Did God Create Kangaroos And Dungarees On The Same Day?

As I write this, Sarah and I are celebrating the fact we’ve been together for six and half years. Thank you, you’re very kind. We’re also only a single week away from our quarter year wedding anniversary. I know!

We like to celebrate things. Yes we do. Even if we don’t actually, you know, celebrate them – we like to remember them, send a message, acknowledge the passing of an abstract, man-made calendar passage of time (whatever ‘time’ is) thing.

Sadly, we are unable to celebrate these particular momentous events together right now. It’s hard, you see, when you’re not in the same house. Or the same town. Or the same  borough of the same Metropolitan County. Or the same half of the country. Or the same country. Or even in the same United Kingdom, continent or even, damn it, the same bloody hemisphere!

Last I heard, we’re still on the same planet, but watch this space, stranger things have happened…

For the unaware, she’s in Australia.

Which means there’s a very significant time difference.

Sarah bought me this clock for Christmas, for precisely this reason.

Then

Right now, it looks like this. 

Now

Celebrating when your other half is fast asleep is a tricky business. And one to be given serious thought before undertaking.

Don’t believe me?

Well, if you share a bedroom with someone, put the lights on, start dancing in clogs and let off a few party poppers at 3.22am and see how it goes for you. A night on the sofa, with your coat as a blanket, and a tea cosy as a night cap, will prove my point, you see if it doesn’t.

I had to stop typing there momentarily – my mouse stopped working.

Yes? A mouse. What of it?

Not an old school wiry mouse like back in the wiry dial-up days. No, no, no. My mouse is a Bluetooth mouse. It has a Bluetooth keyboard friend next to it. I’m tippy-tapping on it right now.

(See how undeniably sexier the letters are, being created via the witchcraft of Bluetooth?)

But Mr. Mouse and his Bluetooth ways mean, occasionally, he loses power and needs a charge. For this purpose, it might astound you to know, I have a charger. It came in the same box as the mouse. A mouse charger. The keyboard came with its own charger too. A different charger. A keyboard charger.

(Let me know if I get a bit technical and I’ll type more slowly…)

Like most of us, I have many chargers. Chargers for this and chargers for that, and chargers for things I have no recollection of. Like many people, I can’t throw any of them away, just in case the (now) chargerless item re-enters my life and requires my absolute attention for reasons no one on earth can fathom. Like old Nokia phones. I have those. And I’ve kept their chargers. Just in case. Currently I keep them in a storage box. With dust. Lots of dust.

But, I digress.

In the last year or so I’ve simplified the charger cable conundrum. I bought a ‘cable’ bag.

More of a very small suitcase kind of thing.

I folded everything beautifully, slotted it all into the various slots, marvelled at my newfound neatness, zipped it up and now I keep it over there, on a shelf. Next to the box of dust. It’s a great system. Except getting it down, unzipping it and looking for chargers I need regularly is a pain, so I have a secondary storage method which I call: A drawer with stuff in it.

This is where I keep the newish charger cables for my Bluetooth friends. To tell the white wires apart I’ve put a K on one and a M on the other. I know, brilliant, right?

So I open the drawer. It’s inches away, built into my desk, not gathering any dust. There’s the K. Hello K! And somewhere near it will be M. Not Judy Dench, M, but similar – powerful, easily recognisable, enigmatic. Except my M, unlike Judy Dench in a James Bond film – isn’t in it...

This is an impossibility.

I’ve explained my cable storage system and you can see it’s fool proof! I’m the only fool who proofs it, so there we are. No one else goes into the drawer. Why would they? It’s my cable in my drawer in my desk.

Which means I didn’t put it back the last time I used it? Why would I do that? Or rather, why would I not do that? Precisely. So it can’t have happened. Because it’s impossible.

However, explain me this - even though it’s an impossibility, it’s still gone.

The Bluetooth experiment is finished. The marking of cables to signify their purpose is similarly a failed experiment! This post is ruined. What’s the bloody point of anything?! This is probably how the fall of the Roman Empire got started.

The K cable stares up at me. I wonder if the K cable would work? What am I thinking? Ridiculous. I mean, how could it, it’s got a K on it. There's no K in mouse.

…

Fine. The K cable works.

It’s still a mystery where the M cable is. A mystery on a par with How Did They Build The Pyramids, but for now, tippy-tapping in my Bluetooth world can resume… Phew.

So. Sarah’s away. And I’m not away. Apart from that our lives are running in scarily similar ways. She’s popping on a bikini and hopping to the beach. I’m popping on nine layers, two pairs of socks, a hat and gloves and hopping down to Asda. And can I say I feel decidedly under the weather before I’ve even left the house.

Yesterday it snowed beautifully!

Home - I live just under that bridge.

But today, all the nice snow has gone.

All the pavements have turned into an icy version of the day before. From fluffy fun to lethal nightmare. There was a time I’d have stepped onto that icy potential death-trap like a figure-skater. But those days are gone. Why? Because I’m no longer an idiot! That’s why.

While we’re talking about figure skaters, there were rumours in the older generations of my family, that John Curry was a relative of ours, from a 'black sheep' arm of my Mum’s family: Curry.

Spooky, huh. The likeness is quite something, isn’t it?

For clarity – I’m the one wearing a hat.

For those of you who don’t know who John Curry is, he was a famous figure skater, Olympic gold medal winner. The only famous skater at the time, before Robin Cousins became a household name.

Robin Cousins - household name

For those of you who don’t know who Robin Cousins is, he was a famous figure skater, Olympic gold medal winner. He made the sport of figure skating respectable before Torvill & Dean made it ridiculous. Again.

Dean was famous for being able to make his legs disappear at will

For those of you who don’t know who Torvill & Dean are (give me strength) they were famous figure skaters, Olympic gold medal winners, winning gold in purple costumes made from a neighbours curtains. Probably.

I think they’re now two of the judges on Dancing On Ice.

I’ve never seen the show. Why? Because I’m no longer an idiot! That’s why. But I’m pretty sure it’s removed any remaining respectability from the sport. Not least because it proves that all you need to be a figure skater is a bit part in EastEnders and a desperate need for personal validation. 

Anyway, whether I’m related to an ice-skating icon or not, I have no idea. But those genes are certainly not alive in me today as I precariously pick my way down the slope towards the supermarket.

As I walk, I do a thing where I sort of squeeze muscles in my legs that give me the impression I’m either gripping the ground more successfully or possibly lowering my centre of gravity. In truth I may be achieving nothing more than a decidedly misplaced core workout. Even so, it’s what I do.

A man comes round the corner at pace. His top half is dressed for the weather. His bottom half is wearing pink shorts. He’s not gripping the pavement through muscle gymnastics, he’s in a proper hurry. Probably because he’s about to pass away from hyperthermia.

He looks me in the eye and I see he’s about my age, yet he looks different. Like he’s really disappointed in his clothing choices. His glance at me is no doubt an apology – me seeing him has made him see himself more clearly. He hurries off. Ashamed. Should our paths ever cross again, we’ll pretend this moment happened to other people.

The closest entrance to Asda is a passage into the carpark. A chap with bags is heading out, so I dutifully wait for him. He doesn’t so much as acknowledge I exist! No, thank you! Christ, he’s wearing shorts too! I hope they’re not having a special charity day at the shops and I’ll have to strip down to my Calvins to get in?

The carpark, however, is filled with miserable people, moving miserably in miserable winter-wear. Excellent, normal service has been resumed. How I love The North.

As I wander round with my basket I check my phone.

Huh, Sarah’s been on the radio apparently. And had breakfast bought for her by a pilot - for no improper reason. She’s been caught in astonishing monsoon-like downpours and awoken to beautiful parrots on her balcony…

Morning chorus!

Christ, Asda’s out of my favourite bin bags. Typical.

Anyway, it’s nice to know Sarah and I are up to the same sort of stuff.

I buy cough medicine for a cough that seems to be getting worse. And tissues for the sneezes that are so huge they can be measured somewhere in the middle of the earthquake Richter scale.

About 5-6, I’d say – they can nearly move furniture.

None of the food looks like the sort of food a pilot would buy me. Most of it looks like it needs a modicum of cooking. And cooking is not a thing I feel I can do terribly well today. I feel like a sit down, to be honest.

I buy a few things that need nothing but a chop before I can chuck them in a pan with eggs. Omelettes are a good choice when you’re under the weather.

The walk home takes twice as long. I’m laden down with mushrooms and onions and the gentle slope downwards has become a base camp sort of area in need of Sherpas and Kendal Mint Cake. The return walk, uphill, requires the use of different muscles, but I’m not sure which ones. My head’s gone foggy and I can’t remember how to walk on ice properly.

So I walk in the road. There’s no ice on the road. And although, I grant you, there are cars. A car at least beeps you before running you over. Unlike ice. Ice has no manners.

Half way home I get a message from an old friend who’s going to travel to see Sarah’s show in Sydney. Which is nice. Except nice isn’t the right word. Over-and-above-the-call-of-duty is the word. My old friend is going to catch a plane and travel more than 800km to see the show!

That’s more than the distance from Asda to my house and back, a few times!

Quite the commitment.

Distance is different on the other side of the world, though, isn’t it? I mean, in a place that has animals with dungarees for skin, that jump everywhere and box, I guess anything’s possible.

I wonder if God created kangaroos and dungarees on the same day. I expect so. It’s very nearly the same basic pencil drawing isn’t it? Yes it is.

I don’t understand kangaroos. Or big spiders. Why do we need big spiders? And why does Australia need all that room when only a few dozen people live there? And does a koala bear, the laziest animal on earth, prove that Darwin was mistaken – I mean if you’re asleep 20 hours a day, surely you’re open to being devoured by any carnivore with the ability to look up!

And why is Australia so far away?

I think I’m getting grumpy. Poorly grumpy. Pauly-Poorly grumpy. Sure sign I’m going down with something.

Sigh.

I get home without incident. No half-dressed men swan by. I don’t win Olympic Gold with an impromptu figure skating display – probably because my clothes aren’t made from purple curtains, but there you are.

The weather report claims it’s going to be really cold for a good few days yet. Apart from in Australia, where it’s going to be glorious. Can anyone tell me why the sun that makes my wife have to wear factor 50 in the shade, becomes little more than a fridge light, 12 hours later, when it shines on the North of England? What’s that about?

I think the sun needs to take a good long look at itself. Is it a furious ball of flame and energy or isn’t it? I wonder if God made the sun and fridge lights on the same day? Probably.

Once I’ve put the shopping away, and warmed the kitchen by leaving the fridge door open, I return to my keyboard.

Bluetooth mouse is now fully charged. It occurs to me that my charging cables are a little like Sarah and me. One of us is at home, the other is missing.

I’m not sure equating Sarah to a charging cable is the most romantic thing I’ve ever said, but I know she’d know what I mean…

I wonder what she's dreaming about...

I think Alphonse might have been onto something...

Sigh.

I think it's time for my omelette.

P.S. You’ll be glad to know the M charger cable turned up. It was down here, behind a box, trying valiantly to charge a lamp. There’s probably a cable with a L on it somewhere.

 Now where would I have put that…?