URGENT - TRAPPED SQUIRRELY".

In other news, what the cock are these beavers doing in this eighteenth century German print? If this is what they thought North America was like, I wonder there were any German immigrants to North America at all!

Day 523: I Use Up The Leftover Turkey And Ham

(NB: this is an actual real pie that we ate with our mouths last night. I photographed it before 'going at it' with a David Mellor cake slice.)

Day 520: I Wish You A Merry Christmas

I am in France! It is like French-Canada (where I live), except full of old stuff. Other differences are that they speak a French that I understand and do not have snow on everything like they do in French Canada. It is also only 0 degrees, not minus 22.

In celebration of this multi-Frenchness, I offer you a charming video of Celine Dion (the Princess Diana of Quebec, except not dead), singing The Christmas Song.

This is to help you regurgitate (in the alleged manner of the ancient Romans) if you eat too much over the 'festive season'. I find two minutes of Celine will usually enable the efficient 'voiding' of up to and including twelve mince pies and/or an entire pyramid of Ferrero Rocher; thirty seconds is sufficient for a plate of turkey and all the 'trimmings'*.



Don't say I never give you anything.

Happy Christmas one and all!!!

NWM

* This expression alone allows me to keep my weight down over the holiday season.