Sat Staring at the Wall

Here I am sitting staring at the wall. Saturday afternoon has arrived and I have nothing to say and less to report. Where did the week go? Did anything happen? On Monday I noticed there was a long list written out awaiting my gentle touch, it is still there, waiting.

Actually some things have been done, attendance at the Dole to meet a bullying woman who attempted to give me a positive attitude. "Don't say 'Fail' when a job has turned you down, be positive!" she said. "OK," said I, "I am positive I failed there." She did not respond positively to this in my view. I also reported to the man who signs me on, and mentioned the bully. A somewhat vile grin crossed his face at this, he has known her for many years! His constant chuckling for the next twenty minutes were unnecessary in my view. Whether he accidentally mentioned 'Jackboots' I could not work out.

My main action was the second driving lesson that I undertook on Monday. In 1972 I almost took driving lessons as they were about to increase in price from £2 to £2:50. I did not have the cash, and then no cash and no time. In London I obtained a provisional licence and then discovered I could not afford lessons there although I did have a small Suzuki motorbike for a while. These Japanese things fall apart easily don't they? Anyway, as I could make Marble Arch in twenty mins walking at that time I decided against it. Learning to drive in London did not scare me much, it was just the other cars and those driving them that worried me. Now out here, where in some regards it is still 1964, I find cars are a necessary. Just to get away from the folks around me! It is also a requirement to drive in most jobs these days, merely to get to them. For reasons beyond my limited comprehension there are a vast number of small companies which have decided to base themselves miles from anybody else, either on disused airfields or farm buildings, or deliberately at a distance from human society. Possibly it is cheaper to rent the building but the cost of transport must equalise that!

So I drove along bendy country lanes, failing to work out how to change gear, push down the clutch and brake at the same time whenever a junction came upon us. Two hours of that and I was worn out for the day. The instructor muttered something about being tired out also from his position in the back seat. I should point out he did not intend to sit there but just outside of Thaxted I made a slight mistake and that's where he ended up. I hope that farmer and his tractor got out all right in the end. Do the 'AA' deal with farm machinery?

However, those small intrusions apart nowt else has occurred. I walked up to the far end of town and back down the old railway line passing occasional sweating joggers and lonely women with dogs and suspicious looks,the women not the dogs. I trailed through the shopping centre wondering why women find these places so entrancing. If there were shops selling worthwhile stuff it would be OK, but it is so mundane, and there are at least six charity shops. Now that is fine as that is where I look for books, although the cretins in this backwater tend to read vast quantities of empty headed wimmens fiction and little else. Occasionally I come across a beauty, the last was John van der Kiste's 'Kaiser Wilhelm II' which was a worth while read although a bit too concise I thought. Did he really start the Great War because he was an imperialist bully, or was he just a weak man easily led by his officer corps who, like the French, wanted war? I go for the latter as with or without the Kaiser war was inevitable with the imperial and patriotic pride that coursed through everyone's veins at that time. There are few books available usually, maybe I should try a Rosalind Pincher or a Margaret Atwood and see how I react? I suspect I will be inspired to get a Kalashnikov and run riot through the streets removing those who read such stuff from the world.

I have looked at houses on the web as this is the time to buy one. It's not that I have any money but I foolishly bought a Lottery ticket and am now indulging in those dreams of what it would be like to possess things again. Now I am not claiming to worship Mammon or anything like that but think of the good you could do with all that money - from that island in the Mediterranean that I would buy with it - would be a blessing to many folks. It would of course also be nice not to live off the nation, and be able to pay back what I take out, and that is a guilt trip for some of us, it would of course be good to be rich rather than handsome for a change. What did you say at the back there?

Ah money, that reminds me I had better wander round to the market, it will be closing now and the left overs will be getting sold of cheap and other greedy folk will be picking up all the damaged veg and fruit before I get there. Selfish I calls them! Then I can come back and stare at the wall and try and think of something worth writing.