You will perhaps have seen the photograph on Facebook already. I thought I would reproduce it here for the benefit of anybody who has not. It is my grandson, Ritalin Boy, my genes’ single shot at immortality, having a day out with Number One Son-In-Law.
I was most comprehensively impressed to see it, and Mark laughed a great deal. It is entirely possible that our bloodline will not make it into the next millenium, given its preoccupation with exciting activities and brave adventure, but it will at least have had a good time on its way to extinction.
I had a terrible misadventure last night.
It was really quiet, and I could sit outside the nightclub in almost completely undisturbed tranquillity writing my book. I had written loads and loads when the screen suddenly wiggled a bit, went completely blank, and then reappeared showing just my home page on the front.
I had lost everything I had written. Six hundred whole words had been swallowed by the universe, to disappear into nowhere as if I had never thought them in the first place.
I was jolly upset.
I didn’t dare write anything else in case the universe was still hungry and decided to pop back for more.
I waited until I got home, where the proper full-size computer sits on my desk. I know that this one is reliable because it has got a proper plug and bits of wire and a trustworthy appearance.
I told Mark all about it, and when I had finished my shower I went to sit in front of the computer where I painstakingly rewrote it all, trying my best to remember the best bits and to improve on them as I went.
It was almost six o’ clock before I got to bed.
It is not a brilliant idea to spend the last hours before bedtime writing about snow-covered adventures. I spent the night having peculiar weather-related dreams and woke up at ten, completely unable to get back to sleep, and not quite able to work out why there was no snow on Oak Street.
We got up then, and I explained endlessly to Mark about saddles and barrels of molasses and lame horses, until in the end he wondered if I would be interested to hear about the bearings on the back axle of the camper van.
He volunteered to stir the picnic curry whilst I went dashing back off upstairs to carry on creating unpleasant experiences for my hapless characters to courageously overcome.
I know that is bad English, please don’t write in about it, it just sounds worse the other way round.
Unfortunately he got distracted by restocking the log pile and didn’t pay as much attention to the curry as he should have. It turned out to be a little drier and blacker than it should have been, but neither of us minded.
We went to work early, in case there were any tourists floating about on the lake who might decide to get taxis home, but there weren’t. There was one elderly gentleman who told Mark that seven pounds was a scandalous price to pay for a taxi, and an intoxicated couple who did not know how to pronounce Aphrodite’s Lodge.
It is a good job I am busy writing a book, otherwise I might be starting to get bored by now.
Only five more hours to go.
