tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-24170111217820904272024-03-12T18:12:03.282-07:00The Swan Village ReporterMichael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.comBlogger149125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-79559021494429804532023-12-18T09:27:00.000-08:002023-12-18T09:27:23.893-08:00All Good Cheer to Everybody<p> 'Well then, Piglet...'</p><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1l90r2v x1swvt13" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id=":rbe:"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="xdj266r x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs x126k92a"><div dir="auto">'Well then, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto">'Jubilate...'</div><div dir="auto">'Time to parte.'</div><div dir="auto">'Doesn't rhyme.'</div><div dir="auto">'Is <a tabindex="-1"></a>that a crime?'</div><div dir="auto">'Let it pass...'</div><div dir="auto">'Charge your glass.'</div><div dir="auto">'Clear your throat.'</div><div dir="auto">'Here's the note.'</div><div dir="auto">'So off we go.'</div><div dir="auto">'So da capo.'</div><div dir="auto">'Merry merry.'</div><div dir="auto">'Happy jolly.'</div><div dir="auto">'Tom and Jerry.'</div><div dir="auto">'Buddy Holly.'</div><div dir="auto">'Jolly happy.'</div><div dir="auto">'Outsize nappy.'</div><div dir="auto">'Roaring fire,'</div><div dir="auto">'Strikers' ire.'</div><div dir="auto">'Carollers plaguing.'</div><div dir="auto">'Rishi reneging.'</div><div dir="auto">'Bankers distraughted.'</div><div dir="auto">'Jenrick deported.'</div><div dir="auto">'Fox known as Laurence.'</div><div dir="auto">'Wrath and abhorrence.'</div><div dir="auto">'Crazed as a bat.'</div><div dir="auto">'Who'd want to...er...that?'</div><div dir="auto">'Ne'er mind winter's chill.'</div><div dir="auto">'Our boots we shall fill.'</div><div dir="auto">'Fine wines in the cellar.'</div><div dir="auto">'Cross-Channel, Suella.'</div><div dir="auto">'Though mirth be erupted - '</div><div dir="auto">'Our council's bankrupted.'</div><div dir="auto">'Though frost is a-glistening - '</div><div dir="auto">'Yon Hancock's a-pissen-'</div><div dir="auto">'Mind your manners.'</div><div dir="auto">'Fly your banners.'</div><div dir="auto">'Happy merry.'</div><div dir="auto">'Tram 'n' ferry.'</div><div dir="auto">'Sleighbells ringing.'</div><div dir="auto">'Bob 'n' Binging.'</div><div dir="auto">'Sprouts 'n' mash.'</div><div dir="auto">'UK crash.'</div><div dir="auto">'Brave Lionesses.'</div><div dir="auto">'HS-themed messes.'</div><div dir="auto">'Lowly manger.'</div><div dir="auto">'Queens Park Ranger.'</div><div dir="auto">'Heaping snow.'</div><div dir="auto">'Strapped for dough.'</div><div dir="auto">'New Year Joy.'</div><div dir="auto">'Myrna Loy.'</div><div dir="auto">'Bette Davis.'</div><div dir="auto">'Dot 'n' Mavis.'</div><div dir="auto">'Here's to you.'</div><div dir="auto">'To you too too.'</div><div dir="auto">'With a hashtag?'</div><div dir="auto">'Plus a gift-bag.'</div><div dir="auto">'All good cheer to everybody.'</div><div dir="auto">'Feel the Noize! Behold - our Noddy!'</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqEt9MND-xiYzyJt17KcwCu2mCD2ZsYYpltdlqZfwObWNS2DRlYHe6ACeF0nHS2OrvtEVSSUmgkBl3_kDpKh3fTv6pmXzIh-9F9TQGYKuFmDSyvfGW1LjTVX-FebSq0Ozfy3bsP5hiCNHgdIZJ6JzJfiSZaCZ2fRcRjflo6ZGA5-6KCn0_eHHp5kXTYUeJ/s648/Pooh%20and%20piglet%20Christmas%20cards.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="648" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqEt9MND-xiYzyJt17KcwCu2mCD2ZsYYpltdlqZfwObWNS2DRlYHe6ACeF0nHS2OrvtEVSSUmgkBl3_kDpKh3fTv6pmXzIh-9F9TQGYKuFmDSyvfGW1LjTVX-FebSq0Ozfy3bsP5hiCNHgdIZJ6JzJfiSZaCZ2fRcRjflo6ZGA5-6KCn0_eHHp5kXTYUeJ/w320-h160/Pooh%20and%20piglet%20Christmas%20cards.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div dir="auto"><br /></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFgILiGBDLbjMOpFz4pnidb1vTrQuRxBb7Qrihv1FQjYk_Tja9dxKbocjENk-PHg4hywMgNn-qxj2wJ5fegcKyt6kUKikzPVRBQAqwvj-AgtXak6NCgKhpIiQ_O8uhay5B2eTJeQFp8HzN_kMcQa5viVwmC7NQVtQjbQpT529jfjBY1rYZMOsxneDvxd_E/s2000/Slade.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1270" data-original-width="2000" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFgILiGBDLbjMOpFz4pnidb1vTrQuRxBb7Qrihv1FQjYk_Tja9dxKbocjENk-PHg4hywMgNn-qxj2wJ5fegcKyt6kUKikzPVRBQAqwvj-AgtXak6NCgKhpIiQ_O8uhay5B2eTJeQFp8HzN_kMcQa5viVwmC7NQVtQjbQpT529jfjBY1rYZMOsxneDvxd_E/s320/Slade.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></span></div></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><p></p>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-1351462268422938722023-11-09T02:01:00.000-08:002023-11-09T02:01:00.539-08:00From the archives: 'Mairzy Doat's A Female Deer.'<p> </p><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Lalalalala....Sososososo....mememememeeeee.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, what are you doing?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Keeping the old vocal nodules at bay, Piglet. Dohdohdohdohdoh...</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Feeegaro...Feeegaro...Figarofigarofigarofeeeegaaaahhroooowww...</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Figaro here, Figaro there, Figaro every fu--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What for?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'My chance to shine, Piglet. My chance to showcase all my hums on that TV show.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'TV show?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Let's Have A Butcher's At Yer Voice, Then".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's "I Can See Your Voice".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That's what I said.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So which, er, hum to you propose--?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A crowd-pleaser, Piglet. A rousing singalong.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, yes?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Mairzy Doat's A Female Deer".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I think it's "Doh A Deer".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I know what it is, Piglet. Always brings a tear to the old eye when Mary Poppins sings it to that Trappist family high in the Austrian Alfs.' </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's actually The Sound Of--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Success, Piglet. And it'll be all mine. Marvellous song. Halfway through the first verse there's that commotion at the back of the circle. Then this Mother Superior sings, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">"Mariaaah, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">I've just decked a nun</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">called Mariaaah - </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">And suddenly that dame</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Is walking somewhat lame - you seeeee".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That's not how I remember the film you don't remember at all.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">''Course, they have to get a move on with the old "Mairzy Doats." Next thing you know, all those German planes are heading their way.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'The Luftwaffe.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'The Stroopwaffel. Exactly. That's when they all have to clear out...you know, climb every mountain, drive Fords across every stream.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I think it's "ford every stream", Pooh. As in get across --'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Though I can't see how they can climb and drive at the same time. Then there's that bit, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">"Climb every mountain,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Search high and low."</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">I mean, you're not going to clock a mountain if you search low, are you? There you are, snout to the ground...your average What'sthematterhorn isn't going to yell "Oi! I'm up here".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, I think--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I suppose that's what they call the mystique of cinema.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I suppose.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Anyway, I'll have a gala time on that show. Very genial host, you know. Paddy McGinty.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's Paddy McGuinn--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'An Irishman of note, he is. Fell in for a fortune and - bam! - suddenly and unexpectedly advanced himself in goat-fancying circles.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Paddy McGuinness, Pooh. And he's from near Bolton.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I have no idea to whom who toom you refer, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I...oh, good luck, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Thank you, Piglet. And you will come along? The old moral support? Front row?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'll be somewhere.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Spendid! Now...lalalalalaaa...mememememeeeeee....Jules-Rimet-fat-solar-flare-tee-dious!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Indeed.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv0dtB-6JNGLF0hS-7-E_-ie83xsy6N2x_HQzu4P1nG1ro3i5Ctr7TkHlzam3iFQG7FMIb0r_TMAvNDye2ESaIDBt7ISYgdJSZBUgy29vsl0fj5zuBsi4Li7aJNH9TmJLOWJ_BWc1a4so9bWg1piVEanAaFzxZMDlcJyjRjiwJpIcbvsHBNMCCR2Jw0Y_J/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjv0dtB-6JNGLF0hS-7-E_-ie83xsy6N2x_HQzu4P1nG1ro3i5Ctr7TkHlzam3iFQG7FMIb0r_TMAvNDye2ESaIDBt7ISYgdJSZBUgy29vsl0fj5zuBsi4Li7aJNH9TmJLOWJ_BWc1a4so9bWg1piVEanAaFzxZMDlcJyjRjiwJpIcbvsHBNMCCR2Jw0Y_J/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-70439508183617317162023-10-08T05:20:00.002-07:002023-10-08T05:20:56.350-07:00Pooh, meditation and minefieldness (with added Vera Lynn and Jimmy Cliff)<p> 'Pooh, I was wondering -'</p><div><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1l90r2v x1swvt13" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="xdj266r x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs x126k92a"><div dir="auto">'Shhh, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto">'Sorry?'</div><div dir="auto">'Shhh.'</div><div dir="auto">'Why? What's happening?'</div><div dir="auto">'Let <a tabindex="-1"></a>us betake ourselves unto the zone.'</div><div dir="auto">'What zone? Oh, don't tell me someone's slung up an installation right here in -'</div><div dir="auto">'Silence, Piglet. Silence. Tigger says it's essential to mediate. You know, let your mind go plonk.'</div><div dir="auto">'Why should we do that?'</div><div dir="auto">'Words, Piglet. Tigger says that sometimes they can be swords when they should be fraushoes.'</div><div dir="auto">'It's that honey, isn't it? Moment I saw "Produce of Colombia" I just knew--'</div><div dir="auto">'That whereof of which we know whatnot, thereof let us know not it.' </div><div dir="auto">'So…if you don't know something you shouldn't talk about it?'</div><div dir="auto">'Yes.'</div><div dir="auto">'When's that stopped Tigger?'</div><div dir="auto">'For it is written, Piglet: let your yea be yea and your shush be shush.'</div><div dir="auto">'Biblical, is that?'</div><div dir="auto">'Oh, Piglet, Piglet. Jimmy Cliff. 1968. Top tune.'</div><div dir="auto">'I think he might have got it from -'</div><div dir="auto">'He sang about the White Cliffs of Dover, you know. Just like Miss Lynn.'</div><div dir="auto">'I don't think Mr Cliff had quite the same experience of Dover as -'</div><div dir="auto">'Your mind, Piglet, your mind is like unto the sky.'</div><div dir="auto">'What's this "like unto" business?'</div><div dir="auto">'Your thoughts are like clouds, Piglet, having a proper old scud. Happy thoughts. Airy thoughts. Then, all of a sudden, sad thoughts. Not all that very nice thoughts.'</div><div dir="auto">'No, Pooh, that's minefieldness.'</div><div dir="auto">'Not mediation?'</div><div dir="auto">'You mediate between things.'</div><div dir="auto">'Ah. Like the devil and the old brown cow?'</div><div dir="auto">'Deep blue sea, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto">'Oh, code now, is it? Well, purple sparrow to you.'</div><div dir="auto">'No, it's a saying that -'</div><div dir="auto">'Sorry, Piglet, I'm in the zone. Ow…ow…'</div><div dir="auto">'Oum, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto">'Ow…cow….'</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHVQz4uEXxizM34OXFyHlKlwb4UqSZMOoKZyeU6rBcWj-5rtLtrdfmEUM4WqQdYCjVm4ZTV4vOuLsYEnVK2seSHl8bTkY2SvKwLZ3GmJEhbR11RvKViSQXEOFw8g2m42obWfe2JGzSk5A-qjm71QriJLvJY2ajjceg9AScGCSRgpxizQ_41AkfJjc5oAf0/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjHVQz4uEXxizM34OXFyHlKlwb4UqSZMOoKZyeU6rBcWj-5rtLtrdfmEUM4WqQdYCjVm4ZTV4vOuLsYEnVK2seSHl8bTkY2SvKwLZ3GmJEhbR11RvKViSQXEOFw8g2m42obWfe2JGzSk5A-qjm71QriJLvJY2ajjceg9AScGCSRgpxizQ_41AkfJjc5oAf0/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div dir="auto"><br /></div></div></span></div></div></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-53429642791610991312023-10-03T08:27:00.000-07:002023-10-03T08:27:26.252-07:00From The Archives: Rabbit Re-Imaged on National Poetry Day<p> 'Well, Pooh, it's all go....'</p><div><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1l90r2v x1swvt13" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="xdj266r x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs x126k92a"><div dir="auto">'Really? I'm sorry I missed it.'</div><div dir="auto">'No, no, Thursday. National Pootling Day.'</div><div dir="auto">'Oh, that, yes.'</div><div dir="auto">'Tigger's been visioning Rabbit.'</div><div dir="auto">'He <a tabindex="-1"></a>doesn't want to make a habit of that.'</div><div dir="auto">'It means getting him ready for his poetry launch.'</div><div dir="auto">'Oh, really?'</div><div dir="auto">'Yes. He has a proper poet name and everything.'</div><div dir="auto">'Proper poet name? "Rabbit" not good enough?'</div><div dir="auto">'Well it would have been last year. Tigger says that National Ptomaine Day '15 was all about channelling the edgeland-glade-and-wistful-wood vibe, so "Rabbit" would have done nicely. But as Tigger also says, we were then in the then then but now we're now in the now.'</div><div dir="auto">'He does know he's talking out loud?'</div><div dir="auto">'Yes. Tragically. Anyway, they found a name format that's been lying around for a few months because the previous owner no longer has need of it. Having…you know…'</div><div dir="auto">'Having what?'</div><div dir="auto">'Gone to meet his Mater.'</div><div dir="auto">'Oh…oh, you mean that Mr Bowie.'</div><div dir="auto">'No the other one…the one word--'</div><div dir="auto">'Prance.'</div><div dir="auto">'Yes. Only he stopped being that and became The Artist Formerly Known As Prance.'</div><div dir="auto">'So Rabbit became what?'</div><div dir="auto">'The Poet Formerly Known As Rabbit.'</div><div dir="auto">'Doesn't make sense…'</div><div dir="auto">'No, they realised that--'</div><div dir="auto">'I mean, Mr Prance, that was his name. He could stop using it and keep prancing.'</div><div dir="auto">'Yes, Pooh, they--'</div><div dir="auto">'Whereas Rabbit is called Rabbit and is a rabbit.'</div><div dir="auto">'Pooh, they did--'</div><div dir="auto">'He can't un-Rabbit himself, National Potiphar Day or not.'</div><div dir="auto">'Pooh, they modified it.'</div><div dir="auto">'They?'</div><div dir="auto">'Tigger and his PR.'</div><div dir="auto">'Gosh, he has a proportional representative.'</div><div dir="auto">'Or is it PA?'</div><div dir="auto">'Gosh, he's bought Philadelphia.'</div><div dir="auto">'Personal Assistant.'</div><div dir="auto">'Who is?'</div><div dir="auto">'Tiffany Breathless. She came up with what she called an interim-facing-fix-going-somewhere-or-other.'</div><div dir="auto">'Which is what?'</div><div dir="auto">'The Poet Still Intermittently Called Rabbit.'</div><div dir="auto">'Mmm. No. Timing problem, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto">'Timing?'</div><div dir="auto">'How will we know when he's a poet and when he's a rabbit? We might see him out and about and say, "Hello, Rabbit, how are you?" but if we, you know, pick the wrong time, we might never get "I'm well, thank you" out of him.'</div><div dir="auto">'Well actually, Pooh, they realised that, too, so--'</div><div dir="auto">'I mean I might just want to pass the time of day with him--as him--but instead I might get an earful of that…you know…stuff.'</div><div dir="auto">'Well, that's why they did what Tiffany called an assessment and unfurther-doingness implement, so--'</div><div dir="auto">'I might say "Hello Rabbit" and he might give me the old, you know, "Thou still unvarnished bed of quietness" and all that.'</div><div dir="auto">'They've decided--'</div><div dir="auto">'Or start wittering about that Arthur League and how he kept going onwards--'</div><div dir="auto">'Pooh, they've changed his name again.'</div><div dir="auto">'To?'</div><div dir="auto">'Brer Baudelaire.'</div><div dir="auto">'What?'</div><div dir="auto">'French poet, Baudelaire was. Tigger says he wrote Fleurs du Mal.'</div><div dir="auto">'What's that mean?'</div><div dir="auto">'Flowery and bad, apparently. But he's really famous. Tiffany says the name has cashew.'</div><div dir="auto">'Fleurs…you sure it isn't Mal's Flowers?'</div><div dir="auto">'Ah, well, now, she and Tigger didn't rule that out either.'</div><div dir="auto">'So we're talking about bouquet-facing sponsorship.'</div><div dir="auto">'A tee-shirt, at the very least.'</div><div dir="auto">'"How's my emoting?" No, can't see Rabbit in a tee-shirt. Or writing a poem, come to that.'</div><div dir="auto">'Oh, that's not a priority. The main thing is to be a poet.'</div><div dir="auto">'Has he written any?'</div><div dir="auto">'Just the one.'</div><div dir="auto">'Which is?'</div><div dir="auto">'"With a wife and twelve kids</div><div dir="auto"> and a leaf in my gob</div><div dir="auto"> that's amore.…"'</div><div dir="auto">'They've got their work cut out.'</div><div dir="auto">'Going forwards.'</div><div dir="auto">'Backwards, Piglet. Emphatically backwards.'</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrs_EnLuT7BwEgbULp24HDWbwL8ztX0yw7ZEP-G1lyKa709UyA0KpZRkkiJwtSxCpV6gza579DVb16fqzExqAm4nZUqcFjkAxv3kJLX9bugr7LaaNk8WSx6PXOx339EQuJOyz3RF8alwlDFghDj96LU2C9ZwVkChcR53mKEmMwGoy5qRuCuI4Gmu-4Bbty/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgrs_EnLuT7BwEgbULp24HDWbwL8ztX0yw7ZEP-G1lyKa709UyA0KpZRkkiJwtSxCpV6gza579DVb16fqzExqAm4nZUqcFjkAxv3kJLX9bugr7LaaNk8WSx6PXOx339EQuJOyz3RF8alwlDFghDj96LU2C9ZwVkChcR53mKEmMwGoy5qRuCuI4Gmu-4Bbty/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div dir="auto"><br /></div></div></span></div></div></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-89520169604756792592023-09-22T01:49:00.004-07:002023-09-22T02:19:13.235-07:00Your Auld Yang Syne<p> </p><div dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1l90r2v x1swvt13" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id=":roc:"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="xdj266r x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs x126k92a"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Her eyes widened. She was the very picture of astonishment.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, what are you talking about?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'At long last she was able to speak.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Who was?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Oh, Torquil...is it really you? After all these years?".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><span><a tabindex="-1"></a></span>'What?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'My new venture, Piglet. Romance. I'm writing a story to send to the outfit that does all those love sagas...you know, their eyes went crossed across a rheumy crowd and all that.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What, Mills and - '</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Wills and Whiffs, that's the one. All the world loves a lover, Piglet. So I bethought me that I'd betake me to pen and paper and becoin me a few extra bob.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So who's your hero?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Torquil Broadshoulder. Commissioned officer in India in the last days of Reg.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You mean the Raj.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No, Reg, his superior, about to retire.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Is that a name? Torquil?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Of course it is. Old French, you know. Ou le Wisdom Normand, as we initiatives say. Derives from tranquil, which just happens to be his key quality, and Torquay, which just happens to be where he embarked for India.' </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'From Torquay?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, picky picky...look, I'll chuck in a paragraph about chaotic sailing schedules.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Right. And the lady?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Lavinia Tempestheart. Youngest of three daughters, still living with her father at his rectory in the village of Soft Verges, a curlew's twitch from Aylesbury.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Dutiful, she is. Helping dad. Good works in the parish. But actually she's in an ecstasy of molten passion.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Funny sort of rectory.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'In her secret world, Piglet!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah, I see...Tempestheart.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pretty nifty, eh? A creative's name, that.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Creative what? That's an adjective.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, Piglet, where have you been? All adjectives are nouns these days. And all verbs. The barriers are down.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Anyway, she and Torquil were childhood sweethearts, gazing hand-in-hand of a summer night upon a golden, rolling Vespa - till fate decreed.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Decreed what?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Again, Piglet, you're stuck in the starting-trap. Fate doesn't have to fossick about with the why and the warehouse. It just decrees.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well I never.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Nor has Lavinia. Anyway, her one pleasure is an occasional trip to London. So there she is, Oxford Street, looking at all the swish shops and imagining a life that, with malevolent caprice, has been so cruelly denied her - when suddenly, she tingles at an intimation.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What, in broad daylight?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A sound, Piglet. A voice. She hasn't heard it for years but there's no mistaking...it thrills her to the phwoar.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Core.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You may well say "Cor". This is her moment, Piglet. La plus ca spare change. Her epiffle. Her apotheotheosis. She turns round. She says what I said at the start. Sorry, intones...all trembling, like.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'And he says?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Lavinia. My darling. I stand before you, your Auld Yang Syne. Yes, it is I it is me except after 'c' - here, cop hold of me troth".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I assume that her eyes have opalescent depths.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, for pity's sake, Piglet, she's not a drinker.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'But he needs something to gaze into.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, all right, he can gaze into his epaulettes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'How can you twist your head to gaze - '</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'He's taken them off, Piglet! They were chafing him something rotten.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Right. And after that?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What do you mean, after that? That's it. That's what the readers have been waiting for. Honestly, I'm obviously casting pearls before - '</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Don't say that!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah...yes, sorry. Anyway...it's a winner, yes? My public will lap it up. Not a dry eye in the hearse.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Broadshoulder, eh?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes, particularly proud of that, I am.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So his other shoulder - narrow?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I knew I should have tried this out on Barbara Cartload.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFDhsxDLhk1p4xj24VZYIg6jdc5-5D6jOLZzrKgw7iV-zKVLCUxjNB3q4ajTXssrkv2hjfSz3Pw_NjEgoL1c6GDN7J0XZ25N7X0cBTjJL_4B82B_S1NH-yDyNcLcVIZntoWnzJ6uAQ8iQlocuK63iNIPPg-oTfgOMmNrmZiJJeohERJ67q-b6dBefoAfyt/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFDhsxDLhk1p4xj24VZYIg6jdc5-5D6jOLZzrKgw7iV-zKVLCUxjNB3q4ajTXssrkv2hjfSz3Pw_NjEgoL1c6GDN7J0XZ25N7X0cBTjJL_4B82B_S1NH-yDyNcLcVIZntoWnzJ6uAQ8iQlocuK63iNIPPg-oTfgOMmNrmZiJJeohERJ67q-b6dBefoAfyt/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-49906068027374714802023-09-19T09:49:00.004-07:002023-09-19T10:16:17.647-07:00Mellow Yellow Frootloops<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well he says it's
looking tatty.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, Pooh, who
says what is?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Tigger. The Wood.
Needs tidying up.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Leaves falling.
Dank grass. Unruly undergrope.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well it is autumn.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Exactly. Yes, I
know poets go a bundle on it. Season of mellow yellow frootloops and all that.
But heavens above, autumn comes round every year. It's had enough chances to
sort itself out.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'But this is what
autumn is.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, I've heard all
the guff, Piglet. Part of the eternal wossname.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes, with autumn
comes decay, with spring comes - '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Regicide.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Is that the word?
They missed a trick this year.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes, well, let's
not go into all that. Point is, Tigger wants us to help spruce the Wood up.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Why us?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Because we know the
place inside out. Who better? We're natives of this heath. You know, like the
characters in those Stan Hardy novels. Jude the Oblong. Tess of the
Doobeedoos.' </p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well I like autumn
the way it is. I think we should just - '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, come on,
Piglet, where's your pluck? Think of it...you, me, Tigger, venturing forth. The
Wood's answer to those French buckle-swashers.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I think you mean -
'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Attlee, Portnoy and
Amethyst.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'It's actually - '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'The Three
Elonmusks. Hacking and pruning, delving and dredging. Can't remember the last
time I had a proper delve.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I think we should
leave autumn just as Mr Keats says, "Drows'd with the fume of
poppies".'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'You see? Drug abuse
and all.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, it means - '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Fat lot you care.
Another day, another hoodie. Let the neighbourhood go to raac and crumble.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'But if we cut
everything back, where would you hide your winter supply of hunny?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah...'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah.'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqVx7o_S_vP6Rza9aFIi7CTH5xEb31Z9COVMq29P3gDA5Xyx04xZ_5dM31yi7ko-LI6GP41wenuQfRJkZNKjhIawStUe7WMSlKXJzeUulX0naobSWQCkWC1ZWN8La9pHGT3KwjE0ooSjid1EiQbNSPH7cKiyV1nUM4eKrXdWFgjKxDGVzJOCL6RwcutfeC/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqVx7o_S_vP6Rza9aFIi7CTH5xEb31Z9COVMq29P3gDA5Xyx04xZ_5dM31yi7ko-LI6GP41wenuQfRJkZNKjhIawStUe7WMSlKXJzeUulX0naobSWQCkWC1ZWN8La9pHGT3KwjE0ooSjid1EiQbNSPH7cKiyV1nUM4eKrXdWFgjKxDGVzJOCL6RwcutfeC/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-65109757227634020102023-07-08T08:56:00.000-07:002023-07-08T08:56:06.721-07:00ShutYerChatgpt<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"> </p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, Piglet.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Another lovely
evening.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Indeed. Especially
when you consider the significance of evening as a dividing line between the
pressures and busyness of the day and the period of calm, rest and reflection
that is night-time.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'What?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Further, the
special properties of evening have been celebrated in works as diverse as
William Collins's "Ode To Evening", a lyric with wistful overtones of
the pastoral, first published in 1746, and "When The Deep Purple
Falls", a song in the light romantic vein popularised by Nino Tempo and
April Stevens in 1963.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'All I said was -- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And what better
place in which to appreciate evening than this, our very own Wood -- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, what are you
-- ?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">' -- referring, of
course, to a certain acreage of land which, while often expansive enough in
itself, does not cover the same quantity of ground as would normally be
associated with a forest -- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I have no idea why
-- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">' -- but which can
often make up for its smaller or more compact or indeed bijou size by offering
a delightful mixture of deciduous trees, deciduous meaning "to shed"
or "to fall off", as evidenced by such as the oak or the beech or indeed
the maple, this last being the national tree or growth or super-sized pot plant
of Canada -- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Now just wait a min
-- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">' -- and evergreen
trees, such as box, holly and juniper, this last happily lending itself to the
title of a song written and popularised by Donovan, a troubadour born in 1946
in the Maryhill district of Glasgow.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, what is all
this?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Being a line from a
track on "The Move", debut album by the band or combo or indeed
massive of that very same name, released in April 1968, the track itself being
called "Weekend" and the line in full being "Holy mackerel,
yeah, what is all this?"'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh!! Why are you
talking this way?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'AI.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Aye-aye?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'No A-I. Artificial
Interloper. Wonderful. All you have to do is feed in key words and it generates
conversation endlessly. Terrific, the site I've found.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'What's that?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'ShutYerChatgpt.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes, well, I think
I've heard enough -- so that'll do.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'A song popularised
by Peter Gabriel though in fact penned by Randy Newman, Gabriel's version
having been released in 1998. With its haunting refrain, "That'll do,
babe, that'll do", the song celebrates the beauties of a kind and steady
heart, which ensured its status as a firm favourite among such radio presenters
as Terry Wogan, born in 1938 in Limerick, a major city in the Repub -- '</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Aaaiiieeeee!'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Being the cry or
outburst or eruption by vanquished foes in such graphic publications as
Fleetwood Comics, whose titles include "Commandos Die Hard",
"Tank Alert" and "Ravens Over Berlin", and usually uttered
in response to such directives as "Die, Pig Dog!" or "Sayonara,
Bub!"</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And Sayonara to
you, too, Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'"You, too,
Pooh" being of course a delightful example of assonance, as in
"bright, white light" -- oh, Piglet, don't go.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I absolutely have
to go -- right now.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Being the first
sizeable hit for The Moody Blues, a group or cohort or indeed clump formed in
May 1964 in Birming....'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoSl-BGjU2eidNR09SQSPz-4Vve_atnfRVgDcMtNIlQVaiTeGZ3s6vt7J54JDWUDzTmE2JUSFhJ3Ka12vPHSB4Il-XooH3Zqsx-dE3UAZGrJwMosJd-HpMjoN8QDum6pnSNAM3qgtMCnXWJlW9iUUIGF1nLPI0LrxB3bc3vuvOrxnFNSO8FkOaJtUPeKyd/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoSl-BGjU2eidNR09SQSPz-4Vve_atnfRVgDcMtNIlQVaiTeGZ3s6vt7J54JDWUDzTmE2JUSFhJ3Ka12vPHSB4Il-XooH3Zqsx-dE3UAZGrJwMosJd-HpMjoN8QDum6pnSNAM3qgtMCnXWJlW9iUUIGF1nLPI0LrxB3bc3vuvOrxnFNSO8FkOaJtUPeKyd/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-11122062888693968612023-05-02T06:32:00.000-07:002023-05-02T06:32:50.618-07:00Bread and sinuses...<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Are you sure,
Pooh?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'It's what I've
heard, Piglet.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'It all sounds very
complicated.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Question of timing,
apparently.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tight schedule.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Eurovision finals are on the 13th and His
Royal Highhorse's ceremony is on the 6th.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I'm not sure it's
Highhorse, Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Are you sure you're
not sure?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I'm cert--well,
anyway...so he's being allowed a late entry for Eurovision?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'A gift from the
world, it seems.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And he'll be--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Singing it halfway
through his ceremony, yes.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'What's it called?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'"Boom-Bang-A-Pledge."'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And the nation has
a part to play.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Does it, now?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes, there's a rap
bit where they all have to cry out in unison.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Cry out?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes--swearing
allegiance to the country's core values.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Remind me.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'In order of
resonance, fidelity, union, community, kinship--then quick pause for
breath--then obedience, fairness and fortitude.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I see.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that's tout ensemble?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Ooh, Piglet, nifty
bit of French, eh?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I have a
smattering, Pooh.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Plume de ma
tante.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bonjour, concierge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Guillotine.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, yes, tout
ensemble.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And they'll be required to
yell the values twice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mind you, the
tempo picks up at the end, I'm told, so it might just be the initials.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No decision on that yet.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'It all
sounds--quite something.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'It will be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Celebrities rapping along with your everyday
folk--one of whom has been chosen at random to officiate.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'That's nice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who is it?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, it was going
to be Louise of Cannock, but she'll be at a hen do in Antwerp, so it's Dean of
Westminster.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah...fancy.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, it'll be fancy,
all right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All the stars out in force.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'A celebration in
the grand tradition.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Roman tradition,
you might almost say, Piglet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bread and
sinuses.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I suppose Mr
Titchmarsh will be of the starry number.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Should be...unless
he's detained.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Detained?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Having to coddle
his spuds.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah, well, not an
activity for shared space.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'It might provoke
comment.'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGgwATj0xJlM2h9STbleN0AVRUTJl_gUzV5hr3XnpPurQ9msHj5yVtK7h26YxOlc4THX0ylSa7c4wCtGC7YVTLMxL0AiNtZdEynvdm9hbWYV-9vtmAfNdT7ror_0D8M0Z4TMpNXGLcmQLnIC5gm1xYBluq2oVA1TI9J6d37qxiZpRVUtY68a_3eRFdGQ/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGgwATj0xJlM2h9STbleN0AVRUTJl_gUzV5hr3XnpPurQ9msHj5yVtK7h26YxOlc4THX0ylSa7c4wCtGC7YVTLMxL0AiNtZdEynvdm9hbWYV-9vtmAfNdT7ror_0D8M0Z4TMpNXGLcmQLnIC5gm1xYBluq2oVA1TI9J6d37qxiZpRVUtY68a_3eRFdGQ/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-76364825629931362472023-04-11T09:38:00.000-07:002023-04-11T09:38:52.827-07:00Fifty Ways To Lose Your Loofah<p> </p><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1swvt13 x1l90r2v" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id=":rk4:"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs xdj266r x126k92a"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see Kanga's organizing a May Day Celebration.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'An old pagan tradition, Piglet, as it happens. Beltloop.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I think it's Belta-'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'And I've been working tirelessly on my contribution.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'One of your hums?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'One of Mr Simon's.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah. "The Sound of Silence"? "Feelin' Groovy"?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Fifty Ways To Lose Your Loofah". One of his best. An unmatched meditation on the vagaries of domestic life and the unexpected surplusnessness of shower-inclined accoutrements.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, I really do have to stop you before--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Shove it down the pan, Jan,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Label it trash, Ash,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Feed it to the bin, Cyn,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Just listen to me --'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Really, Pooh, I --'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Turn it into straw, Tor...</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">For your hamster's floor, oh Lor...</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Shred diligently, Fi, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">And set yourself free.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, just stop--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Chuck it in the flames, James,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Lag it round a flue, Pru,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Scoot it off the grid, Sid--what?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'They aren't the lyrics.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well no, not the lyrics Mr Simon was forced to re-write.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Forced?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A bootleg of an early take started doing the rounds. Next thing you know, poor Mr Simon's arraigned.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Arraigned?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'By the Orificio Lifetime Expandable Loofah Co. Inc. DSO Wine-Bar and Half-Day Wednesdays.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Who?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Our motto: "Wonderments for Fundaments".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Good grief!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Threatened him with High Chaparral action if he released it.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Chap--? You mean Court.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Of course he was caught, that's what I'm going on about.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, maybe...just maybe...you might consider some other song.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah, now, "Homeward Bound" was, as they say, in the frame.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh dear...was it?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Poignancy itself, that one:</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">"I'm sittin' in a railway station</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Got an ointment for my pustulation....mm-mmm".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Perhaps just the mm-mmm, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Nothing else?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Nothing else.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Not even "Hello, heat-rash my old friend"?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Music will thank you.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Jan, Pru and Sid won't...saddled with loofahs like barbed-wire.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm sure they'll find other uses.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Squish it like a wedge, Reg--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb8o59fXyOWbI5kOnKpz5KMzT8fdyrJDr6qNnWSsk6OD1Mo9rJq0Ylumiwo3KhcwxFNEpqviA_se5k9Lwh1UdDQxc7DeLTCs-1Dwia6NoU3e_CdMIsivS0u9w7zQ5_pSA6PxMzGifoGtMN3i-jp9BkaDVzISiG5D5iMZq8Ttq5Pyoi6kZRSO7CxTV_SA/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb8o59fXyOWbI5kOnKpz5KMzT8fdyrJDr6qNnWSsk6OD1Mo9rJq0Ylumiwo3KhcwxFNEpqviA_se5k9Lwh1UdDQxc7DeLTCs-1Dwia6NoU3e_CdMIsivS0u9w7zQ5_pSA6PxMzGifoGtMN3i-jp9BkaDVzISiG5D5iMZq8Ttq5Pyoi6kZRSO7CxTV_SA/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-84608198852154523552023-04-04T01:46:00.000-07:002023-04-04T01:46:04.813-07:00Mañana-facing <p> </p><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1swvt13 x1l90r2v" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id=":ral:"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs xdj266r x126k92a"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Spring, eh?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ribeye steak, eh?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><span><a tabindex="-1"></a></span>'Sorry, I thought we were dallying in randomness.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No, I meant Spring seems to be sort of here.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah. Yes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Lovely. Though the Wood looks a bit tatty.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well that's easily remedied.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'How?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'ODA.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm sorry?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Strategy for focussed change. Observe. Do. Achieve. Tigger was full of it.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Tigger's always full of it.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No, but he said you see it on notices in hospitals, town halls and the like. You observe a particular thing that needs changing, you go about it, you state the result. Tigger gave me some case studies. Might help with the Wood.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Such as?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well:</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I observed: Rome.</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I did: Sacked it.</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I achieved: Existential chaos in much of Europe for the next four centuries.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Or a more person-centric, non-inward-facing implementation.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'As in?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What I observed: Bloke in hat that did him no favours whatsoever, asking "When did you last see your father?"</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I did: Muttered "dunno."</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I achieved: The reproduction of exactly that scene on sundry wood-panelled walls throughout the known world.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Effective.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Certainly.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So it could be:</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I observed: Fallen branches damming the stream.</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I did: Stared hard at them for a bit.</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">What I achieved: The triggering of bark-defined self-consciousness, resulting in their rebirth as bijou distressed side-tables for the adornment of today's life-space.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'See? You're getting the hang of it.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I rather think I am.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'We could start right away.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'My defaultiness is mañana-facing.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Of course. Silly me.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfYxVO2rnv_jccKEYsXmgsMrZbooUL_pKlMxRgWcwIxZ0ywU_yY6aExxBwDvVCXFcU1EL36uEQrJzc2ytzdiL1U9KyFm-3_VNHYbF4G8twrcdwssHKR_wUhheKNh77pmsENtBE0auZtba49WEKfKyTsZR9fOTqmoyTQZQcaDdkwENIWv-1-frzZ9i9kw/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfYxVO2rnv_jccKEYsXmgsMrZbooUL_pKlMxRgWcwIxZ0ywU_yY6aExxBwDvVCXFcU1EL36uEQrJzc2ytzdiL1U9KyFm-3_VNHYbF4G8twrcdwssHKR_wUhheKNh77pmsENtBE0auZtba49WEKfKyTsZR9fOTqmoyTQZQcaDdkwENIWv-1-frzZ9i9kw/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-31309815828899481712022-12-27T11:10:00.005-08:002022-12-28T02:09:48.214-08:00'Stan Wesley Ogden'<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Are you sure,
Pooh?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Absolutely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tigger confirmed it.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, think
carefully about those two words.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Tigger.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Confirmed.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'No, this time he's
actually got something right.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Really?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Really.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'So.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bob Dylan?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Coronation Street?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Big fan?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And he's appearing in it.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Really?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Really.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He's writing a script for an hour-long
episode.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'About what?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'It dallies with
Weatherfield mythology and gender-fluidity concepts.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Dallies,
indeed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well I never.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh yes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bob himself travels through time and bursts
into the Rovers Return as an alt-Elsie Tanner.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'To do what?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Settle an ancient
score about a contested hairnet with an alt-Ena Sharples.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Also played by
him?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'No, by that...oh,
what's her name?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Played Hayley
Cropper.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Julie--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah, Julie
Hesmondjesmondosmondmarcalmondhalgh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'That's the one.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well...fancy.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Written a whole
album of new songs, Bob has, to go with his episode.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Called?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'"Stan Wesley
Ogden".<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, I say
"new". Some of them are reworkings of his hits.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I see.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>"Lay, Petal, Lay", "Stuck
Inside of Stockport With The Cheadle Blues Again", "All Along The
Foot Of Our Stairs", "Just Like A Barlow"...and...erm....'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Erm?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'"Pissing In
The Wind".'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Good grief!'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Bob's word, not
mine.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'So how does that
one go?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'"How many
pints <br />
Must our kid put away<br />
Before yon cops</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">Mark his
card?"'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Catchy.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'And if it's a
success he'll take the whole concept on tour.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Will he, now?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, yes. The
Rolling Gail Platt Revue.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Gracious!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And will Miss Platt mind being rolled?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, now,
Piglet...steady on.'</p>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJSRQpL0hrUnIfldv0ZPB2-d_T6DsL7UqhnMFl4wrVHcY-8rLUmr5jxeq0CU5Uezfr5tvGTqp4cBAwIlafmTrbwATXbOD5q9hElnb6C8fBOAuIPlUNAMCwo8JsDcxmkQXHt678gO-gomyXSTUHtV9UAUeLj7-LuU4pNEQEyyr1ERsKMf1VK9StPYs98g/s363/Pooh%20and%20Piglet%20in%20Snow.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="244" data-original-width="363" height="215" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJSRQpL0hrUnIfldv0ZPB2-d_T6DsL7UqhnMFl4wrVHcY-8rLUmr5jxeq0CU5Uezfr5tvGTqp4cBAwIlafmTrbwATXbOD5q9hElnb6C8fBOAuIPlUNAMCwo8JsDcxmkQXHt678gO-gomyXSTUHtV9UAUeLj7-LuU4pNEQEyyr1ERsKMf1VK9StPYs98g/s320/Pooh%20and%20Piglet%20in%20Snow.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-16789884522802917622022-12-11T10:24:00.001-08:002022-12-11T10:24:36.204-08:00Season's Greetings from them and me...<p> </p><div><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1l90r2v x1swvt13" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs xdj266r x126k92a"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Hello, loves, us again. Just to say that Matthew Timmins--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Michael Thomas.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh...yes...that...he's asked us to send everyone Christmas wishes this year on--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Are we getting paid for this?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I didn't ask, Ivy, and he didn't say.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So that's no.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'He's got other things on his mind.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, really? Barmaid showing plenty at the Bricklayers' Arms?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'He's not that sort of bloke.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'He's a bloke sort of bloke, there's only the one.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I mean, Ivy, he's a poet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh God help us, one of them. Remember Taplows, as ran the Post Office? The father had a fling with that blonde piece at the Minimart. Their youngest reckoned himself a poet. You could tell, really, looking at him. Never right in all this world.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ivy, it's the time of year for poetic thoughts...happy thoughts...reflective thoughts on what we might be missing--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Like Flog It! right now. Hurry up.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A time for looking back on--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Is this it? His message? Have you started?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm coming to it, Ivy...I'm extemporising.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Strewth, woman, we passed two chemists to get here. You could have popped in.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'--what we might be missing. The company of old friends. Though, of course, everyone is a friend. Strangers are friends we've yet to meet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Flamin' Nora, not that guff. Marie at the Sue Ryder, she came out with that to me the other week. Oh, yes, I said? And what if you never meet them? Do they come running after you, tugging your sleeve? "Here I am...meet me, go on, meet me." 'Course Marie didn't have an answer to that. Half-baked as the day is long.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ivy, shush...and so, as the festive season draws nigh--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oooh, get you...nigh, is it? Well, Holly my dear, my full bladder's drawing nigh, so I'll do 'em a message while you're faffing about:</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Don't trip and tumble in the snow</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">You'll gum the works up down below.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ivy!!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's practical, is that! Sight better than oooh, peace and love, oooh, joy to the world, oooh, may the Cat of Misfortune do its widdle on someone else's rug.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm creating the mood for his message.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'll be creating a yellow angel in the snow if you don't--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Merry Christmas and a Happy, Peaceful New Year to everybody. From him and us.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Coo, amen! Now come on, Flog It! might still be on and I want to see if that git from Beaminster got rid of his glitterball orrery....'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLGfZfB-p_BnlU2QD_djNy5IAZm40TuCt3IhJ_5ok9YMvAoPknUMM1bm0d8BhLKCR7q3E3PUNMpsZzSn-M6yBJswia7ralyR4yWtH8IwRYBZ0TQ35z-meLL86qyU1x9iljytj80eBxBmHm_k_Bh69uKTRaWV2J8zLZN-nJSELIhxgpOZ3SFC9VZu2U8A/s397/Holly%20and%20Ivy.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="397" data-original-width="397" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLGfZfB-p_BnlU2QD_djNy5IAZm40TuCt3IhJ_5ok9YMvAoPknUMM1bm0d8BhLKCR7q3E3PUNMpsZzSn-M6yBJswia7ralyR4yWtH8IwRYBZ0TQ35z-meLL86qyU1x9iljytj80eBxBmHm_k_Bh69uKTRaWV2J8zLZN-nJSELIhxgpOZ3SFC9VZu2U8A/s320/Holly%20and%20Ivy.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /></div></div></span></div></div></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-25171806198404954962022-11-08T04:10:00.001-08:002022-11-08T04:13:48.265-08:00Mairzy Doat's A Female Deer....<p> </p><div dir="auto"><div class="x1iorvi4 x1pi30zi x1l90r2v x1swvt13" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_d1"><div class="x78zum5 xdt5ytf xz62fqu x16ldp7u"><div class="xu06os2 x1ok221b"><span class="x193iq5w xeuugli x13faqbe x1vvkbs x1xmvt09 x1lliihq x1s928wv xhkezso x1gmr53x x1cpjm7i x1fgarty x1943h6x xudqn12 x3x7a5m x6prxxf xvq8zen xo1l8bm xzsf02u x1yc453h" dir="auto"><div class="xdj266r x11i5rnm xat24cr x1mh8g0r x1vvkbs x126k92a"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Lalalalala....Sososososo....mememememeeeee.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, what are you doing?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Keeping the old vocal nodules at bay, Piglet. Dohdohdohdohdoh...</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Feeegaro...Feeegaro...Figarofigarofigarofeeeegaaaahhroooowww...</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Figaro here, Figaro there, Figaro every fu--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><span><a tabindex="-1"></a></span>'What for?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'My chance to shine, Piglet. My chance to showcase all my hums on that TV show.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'TV show?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Let's Have A Butcher's At Yer Voice, Then".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's "I Can See Your Voice".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That's what I said.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So which, er, hum to you propose--?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A crowd-pleaser, Piglet. A rousing singalong.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, yes?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Mairzy Doat's A Female Deer".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I think it's "Doh A Deer".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I know what it is, Piglet. Always brings a tear to the old eye when Mary Poppins sings it to that Trappist family high in the Austrian Alfs.' </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's actually The Sound Of--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Success, Piglet. And it'll be all mine. Marvellous song. Halfway through the first verse there's that commotion at the back of the circle. Then this Mother Superior sings, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">"Mariaaah, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">I've just decked a nun</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">called Mariaaah - </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">And suddenly that dame</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Is walking somewhat lame - you seeeee".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That's not how I remember the film you don't remember at all.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">''Course, they have to get a move on with the old "Mairzy Doats". Next thing you know, all those German planes are heading their way.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'The Luftwaffe.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'The Stroopwaffel. Exactly. That's when they all have to clear out...you know, climb every mountain, drive Fords across every stream.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I think it's "ford every stream", Pooh. As in get across --'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Though I can't see how they can climb and drive at the same time. Then there's that bit, </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">"Climb every mountain,</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">Search high and low."</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">I mean, you're not going to clock a mountain if you search low, are you? There you are, snout to the ground...your average What'sthematterhorn isn't going to yell "Oi! I'm up here".'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, I think--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I suppose that's what they call the mystique of cinema.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I suppose.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Anyway, I'll have a gala time on that show. Very genial host, you know. Paddy McGinty.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's Paddy McGuinn--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'An Irishman of note, he is. Fell in for a fortune and - bam! - suddenly and unexpectedly advanced himself in goat-fancying circles.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Paddy McGuinness, Pooh. And he's from near Bolton.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I have no idea to whom who toom you refer, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I...oh, good luck, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Thank you, Piglet. And you will come along? The old moral support? Front row?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'll be somewhere.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Spendid! Now...lalalalalaaa...mememememeeeeee....Jules-Rimet-fat-solar-flare-tee-dious!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Indeed.'</div></div></span></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-48595968430945932232022-10-29T03:13:00.000-07:002022-10-29T03:13:06.332-07:00Fromage-based rockabilly.<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, quite a nice
evening for the time of year, eh, Pooh?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Pooh?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, Piglet, I
was miles away.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Any particular
reason?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Just very sad that
he's gone.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Who?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'The Last Rocker
Standing, Piglet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He of the rebellious
forelock and keyboard thumpage.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, yes...you
mean--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Dairylea Lewis.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I think you'll find
it's Jer--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Quintessential
purveyor of fromage-based rockabilly, you know.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, he was
nothing of the sort--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'"Great Balls
of Stilton."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Incomparable groove.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'He had nothing to
do with--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Finger in every
fondue, Dairylea.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pioneered CaerPhilly
Soul for a start.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, it's just
Philly--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Master
songwriter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wrote that wonderful
hit,<br />
"The moment I wake up<br />
Before I put on my make-up,<br />
I cheddar little tear for you."</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">Made a star of
Benjamin Franklin, that did.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I think you'll find
it's Aretha--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And of course he
played with all the greats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dorset Blue
Vinny, Mississippi Red Leicester.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Soundtracks to
boot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For that film with Whoreson Welles
and Frankie Howerd.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Er, Orson...and
Trev--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Now, what was
it?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ah, yes, the Harry Lymeswold
theme.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But of course Anton Karas played
it...on his slither.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dairylea gifted it
to him and stepped aside.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A measure of
the man.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, it...oh,
never mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Great shame about Jerry Lee
Lewis, too.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Who's he, then?'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"> </p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvQwu9T3xIZhO4xS1P3xnbLfw4f7rPKTqEG413CAe1Uk1zGk0FIw9FwJFC45WovzfS09BWDWvDfO0ATd5MqILroC6q46QDc_aLqoNyWq-j16fZ9Tl43ccBU7MkpOzNhR7NDIQFoZ0u2dxHVYKC7cYIRuw5TiGWktzYhBpM31oyfX-YMozvSJTcjU3MzA/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgvQwu9T3xIZhO4xS1P3xnbLfw4f7rPKTqEG413CAe1Uk1zGk0FIw9FwJFC45WovzfS09BWDWvDfO0ATd5MqILroC6q46QDc_aLqoNyWq-j16fZ9Tl43ccBU7MkpOzNhR7NDIQFoZ0u2dxHVYKC7cYIRuw5TiGWktzYhBpM31oyfX-YMozvSJTcjU3MzA/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"> </p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-37106891509827574462022-09-27T03:31:00.003-07:002022-09-27T03:34:01.292-07:00Smocks and Mirrors<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;"> </p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Of course it's all
flummery, Owl says.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, Piglet, what
is?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Politics.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Nothing but smocks
and mirrors.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Tchah.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I mean, look at the
present management.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Must I?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, all right, for a minute.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'All they've got to
offer is a Quasi-Kwarteng.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Really?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'True, Owl
says.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Won't stump up for a real one.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Dear, oh dear.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'And that Therese
Coffin.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I thought it was
Coffey.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Have you seen the
way she gets through cigars?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Take your point.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'And there's another
called James Cleverly.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Need we go there?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Not at the end of
a chilly day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mind you, someone said he
was fairly decent.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'So how did he end
up among--?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Lost a bet?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'That'd be the way
of it.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I'd say so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And not to mention Miss Truss.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, I
wouldn't.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But is she the one who has
nightmares about being pursued by giant rounds of French cheese singing
"Mademoiselle from Brexitieres"?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Still wakes up
screaming.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or rather, Wakes. Up. Screa.
Ming.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'She. Should. Dou.
Ble. Her. Hor. Licks. In. Take.' </p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'She was a Loiner
for a while, you know.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I wouldn't believe
all they say on Tinder.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'No, she lived in
Leeds.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, I see.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'And spent a year in
British Columbia.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, if you catch
the wrong bus from the Headrow --'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'No, while her dad
was working there.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah, right.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Enjoyed school
there, she did. Said it was really good to be top of the class.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'That's the beauty
of one-to-one teaching, I suppose.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I suppose.'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKKpu1IKU6zKCCSFqgp0EhtTaFinava9-15uS4ejmrBbZjxpOucBN9pB_ChW6H-ynrgiNdqxiwst9o9uY5bz12AnOlCN0ALC0Ru1SyTAV5wycp5AIlQEd4-X8Eo3lwuW5SE2C6nX7WJdNSEYCnzLQsT--igLbjrx97WFFbprbyKDINZwZE47wTVrH7MA/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKKpu1IKU6zKCCSFqgp0EhtTaFinava9-15uS4ejmrBbZjxpOucBN9pB_ChW6H-ynrgiNdqxiwst9o9uY5bz12AnOlCN0ALC0Ru1SyTAV5wycp5AIlQEd4-X8Eo3lwuW5SE2C6nX7WJdNSEYCnzLQsT--igLbjrx97WFFbprbyKDINZwZE47wTVrH7MA/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-63161923874712530532022-09-09T07:02:00.000-07:002022-09-09T07:02:47.689-07:00Unimaginables<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, Piglet.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'How do you feel?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Reflective.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Not to mention
sombre.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'We shan't.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'In fact - enwrapped
in unimaginables.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, you really
should buy them in your own size.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I have to say, this
morning, I definitely felt the hand of destiny.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, that was me
- I thought you were sitting on that extra pot of hunny.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'There will of
course be reverberations.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I know. I ate it
too fast.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'The need to take
stock.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah...yes. Quite.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'To ask the
unaskable question.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'To fight the
unfootling foe.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'To bear with
unbearable sorrow.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'To take a left turn
at Glencoe.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, what are you
on about?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, I thought we
were onto that song...you know..."This is my quest...to leach the
unleachable tar" - and all that.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Hardly appropriate
for the present moment, Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I suppose not.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'There'll be an
extended mourning.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I don't like the
sound of that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My stomach starts
whimpering round eleven.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Not that kind of -
look, let's just ponder in silence.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Right you are.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Have a proper
mull.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Don't we need a
mist rolling in from a sea for that?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Silence, Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'No. I'm sorry,
Pooh.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was rather harsh just then.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I quite understand
- unimaginables chafing, eh?'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">9th September, 2022. <br /></p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKEGPhuzkQ32Px5HNauLd-SdE47FNn9JaInJt6F5WfvGHpeEP8eo0W-MYx5nKw1zfD25zefgIT9Bi7Ew9b6bEre7g1fJOET_Cyrfq9UnYkRuxlXdOQ-TxvIutW36zkopq5-079zsJIHZ8vgBaFVuqWJ1Su2VYuGjhFu5M6dah1hjXZPRuO23Pf_82ydA/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKEGPhuzkQ32Px5HNauLd-SdE47FNn9JaInJt6F5WfvGHpeEP8eo0W-MYx5nKw1zfD25zefgIT9Bi7Ew9b6bEre7g1fJOET_Cyrfq9UnYkRuxlXdOQ-TxvIutW36zkopq5-079zsJIHZ8vgBaFVuqWJ1Su2VYuGjhFu5M6dah1hjXZPRuO23Pf_82ydA/w320-h189/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"> </p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-3174407666591875632022-06-18T03:09:00.000-07:002022-06-18T03:09:40.844-07:00"This is my best side...."<p> </p><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="ecm0bbzt hv4rvrfc ihqw7lf3 dati1w0a" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_59"><div class="j83agx80 cbu4d94t ew0dbk1b irj2b8pg"><div class="qzhwtbm6 knvmm38d"><span class="d2edcug0 hpfvmrgz qv66sw1b c1et5uql lr9zc1uh a8c37x1j fe6kdd0r mau55g9w c8b282yb keod5gw0 nxhoafnm aigsh9s9 d3f4x2em iv3no6db jq4qci2q a3bd9o3v b1v8xokw oo9gr5id hzawbc8m" dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Shame about the stream.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Sorry, Piglet'?</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'By Eeyore's field. Pretty well dammed up after the rains. Set to burst its banks.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, dear.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Still, Tigger's on the case.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm glad to hear it. Very probiotic, Tigger.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Proactive.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, yes, if he has time left over. I'm sure the first thing he'll do is get everyone together--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Second thing, then?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'If that.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So what's the first thing?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Fly to Ukraine for a photo-op with Mr Zelensky.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Tigger says it's the only way to deal with issues whose parameters are own-doorstep-facing.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'He does realise that he says these things out loud?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Occasionally.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Actually, I've noticed a bit of a split in the grain round my front door.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A bit of a split?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'A bit of a split.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, Pooh, you know what to do.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Plane?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Up and away'?</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"Hello Zel...this is my best side"?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"I was meant to meet some chaps in the north of England but I can't for the life of me place where that is"?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'"By the way, have you got any wood-filler knocking about"?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You won't need it.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Whole point of the photo-op. The moment they start snapping, your bit of a split will go away.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Goodness.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You can focus on post-split priorities moving on-wise.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Tigger again?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Sadly, yes.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, that's all a big relief.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Exactly what Kanga found.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Kanga?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Problems with an unruly coppice.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So she's--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Seven miles over Magdeburg as we speak.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOk7iEpO4yo9SD-qGPKHqbTsJU5GmgRGAM8MUYhKfwrHcZ5mWvfT4UMMzHrlaEP8qg1h_cpAKHYfdrAMbbWtjDb2av8XqSCMDEGHFu9MmVx3l324-YCLhTUaIGBb9mprgtyELhIwikUANTcCvyFbEwiOcuJXriRer3O8dGcf9h-ZdmAoGXS_Ryt_YURA/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOk7iEpO4yo9SD-qGPKHqbTsJU5GmgRGAM8MUYhKfwrHcZ5mWvfT4UMMzHrlaEP8qg1h_cpAKHYfdrAMbbWtjDb2av8XqSCMDEGHFu9MmVx3l324-YCLhTUaIGBb9mprgtyELhIwikUANTcCvyFbEwiOcuJXriRer3O8dGcf9h-ZdmAoGXS_Ryt_YURA/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div><div class="l9j0dhe7"><div><br /></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-17065257727223916362022-05-03T09:56:00.000-07:002022-05-03T09:56:19.402-07:00Platignum street plates<p> </p><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="ecm0bbzt hv4rvrfc ihqw7lf3 dati1w0a" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_16j"><div class="j83agx80 cbu4d94t ew0dbk1b irj2b8pg"><div class="qzhwtbm6 knvmm38d"><span class="d2edcug0 hpfvmrgz qv66sw1b c1et5uql lr9zc1uh a8c37x1j fe6kdd0r mau55g9w c8b282yb keod5gw0 nxhoafnm aigsh9s9 d3f4x2em iv3no6db jq4qci2q a3bd9o3v b1v8xokw oo9gr5id hzawbc8m" dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So it's a big occasion.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, yes, Pooh. None bigger.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What's the official name again?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'The Platignum Jubilee.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Platignum, eh? Meaning?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Meaning the nation's admiration.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Because?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well obviously because she's taken good care of the same fountain pen for seventy years.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Fancy that. So...much celebrificalibration.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Bound to be, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Street parties and such.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah, no...street meal.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Meal?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Where we are now, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Meaning?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well back in the mists you'd have had street parties. Now everyone in each street will be asked to contribute the one thing they could afford that week, and it'll be put on a single street plate.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Not cooked?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Cooked, he says. Cooked. Requiring gas. Electrics. Where've you been, Pooh? Get with the pugwash.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So they'll eat the stuff raw?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes...well, when I say "they" - '</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No, I said that.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, when you say and I repeat "they", diners will be selected by raffle.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah, the good old stromboli.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Tombola.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I thought he was the new T20 captain.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Yes, well, they might have a celebrity to pick the tickets.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What about those who aren't winners?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, there'll be plenty of other attractions.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Always assuming that a hundred people watching half-a-dozen other people eating vegetables al-dirtyden is attractive.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, yes...but, you know, there'll be trips down memory lane. Old films.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Such as?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, footage of some chap filling up on a forecourt, paying, coming out with change.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Or maybe some archive nugget of all four gas rings burning for a good minute.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Mercy. I wonder what she'll choose.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Choose, Pooh?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Which uncooked vegetable she'll eat off her street plate. 'Course, she might not get a winning ticket.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Not get...? Oh, Pooh. Bless.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"> </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMWQFMqpCkrIvJO8KFvODaMXohPlCL8NT-cZnSXiFejnhcT51RjcVSVXqGReWoj1bpjO72wklYLPbZBSV_mE_UEHNT1Qwac0msewpfzfZ4ytsjunpOF6veo7nkteW5H5e8L0d8T1fWbxHXNUHvuQ2KEz8WGZ_lPqKhF7B7Zf1JMaAKAsyY27MpruhrMQ/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMWQFMqpCkrIvJO8KFvODaMXohPlCL8NT-cZnSXiFejnhcT51RjcVSVXqGReWoj1bpjO72wklYLPbZBSV_mE_UEHNT1Qwac0msewpfzfZ4ytsjunpOF6veo7nkteW5H5e8L0d8T1fWbxHXNUHvuQ2KEz8WGZ_lPqKhF7B7Zf1JMaAKAsyY27MpruhrMQ/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div><div class="l9j0dhe7"><div><br /></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-41569643889126087902022-02-26T10:23:00.000-08:002022-02-26T10:23:42.712-08:00Slow to clear<p> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="35" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="10" QFormat="true" Name="Title"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="1" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="22" QFormat="true" Name="Strong"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="20" QFormat="true" Name="Emphasis"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="Table Grid"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" Name="Revision"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="34" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="29" QFormat="true" Name="Quote"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="30" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 2"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 3"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="61" Name="Light List Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="63" Name="Medium Shading 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="64" Name="Medium Shading 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="66" Name="Medium List 2 Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="67" Name="Medium Grid 1 Accent 6"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="69" Name="Medium Grid 3 Accent 6"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="71" Name="Colorful Shading Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid Accent 6"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="19" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="21" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="31" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="32" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="33" QFormat="true" Name="Book Title"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="37" SemiHidden="true"
UnhideWhenUsed="true" Name="Bibliography"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
UnhideWhenUsed="true" QFormat="true" Name="TOC Heading"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="41" Name="Plain Table 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="42" Name="Plain Table 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="43" Name="Plain Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="44" Name="Plain Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="45" Name="Plain Table 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="40" Name="Grid Table Light"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46" Name="Grid Table 1 Light"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51" Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52" Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 2"/>
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</p><p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Slow to clear</span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;">There’s one light out there.<br />
The fog isn’t yet what it may be.<br />
Twice I lift and let fall my hand<br />
pretending to sketch the pillared folds <br />
of the curtains dropping clean <br />
either side of the window.<br />
I turn my head.<br />
The room nudges up<br />
its all but colourless angles.<br />
It is dawn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is morning.<br />
It is no time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the wall<br />
is a painting of a boat<br />
run up on nowhere sands<br />
perhaps Rosslare<br />
or granite Brittany.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><br />
Around the light switch<br />
the plate snags a fugitive gleam<br />
like the draff of riches.<br />
I hear whistling cut from a body<br />
in the murk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hear the grizzle of
motion<br />
as an engine crests and sinks<br />
below itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fog thickens.<br />
The one light disappears.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the path<br />
a cat stalks a single fetch of shadow<br />
in hope that it has enough give.<br />
It steps in and never was.<br />
And now a single cry far out on that sea<br />
could be the very world <br />
unfastening its soul<br />
rocking against the effort<br />
then for all time still.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi6Xt8VW7SKtor6eUHx9algObla3anwywPdz254Da1Ay6T3i8IuY39kSKfXEZu_uu5zy8qPlmbSE9qgK4VnF5Z1oquFoHR2CpDX4-JkkQnPpJtMZfDF99O_0wqfwYEpQl6xSCm59CQ1eH6e1kz_BZoPyu3QTzp291YGH0WaEGmO3cL6j1Nc2ox0sYLr3Q=s275" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="183" data-original-width="275" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi6Xt8VW7SKtor6eUHx9algObla3anwywPdz254Da1Ay6T3i8IuY39kSKfXEZu_uu5zy8qPlmbSE9qgK4VnF5Z1oquFoHR2CpDX4-JkkQnPpJtMZfDF99O_0wqfwYEpQl6xSCm59CQ1eH6e1kz_BZoPyu3QTzp291YGH0WaEGmO3cL6j1Nc2ox0sYLr3Q" width="275" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 107%;"> </span></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-35323334815423835352022-01-21T03:36:00.001-08:002022-01-21T03:50:05.177-08:00Talkin' 'bout mah Hiberna-shun!<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well, that's a
great shame...'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, Piglet, what
is?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Penguin Awareness
Day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We just missed it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>January the twentieth.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah, well, never
mind.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'We could say we're
early for next year.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I
suppose...actually, what was that odd Penguin song they used to play?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Sorry, what song?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, you know,
"When you feel a little p-peckish, pick up a p-p-p-Penguin" or
something.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah, now, I asked
Owl about that.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'And he said?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'It's apparently a
cancelled verse from "My Generation".'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah, that would make
sense--</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">"P-people try
to p-pick us up"--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'"Talkin' 'bout
mah Hiberna-shun"--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'"Like we wuz a
store-bought p-pup"--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'"Talkin' 'bout
mah Hiber--"'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Well that's quite
enough of that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still, it fits with that
line, "Things they do look awful c-cold".'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Does it?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Of course.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How penguins see all and sundry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those freezing temperatures.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It coats their eyeballs.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I suppose.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'But I'm at a loss
to know how you show Penguin Awareness.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, well...possibly
rush into a bunch of them and yell, "Am I surrounded by gerbils?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think not!".'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah. Right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is it, though?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Is it what?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'A bunch? Of
penguins?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Actually, no.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When they're on land it's apparently a
waddle, and when they're in the water, it's a raft.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Ah...well, sounds
like a tall order, penguin-raft-rushing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Think I'll give it a miss.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Yes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Probably better to fly over them with a
sign-writer: "Hello you non-gerbils!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>How's tricks?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>C-cold?".'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Far better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I don't think I'll p-pick one up,
either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, why would you?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, you know...all
night bar, lonely weekend, far from home, relationship just ended, in comes
this penguin...'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'What are you
talking about, Piglet?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;">'I haven't the
faintest idea...'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh8rgJLWxZJd5ezRJtGgOwot1R1B9ieIU34WrRdME5F-c4evs_vCe4wpE1OEO8xP-5Sc475sxkJ_P5J8HPuHclEM0yu8Y1K-GgqzUoCKdKdAitwfJEIyo-Ur24KlgWzT14pUsgNGHOeaRyooIm5dHgShTnol0Whz8NaUYzzMEBjoC7MBe2NskhATPctRQ=s449" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh8rgJLWxZJd5ezRJtGgOwot1R1B9ieIU34WrRdME5F-c4evs_vCe4wpE1OEO8xP-5Sc475sxkJ_P5J8HPuHclEM0yu8Y1K-GgqzUoCKdKdAitwfJEIyo-Ur24KlgWzT14pUsgNGHOeaRyooIm5dHgShTnol0Whz8NaUYzzMEBjoC7MBe2NskhATPctRQ=s320" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-519116497157701202021-11-29T11:00:00.001-08:002021-11-29T11:05:48.172-08:00A cornucopacabana<p> </p><div dir="auto"><div class="ecm0bbzt hv4rvrfc ihqw7lf3 dati1w0a" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_6n"><div class="j83agx80 cbu4d94t ew0dbk1b irj2b8pg"><div class="qzhwtbm6 knvmm38d"><span class="d2edcug0 hpfvmrgz qv66sw1b c1et5uql lr9zc1uh a8c37x1j keod5gw0 nxhoafnm aigsh9s9 d3f4x2em fe6kdd0r mau55g9w c8b282yb iv3no6db jq4qci2q a3bd9o3v b1v8xokw oo9gr5id hzawbc8m" dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm telling you, Pooh, it's most unwise.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I care not.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Look, we've been through it times --'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I know we've been through it times enough. To the point where there isn't enough time to time the times we've been through what you've put me through till I'm through in the face.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well, then...if it's you, or me, or Eeyore, or Owl, then you add (he / him / his). If it's Kanga or Tigger's PA...whatever her name is--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Tiffany Breathless.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Right...then you add (she / her / hers).'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What's that little shushing sound you're making?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm opening and closing brackets, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, is that what they sound like?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'They should. If the runners are oiled and they're flush with the woodwork. Which mine are.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Well I don't care a fig for--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, you just can't present yourself as Edward Bear (it / wot?).'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That, Piglet, is just the start of it.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm not just Edward Bear. I'm Edward Bear, Winnie-the-Pooh and Pooh. I'm a confection, Piglet. A plurality. A cornucopacabana.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So - '</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So on other occasions I may advert to my being as Winnie-the-Pooh (them / more of 'em / "Zulus, Sarge, thousands of 'em").'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That's even worse.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'How so?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You're not a Zulu. And it's not right to claim--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'How do you know?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'How do you know I haven't been channelling my essential Zulu-ness on our homeward walks?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'For pity's sake, Pooh --'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You're just Pooh!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see. So now I'm a victim of your mono-descriptoral malfeasance.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'My what??'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You're a fascia!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'It's fascist, Pooh. I've told you--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Now don't you try baffling me with your high tone and semantications. I suspect that you need re-educating.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Do I, now?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, yes. You need training out of your unconscious Gonzales Byass.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'And what on earth might that involve?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'For a start, a free crate-of-twelve...and with Christmas coming up...'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'And where does the unconscious bit come in?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'll repeat it slowly, Piglet...A. Crate. Of. Twelve.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Please, Pooh, just stick with (he / him / his).'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'You do know how annoying that shushiness is...'</div></div></span></div></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyriUd-9HaDQQnxpiNegFZ5khjcxSzF16iMvsNKGqlMeccHZHO7HyNTcbw7nd-Z_LkJ1kdPvJpLd3OvvhtHC00_55bVLmKDWZA9aojmKFbzn38qZgKJuD1GLGU_mJxjdUW9QTyxG9bsjSX/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiyriUd-9HaDQQnxpiNegFZ5khjcxSzF16iMvsNKGqlMeccHZHO7HyNTcbw7nd-Z_LkJ1kdPvJpLd3OvvhtHC00_55bVLmKDWZA9aojmKFbzn38qZgKJuD1GLGU_mJxjdUW9QTyxG9bsjSX/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-80186731350930787362021-11-02T10:53:00.000-07:002021-11-02T10:53:24.222-07:00The last-chance spittoon<p> </p><div class="" dir="auto"><div class="ecm0bbzt hv4rvrfc ihqw7lf3 dati1w0a" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_21"><div class="j83agx80 cbu4d94t ew0dbk1b irj2b8pg"><div class="qzhwtbm6 knvmm38d"><span class="d2edcug0 hpfvmrgz qv66sw1b c1et5uql lr9zc1uh a8c37x1j keod5gw0 nxhoafnm aigsh9s9 d3f4x2em fe6kdd0r mau55g9w c8b282yb iv3no6db jq4qci2q a3bd9o3v b1v8xokw oo9gr5id hzawbc8m" dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So, Piglet.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'COP 26.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Happening right now.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'What does it refer to?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Whom, Pooh.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Whom?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Specifically, PC Jamie MacGillivray of Coatbridge.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah...you mean he's in charge of security--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'He is security.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Goodness...big responsibility.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, yes...all that sitting around...listening.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Sitting and listening?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'That's what each one-cop security contingent has to do at these farragoes. Listen to all the speeches and arrange them in rank order.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So, next time, whoever comes top starts off and whoever comes bottom tries to make themselves heard amid all the departing Range Rovers and bijou jets.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah...so I suppose whoever comes bottom would have to change their tune for next time, to avoid--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Can't be done.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'No?' </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Speeches have to stay the same, by law.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, I see.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'They have to declare that everyone is...now, what's the phrase?...gobbing in the last-chance spittoon.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Good grief.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Plus a lot about our children's children not forgiving them.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'How will they know they won't forgive them?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh, they'll jet into the future, turn up all breathless, ask "So how's the forgiveness thing?" and a bunch of semi-skeletons in the red wastes will say "Nul points" and they'll jet back just in time to see PC MacGillivray draining the last of his thermos.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I see. Still, it begs the question...'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Just one?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'For now. I mean, if all the speeches stay the same, no-one can change their place in the order next time.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Ah, now, that's a matter of taste.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Taste?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Oh yes. Rhetoricorically-wise, Cop Twenty-Six might be, well, differently attuned to, say, Gendarme Vingt-Sept or Polizist Achtundzwanzig...or indeed يىگىرمە توققۇز ساقچى .'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'm sorry, Piglet?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Cop twenty-nine...in Uyghur.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Hmm...but the chances of Uyghurs having any say in climate--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'About the same as having any say in how they draw breath.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Nul points?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLQVwf-49rGPtrw30nq3s_jxYrK5oPLmUuTxlYJggDnsfDWOawUZizOy4cIAizbhkL6ggpRrfzUK5h5vkZ_7apHWgp9b2JuhRtymocCPa3L_JxqhhsreWKj4THGuSXfpfTXuVp5rK3eSEm/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLQVwf-49rGPtrw30nq3s_jxYrK5oPLmUuTxlYJggDnsfDWOawUZizOy4cIAizbhkL6ggpRrfzUK5h5vkZ_7apHWgp9b2JuhRtymocCPa3L_JxqhhsreWKj4THGuSXfpfTXuVp5rK3eSEm/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-60348600431625287612021-09-26T04:20:00.001-07:002021-09-26T04:26:16.338-07:00Dongledangle<p> </p><p></p><div dir="auto"><div class="ecm0bbzt hv4rvrfc ihqw7lf3 dati1w0a" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_kv"><div class="j83agx80 cbu4d94t ew0dbk1b irj2b8pg"><div class="qzhwtbm6 knvmm38d"><span class="d2edcug0 hpfvmrgz qv66sw1b c1et5uql lr9zc1uh a8c37x1j keod5gw0 nxhoafnm aigsh9s9 d3f4x2em fe6kdd0r mau55g9w c8b282yb iv3no6db jq4qci2q a3bd9o3v b1v8xokw oo9gr5id hzawbc8m" dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'The problem with you, Piglet, is you've got no gumption.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh, all I'm saying is that it's unworkable.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Of course it's workable. Look...all we need...big cushion against the seat...you up on my shoulders so you can reach the steering wheel...me in my winter galoshes to reach the pedals...extendable arm on your left trotter so you can do the gears...and Hey Pasta! Solution! One less lorry standing idle.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I doubt that we'd be allowed--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Piglet, they're crying out. We'd be doing our bit to rescue the nation...you know...our paleolithic duty.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Really, Pooh--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'We'd turn up at Swansea, you on my shoulders, extra long coat, chappie says "Congratulations, young man, here's your matriculated lorry licence, go forth and truck" - result!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'They'd figure out that there were two of us.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I'd hold you steady. And you could wear a balaclava. That would--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'So someone turning up in a balaclava asking to be let loose on the roads...that wouldn't arouse any kind of---?'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Your problem, Piglet, is that the bigger picture constantly eludes you. Think of the benefits. Travelling the world. Seeing how Maersk is spelt in a hundred languages.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I rather think you'd find it's still Maer--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Taking our place on the pantechnicon of haulage greats. You know, Norbert Dongledangle...'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Er, Dentressang--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'R T H Lubbers. Scared of water, they are...great opportunity to poach business from them, though, global-solution-logistics-wise.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'I think R T H Lubbers is quite happy to sail on--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Prestons of Potto. Word is they're actually Potters of Preston but the sign-writer got all squiffy on the paint fumes...by which time it was too late.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Actually, Pooh, Potto is in North York--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'And who knows where we might go from there? Like that chap who built up his fleet and then made it big in Hollywood.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'For the last time, Pooh, you're confusing--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Humphrey Stobart. Terrific, he was, in "Doverblanca". Means "white cliffs", you know. Epic lines. "Sign it again, Sam...here's flashing me docket at you, kid...round up the usual sprockets." Immortal.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Just imagine, Piglet. Sunrise over the Hook of Holland. The smell of dockside containers in the morning--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh--' </div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Like victory, you know. Which we'd be helping to ensure. I can see it now--'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Unlike one of Rabbit's larger holes, which you're about to fall into.'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Pooh 'N' Pig--Provisioning the Planet. Big gold letters in--Aarrrgghh!'</div><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;">'Told you.'</div></div></span></div></div></div></div><p></p><p></p><div dir="auto"><div class="ecm0bbzt hv4rvrfc ihqw7lf3 dati1w0a" data-ad-comet-preview="message" data-ad-preview="message" id="jsc_c_kv"><div class="j83agx80 cbu4d94t ew0dbk1b irj2b8pg"><div class="qzhwtbm6 knvmm38d"><span class="d2edcug0 hpfvmrgz qv66sw1b c1et5uql lr9zc1uh a8c37x1j keod5gw0 nxhoafnm aigsh9s9 d3f4x2em fe6kdd0r mau55g9w c8b282yb iv3no6db jq4qci2q a3bd9o3v b1v8xokw oo9gr5id hzawbc8m" dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q"><div dir="auto" style="text-align: start;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk7cheJH2azyXvgc5ZgQw-sBBd7MzKpZMkeQa3gYOjM2IkP_uQohkVqlneD9I8AyrbSe-Bua9Ir_clyHyuCcH676vZ4rot7AJyowty_nUm_KMnuMZz089wvvmNZBbOJpQNIyYo7nkJ8XiY/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjk7cheJH2azyXvgc5ZgQw-sBBd7MzKpZMkeQa3gYOjM2IkP_uQohkVqlneD9I8AyrbSe-Bua9Ir_clyHyuCcH676vZ4rot7AJyowty_nUm_KMnuMZz089wvvmNZBbOJpQNIyYo7nkJ8XiY/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> </div></div></span></div></div></div></div><p></p>Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-44765871138890150102021-08-25T08:06:00.000-07:002021-08-25T08:06:19.327-07:00Watteau<p>
</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'It's very sad,
Piglet.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Indeed it is,
Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And to think he
wasn't just a drummer.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'No, he started out
in graphic--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Discovered the
steam kettle, you know.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh, I rather
think you're rather thinking--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And when Benjamin
Franklin invented the electric kite, he was first on the scene.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Pooh--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Came straight out
with "Watt's all this?"<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Didn't
bat an eyelid, just punned himself and coined a unit of power.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'I think you'll find
that Benjamin--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Not to mention his
swerve into art.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>'Course, he called
himself Watteau for that.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Where on earth did
eau come--?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Watercolours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Honestly, Piglet...'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Silly me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well...a man of many parts.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'All of which
clubbed together to help him...well, club together.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'And what's your
favourite song, Pooh?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of theirs?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Oh, has to be Dinky
Toy Women.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yours?'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Mmm...probably
Jumpin' Flash Git.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'D'you know, I
always fancied being born in a crossfire hurricane.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'One to ponder,
Pooh.'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'Exactly!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because it strikes me--'</p>
<p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;">'But not now.'</p><p style="font-family: Calibri; font-size: 11.0pt; margin: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWVViRVTmcmDC6VyFlucsgomIhQUT3anKH_5mbnDg6NcJWBfkVYApX7tmpJ8l7RXId7nVkTzutb_aErcIOyQooXLBvKSJfuD32yoKWGEJWtzm0hvISAoj2g1nOpvEB4wzHwhw5sOnlOxUq/s449/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="292" data-original-width="449" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWVViRVTmcmDC6VyFlucsgomIhQUT3anKH_5mbnDg6NcJWBfkVYApX7tmpJ8l7RXId7nVkTzutb_aErcIOyQooXLBvKSJfuD32yoKWGEJWtzm0hvISAoj2g1nOpvEB4wzHwhw5sOnlOxUq/s320/pooh-and-piglet.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2417011121782090427.post-81979196556364559232021-06-29T01:57:00.000-07:002021-06-29T01:57:55.741-07:00Jenga (i.m. 2004-2021)<p> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="35" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="10" QFormat="true" Name="Title"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="1" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="22" QFormat="true" Name="Strong"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" UnhideWhenUsed="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" Name="Table Grid"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="62" Name="Light Grid"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="73" Name="Colorful Grid"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="65" Name="Medium List 1 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" SemiHidden="true" Name="Revision"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="30" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="72" Name="Colorful List Accent 1"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="60" Name="Light Shading Accent 6"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="19" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="21" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="31" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="32" QFormat="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="33" QFormat="true" Name="Book Title"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="37" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="39" SemiHidden="true"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="41" Name="Plain Table 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="42" Name="Plain Table 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="43" Name="Plain Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="44" Name="Plain Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="45" Name="Plain Table 5"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="40" Name="Grid Table Light"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46" Name="Grid Table 1 Light"/>
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51" Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52" Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
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<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 1"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="51"
Name="Grid Table 6 Colorful Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="52"
Name="Grid Table 7 Colorful Accent 2"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="46"
Name="Grid Table 1 Light Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="47" Name="Grid Table 2 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="48" Name="Grid Table 3 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="49" Name="Grid Table 4 Accent 3"/>
<w:LsdException Locked="false" Priority="50" Name="Grid Table 5 Dark Accent 3"/>
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</p><p class="MsoNormal"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Jenga</span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Not a four walls enthusiast.<br />
His were the scarps and highways<br />
of the garden,<br />
the shrubs above him<br />
high as Nordic pines.<br />
Mid-morning by the summer-house<br />
he’d turn from whatever labours<br />
the cat-world confects<br />
and just sit, <br />
then maybe take on a fence-post<br />
or have an unavailing lick<br />
at one of his off-white paws.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">Jem, I called him for a bit,<br />
but mostly we settled for Jen.<br />
<i>Jenga </i>was thrown round him<br />
like a kid’s brute embrace<br />
by whoever had him before he arrived,<br />
an RSPCA two-for-one<br />
with a sister who died years ago.<br />
To begin with he stayed a good seven days<br />
in the sideboard’s under-shadow,<br />
fearing the rough-house would simply resume<br />
in this new, just as frightening land.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;">The evening after his sister died<br />
he patrolled the living room<br />
chair by chair and cover by cover,<br />
sensing that the world now nursed<br />
a black-and-white-shaped absence.<br />
Before much longer <br />
our lonely tabby might search the same,<br />
still hearing in her own way<br />
his morefoodnow plaint.<br />
And maybe she’ll wait in a room’s open country<br />
for the off-white clip round her ear<br />
which he’d deliver at full-bowl time,<br />
and which, in the ether behind her eyes,<br />
he may keep on doling without a care<br />
from whatever pocket Eden <br />
now protects him.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 107%;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMn35n6eu5DQYCElB8V0tNNSwSdC0T1VOtK38H0rCrt5fhMhbjE97hjH2sABvDIRp6b3lMB0gOt4eagFsVvREJWg_bW_pKZnluo3f9mbx6orLoDbOj8_YN4a0GR1IZ_K39i3cTwyvNcKzi/s2048/Jen+%25232+28+12+20.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMn35n6eu5DQYCElB8V0tNNSwSdC0T1VOtK38H0rCrt5fhMhbjE97hjH2sABvDIRp6b3lMB0gOt4eagFsVvREJWg_bW_pKZnluo3f9mbx6orLoDbOj8_YN4a0GR1IZ_K39i3cTwyvNcKzi/s320/Jen+%25232+28+12+20.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><br /> <p></p>
Michael Wyndham Thomashttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12151132921204957188noreply@blogger.com2