Mr Soap Suds Bumble's Weekend

WRITTEN ON SATURDAY EVENING - 15th December 2007

TEN DAYS TO GO! Till nasty old Xmas! I'm decamped to my floor, hammynesting between bed and mattress upended and shoved sideways... a deep valley...

I put "wild bird" (seed) out for the robbies earlier, so they've been all a-scamper and a-paking pouches and pinging to and from their seed packed teabox.

Spherical had crammed her own pouches so brimmingly full she really did look like a furry ball with stubby pink scampery legs and beady eyes (when I first got her I honestly did think she was pregnant). And unable to squeeze into said teabox, she made an attempt at climbing the wheel on the outside which of course is impossible unless in ultra-gremlin style they've managed to bung it up with plugs of furry nesting... tubbily somehow she slipped down and underneath the contraption until she was laid out on her back, pink legs in the air, pawing at the whirling wheel with all fours for a full four minutes as it spindled round and round like crazy. O, how I wished I'd had something to film her with!!

Dickens' Oliver Twist I've been ploughing through with a literary alacrity unknown since my school days. Presently I'm on p254 and Oliver's with Bill Sykes on a burglary that's going all wrong.

It is late evening and the poetry of John Dryden is bleating out on Radio 4. One reason no "Gledwood's Poetry Blog" is included among my spoutly list of bloggery that even includes that Japanese blog is that for all the tiny collection of works I have thus far penned and posted intermittently up here in days gone past, I have not written a single poem in over a decade!

Now I'm feeling quite ill at ease and disaplied or disconnected/discontented I'm not sure which and all quite wearied out. It is that time of year. And Oliver Twist (which is now at p302) is floundering a bit) and I'm depressed...

I am succeeding, however, in my personal antiliquor crusade! Just one cyder can today! (Saturday.) And four or five cups of tea (and no sugar: how worthy of me!) in compensation.

O, I could really do with a Chinese chicken curry egg fly lice! Or possibly beef with glean pepper black bean sauce egg fly lice! One time they got the lice order wrong and purveyed me boiled! Ugh! I was vulgarized beyond description. Nobody orders plain boiled rice unless they're also the type of idiot who orders prawn flavoured pancake rolls (yukk!!) or who actually enjoys that revolting boiled sweet flavoured sweet-&-sour sauce they give out with chicken and prawn balls....

Mother Hubbs once presumptuously poured half a jar of industrial Uncle Ben's or similar sweet-n-sour - thankfully into a corner of and not all over - a marvellous risotto she'd conjured the day before, served mostly up, and was going to waste in a covered pan... The sickly putrid tide had encroached on nearly a third of this wondrous dish by the time managed to take urgent remedial action and scoop it into a plastic wrapper which I hurriedly shoved into my bag while she was out of the room ...

Sadly I forgot all about this until the pong of sheer putrescence flatulated out at me on a crowded bus and I pulled out the by now furry and green risotto to freedom.

Man! The sheer horror on everybody's face somehow almost made it all worthwhile...

Here's a good quote from Oliver Twist p333. The pompous Mr Bumble, formerly parish "beadle" (which seems to mean "general busybody and nose-poker-inner") is now most feared governor and chief punisher at the workhouse, where this scene takes place:~~

Mr Bumble came to a room where some of the female paupers were usually employed in washing the parish linen; whence the sound of voices in conversation now proceeded.

"Hem!" said Mr Bumble, summoning up all his native dignity. "Hallo! Hallo there! What do you mean by this noise, you hussies!"

With these words, Mr Bumble opened the door and walked in with a very fierce and angry manner: which was at once exchanged for a most humiliated and cowering air, as his eyes unexpectedly rested on the form of his lady wife...

"I'll tell you what, Mr Bumble" returned his lady. "WE don't want any of your interference. You're a great deal too fond of poking your nose into things that don't concern you, making everybody in this house laugh, the moment your back is turned, and be making yourself look like a fool every hour of the day. Be off; come!"

Mr Bumble, seeing with excruciating feelings, the delight of the two old paupers, who were tittering together most rapturously, hesitated for an instant. Mrs Bumble, whose patience brooked no delay, caught up a bowl of soap-suds, motioning him towards the door, ordered him instantly to depart, on pain of receiving the contents upon his portly person...!

***

Haha! I wrote the above post last night when I still had over 150 pages to go. Well now I'm on circa page 512 and with only a page and a half to go until I've finished it! What an excellent read! I can't believe it took me until my 35th year to discover the genius of Charles Dickens!

Hope everyone's had a cheery weekend. All the best to yous all!!

Roll on tomorrow!!


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