Laundry

I attended a get-together tonight. One of my neighbours was celebrating finding her cat after it had been missing for a fortnight. Again, I am drunk.

In conversation, I discovered that it is normal to change one's bedclothes every week. Oops! That is (at least) four times more frequently than I had previously understood to be acceptable.

So, while I am airing my dirty laundry in public...

I recently bought and watched an American TV series called "Dexter". I empathized with the eponymous anti-hero, not because he is a serial-killer (you will be relieved to read) but because he is detached from the world, a mere observer.

Last week, I hitched a lift to France. I went for the sole purpose of bringing back the little car that I have owned since I courted Ann: the car that witnessed her agreeing to marry me; the car that took us to Cornwall and to Scotland. It missed not a beat as it blasted noisily across Northern France from the Mayenne to Boulogne. Now, it is parked in the narrow road outside my house here in Kent. I can see it from my bedroom window. It is raining hard and the ancient soft top leaks.

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The day or so that I spent in France was, confusingly, entirely delightful. Spring had sprung, as they say. I mowed the grass, tended the fruit trees and immersed myself in the simple things. A little splash of bright colour on the drab walls that surround me.

Life is a strange, strange affair.