Two?
Nothing wrong with two. As an amount, it is often perfectly adequate. Two scoops of ice cream, great. Two athletic lingerie models in bed, no argument from me there. As a euphemism, a number two is very hand for talking to old people about bowel movements. As a number, it's quite useful as a segregation between one and three, who have to be kept separate as they are a bit odd.
As a quantity of blog posts over a month though - unacceptable. Before the Department of Blogging demands I commit seppuku, I really should get another one in.
So, what else have I been doing to make bloggaging such a rare event? Something exciting, and awesome, maybe involving ninjas and pirates and bears and T. rexes with laser beams coming out of their freaking eyes, possibly?
Well, there's . . . er . . . work, obviously, and overtime, which is also work, and there's chores, and parenting duties such as playschool and swimming for my son, and letting the baby Bonobo gnaw on my finger with her gums, whilst she presumably tries to cover her entire body in some sort of spit cocoon to protect herself against predators and I wonder if my finger will ever revert back to an unwrinkled state.
Other than that . . ?
Well, that appears to be everything.
Looks like I can safely hang up my Cloak of Fun and the Spangly Top Hat of Adult Orientated Entertainment, because I'm now sporting the Beige Slacks of Parental Encumbrance and the Sensible Cardigan of Steadfast Culpability.
I expect one day, when I've done my ninth Sudoku in a row and am just about to spend some hours deciding whether to have semolina or rice pudding for dessert before Nurse notices I'm out of bed again, I'll look back on this hectic period as the halcyon days, as my prime, maybe as some of the happiest times of my life.
At the moment though, I just feel knackered.
Still, famous for my rock-like stoicism, I understand that harping on about not having enough hours in the day is ungrateful, so I will never mention it or complain about it, and I definitely won't do something as needy and self-serving as moan about it in a blog or something.
But that's only because I don't have time to write the damn thing.
Moving on.
I walked into town a few days ago to visit the supermarket (yawn), the post office (double yawn) and the bank (gaping, Herculean yawn seen just prior to descent into vegetative state from sheer lack of interest in the subject at hand), and remembered that, once, I took pleasure from taking random photos in order to post them on The Gravel Farm.
It occurred to me that I hadn't done that for a while, and now I am more likely to simply power walk my way to a destination, head down to avoid distraction so I can calculate the most efficient route from start to finish that will enable me to complete the journey ahead as effectively as possible, much like a German tourist in a particularly beautiful location.
Well, not today, I thought, rebelling. Just like when I was a teenager and rebelled against my strict hierarchical upbringing by trying a lager rather than a bitter, and not caring if my Dad found out and threatened to disown me.
Turns out he's tried lager too, although it was when he was young and impressionable.
On this walk, I would revert to earlier days, when I was blogging more frequently and could go out with the sole purpose of looking around for pictographic opportunities.
So, head up, phone out, camera on!
Ooh, a kitty!
Cats are usually good for a laugh, gambolling playfully on the pavement and often rolling over to show you their fluffy tummies, ready for some hard core petting action. What with the popularity of lolcats and their ilk, a cute pussy pic would be just the tonic for this blog.
I drew closer, and photographed my very own lolcat:
Ew . . .Trust me to find possibly the most depressed looking feline this side of Korea.
It blinked at me, first the left eye then, a couple of seconds later, the right eye, and through pitiful cat tears it tried bravely to meow, but all that came out was "heehurgh." Like a tiny, overworked donkey.
Not wanting to lower my mood, I hastily left Waitingtodiecat on it's driveway, dreaming of past glories and a healthy if long gone youth, back in the day before it began to look like one of it's own fur balls, and I made my way to town with a forced cheery grin.
My town (which is essentially a large village) is famous round these parts for having a sizable population of people whose primary choice of locomotion is the mobility scooter. There is even a mobility scooter parade at christmas.
Seriously.
Scooters get dressed up in tinsel and reindeer antlers and are allowed to weave their unsteady way up the high street, occasionally having to be unstuck from drain covers by bemused onlookers, the usual questionable quality of driving being exacerbated by seasonal advocaat and sherry consumption.
Anyway, today, it was sunny and, parade or not, there were still a lot of them about. Usually piloted by elderly folk enjoying the sunshine by wearing their flimsiest raincoats and least padded woolly hats, their only concession to the heat of June being gigantic plastic sunglasses that are designed to go over their usual spectacles and hinder their view even further as they trace a sinuous track on road and path.
You take your life in your hands wandering along the High Street when such scooter gangs are on the prowl.
Like Hell's Angels, they also individualise their mounts. A sticker here, a novelty toy there, maybe a silver skull with red LEDs in the eye sockets, that sort of thing.
One in particular caught my eye, as it denoted not only a modification that made it instantly recognisable to its owner, but it was a cheap, practical application as well:
That, friends, is a wooden bread bin nailed on the front.I have to tell you that it took all of my resolve not to open it and see what he kept in there. I was presuming bread, for duck-feeding purposes, but I wouldn't have been as surprised as perhaps I should have been had it contained a human head. I resisted, on grounds of not wanting to be seen by one of the owner's homies and made a target for scooter revenge. A man can die from repeated shin-knocks you know. My Nan told me.
Ancient cats and mobility scooters brought the ephemerality of life starkly into focus, and I mused on the fact that, that if we're very lucky, we have a few years of vigour and youth, before all too soon the ravages of time take away everything that is good and everything that is bad.
*Heavy sigh*
Still, not to worry. As the old and undoubtedly wise proverb goes, this too shall pass.
Useful for helping one keep perspective is that. Suffering mightily? It'll pass. Overly elated? This too shall pass.
From such, one can draw the deepest, most philosophical and meaningful of conclusions about existence, and life in general.
"This too shall pass."
Life is like . . . a colon?
That'll do.
