David Hadley's Blog, page 86

The Shape Of Things To Come

Well, it is not often… but enough about that. This is not the place for personal revelations, neither is it the plaice. But enough about such instances of questionable legality and excessive amounts of seaweed in the socks.

It is time to move onto other less waterlogged questions and to sally forth to see what additional confusion we can add to whatever is the issue of the day, today. On the other hand – considering when these things are first written, the issue of the day several months ago.

Of course, we do expect our current Queen, Victoria, to lead the Great British Empire well into the next century. With such technological marvel as the steam train and Spadgecock’s Patented Wildfowl Distractor Britain should at least spend the twentieth Century as the world’s greatest nation and remain the world’s biggest empire for the foreseeable future.

Anyway, there is not much left to be invented. Our greatest scientists assure us that almost everything than can be known is already known, so there remains little for the British to do in order to continue to rule most of the world. Of course, it may need a few minor changes at the periphery, but Great Britain is the epitome of civilisation and civilised behaviour so there will not be much that needs doing.

Anyway, all that is all well and good, but in the next few months, or so, there could always be something unforeseen that happens which make this piece somewhat less up-to-date than it is now.

Although, it is hard to see exactly what that could be, unless some scientific geniuses, technical wizards and people of vision manage to construct machines that can talk to each other across the world almost instantaneously. However, that does seem at best rather fanciful. The steam power alone for such devices would be much better utilised in keeping our breakfasts warm.

After all, in the end who would be interested in the daily ramblings of other ordinary people from all over the globe? Who would wish to read or hear the musings of those not of one’s station, or not belonging to one of the recognised London Gentlemen’s clubs?

If we are not careful, one could even find oneself talking to an American, or – if such a device appears and brings about the end of civilisation as we know it – a French person.

Still, such things all belong in the poor quality novels they call scientific romances. Such things will, of course, never happen, with the scientific romances soon forgotten along with the fad for detective novels and other forms of cheap mass entertainment.

You mark my words.

Something Comes

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There is nothing, and it is nowhere.

Then something emerges.

What was once dark and empty now becomes white and light as though a light has switched on. Still it has no shape, not until lines creep out, crawling apart, to give it volume. It becomes a sketch of a box on plain white paper.

Over on the far side of the box, a window grows. For the moment, it is little more than a suggestion of a window, slightly more than a young child’s sketch. Outside the window, it is summer. There is the bright green of summer grass. A cliff edge and the sea below it stretching out to a horizon, where it meets an almost cloud free-sky.

Now the wall around the window appears, pale blue paint on old walls. The ceiling bows and bends between solid ancient beams. The beams themselves are dark, and – in places – damaged by the centuries they’ve been though.

It is a bedroom now. An iron-framed bed stands on bare floorboards. Age has warped the floorboards too. Some bowed in places and a couple of rugs cover the spaces between the sparse bedroom furniture.

It is a big bed, a double bed. The head turns to see you are not alone. A shape sleeps next to you, a human shape. You realise you exist here too and look down to see what you are.

Human too… for once.

This time, a man and young too.

You glance up seeing something familiar. The room has grown from a memory, or rather several memories. There was once a holiday cottage with a bedroom like this, but it did not look out on the sea.

You turn and see the woman who sleeps next to you is not your wife.

Now you know this is no dream or memory.

This is a story.

Now you are keen to get out of the bed to face the morning and learn whatever this story is going to tell you.

 

What Is It Good For?

After all the pain and all the suffering, what did we have left? Some of us were lucky to be alive. Many though were unlucky to be alive with wounds too severe for any working life and depending on the charity of others for survival. We who survived – more or less – intact, felt both pity and shame when we came across one of these invalids sleeping in some doorway, or starving out in some roadside ditch. Often we did what we could, but sometimes it was better to look away. Especially when the thought came that it could so easily be one of us sitting, reaching out an empty hand pleading into an indifferent world.

It is true, a soldier fears wounds more than he fears death.

I know even some soldiers still do believe the words of the priests, despite the horrors of the battlefield. They still believe even when the priests tell them the afterlife is a paradise for brave warriors who die with honour in battle.

Although, many would say that dying in battle is infinitely preferable to the life of a wounded invalid beggar.

There are times to in a long war, a campaign far from home, when we have all – at some point – wished for death to take us. We hear so many stories of the great heroes, but not of the endless trudging half-starved through thick mud. Nor the illnesses that rip the guts apart, leaving a man barely able to stand while facing a horde of the screaming enemy.

And – as I said – for what?

So our lords and kings get more lands, lands that we have to die defending. So men can shower a few foreign whores in gold, because those men cannot believe it is all over and they have somehow survived. So the ordinary folks like us can make our lives a tiny bit better through robbing corpses and sacking towns.

Yet, even now, when the rumours of war come, there are those of us – old enough to know better – who begin polishing our armour once again.

 

Into The Unknown Lands

There are all these times and all these places haunting our memories. Will we ever escape the weight of everything pulling us back and make it to some new place of beginning? Time has a weight that drags on the shoulders, bending us down over the years we drag behind us as we travel these winding lanes on into the unknown lands of the future.

The past wraps itself around us, tying itself there with the ropes of memory. It is too hard to untie those knots and to let everything fall by the wayside. So we drag it all along behind us, growing heavier with every step as we take one more step deeper into the unknown lands.

Each step adds weight. We can only trudge on or fall by the wayside. We each have our own individual route to take. The maps we have, left by those who have travelled their own roads, are of limited use. They reassure only in the knowledge that others have travelled these roads before. All trudging on towards the same destination they never did reach and we know we will never reach either.

Of course, the wisdom and the understanding only will come slow, if it comes at all. A realisation that the destination so many seek – call it heaven or paradise, or whatever you want to call it – does not exist. Rather than the destination, it is the fact of travelling – the slow trudge of one step after another – that is the point of it. It is the journey, not the destination.

Then when we know this and understand it, we look up to see the wonders that lie all around us, on each side of the path. Only then does the load of the past seems much lighter and the step more sure, as understanding and knowledge make the weight of everything so much easier to bear.

 

How To Be Normal

Sometimes there was nothing to say, but being human meant Tredore went ahead and said something anyway. After all, he thought, saying something, anything – no matter how inane and pointless – was better than saying nothing… wasn’t it?

There had been a time when he’d tried – briefly – to be interesting and original. He’d stay awake at night in bed, trying to think of interesting ways of saying hello and good morning. He’d think of interesting new conversational gambits beyond the usual run of the mill chat. He tried to discover ways of being interesting.

That hadn’t lasted long.

He’d lost friends and a few people, especially those women he’d tried to impress with his witty originality. They now stared at him in the corridors and avoided being alone with him in the lifts or near the vending machines.

Tredore thought about trying to apologise, then realised he’d only make it worse. He was well on his way to becoming the new office weirdo. Which, considering Heldach – one of the janitorial staff – now held that post because of his unusual interest in rats and other vermin, was not something to which Tredore aspired.

After one of his attempts at casual banter had gone spectacularly wrong, when standing by the Mysterious Hot Brown Liquid drinks machine, Tredore decided that from now on he was going to be nothing but normal. So all he needed was some book that explained, preferably in easy steps, just how to be like everyone else. Maybe – with a bit of luck – it would also explain just how everyone else managed it so effortlessly.

 

The New Job

‘Well, what do you think?’

‘I… er….’

‘Come on, you must have some opinion?’

No, Pannis thought, I don’t. He shrugged. ‘Whatever you think best.’ There was silence. Pannis dared a glance. ‘…Sir.’

Ulpert nodded. ‘Yes.’ He made a dismissive gesture towards Pannis and began shuffling papers on his desk.

Pannis got to his feet. ‘So, shall I…? What you said?’

Ulpert did not look up. ‘Yes, yes, yes…. Carry on.’

‘Right, I’ll….’ Pannis turned for the door, ‘Sir.’

Ulpert grunted.

Pannis left his superior’s office wondering why the other man was so keen for his underlings to call him sir. ‘Must be insecurity,’ Pannis muttered as he made his way down the corridors back to his own office.

This time Pannis did not get lost… not too often anyway.

He sighed when he saw his secretary walking back up a corridor with a coffee cup in each hand.

Glenna smiled. ‘Just follow me, sir. I know the way.’

Pannis smiled back, mostly in relief. ‘Don’t call me sir, Glenna. Makes me feel like your teacher.’

Glenna turned and looked him up and down. ‘I bet you could teach someone like me a thing or two. Anyway, it is the rules; I must call you sir, sir.’

Pannis felt himself growing hot under her stare.

‘Anyway, I like calling you sir.’ Glenna stopped in front of a door. She looked back at him. ‘I enjoy having you over me, sir.’ She looked at him.

‘What?’

‘Would you mind opening your door?’

‘Oh, yes, sorry.’ Pannis opened the door, trying not to watch Glenna as she walked ahead of him. She had a way of walking that made him….

‘Well?’

Pannis realised Glenna was talking to him. ‘Sorry, what? I was thinking about other something else.’

‘I bet you were… sir. A girl can tell these things. Anyway, I asked if you’d found out.’

Pannis sighed as he slumped down behind his desk. ‘No, Glenna, I still have no idea what my job is, or what we are meant to be doing here.’

 

Dogging Around

Punnet Kneetrembler is probably one of the UK’s leading hot sex entrepreneurs. Although little-known outside the casual sex scene, apart from that infamous incident with the chiropodist from Luton, she is regarded as one of the leading sex experts of our time.

As outdoor casual sex had become increasingly popular in the British Isles, Kneetrembler has become one of the most important and influential experts on the scene. She provides an in-depth analysis of all the best places outdoors to engage in whatever sexual acts you desire and the likelihood of those acts taking place in a certain vicinity. She also provides information on the locations of the nearest shops selling the essential watermelons, thigh-length waders, mittens and bobble hats necessary for outdoor sex in the UK.

Although surprising to many of us who have some familiarity with the vagaries of the British weather, this predilection for having sex outdoors does go to the heart of something about the British character. After all, there is not much that sums up what it is to be British than the dogged pursuit of something, despite the elements, bureaucracy, forces of law and order and even common sense all stacking up against you. The more obstacles you put in a British person’s way to prevent them doing something, the more inclined they will be to do it. Often just to prove it can be done.

Going outdoors in the middle of a cold damp February evening is bad enough. To do it just to have sex with people you don’t know, and probably wouldn’t like if you did know them, must have some reasons beyond mere sexual gratification. Not only for the devotees of these pastimes to continue doing them, but also seizing on them with this apparent increasing alacrity.

However, the only alternative to venturing out in the British weather to have sex with someone you don’t know is to stay at home and have sex with someone you are married to. Maybe this explains the alacrity with which the British have taken to dogging, as it is known, and is probably not that surprising after all.

This is why Punnet Kneetrembler has become such a well-known authority, commentator and post-match analyst on the swinger scene. For, a modest membership fee her Kneetrembler Swingers Club provides maps and surveys of the best areas for these activities. Especially important is her precise mapping of the local nettle beds, so vital for after dark surreptitious naked romping.

She also provides a fleet of mobile snack vans that visit each of the most popular areas. After all, there is nothing the British like better than a nice cup of tea and, perhaps, a post-coital bacon sandwich. Not only that, the informal setting of Punnet Kneetrembler’s mobile snack vans enables one to be introduced to one’s recent sexual partners. Often in a much more informal manner than would otherwise be the case in other social situations in the UK.

For that reason alone, we all must be grateful to Punnet Kneetrembler for the vital services her Kneetrembler Swinger’s Club provides.

 

 

As We Were Saying

However, as many often say, you don’t get many of those in a bucket of mackerel. Especially on a Thursday when the prevailing wind is coming from the east and there is something interesting on the telly in half an hour. I’m sure you all (well, you and your friend) reading this will now be smiling in recognition. In particular as you recall the many recent times you yourself have used that exact phrase during the course of your day.

It is surprising how often such memorable and pithy sayings entire the national consciousness. After all, we all remember during the previous government, the then Prime Mentalist Minister saying, you can’t blame me for that, guv. After all, it’s not my job to sort out the country. It was a phrase that – looking back – gained instant currency all around the country. Everyone from taxi-drivers to the nation’s police chiefs used it as an excuse when things – inevitably – went wrong. It even became a global meme when used with such stunning effect as a caption to a photo of a cute cat doing that cute thing.

Of course, there was the world-famous pornstar, Dyson Polestraddler, and her celebrated remark about the (almost famous) independent author and blogger, [redacted], and his staggeringly impressive organ. She also praised his awesome sexual technique that left her stunned, breathless, and with strawberry jam stains on her inner left thigh. Afterwards, she could only smile and say, Bloody ‘eck, our kid, that were a right good seeing to, and no mistake. This soon became another meme familiar to everyone around the world. It later became a YouTube hit when the current Home Secretary set it to music and produced a music video featuring the entire British government cabinet in a stunning dance routine. Consequently, the video received amazing viewing figures for a political video clip, reaching almost double figures, seen nearly seven times in Worcestershire alone.

Then, there is the saying that became instantly popular all around the world when the American president uttered it at the inaugural address at the White House. Most interpreted her remark as a direct warning to America’s enemies all around the world. She said I’m the man now, bitches, and if you want to see what that means just make me press this button here, know what I’m saying? A speech than many historians argue will outlast the Gettysburg address, and even the world-famous Reagan shopping list, as the best speech ever made in the history of the American presidency.

So, in summation all that it remains for me to say is, mind how you go.

 

The Night Of The Disappeared

Then she was there.

Then she was gone.

I sat up in the bed, staring into the darkness. There was no-one, nothing there. I sat there unmoving for a moment, waiting. I could feel sweat cooling on my body in the cold night air.

I shivered.

Whether I shivered from the coldness or something else, I wasn’t sure. It felt as though the only sound in the room was the thump of my heart.

Eventually, after a minute or so, the tension eased and I felt calmer. I tried telling myself it was nothing more than a dream, even though I knew I didn’t believe it.

I readied myself to go back to sleep, or at least lie down and pretend to sleep.

She was there.

She reached out towards me. I saw her mouth move, in silence she called out to me, pleading.

I was half out of the bed, not knowing whether I was rushing towards her or away from her.

Then she was gone.

I sat on the side of the bed, feeling the rumpled sheets under me. The cold metal bed-frame pressed against the backs of my thighs. I thought I could even sense the grain of the wooden floorboards under my feet. Everything seemed hyper-real. Even the darkness of the room had a brooding quality to it beyond mere absence of light.

I got up and shuffled forward, yawning with tension rather than tiredness, until I stood at the spot where she had screamed for me.

The air there felt colder.

Or was I just imagining it?

Then she reached out and took me in her arms, wrapping herself around me and screaming in my ear, ‘Save me!’

Then, this time, before I could react, when she disappeared she took me with her.

 

The Sensual Kitchen

Of course, Rupertina Dumplings was one of the first in the country to try it. She has since her early days as a TV chef always had a keen interest in the erotic possibilities inherent in the everyday world. For instance, Dumplings was the first to take the erotic possibilities of the egg-whisk seriously. This, long before any other celebrity TV chef used one. Even before celebrity TV chef, Dollop Servingsuggestion, used one to whip up a kitchen maid into a state of sensual awareness in the vicinity of a lemon meringue.

Of course, as celebrity chef, Rupertina Dumplings does rather excite a certain portion of the male TV audience with her use of the whisk or when kneading dough in sensual slow motion close-up.

However, it is Dumplings’ use of the cheese-grater, in what some have claimed is an overly sexual manner, that has raised concerns about the suitability of her programme for a family audience. Especially since the incident when she fell out of her apron into an unusually large bowl of warm custard during her Christmas special last year.

Although, the DVD sales of that series have significantly outperformed every other title in the market, especially since the release of the Director’s Cut version. This features an extended HD version of the custard incident, with special live commentary by John Motson, brought out of semi-retirement specifically for the occasion.

However, recently more and more TV critics, echoed by only a minority of viewers, have begun to complain about Rupertina Dumplings and her programmes. Many of them say she has long since left the traditional idea of the TV cookery show behind. They claim she now concentrates less on producing dishes and meals and more on what some call ‘the erotic possibilities of kitchen utensils’. Rupertina Dumplings, of course, denies this and says it is hardly her fault that her skimpy tops often pick up a transparent sheen of olive oil. Or, that she accidentally caresses an erogenous zone or two with a spatula while waiting for her leeks to come to the boil.

However, we will have to wait for the next series of her TV show. Maybe then, we will see if Rupertina Dumplings brings about any changes to what has been until now a highly-successful formula.