Dogs days with Sir Sean Connery (Rousse)

Posted on February 10, 2019 by Dreamaticus

Mine was one of the first families drafted to perform anti-terrorist service. We lined up inside a long plastic tent at the junction of Queen Street and North St David Street in Edinburgh, following the instructions of the police to bunch up together as closely as possible with all the other ‘volunteers’.

I soon started to feel claustrophobic and hot. I found a small hole in the clear plastic sheeting and pulled it apart to let myself out.

My punishment was instant. First I was transformed into a small dog. Then I was sent to live out the last of my days in a remote wood cabin with Sir Sean Connery as my only company.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A hospital romance (Rousse)

Posted on February 9, 2019 by Dreamaticus

The cancer ward proved a fertile hunting ground for a new husband. There I was courted by a tall dark French man. Meanwhile my mother patiently waited for me in the café.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

The British Library and Boris (Rousse)

Posted on February 8, 2019 by Dreamaticus

I unexpectedly bumped into VAE in the vaults of the British Library. She was on sick leave in the UK, having suffered illness since her move to Singapore several months earlier. VAE’s current destination was one of the rare books storage areas. She invited me to join her.

A librarian locked us in a room the size of a small bathroom. Rather than sitting on shelves, the books were glued to the midnight blue walls. All were modern, and – at first glance at least – none looked particularly valuable. Amongst them were tiny first editions of the Harry Potter series. A laser swept the tiny space to deter us from touching the covers.

Afterwards we caught the tube back into London. We accidentally alighted at an unfamiliar stop named Boris.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Escaped astronauts (Rousse)

Posted on February 8, 2019 by Dreamaticus

I asked the students to dress up for the tutorial according to the theme of ‘outer space’, so was delighted when the six of them turned up as astronauts in bulky all-in-one ski suits.

Forty-five minutes into our discussion AA walked into the room to enquire about a non-existent meeting with a PhD student. The three youngest students (all male) took advantage of this interruption to leave the class early.

I was shocked at their rude departure, and disappointed that I would not be able to take a photograph of my personal cohort of space travellers.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

A bit of give and take in the kitchen (Rousse)

Posted on February 4, 2019 by Dreamaticus

As one friend added to our kitchen, another took away.

DM gave us a set of pale blue ramekin dishes (though not Le Creuset). Meanwhile RK accidentally pulled some of the facing off the crockery cupboard.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Missing the ‘mont’ in Montreal (Rousse)

Posted on February 4, 2019 by Dreamaticus

The plane overheard sounded like it was in trouble. It was flying so low that we could all see that it was a transatlantic EasyJet service coming into the city.

We predicted correctly that it would smash into the mountain.

Why this should be the fate of so many incoming flights was always a puzzle to me. The big hilly clue was so obvious in the name of the flight destination: ‘Montreal’.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Sticking up for a dear friend (Rousse)

Posted on February 4, 2019 by Dreamaticus

I stuck up for WB in anticipation of criticisms about to be uttered by a severe-looking woman.

‘WB is extremely beautiful, and very, very clever’, I declared.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Ashes in the cupboard (Rousse)

Posted on February 3, 2019 by Dreamaticus

QL died with no next of kin. It was for this reason that his ashes ended up in my cupboard.

It was always a shocking reminder to see the green box whenever I opened the cupboard door.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Turkish Eurovision win fails to impress (Rousse)

Posted on February 1, 2019 by Dreamaticus

The school office staff did not appreciate my CD of the solo Turkish artiste – even though she won the Eurovision Song Contest just a couple of years earlier.

‘I suppose I’ll just have to listen to it through my headphones’ I muttered sulkily, regretting the day that I agreed to move my desk into the huge shared office.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

An heiress makes plans (Rousse)

Posted on January 31, 2019 by Dreamaticus

I was trapped inside the house that I had inherited from my maternal grandmother. I could happily entertain myself by revisiting all the rooms that I remembered from my childhood, and perusing the contents of the cupboards. All the crystal riding trophies in a glass cabinet – presumably the winnings of my long-dead aunt – caught my eye. However, I really wanted to wander out into the front garden and photograph some of the unusual flowers that I could see growing through the snow.

I hoped that the postie would rescue me, but she couldn’t force open the front door. Then a neighbour and friend of my grandmother appeared with a spare front door key. Now I could be released to the rest of the world! As well as the garden, I discovered a long ground floor extension to the house that comprised several double bedrooms. These were occupied by nurses who worked in shifts across hospitals in Newcastle. Their accommodation was to the highest standards, with windows affording great views of the Tyne valley.

All the space in the back garden could also be put to good use in the future, if only I could persuade TPR to invest in the building of a couple of holiday cottages.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment