Vagueness and the Aftermath - A sporadic diary

[RED-DOG]

Tom after your posts about perceptions of Gypsies, I was wondering how life for a Gypsy has changed between your childhood and the lifestlye your grandchildren will have

Blimey! What a question that is.

[RED-DOG]

Have your ears recovered from the non stop bollocks that woman was spouting on your GUKPT table yet ?

Pardon?

[david3103]

p 106

If only there were more hours in the day...

A quick question though - I always understood crows to be solitary creatures? Isn't the saying, "If you see a rook, it's a crow, and if you see a lot of crows, them's rooks"?

[RED-DOG]

On Friday morning, I threw my bed, my wash bag, and a change of schmutter into my pickup and pootled off down the smoke to play the GUKPT main event at the Vic.

Traffic was sparse, and I covered the 90 or so miles to the Edgware Rd in a little over an hour. It then took me about another 45 minutes travel to 4 or 5 miles along the Edgware Rd to my recently discovered secret parking space. You have to negotiate a 14in kerb to gain access, but it’s right on the main Rd, outside the congestion charge zone, and less than 10 minutes walk from the Vic. I could tell you where it is, but then I would have to kill you.

It was only 12:30pm when I arrived. The comp didn’t start until 2pm so I had plenty of time to spare. Unusually for me, I was hungry, so, I sallied forth in search of sustenance.

What a great place the Edgware Rd is to go walkabout. Crammed to bursting with brightly coloured, multi ethnic shops, and brightly coloured, multi ethnic people. I could have strolled around for hours in the spring sunshine. Squeezing fruits that I didn’t recognise, looking at bizarre foreign goods in store windows, and listening to the babble of exotic voices. It was like being on holiday.

All to soon, I realised that two things were pressing. Time, and my belly against my backbone. I needed to make haste. I spotted a kebab shop that looked busy (Never eat in an empty restaurant) and I ducked inside.

There were two of those huge “Elephant’s legs” of meat (One lamb, the other chicken) slowly twirling in front of a gas-powered grill. Then, in a glass fronted cabinet below the counter, there was a vast array of salad, dips and sauces. Finally, and fascinatingly, in the middle of the floor, there was a dark skinned man with a huge, impossibly white smile, cooking  bread in what I can only describe as a cement mixer balanced on top of a bonfire.

If the cooking implement was fascinating, the cooking method was even more so. The smiling man would take a lump of dough about the size of a cricket ball, spin it in his hands until it was a Frisbee, and then hurl it into the glowing cement mixer where it would attach itself to the red hot side of the drum. The man would now turn his attention to another ball of dough, leaving the first one to become absolutely delicious.

Quickly, I got myself on the outside of a large portion of elephant’s leg and cement mixer Frisbee. 20 minutes later, I was in the Vic

[RED-DOG]

p 106

If only there were more hours in the day...

A quick question though - I always understood crows to be solitary creatures? Isn't the saying, "If you see a rook, it's a crow, and if you see a lot of crows, them's rooks"?

No. You often see them singly but they're not always solitary. The term for a group of crows is a "Murder"

[tikay]

Last Friday, I played the GUKPT £1500 + £75 main event at the Victoria casino.

I was so “up” for this one. I had been looking forward to it for ages. I felt relaxed, but not too relaxed, confident, but not too confident. Yada yada, etc etc. In short, I had, to quote Newman’s character in Cool Hand Luke, “Got my mind right boss”.

Because of the 2pm start and the difficulty sometimes encountered when trying to negotiate the M1 and the Edgware Rd on a Friday, I toyed briefly with the idea of travelling down on the Thursday, but eventually decided against it, opting instead to spend the day doing my odd jobs and generally getting everything organised so that the girls could survive for 3 days without me. (I’m the only one who ever does anything around here, honest).

So on Thursday morning, I got up fairly early and took the dog a walk, (When I said this once to Tony' he said it should be “Took the dog for a walk”. He’s right of course, but We’ve always said, “Took the dog a walk” in our in our family and it’s too late to change).

Anyway…

I took the dog a walk and then came home and cut the grass. I have a lot of grass, and I cut most of it with an ancient ride on lawnmower. Every time I use this mower, I have to do some kind of repair or modification to it, today was no exception. The choke cable had seized up inside it’s housing. So I had to break off the choke knob, remove the housing, and use the now free but very floppy cable freestyle, tucking loose end into a conveniently missing bolt hole to prevent it getting tangled in the mower blades after the engine had started. (Pics available on request).

Next, I checked all the gas bottles to make sure none of them would conk while I was away. I don’t actually use a lot of bottled gas, but I do use a lot of gas bottles, if you know what I mean. (If you don’t, admit it now and I’ll explain it better) There is one bottle on each of the two caravans, one on the portacabin, and two on the mobile home.

I changed one bottle using a specially shaped “Gas” spanner that I found in the scrap one day over 30 years ago. (Pics available on request) I don’t know how I’ve managed to keep it so long, because gas spanners are very prone to being borrowed and, once borrowed, not returned. I like this little gas spanner though, and I’m a total pain in the arse when I lend it to someone. “Don’t forget where it came from” I say, wagging my finger. “I’ve had that gas spanner for 30 years, and if it goes missing, I’m holding you personally responsible. You will have to replace it, but you can’t replace it because they don’t make them like that anymore, it’s irreplaceable.

After that, I filled the bird feeder, cut Kizzy’s fringe, and replaced a blown light bulb with an energy saving one. (Pics available etc)

We started using energy saving light bulbs ages ago, and I’m a big fan. When you turn them on, they don’t operate at full brightness until they get warmed up, (a bit like me really) but we’re used to candles and Tilley lamps etc, so we don’t mind that. On the plus side, they last forever and they really do reduce your electricity bill and reduce your carbon footprint. Mind you, I don’t worry too much about that (You know what they say about men with big carbon footprints). Pics available on request.

More to follow. (I’ve found it quite refreshing to write about poker for a change)

No - you said "me Dad wanted to take dog a walk". Just as wrong, sigh.

And without warning, the best Diary on the Web bursts back into life!

Lovely piece Tom, thank you, must have taken an age to fettle & faff it.

And I just have to come see that partridge.

[Karabiner]

Should that not be "come AND see that partridge" ?

[Laxie]

Should that not be "come AND see that partridge" ?

Depends.  Is he good at multi tasking?

[tikay]

Should that not be "come AND see that partridge" ?

Bugger!

Not wrong Ralph.

Red's English is rubbing off on  me.

[Karabiner]

But surely to take the dog a-walking, ergo a-walk is acceptable in a poetic sort of olde tyme English stylee ?

[MANTIS01]

It then took me about another 45 minutes travel to 4 or 5 miles along the Edgware Rd to my recently discovered secret parking space. You have to negotiate a 14in kerb to gain access, but it’s right on the main Rd, outside the congestion charge zone, and less than 10 minutes walk from the Vic. I could tell you where it is, but then I would have to kill you.

I have a friend who wants me to ask if you could tell his ex-wife where it is.

[RED-DOG]

Should that not be "come AND see that partridge" ?

Bugger!

Not wrong Ralph.

Red's English is rubbing off on  me.

Hypocrisy!! I am affronted, incensed and indignant.

If some tiny element, some infinitesimal molecule of my boundlessly comprehensive vocabulairy should undergo an abrasive transposition, and in that process  become part of your lexicon, it would then be veracious for you to consider it a result.

[kinboshi]

It then took me about another 45 minutes travel to 4 or 5 miles along the Edgware Rd to my recently discovered secret parking space. You have to negotiate a 14in kerb to gain access, but it’s right on the main Rd, outside the congestion charge zone, and less than 10 minutes walk from the Vic. I could tell you where it is, but then I would have to kill you.

I have a friend who wants me to ask if you could tell his ex-wife where it is.

[tikay]

Should that not be "come AND see that partridge" ?

Bugger!

Not wrong Ralph.

Red's English is rubbing off on  me.

Hypocrisy!! I am affronted, incensed and indignant.

If some tiny element, some infinitesimal molecule of my boundlessly comprehensive vocabulairy should undergo an abrasive transposition, and in that process  become part of your lexicon, it would then be veracious for you to consider it a result.

Sorry Tom, but vocabulary is not "matter", & as such, does not contain any molecules.

Take the dog a walk. Quaint, yes, right, no. The dog goes to the walk, the walk does not go to the dog.

The default setting in these matters is what would HM The Queen say. She would take the corgis FOR a walk.

[kinboshi]

Should that not be "come AND see that partridge" ?

Bugger!

Not wrong Ralph.

Red's English is rubbing off on  me.

Hypocrisy!! I am affronted, incensed and indignant.

If some tiny element, some infinitesimal molecule of my boundlessly comprehensive vocabulairy should undergo an abrasive transposition, and in that process  become part of your lexicon, it would then be veracious for you to consider it a result.

Sorry Tom, but vocabulary is not "matter", & as such, does not contain any molecules.

Take the dog a walk. Quaint, yes, right, no. The dog goes to the walk, the walk does not go to the dog.

The default setting in these matters is what would HM The Queen say. She would take the corgis FOR a walk.

No, usually she'd get someone else to take them for a walk - especially if they've had an annus horribilis.