Reply to Rebecca #12

Tottering, gout, cats, languages, crosswords, practical drivelling

Dear Rebecca

Thank you for your recent letter, which seemed to be full of stuff about see-saws and tottering. The only tottering I’m aware of was when one of our neighbours, a very refined lady in her 60s, unaccustomedly got completely blotto after a Christmas meal. A couple of us thought she would never make it home ok (a journey of 100 yards max) because she was teetering and tottering all over the place. All of a sudden she lay down in the middle of the road, and it was impossible for me to help her sit up or get up without the risk of accidentally touching bits I shouldn’t, so I didn’t. It was a case of cajoling her to raise her carcass. It took a while.

Anyway, thanks for explanation of why potholes might lead to trench foot but not gout. As you pointed out, gout arises from an excess of uric acid. I’ve drawn a diagram to illustrate how potholes lead directly to gout:

Gout, by Terry Freedman

I rest my case.

Thanks also for the link to cat-speak in all different languages. That’s interesting in an academic way but the sad truth, Rebecca, is that our cats take no notice of us whatsoever except in certain circumstances:

• They want feeding.

• They want biscuits.

• They want a cuddle.

• They want a launch pad.

• They feel the need to use a trampoline.

• They need us to vacate the bed to give them more room.

• They need feeding again.

Otherwise, if we call them in from the garden, or from in the middle of the road, they will waggle an ear or two and then very studiously ignore us.

To provide you with a sense of the contempt in which these miscreants hold us, look at the photo below. E has a keyboard that was purchased for the purpose of practising the piano at unsociable hours. The cats, however, regard it as (a) a great vantage point for seeing what’s going on outside without going to the bother of actually going outside, and (b) a bed.

Cats on a keyboard, by Terry Freedman

Your German cockerel sounds reminds me of a story about my mother-in-law. She was a polyglot. (Took pills for it too, but they didn’t help.) She tried to pay in a petrol station in France, and the person had no idea what she was talking about because she was speaking in four languages.

I’ve noticed that you like to show photos of your completed crosswords, and that you need only the flimsiest excuse to do so. In one of the modules of my Practical Drivelling course, I teach a technique that I think I must have read about in one of the One-upmanship books. This involves sitting on a train or in some other public place, with The Times Crossword (or a similarly abstruse crossword), and filling in the squares with random words while muttering to yourself such phrases as

“Hmm, apoplectic horseman in the north? Rather obvious methinks.”

In any case, your technique of uploading photos of non-cryptic crosswords cuts no ice with me because it is so easy to cheat. I know that for a fact, because I’m really good at that. I find that whenever I’m faced with a clue, whether in a crossword or quiz programme on tv, my mind goes completely blank. Cheating is the only viable solution in that situation.

On a completely different matter, I notice that in your comments on my latest Start the week post you made no mention of my drawing of Chas and Cam. That was deeply disappointing considering the years of training that lay behind that work of art. Sometimes I don’t know why I bother.

And on yet a different matter, I am writing this in the garden because someone has taken our windows out¹, so it was like sitting in the open air anyway. I have a cup of coffee on one side, and a cat on the other, which is the way it should be.

And on that note I shall love you and leave you.

All the best

Terry x

If anyone reading this would like to see Rebecca’s reply, and my reply to her reply, ad infinitum, then subscribe to hers and subscribe to mine. You know it makes sense. Here are the links you need:

1. This wasn’t some gigantic theft. We’re having three windows replaced. I’m not sure why. It all comes down to my recipe for a happy marriage: I just say “yes”.