Day 97. Two days
until I let my self have a chocolate flake. In preparation I covered myself
with a raspberry sauce and sprinkled hundreds and thousands on my head. I
didn’t really. I’m not going mad, just very, very lonely. I would talk to
myself but we fell out quite badly last time and I said things I regret like
“Jesper Blomqvist is a silly name.” I don’t know if I will ever forgive myself
but the silence is deafening and I can’t look myself in the eyes. As if I would
put hundreds and thousands on my head two days before Ninety Nine day, they
would go stale. The sauce is proving to be quite sticky so I may have to wrap
myself in cling film.
Day 98. Without anyone to garden nature has taken back the
land and it is encroaching in many places. I have never been much of a gardener
and indeed never had a neat lawn but today I put on some gloves and went out to
trim bush. At first I tried to do the Privet with a water melon, then a Holly
with an Airfix kit of the Cutty Sark. After little success it tried to cut back
the Forsythia
with a jar of pickled eggs. When I failed to make any mark on the Laural with a
special edition of Whitaker's Almanack I sat down in despair. Then it struck me
like a blinding light. No wonder I was getting nowhere. I wasn’t using secateurs,
I was using non sequiturs.
Day 99. I have not felt right all day. I was going to
celebrate but just didn’t feel up to it. Instead I have sat in doors playing
games in the hope of feeling better. I started with simple ones from my
childhood like snakes and ladders and solitaire. As the day wore on and I began
to feel a little stronger I graduated to monopoly and totopoly. Finally,
thinking I had recovered, I started playing scrabble. It wasn’t long before I
looked down and realised as was still not well at all and had spoiled the
board. There was ‘beeecos’, ‘alaarm’ and ‘liiiid’. Oh god I hate having loose
vowels. Hope I’m better for tomorrow
Day 100. So I have been here one hundred days. It seems
both an age but also as though it was only yesterday I swept up here. I think I
have learned a lot about myself in that time. I have certainly had time to
explore my weaknesses and frailties but also to time wonder if my life would
have been different in different circumstances. I believe it was these thoughts
that created the strangest dream. I dreampt of people skiing down a hill with
blocks of ice on their feet, of giant guinea pigs, of bread balls being hit
into a river and throughout of a 'half child half goat' who seemed to make
everyone smile. I know it’s not real, I haven’t lost it completely, but it did
make me wonder if living with a smile on you face could make the world a better
place. Day 101 tomorrow and, in the words of Scarlett O’Hara in Gone with the
Wind – “You go pack my things like Mother said.”
Day 101. I am going to invent things to help the human
race. Ants can carry up to 100 times their body weight so….. how many ants
would it take to carry a human and could I make ant powered shoes? Quite simple
the souls would be made from enough ants to carry your body weight plus ten
percent. You would have a piece of sugar on a stick to direct the ants but they
could carry you everywhere. I have done a sketch and tried a pilot experiment
by putting jam on the souls of my shoes. It attracted a large number of ants
but clearly not enough. It was messy. But the theory is still sound as
with celery gutters for small houses.
Day 102. I can’t believe how ignorant I have been. I
picked up a leaflet on the evolution of our names for the digits of our hand.
Originally they were all called ‘thums’ but with the dexterous opposable one
spelt with a ‘b’ at the end to identify it. Subsequently the others were
renamed ‘four fingers’ as the pronunciation of the letter ‘b’ was often
misheard leading to confusion. Further refinement meant the that the second
finger became known as the primary ‘Forefinger’. As a result further
definitions were added bringing ‘middle finger’, ‘little finger’ and of course
‘mincy mincy feneckety useless digit’. I still don't know where I stand on
crepe paper
Day 103. Everyone so often you think of a saying or
expression and wonder how it originated. Often the answer is as perplexing as
the saying but every so often one smiles and nods at the explanation. Just such
a case is ‘having a square meal’ which comes from the days of Nelson’s navy
when sailors were fed using square slate plates. Today I found another that
suddenly defogged the mist. I was reading an old Will at the library which
showed a family clearly torn apart by strife. The bequests to the four children
were painful to read. Three received sizeable properties and endowments but to
the last all it said was, ‘To Helen, a handcart.’
Day 104. In the night I heard the tigers calling to each
other. It reminded me how fragile my life is here. Although it is better than
where I first was I have to shake off this torpor and plan an escape but first
I must make sure I am safe. I know that tigers leave a strong scent to claim
their areas. I took a variety of products from the supermarkets and mixed them
to produce a most ghastly aroma which I have spread around the edges of the
area I occupy. Unfortunately the pungent smell does not just drift outwards but
in as well. Then I had a brilliant idea – I have built a wall out of all the
Odor Eaters in the shops. Suddenly a realisation - ‘hen’ with a ‘t’ at the
front becomes ‘then’. Today is going to fly by.
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