THE dog in the neighbour's garden is wearing socks not sports socks, but thick woollen ones. Apparently, this is a measure to prevent him from scratching his ears off.
You can probably tell already that I don't have a clue what to write about this week. That's because there's nothing happening and I'm not going to bore you with mundanities. I promised myself many years ago, in the event of ever having the opportunity to write a regular column, that I would never dwell on the petty middle class concerns that are such a feature of this medium tradesmen declining standards in the usage of the English language carpool.
"The damn washing machine broke again this morning. I wouldn't mind so much only I had a huge dinner party last night and the place is a mess. During the party one of the guests suddenly announced that she was downsizing her car and wouldn't be able to bring my kids to school. Some friend, huh?" That's the type of thing I was trying to avoid.
I suppose at some point every columnist writes the sort of piece in which they agonise publicly about the nature of writing and the blank page, in what they assume is a clever, ironic post modern sort of way. And once that's out of the system, they continue to muse about the banal trivia they call life. That's another approach I've vowed to avoid.
And I've obviously failed. Instead of going out and doing stuff I could then reflect upon, I'm sitting here looking out the window at a flea bitten dog, trying desperately to think of things I could he doing.
By the way, the dog now has a ridiculous funnel shaped object made out of plastic around his head. He looks like a big hairy trumpet. And he is distressed. Apparently this embarrassing contraption is designed to protect his ears too.
I had a gig last night at a summer festival in Hereford, one of those quaint, medieval towns whose narrow streets are lined by well preserved Tudor buildings. I'm always careful in places like this to walk in the middle of the street in case somebody throws a bucket of shit down on top of me. They usually do.
Somehow I misjudged the distance and arrived early. To kill time I visited the main tourist attraction in the town, a cathedral which as usual was just a glorified war memorial. It did contain a thing of note called the "mappa mundi," a 12th century map of the world one of the oldest maps in the world. People around here still use it for navigation.
Earlier in the week, I had a similar assignment in Stockton in the north of England.
The gig was in a circus tent. While was doing a soundchcck, a fierce hairy man with a straw through his nose was painting a pentangle on the floor. It looked like I might be in for another brush with the forces of dark magic in rural England.
I can't say I'm a fan of the modern circus. It's true they no longer abuse animals, but they are guilty of extreme cruelty towards motorbikes. And that man with the straw in his nose didn't shock or impress me. Now if he washed himself, that would be an extraordinary fact.
During the show, I began to panic as members of the audience came and went at wilt. I was convinced they were building a huge pyre in relays on which to sacrifice me after the show. They don't like laughing around here. It's heresy.
Stockton is like any other northern town at the weekend. Teenage girls wear almost nothing, summer or winter. Most people wear more in the bath. It's so unfair. When I was going to discos, girls wore jumpers and raincoats and reinforced jeans. The men were equally hardy, dressed only in tattoos and knotted veins.
The best thing about being away for a few days is coming home again. I can hardly get the key in the door with the excitement of my return. Will there be any letters, any messages on the answering machine, any squatters in the living room (it is London, after all)?
There ar«MDBO»e«MDNM» no letters for me this time. It must be the postal strike. Or thieves. Lonely thieves steal letters. They have no friends of their own, on account of their anti social occupation. There are, however thousands of leaflets advertising various pizza restaurants in the area. Unlike most people, I don't throw these out. On the contrary, I collect them until I have about a ton of them then I bundle them all up and sell them to a recycling plant for a tenner. And then I go out and buy a pizza.
The only message on the answering machine is the one I left a few days ago saying. "Hello, I'll be home in a few days". But hey, that doesn't matter. The lack of stuff to deal with allows me a clear run at writing this.
A friend rings and suggests a game of pitch and putt. It sounds like a good idea. He is an excomic. (He's still funny but just doesn't want the public to know.) It turns out to be one of the worst pitch and putt courses of all time. I've only been on two but there is a sign on the gate that verifies this. "Don't come in here, this is the worst course in the world~!" It's built on the side of a hill and each hole is a par 20. There was no point wearing golf shoes. You needed a pair of skis. It was more like crazy golf.
That night, I was invited to a barbecue. I deliberately moved into a flat that doesn't have a garden so I'd never be tempted to have a barbecue myself. I hate barbecues almost as much as I hate picnics. One of the few benefits of civilisation was moving the animals outside so as we could eat inside.
Eating out of doors is stupid. If I wanted flies in my food, I'd pickle them and put them in ajar. People in this part of the world simply don't have the right equipment, the right weather or the right personalities for barbecues. Waiting four hours in the rain for a piece of burnt chicken isn't fun. The sooner people realise that, the better. Give me the microwave any day.
And fresh air my arse I can hardly breathe with the smoke from the grill and from the 40 other barbecues going on in the neighbourhood at the same time. I'd be as well off staying at home staring out the window.
(The dog is now in one of those sterile bubbles. His cars have been removed and sent to a special dog clinic in Germany.)
