Just Bobbin' Along.

My front door has developed a groan from the cold. In one of those marvellous twists of fate the groan is identical in every long note to the opening trombone blast of Bob Dylan’s ‘Everybody Must Get Stoned.’
‘Baohh Baohhhhh!!!'

image from internet
I walk into the house behind Grace and every time add in the descending ‘Baow,
baow,
baow,
Before launching into the verse. ‘They’ll stone you when you’re trying to be so good
They’ll stone you just like they said they would….’

It is hardly possible to feel the fates are against you when your door is a Dylan fan.

However, having said that, we were quite sorely tried this week. My darling Grace got food poisoning on the commute home from Bath and was exhausted and very stressed for several days. I decided not to travel until she got her mojo back.
'Sick as a Dog' (c) T. Bush 09

Then the blokes came on the dot of 8 am (the DOT?! Isn't it normally between 9 and 5pm?) to put a new sink unit into my kitchen......only 'someone' forgot to check the measurements and neither of them could connect up the drain or stuff the washing machine back in. The carpenter scratched his head, then his arse, made a couple of calls, put his tools away..and left.
They’ll send a man round,' he muttered over his shoulder but he didn't sound convinced.
'You’re a man,' I said to his retreating overalls but also without conviction.

That night I cracked my toe into the washing machine sticking half way out into my skinny kitchen and dropped the entire bag of paprika into my supper. I am not Hungarian. the food was wasted.

Tuesday night and Grace and I were floating home after our meditation class and we were nearly run down by a yoof. I shrieked and leapt back dragging poor Grace. He was so close he actually caught my hair as I jumped back. Gasping in shock I glared up at his back. His hood was up, his back relaxed, straight and he didn’t turn around but casually cycled away. A chill went through me as I realised that this boy/man had actually driven at us. Tried to knock us or at very least give us a fright. I didn’t shout at him. I was scared he might come back.

Image from internet

I was anxious that, with my dreadful night vision I had missed something. Perhaps he had tried to warn me? Or perhaps I could have avoided him somehow..read the signs? That is the problem with visual impairment in an emergency. Everything moves to fast for me to scan and especially at night when my vision is almost nil I don’t stand a chance against an idiot like that. I HATE being so vulnerable. I can't fight what I can't see. I am not a ninja. (Not yet Bro...not yet..)

(Creepier..There was someone parked across the road. I know this because he had turned his headlights off when Grace and I came to the kerb..but noone got out of the car to help or offer reassurance. I wonder more about that person. I would have got out of the car…wouldn't you.?)
But
But
Remember my door…I am fine. Grace is now in good form too and in two weeks I shall be with my fabulous Dad in the stonkingly delightful though often remarkably smelly Lusaka.
Grace will be on a farm with a bunch of dogs she knows and loves, horses, chickens, geese and a bantam cockerel called Zeb who is more beautiful then Brad Pitt..(and therein possibly one of the reasons why I remain single…chicken lust. Or is that just a too refined appreciation of cocks…sorry..)
'Photo: Zeb' (C) T.Bush 09
Anyway, back to the homework and back to Bath at the weekend. More soon and much love to all but that sodding little hoodie….
image from the internet

'....Well they'll stone you when you are all alone

They'll stone you when you are waling home

They'll stone you and then say they're all brave

They'll stone you when they send you to your grave

But I would not feel so all alone

Everybody must get stoned!'

Oh The Green Green Grass! or Another Train of Thought

Last Sunday my journey cost me my entire week’s income support.
All of it.
There is nothing quite like knowing on the Sunday that the rest of the week is all oozing out of the overdraft. The problem was that there were no trains to Kings Cross and we had to reroute and take taxis across London. By the time Grace and I were squeezed onto the Paddington to Bath train we were dishevelled, disgruntled and the stress had caused my eyes to blur. Grace disappeared under the seat in disgust to hoover up old chewing gum and I squinted at my homework through my magnifier.

The train was full to bursting and within a few minutes there was a queue for the seat next to us. I huffed (very quietly in my best British manner) and took my rucksack off the seat to let in a large man with long shaggy grey hair and wire-rimmed specs. He didn’t mind dogs he said and somehow managed to manoeuvre his legs into the spaces left by Grace. His young son had to sit on his lap. There was just no other room.
They were on their way home from a match. I listened for a while as they spoke ‘football’.
‘What was Lampard thinking?’
‘Rooney got one in…..did you see?’
As happens eventually the man and his son asked about the dog and then - because the magnifier was giving me a cracking headache and I was needing to feel empowered again, to feel worth something, I began to whiter on about how I hadn’t always been this way...blind and alone..…oh no.! Once, darling... I had been in the movies, talking pictures..ahh yes..back in the day.....(sighs, turns diva like to camera, lights cheroot, sips dry martini. )
‘I wonder if he is impressed,’ I thought knowing full well that he and his son were probably quite happy to keep discussing goal tactics.
Refusing to release my captured audience on I went.
‘In Zambia,’ I boasted like some hideous ex-colonial ‘I tried, single handed, to jump start a non-existent film industry... ‘
The man laughs kindly and something about the mannerism is somewhat familiar. A little chill runs down my neck. I peer at him closely.
‘Err … are you in media?’ I ask.
‘Well yes I am,’ says the man. His glasses catch the light and I can’t quite tell his expression. ‘I make my own films and stuff.’
There is a pause.
His son is looking at the back of the seat and trying not to grin.
‘Umm.. would I have seen any of your ..'stuff'’? My voice is a little high.
‘Now lets see.’ The man genuinely thinks about this for a second. ‘You may have seen my last release. ‘The Bourne Ultimatum’?’
Turns out I am sitting next to Paul Greengrass .
That’s The Paul Greengrass.
Two Bourne films and 'United 93' among other remarkable and ingenious works.
I notice my mouth is open. I shut it.

After a while I manage to open it again and we end up having much banter for the last remaining minutes before they get out at Reading station.

After they have gone I resist the urge to stand up and shout to the other passengers in the carriage, ‘Oy! Did anyone just see that?!’ I nudge Grace but she just chews her gum and turns over.

So after all the delay, the stress, even so, I still feel exuberant and blessed. Of all the trains in all the world I am the woman who gets to have a personal hero from the movie industry and his son spend 15 minutes making me laugh by telling stories of Matt Damon mistakenly hitting someone in the face on set.

I wonder who Grace and I will bump into this week!