Posted on by JonnyB

The LTLP is electrocuted!!!

A short cry followed by silence from the scullery announces this fact. I look up from the TV with interest.

“Would you come here a minute?” demands a voice in a weaker-than-usual timbre.

I pick up the Baby and head for the voice.

“Do not bring the Baby.”

I replace the Baby. We meet in the connecting corridor. She explains that she has received a large shock from the sink. I push past her and poke my head round the door. The sink is there, an innocuous look on its face.

The short cry was real enough. I realise that I will have to perform some tests. Not having much electricians’ gear in the shed, I am nevertheless able to locate a diagnostic tool which consists of five long strips of bone, each sleeved in a layer of skin, connected to the end of my arm.

The sink smiles coyly at me.

I place my hand about an inch from its metal surface, slowly moving it closer, millimetre by millimetre. Everybody knows that things hurt less if you do it like this – it is probably the mix of metric and imperial units. I touch the sink and nothing happens. I grin, reassured.

Recklessly, I remove my shoes and do the same.

“OOOAARGHHHHYOOOY!!!” I comment.

There is a sort of noise, which I take to be the insolent laughter of a domestic fitting.

Bough’s Law states that when something surprising or unexpected happens as a consequence of a repeatable action then you shall mindlessly repeat the action, no matter how unpleasant the previous consequence.

“OOOAARGHHHHYOOOY!!!” I reaffirm.

“The sink is live,” I carefully explain to the LTLP. I have an idea, and switch off the lights in the sunroom, which have been behaving oddly. I return to the scullery and touch the sink again. It is pitifully impotent.

“That is interesting,” I muse. “When the lights in the other room are switched off the sink is normal. But when they’re switched on, it gets all electric.”

There is a silence. “That could be useful,” I continue.

The LTLP glares at me. I pick up the telephone to call the Methodical Builder.

Posted on by JonnyB

There is a noise in the kitchen.

I turn to investigate. Mrs Short Tony has appeared, like the shopkeeper in the Mr Benn cartoons.

“I’ve brought the list for you,” she announces.

I am nonplussed by this. I have a slight hangover, and am not functioning at my usual 85% capacity. She clearly notices my vacant look.

“The list. For the Village Book Group.”

I have joined a book group!!!

There is a dim memory of a conversation about this in the Village Pub. It had seemed an extremely good idea – I do not get much intellectual stimulation at present what with looking after the baby, not having a satellite dish etc. I go to take the list, only to find it snatched away.

“You are not,” she states, “allowed to join if you are only planning to write sarcastic things about it on the Internet.”

I am genuinely stung by this, and protest some protestations. In fact I am a bit insulted. After extensive negotiations it is agreed that I am allowed to join the book group if I impose a strict news blackout of its activities. I assent to this, shamefully capitulating to the petty tyranny of Blair’s fascist id card state.

She hands me the list and tells me to choose a book. On close examination, I haven’t read any of them, which is a bit of an unexpected hurdle. In the end I pass on the Robbie Williams and Dan Brown ones and settle on one called ‘The Time Traveller’s Wife’, as it is most probably about space, and I particularly like books set in space.

She takes my choice to put in her important book group file. I am pleased with my new position amongst the literati, notwithstanding the frustration that I will never be able to talk about it.

Posted on by JonnyB

There is a scrunch of gravel!!!

I sprint down the secret path that leads to Short Tony’s house, arriving breathless as he is getting out of his car.

“Did you get many geese then?” I blurt, casually.

His face falls like shares in a factory making plastic Chris Langhams for cereal packets. “It was a fiasco,” he bemoans, rather than just moans, as it sounds moanier.

“No geese?” I ask, aghast.

“Not even one,” he confirms.

I cannot believe that his long-awaited wild goose hunt has turned out to be a wild goose hunt. The bitter irony hangs in the air like a malignant helium balloon. I mutter some words of consolation and turn to slope back home.

Posted on by JonnyB

The fire whooshes away in the ingle-nook.

“To be honest,” concludes Short Tony, “I was embarrassed for him. I mean – it says something that I wet myself and was sick over Keith’s car, and still wasn’t the person who emerged with the least dignity.”

We nod in appalled recollection of an evening many months ago. I sink back into the sofa. The impromptu re-opening of the Short Man, the pub in Short Tony’s dining room, has been a measurable success. Short Tony pours me more wine, which I will later fling over his carpet via the wrong end of a pool cue.

We have neglected this aspect of our culture recently. The Short Man opened when the Village Pub was closed for a period of time; we used it regularly, being proud to be such a part of a locals’ establishment. But – on my part – babies, family life and bowls intervened; others drifted away similarly; the snooker table lay unused and the dartboard grew cobwebs.

Now, to my great joy, I find that the baby monitor thing just has enough range to reach the lounge bar area.

It is time to resurrect my social life.