Skip to main content

The soothing dullness of the prosaic

First up thanks to all for kind thoughts, words and deeds. It's all much appreciated (though those words do the degree of a appreciation a gross injustice). It's impossible, I feel, to adequately convey a reaction or emotion under this sort of circumstance. One of the reasons I chose not to speak at the funeral is that every sentiment sounds like a Hallmark card, it sticks in my throat, it doesn't seem enough, somehow, and I loathe retreating into the prosaic, the rote, the truism. It seems like I'm doing him down by not coming up with something better.

But hey, truism alert, life goes on.

So it does, this is incontrovertible. Seasons turn yadda yadda yadda. Save it for the film of the book of the film if you please, doubtless the heroine will love again, her boyfriend from the first scene's still bleeding dead though, isn't he? So no "moving on" (appalling phrase) is something I don't see occuring any time soon.

But, but, see above. Life goes on. yes it does, of course it does. Grieving doesn't pay the bills. So thank the deity of your choice that as a repressed Briton I get to sublimate everything into work. Huzzah! Scrub them pans, bake them scones, dish up them fritattas. Ponder the mysteries of life (such as where the fuck has everyone in Ormskirk gone? seriously, the place is deserted, shopkeepers meet each other's worried glances as they peer out of doors scanning the deserted streets, it's freaky, I tell's ya), do your bit, come home, try to be a nice guy. And it does get marginally easier to do so each day. Another hundred-odd customers would be nice, though; much easier not to think when you're getting battered.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Inedible

"He says it's inedible" said my front of house manager, as she laid the half-eaten fish and chips in front of me, and instantly I relaxed.  Clearly, I observed, it was edible to some degree. I comped it, because I can't be arsed arguing the toss, and I want to make my front of house's lives as simple as possible. The haddock had been delivered that morning. The fryers had been cleaned that morning. The batter had been made that morning (and it's very good batter, ask me nicely and I'll give you the recipe some time). The fish and chips was identical to the other 27 portions I'd sent out on that lunch service, all of which had come back more or less hoovered up, we have have a (justified, if I do say so myself) very good reputation for our chips. But it was, apparently, "inedible". When it comes to complaints, less is more. If you use a hyperbolic word like that, I'll switch off, you've marked yourself as a rube, a chump, I'm not g...

Creepy old men

I note, somewhat wearily, that creepy old men are back in the news, being creepy. Creepy old men, and their apologists and enablers, who argue that their creepiness is somehow the natural order of things. Old men would have you believe that it is difficult to not be a creepy old man. That it is a task of epic proportions. It is not that difficult. It is a matter of intention. As yet more of the grimness of Epstein unfolds, creepy old men are, sadly, a flaccid topic once again. Whether it be pursuing students thirty years their junior, or simply not asking too many questions about the background of the probably legal young woman who you've just been introduced to by your good pal Jeff. To be clear, I am not referring to criminal creepy old men, the ones who actually committed statutory rape, the ones who fucked trafficked hirls. That is not something which is allowed to get away merely with the contempt of the observer.  That deserves prison.  No , I'm referring to the hinterla...

Chop chop

I was completely ignorant of the fuss over the edited Trump speech in an edition of Panorama until, one moment later, I wasn't. And the reasons for my ignorance are instructive. I had no idea that the story was even brewing until the surprise Sunday night news of the resignations of Tom Davie and Deborah Turness. As I'm sure you are by now aware, this was occasioned by a clumsy edit in an old edition of Panorama, which has already been on the iplayer for a year. It's a non-story. Except people decided to make it a story. The reason I'd heard nothing of it until the resignations was that I'm not on X, where, apparently, it was all the media classes had been talking about for a week. It was an obsession of the unholy right-wing trifecta of the Mail, Telegraph and Times (who, given that they sent a bloke just last week to interview the wrong Bill di Blasio, you'd think would wind their necks in over factual inacccuracy). It was big news on GB news, all self-contain...