Cat capture (Rousse)

Posted on November 15, 2018 by Dreamaticus

I was speaking to my parents on the phone from the comfort of my own bed at 06:00am when three cats jumped into the flat through the bedroom window.

I left TPR to chase the intruders out again.

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Mid-summer’s Day in Cornwall – with curry (Rousse)

Posted on November 12, 2018 by Dreamaticus

It was super-early on Mid-summer’s Day in Cornwall and I was lucky enough to observe the locals and a selection of animals march up the hill in the annual sunrise procession. I could not fathom how they managed to persuade everyone to walk in a neat line, at the same pace, each an equal distance apart from the person/creature ahead.

I would have like to have joined the celebrations at the top of the hill, but there was some problem with the minibus transport in the village below.

Added to this, KA caused all sorts of confusion over a curry. In the end we decided to eat out and invite S to join us.

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Darts and death with Prince Charles (Rousse)

Posted on November 6, 2018 by Dreamaticus

When Charles, Prince of Wales challenged TPR to a game of darts, I wandered out into the damp garden.

The peace was interrupted when a woman ran across the terrace screaming ‘He’s dead, he’s dead, David is dead!’

Then a rook overhead diverted its course to swoop down to the lawn and attack a man who had been quietly standing on the grass.

From this I concluded (a) that Prince David had been murdered, and (b) that his assailant was known.

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The Fringe, Finchley, and frightening fiction (Rousse)

Posted on November 5, 2018 by Dreamaticus

One of the women at the café table turned to me and asked how I was enjoying my annual trip up to Edinburgh and the fringe festival. I politely explained that I was a resident of this fine city, so I was able take full advantage of the annual arty shenanigans while based at home. Then I asked where she was from.

‘Rural central London’ she replied.

I wondered if she meant Finchley? Weren’t there trees there? I turned to my mother to remind her of the time that the whole family drove down to London and parked the car in Mrs Thatcher’s old constituency before setting off to explore the city.

Then I noticed Belle and her new boyfriend at the other end of the table! They had very little time left in Edinburgh and were about to head back to London. I abandoned all my plans for the day and followed them to the station. Five hours later I was a guest in their little terraced house in central London.

Belle took me up to her secret room in the attic to read extracts from her latest horror novel to me. It was all terribly gruesome, but she was bound to make a fortune when she sold the rights for a slasher movie.

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Treatment of yellow fungus disease (Rousse)

Posted on November 4, 2018 by Dreamaticus

I arrived a couple of minutes late to be admitted to the auditorium where TPR and some of our friends were in the audience of an Edinburgh Fringe theatre production. Luckily, there was a sudden unexpected power cut before the actors took to the stage, so I snuck in and found our party in the dark of the third row.

In the seat that should have been mine was a much younger woman, snuggling up to TPR. Our friends were obviously familiar with this arrangement. When the lights came back on and she saw me, TPR’s young lady took flight.

Although I was angry to discover further evidence of my husband’s extra-marital dalliances, I was relieved that my own affair with a young London ex-polytechnic lecturer called Tweed could somehow be legitimised as a form of romantic tit-for-tat.

More worrying, however, was the discovery that TPR had contracted yellow fungus disease from his amorous adventures. This was in urgent need of treatment – not least because this fatal contagious skin disease is normally found in reptiles (especially bearded dragons), and not in humans.

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Spectacular mountain bike accident at Corbridge (Rousse)

Posted on October 29, 2018 by Dreamaticus

KA tore past me on her mountain bike, then shattered into a thousand tiny pieces when she hit the rocks on shore of the River Tyne under the bridge at Corbridge.

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Blue Peter’s Patch lives! (Rousse)

Posted on October 29, 2018 by Dreamaticus

As a former Blue Peter presenter, I cared for the programme’s dog Patch well into his old age.

(Many people mistakenly believed the BBC’s story that the pet had died in the early 1970s. This simply was not true, and I could prove it.)

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Prince George’s part-time passion and a romantic near-miss (Rousse)

Posted on October 28, 2018 by Dreamaticus

Prince George of Cambridge had 5 minutes before his next royal appointment to open a new hospital ward. He chose to spend it stroking my upper torso.

Afterwards I almost climbed into bed with my cousin NA. Fortunately I saw sense at the last minute. My only regret was that I was overheard boasting to him five minutes earlier that I was knickerless.

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The naked lecturer (Rousse)

Posted on October 26, 2018 by Dreamaticus

My undergraduate class was very polite. Nobody said a word when I turned up to teach completely naked.

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Terrifying taxi transport costs (Rousse)

Posted on October 21, 2018 by Dreamaticus

My cousins T and SB complained of their lack of sleep. They had been forced to leave the ball ‘early’ at 03:30am and only managed a couple of hours in bed before they were obliged to cross town to collect us.

I was both surprised and annoyed that they arrived by taxi. How much would this cross-city travel cost? I could see that the meter was already ticking close to £100, and was infuriated when TB told me that he had no cash so I would have to pay.

Along the way we stopped off at a gym to do some weights. Here we bumped into ECM, who was looking great, if a little old. Meanwhile the taxi waited for us all outside, the meter still running. We were going to be completely cleaned out by this ridiculous transport arrangement devised by my idiotic cousins.

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