For Spedbug

Left Back,
originally uploaded by skyring.

Here's the first of my hands, which also contains the entirety of my personal jewellery, apart from the occasional cuffling.


See the other three photographs here.

He only said six words...

Only six words, but they were more than enough. I've been a nut case ever since, and it was three days ago now.

I was sitting by the Thames, camera mounted on a tripod, catching jogglers as they went past. I grabbed a few of the hunkier guys, knowing my readership, but really I was making a subtle architectural statement.

Anyway, this bloke joggled past, one out of a long parade, and as he passed at me, he looked me right in the eye, smiled and said those words. I mean, I was appalled, but the damage had been done, and I can't stop thinking about them. They keep on whirling through my thoughts at the most irresponsible moments, and if you can put yourself in the mood, I'll share them with you.

Think of a bilateral pressure in your ears. The iPod strapped to your body. The pain, the burn of a good jog along a mighty river, the pounding, thumping steady rhythmn as you reach a joggers' high and the voice of Frank Sinatra swings softly through your consciousness, those blue eyes and honey tongue. The music swells, you approach some random Australian sitting there minding his own perverted business and you look at him and croon, "I've got you, under my skin..."

And then you joggle along out of range, leaving behind a life utterly shattered by an earworm.

A premature one

I may learn different later today in Julie Cohen's Erotic Writing Master Class, but it's surely wrong to have the climax at the beginning. I mean, it saves time and everything, but surely it cannot get any better than this?

The waiter said it all, really. With one dramatic gesture, he held the plate high over his head, smiled for a taut moment, and then flung it down. It shattered into a million dancing pieces, and then he did it again, and again. We laughed and cheered as the music swelled around us and the persistent rhymn and Molyneux got us out of our chairs and hopping and skipping and kicking and laughing in a long line through the restaurant, out into the steamy night air of midsummer Birmingham, and back in again.

He and four of us BookCrossers were the only men in the place, I'm sure. Every other group in the place was a hen's party, and there were happy, uninhibited lovely young women everywhere. Some of them were wearing bunny ears, fuzzy pink bunny ears, and the sight proved irresistible to me later on that night. Even more so to sirroy.

But that's another story, and I am quite sure that some of the many photographs taken will show the moment in full glory. For once, I didn't have my arms around a bunch of beautiful women. Well, my arms, maybe, but my hands were doing something else, and no, they weren't fondling anyone's licorice allsorts! It was SirRoy handing out the sweeties to the sweeties, and when chipped about the rate the Tim Tam reserves were disappearing, he said, "It was a WEDDING PRESENT!"

I couldn't stop laughing at that one.

Oh, but I've been having such a time. People have been coming up to me and saying their name in a diffident tome of voice, "I don't know if you know me, but my screen name is constantweader, and..."

They generally don't get any further than that, because I am generally seized by an urgent desire to embrace them. So good to meet people whose posts, journal entries, photographs and whatnot have been highlights of my BookCrossing career for years,

And then there's the people I already know. NetStation, WistfulDragon, Ozone-Nut, DubNordie and dozens of others, old friends from meetings in the Stammie or conventions elsewhere. Darlings to a man. Or women rather, BookCrossing being a female sort of pursuit.

There's about 150 of us all told, and if you don't see your name here in the brief moments I get between waking and beginning the day's events with a breakfast, then it's not because I don't love you.

But I do want to see if I can pass on some of the flavour...

It's been like that all day long, ever since I spotted dubnordie at New Street, bare moments after arrival. Friends old and new, each one nudging my happiness meter one notch higher.

We all split off for dinner, some arranged weeks before, some spur of the moment. I really wish I could have attended them all, but there's no restaurant big enough for all those I love.

Our little party began in the Apres Bar, where there were Friday evening football celebrations in full swing and the noise was incredible. We mouthed words to each other, but there was no way, no way in the world that this was going to be a pleasant dinner. "We're just waiting for Sirroy", I was told, "We'll be out of here as soon as he arrives. His plane has landed, and he's on the ground."

"'Down to earth,' you mean." I replied. I've met Sirroy!

It was quieter outside, but when he magically appeared, the noise level increased. And the happiness level, I'm dour, tedious company in comparison to my glittering friends. It's nice to have someone else make the social running, so all I have to do is sit back and enjoy.

And the Greek restaurant was nice and quiet too. At least until the hens' parties got cranked up and the noise and the plate smashing and the dancing began.

But that was fun.

I sat down and wrote a brief attempt at a blog entry in my Day-Timer (another journal I maintain, I guess), but the handscrawled entry is all but illegible this morning. Perhaps it was the alcohol, perhaps it was the mood lighting, but I think it was happiness.

It surely cannot get any better than this. Great food, great companions, great times.


***later*** Here's the photo>. The rabbit ears thing struck me as insanely funny. Maybe it's just me.

Hand-scrawled blog draft

Hand-scrawled blog draft,
originally uploaded by skyring.

As per Antof9's suggestion, here 'tis. It's sort of the equivalent of a voicepost, needing transcription!