People are wonderful...

but sometimes a little odd, and I don't exclude myself from this. The front wall outside my house has been looking pretty shabby for a year or two now. Charities have started posting leaflets inviting me to apply for grants and other forms of assistance. I answered the door once to a local priest who from the front wall's condition assumed I was near death. I said I didn't believe in God and also thought Benedict the Umpteenth was a stop gap pope who wouldn't last the course. He left in a huff when I suggested the next pope might not even be Catholic, sort of as a shock result. You know how it is with those ancient Cardinal guys I shouted at his receding back, dark room, nappy time, and before you can say I've forgotten my name a young French nurse is Popina Angelique I. It's easily done. Not impressed with my perspective on pope futures he managed to push down a bit of my wall on the way out. I could be generous and say he stumbled, but the un Christian, "Rot in hell you Marxist Fuck" was a giveaway. However, this is a wall story so I'll move on.

Yesterday I bought a 1kg lump hammer, 1" chisel and set about said wall. Now many of you may know I'm a social worker by profession and therefore not used to holding manly tools of anykind. Nevertheless I managed the day with little injury though the RSI flared up. Not for me builder's lung, dislocated shoulders, or melanoma from all that sun, no siree, all I'm good for is a bit of tendonitis. Still I was proud to have suffered for that wall. Today I bought some cement, forgot the sand. In fact didn't know I needed sand until I the cement wouldn't mix. A passing priest, for it was he, muttered, "You forgot the sand, you half wit. Think you can change the world when you can't even change a wall!". I politely asked him if the 90 year old Benedict the Umpteenth had "MADE IT THROUGH THE FUCKING NIGHT?" but he affected not to hear. I fetched sand. 10 minutes later he passed again. "You forgot the bricks numbskull." Hmmm, I crept to the store and bought bricks. A crowd gathered, it's a hot Sunday, the football season's over, people are bored. The crowd got bigger, arguments were had about the proportions of sand to cement (6 to 1 as it happens), priests worked the aisles, everyone had an opinion. Hours later I'd laid my four bricks (the coping stones are for another Sunday) even used a spirit level. A passing hippy who looked like Jesus quietened the crowd with a tale about real spirits in the level, tiny trapped Sisyphus's pushing against each other in eternal competition.

"Hey look man," He said in that classic stoner voice. "You can even see them." He held the level to his eyes and lost touch with the rest of us. "Hey! Hey! Fuck man. there's a fucking crowd of them, and they're all fucking green. Hey and there's priests working the aisles man. Wow." I gently took back my level and the hippy blinked "Far out man, far out. I think there's more than two Sisyphuses in there man. Never seen that before, more than two. And fucking priests as well man. Fuck!" He gave two fingers of peace to the crowd and wandered away muttering "That level's fucked man, crowd like that, how's the bubble gonna move man?"

Ahhh.