Rainy Weather

Three rabbits unfortunately drowned in this weekend's downpour

Bert and I had planned to go for a long walk today. We’d even pre-booked the party animal (Hannah) for an early return from her weekend on the tiles, thus ensuring that Pearlie Blue would have somebody to moan at. But rain stopped play. A wee bit of a shower wouldn’t deter me but Bert, him being made of candy floss, melts in the rain.

Instead I took a solitary walk along the river path hoping to see massive flooding. I wasn’t completely on my own as I’d a couple of dogs with me. I like walking on my own as it gives me an opportunity to do a bit of serious thinking.

So what did I think about? I thought about global warming and wondered if it was really happening and, if it is, does it really matter? I thought about God and does it exist? I thought about money and what would happen if we stopped caring about it. And I thought about why it seems to be fine and dandy for horses to shit wherever they like and yet it’s a big sin for a dog to take a dump out of doors. Nobody expects horse riders to dismount and shovel those great steamy turds into plastic bags do they? I call that not fair.

Things Change

I've been reading a lot of Barbara Trapido recently. In Noah's Ark (1984) Noah is preparing for a trip to New York and he asks his wife if there are any cartons of orange juice that he can take with him, as he never gets enough to drink on the plane. His wife then reminds him to bring scissors to open the cartons. How strange that sounds now. Noah might find himself in Gitmo if he tried doing that today.

Then in Brother of the More Famous Jack (1982) Jane Goldman smokes a cigarette and drinks a glass of wine. And she's pregnant! No one blinks an eye in 1982. Nowadays her unborn child would be placed on an At Risk Register.

It was in the early 80s that we thought we were all going to die in a nuclear accident, disaster, war, whatever. Maybe we still will. Who knows? If we survived that then our lives would be blighted, our babies blinded by genital herpes. Once Aids came along herpes was never talked about. Now Aids, in this continent anyway, is hardly mentioned and we're all going to die from obesity or die out because of chlamydia or contraceptives in the water supply.

And yes - I do worry about global warming and the environment. But not that much. Because in twenty years time we'll all be worrying about something else altogether. That's if we're still here.