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Who do you dance like??

22/6/2014

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So, to a wedding in Dorset.

Lovely day, blah blah blah, and the obligatory disco later. I was sporting a new beige linen summer jacket of a type worn on that day in that place by only 27 other middle-aged men. It was basically a trial run for Glorious Goodwood. In my head I was Fortescue Bothering-Heigham, a 6 foot four, eleven stone dandy, with lissome moves and a voice like Radio Four nectar. Or John Gosden if you prefer.

Revisiting the evening over dinner just now, Anne and I gossiping wildly behind everyone's backs, unpicking the details with forensic precision, I mentioned in passing to my dear wife that she may have been a little blootered, a mite boozed up, completely banjaxed.

She agreed, and admitted to looking at me on the dance floor, as I showed the younger folk how to throw a few shapes to Chic and Sister Sledge, and seeing through a glass darkly that I was actually Stynx, the Commander of the Sontaran people. Which explains the filthy, other-worldy sex we almost had later, I suppose...

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Boris the Spider

11/6/2014

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A guest has moved into our downstairs toilet. A big one. To paraphrase Woody Allen it's a spider the size of a Buick. Late at night when I turn the light on it darts back behind the cistern where it has taken up residence. On its webs there's enough trapped meat for a family barbecue. This Spring in our house, it's basically been an apocalypse for insects and little spiders. The damned thing is growing by the day.

Now, if I understand the theory of biophilia properly, my fear of spiders and snakes is not the delirium tremens of a soft southern ponce it's always been mistaken for by your average playground bully (and Anne), but a genetically encoded survival mechanism. Come the invasion of the spiders and one of us is ready, that's what I'm saying. I'm basically the Andrew Lincoln of spidergeddon.

And the self-administered cognitive based therapy of the last twenty years has worked. Nearly. I find, if I'm well past a bottle of red wine, I can stumble into the bathroom of an evening, watch him watching me from around the back of the toilet and have a short unsatisfying pee. What's that? Turn my back on him for poo? Are you kidding...?




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One Dog and His Man

6/6/2014

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So, after much ado, by which I mean two long years failing to get the damned thing published, and in which time I've managed to co-write and publish a novel, here's the cover and new title for my little Shropshire book. 



Out soon...

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Steam Training

2/6/2014

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The internet may have shrunk the world, but Arriva Trains Wales hasn't.

I caught a train from Swansea to Shrewsbury this afternoon and am due to arrive in several days time. One poor bloke boarded the train at Milford Haven in 2008 and is due to alight at Manchester Piccadilly in time for the first Mars landing. The train – two carriages long – trundles through pretty much every small town in South Wales and the borders. It stops at Cardiff for an extended season to take on board coal, water and cowboys for this is pioneer country with Neath valley taking the part of Wyoming. 

Later, out of Wales and into England, we wander into the lost valley of Yosemite, or Church Stretton as settlers will doubtless go on to name it, and it is so beautiful in the rain I almost wish it was 1869. Instead of 1954...


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    Writing

     LuluCurrent state of play:


    1. Indifferent Voices
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    2. One Dog and His Man. Out now in paperback.
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    3. Farewell Trip.
    Published by Carina UK.
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    4.  Silly Verse for  Grown Ups
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