On Tour with AK: Part 4

“Okay, look at me? Let me see your face.”

“Dude, you don’t know my face by now?”

“Not off by heart, no. Let me see your side profile. I want to get the proportions of your nose right.”

“You know my nose. You called it a Disney nose.”

“Yeah but I need to be certain of whether it tips up at the end or levels out.”

“Tips up? Like a snout? Are you kidding?”

“More like a ski jump. In a nice way. I have a ski jump nose too. They’re the gold standard for noses.”

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On Tour with AK: Part 3

“There was this story I used to like when I was a kid in Cali. There’s a boy, and his best friend is a tree.”

“Weird.”

“Shut up. And every time the boy needs something, the tree gives him it. Like when the boy needs to eat, the tree gives him fruit. Then when he needs to build a house, the tree gives him branches for wood.”

“Charitable tree.”

“And then by the of the book, the boy is an old man, and the tree has been all used up by the boy, so all that’s left is a stump. And the boy asks the tree for somewhere to sit, and the tree says ‘you can sit on me’. And he does.”

“Huh. Unsure how I feel about that one.”

“Right? When I was a kid I loved that story. I thought ‘aw, what a beautiful kind tree’. I thought the story was all about giving everything you can to help others. Then I got older and I realised the kid’s an asshole.”

“I don’t really understand what the story is meant to represent. Like maybe the tree is a parent and the kid is their child. Or maybe the tree is a good friend and the kid is a bad friend. Or maybe they’re both bad friends, in their own way.”

“I think the core of it is that real friends should help each other grow.”

“Yeah. I think you’ve got it.”

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Lockdown Diary: A Germaphobic Jaunt

Yesterday Jeanne and I took our daily lockdown walk, and we went a little further than usual. It was March the last time I walked further than the Arches down Gloucester Road. Since then, all our late afternoon strolls have seen us weaving through suburbs, exploring sleepy avenues and cul-de-sacs. On a whim, however, last night we decided to continue on, right the way down to the harbourside we’ve not seen in so very long. What a bleeding mistake that was. Continue reading

Bristol: Poison and Punch Ups and Jacob Marley’s Ghost

LondonSkyline01

Plenty has happened in a relatively short space of time – relative, that is, specifically to the age of me, Dan, rather than the Byzantine Empire or the moon or a housefly, because these things would throw that qualifier way out of whack. Come to think of it, I wish I’d not used it. But then if I only said ‘in a short space of time’, you might have thought I meant twelve minutes, or a nanosecond, and that would be ridiculous. So here, let me try again: a lot has happened in the last two weeks (Earth weeks, naturally). Continue reading